September 2014 - Nebraska, Honduras, and Mexico

Kyle left me alone again in September and drove the kids to Nebraska.  When I told Alexa she was going to drive to Nebraska with Uncle Todd tomorrow, she turned to Kyle and said, “Daddy, guess what?!  We’re going to drive to Indiana tomorrow!  For Christmas!!!”  I am either a horrible communicator or she’s a 3-year old...  I wasn’t able to take time off of work, so I was really, really glad that Kyle had Todd there to drive with him.  Especially since it turned into a 17-hour one-way drive (including stops), so that would have been especially difficult to do alone with the kids.  Sweet Aden was baptized and I’m so glad that so much family was able to be there.  I really wish that I could have been there with everyone.  It was really great for Kyle to be with his sisters.  He misses them a lot, and I know a highlight of the trip was being able to stay up late and talk to them about life.  Like in Indiana, the kids loved playing with cousins and I wish we had some closer!

Craig drove home with Kyle and Todd and moved back into his old room at our house.  He started work at Thrive the next day and I’m hoping it will be a great fit.  We’re glad to have him back and the kids are loving having an uncle in the house.  Tyler often goes to the top of the stairs and yells “Caaaiiiggg!!” until Craig responds from his room with “yes, Tyler?”  And then Tyler smiles and runs off to play again.  It’s pretty adorable.

Some random photos of their cuteness...

Alexa: "Mommy, I was cold so I cuddled
with Daddy and now I feel all better."

And her favorite hair request--an Elsa braid.

Before and after playing in the neighbor's sprinklers--

Matching pedicures with Granny--

The boys at our weekly lunch on Wednesdays.

We can’t seem to stay at home.  We had California for two weeks, Indiana the next week, Nebraska two weeks later, and then a cruise the week after that.  The only things we actually planned on were a few days in California when Craig came home and then the cruise a month and a half later, but everything else filled in the cracks and it feels like we haven’t been home in a long time.  And I haven’t had enough time with the kids!  I miss them!

I’m writing this as we fly home from our wonderful cruise and I must say that we will have to do that again.  Maybe for every 5^th anniversary.  Or sooner if we can justify it.  We took a 5-day cruise out of Ft. Lauderdale that stopped in Roatan, Honduras and Cozumel, Mexico.  We enjoyed the wonderful food, incredible staff, other people doing our dishes and laundry, the sunshine, and most especially the time we got to spend together.  We were thrilled to have Jonny and Michelle on the cruise with us, and we’ve decided that next time we need to have all of the Swingles and Sweenys on board.  I was impressed at the diversity on the ship, and I was reminded of how much I love being surrounded by different ethnicities and cultures.  Of the 800-person crew, only 25 were from the U.S.  Our waiters were sweet men from India who argued about whose mother was a better cook, and they even brought us a special Indian meal one night because we had bonded with them.

While on the boat, we sat in the sun, stuffed our bellies, and played a lot of cards with Jonny and Michelle.  In Roatan, we took a taxi to the white, sandy beach and walked around the local village on foot.  We tried iguana—delicious!—and met some neat people.  I was glad to be able to use my Spanish, and also surprised by the British and African influence there on the island.  Our taxi driver said that he drives the car on Wednesdays and Thursdays when cruise ships are there, but the rest of the week he hunts for armadillo and iguana with his dog to sell to local restaurants.

Royal Caribbean Vision of the Seas

Walking through Roatan

In Cozumel, we took a morning excursion to some Mayan ruins that were mostly destroyed by dynamite in the early 1900’s.  It was interesting, but we kind of regret taking that excursion to see blown up ruins and wish that we had instead rented scooters for the day to drive around the island and go to the beach.  However, our afternoon excursion was amazing!  A friend recommended that we do the “mini submarines” through the reef and I’m so glad we did.  The two of us dove in these mini subs that feed oxygen into a bubble for you to breathe.  It’s basic physics, but it still blew my mind because there’s absolutely nothing blocking your head from the water.  The water just doesn’t come in because of the bubble—like putting a cup upside down and under water in the bath tub.  Crazy.  Anyway, it was just Kyle and I and then two scuba divers who helped find incredible things for us to hold and who took pictures.

View of Cozumel Port from the ship

Standing on corral at the beach on the North side of Cozumel island

 Our mini sub adventure:

A ginormous thank you to Mom and Dad for watching the kids (and Craig for watching Roxy :) while we were gone.  Couldn't have gone without all of your help!!

Oh, and a random thing that I finally finished this month was a photo family history book to teach our kids about the Sweenys and Ludlows.  It goes back four generations and was a lot of fun to learn about our family and sort through photos.  Here's the link.

We welcomed sweet baby Dean at the end of the month!  Now every baby we see is "baby Dean!!" according to Tyler.  He was a whopping 10 pounds 6 ounces--Melissa is amazing for pushing that boy out!

 

To close this post, I just wanted to say how much I love Kyle.  He has been such a support and comfort lately, and it’s been really nice to have some alone time with him this week.  He is wonderful, which I’m sure all of you already know.  Continuing on that thought, we were watching a TV show last week that we both like but that has kind of gone downhill the last couple of episodes much to our despair.   It left me with a bad feeling the last time we watched it.  An hour after we watched that episode we were getting ready for bed and Kyle said that he thought we should stop watching the show.  I felt such peace and gratitude that we both received that prompting and then acted on it.  Together.  I love that man and the fact that he is worthy and inspired.  The end.