Great to be 8!

Such a fun memory maker being baptized with your cousin! These girls were as cute as could be thanks to Jessica who hunted down the dresses and make their hair look gorgeous!  The day was wonderful-- with all the grandparents in town and lots of family support.  Sad to see this day end since -- no more 8 year old in my house. Happy Baptism Day Alexis and Camille.  Jesus loves you!

Happiness, gratitude and love

look something like this.  

The end.

Sunny Celebrations!

Happy Birthday to my babies! Cake, cousins, presents and a pool --doesn't get better than that! Stay little you precious little people.  

 Birthday Crush

Me: Nicholas, you better marry a girl who appreciates your humor.

Him:  I'm sorry, that girl is already taken.... by my father. (wink)

It's no secret that I have a mad crush on my first-born.  He has been my loyal fan since day one and I love that we make each other laugh on the daily.  He has razor sharp wit and is the comeback kid with his clever quips.  Not saying he'll be doing stand-up anytime soon because there's not much he hates more than the spotlight.  I look at these pictures below and chuckle because as he was highlighted, roasted, praised and mentored by friends and family, I could see his smile was plastered on as his eyes communicated, "WHEN will this end, Mother?!"  He's a good sport and would rather take a bullet than rock the boat or cause contention--couldn't ask for more from a #1.  He has set a precedence for peace in our home and there is rarely a fight or tension among the sibs, largely due to his calm nature.  Happy 16th to my darling pal.  You were born my bright-eyed boy with your fist all the way in your mouth; just look at the size of that smile!  You are loved, NJM.

I'll Be Your Platinum

aka 20 years, Baby!

I remember about ten years ago, I was flipping through some magazine and I saw a full page advertisement for "The Windjammer," a gorgeous navy blue sailboat, with a description that went something like this... Experience the Caribbean like never before on our private 60 ft sailboat. Let our expert crew cruise you and your loved ones through paradise on a vacation you'll never forget ...   Anyway, I think I literally pouted about that ad for a solid few months, probably a year, actually. I daydreamed about that boat nonstop and knew a trip like that was so out of our league. I remember thinking it'd be a miracle if I even make it on a cruise!  And then I'd whine-think, "But I don't wanna go on a cruise, I wanna go on the Windjammer! Waaaaaaaahhh!!" I never in a trillion years thought we would actually be the ones on a boat, with my hunny at the helm.  I can literally say, this IS one of my dreams come true.  And it has been just as incredible as I had envisioned.  I'm so glad the men risked their lives to make it so..

Nick and I went down again for our 20 year anniversary and boy was it awesome!  We had four days alone, then Jon, Jayne, Johnny and Kelley joined us:  PERFECT.  We sailed all the way to Bitter End in the Virgin Gorda and then back to pick them up at the ferry in St. John.  I read Unbroken as we glided along, we watched "Homeland"at night and effortlessly basked in the sun all the day.  It was so Zen.

The whole first day we were there, I swear I couldn't wake up, I mean I literally slept for hours and hours straight.  I honestly think it's because it had been such a long time since I truly gave myself permission to totally and completely relax.  When the others arrived, Jayne and Kelley did the exact same thing!   They looked drugged--and I understood.

Sleepy Kelley

Slumbering sweet Jayne

Now this is just pushin' it!

It's hard to describe how nice this trip was.  One of our best finds was this beach named White Bay on Jost Van Dyke.  It was literally unreal gorgeous.  When we pulled in around dusk we could hardly stop with the superlatives,  "the whitest sand! the most aqua water! the most gorgeous trees!"  Unfortunately, Nick thought we would hit the ground, and figured we've have to find another place to stop for the night.  But after asking a few other boaters, we decided to chance it, and to our giddy joy, it was just fine.  We put our party pants on and ventured ashore that night for an island buffet at Foxy's and hung around to see some really strange bar dancing by the locals.  We woke to a fantastically beautiful view the next morning and declared it our best beach yet.

"We have bars." (inside joke)

We made plenty of stops and island hopped to our hearts content.  Jayne felt so free she busted out in some spontaneous yoga moves. Shortly after this blissful maneuver, Jayne, Kelley and Jon got totally stranded between the beach and the boat on the crappy, dead dinghy and had to get towed back by some nice folks who took pity on the strugglers. The water had gotten super rough and they were being tossed about in all sorts of awkward ways! This made for some real good laughs!

Tree of Life

Kids who?

Breath in, breath out. 

On our last day, when we really had to book it to get back to St. Thomas, we quickly stopped at a new place to snorkel, that was supposedly really good.  Since the water was sort of rough, or it was windy or something, only Kelley and Jon Layne opted to get out and explore.  The part I want to remember is, after they'd been out for about 15 minutes, four sharks swam right up to our boat.  We were dying over our luck and it was so exciting and crazy!  We screamed our guts out to Jon and Kelley yelling "sharks!" about a million times over, to make sure they could hear us.  You can't imagine how fast a wide-eyed, panicked and doggy paddling Kelley suctioned herself to Jon!  We laughed so hard watching them awkwardly swim back as one with their eyes darting to and fro.  Even now as I write this, I feel like I need to raise up my dangling legs. Yiiiiikes!

And then is was over.

John wins for most creative souvenir!