November 15-26, 2014
We were finally going to be able to make it Mexico to see Nana and Papa and their new house! Nana and Papa knew our family was coming, but they didn't know that Carlos and Juan were also coming. The day before we left, we rented a mini van from the airport, drove it home, packed it and then the morning of, we went to Uncle Carlos' house to pick him up. We all drove to the airport, dropped off the rental car then went into the airport to wait for Juan. We were all there and began the check -in process. This was going to be Christian's very first plane ride.
Addison had been on a plane before, to Buffalo, but she was young, so she didn't really remember. We were flying from Seattle to Portland, OR then from Portland to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. The kids did great on the plane ride. When we arrived in Puerto Vallarta.
Nana and Papa were waiting for us in the airport and were surprised to see Carlos and Juan. Good thing, they rented a nice passenger van that could accomodate all of us and our luggage. We made our way to Guayabito's which is about an hour away from the airport. You have to drive through a very jungly area with very narrow roads. We finally made it to their house and man the pictures just do not do it justice. It really is huge and completely amazing. 8 bedrooms, 5 bathrooms, nice large back yard with a pool, Nana's party room that has a bar, icepit and bbq. My favorite part of the day is when the sun is setting. It creates the most beautiful color in the sky. The best part was going up on their roof to see the sun setting, the water and all of the gorgeous palm trees.
The next day we decided to pack up and spend all day at the beach. Its about a 5 minute drive and a 10 minute walk. We loaded the cars full of chairs, tables, umbrellas, food and alcohol. Once we found our place, we posted up and had so much fun in the water and spending time with family. The weather was amazing.
One of the days we decided to rent a banana boat and it was Me, Julian, Juan, Celine & Carlos. Then in the boat that was pulling us, was Papa, Christian and Addy. We toured around the bay for a while and then at the very end, Julian gave the boat driver a thumbs up, which meant for us to get off the banana boat, he was going to whip the boat around which would dump us off! I came up out of the water and immediately grabbed onto Celine and she kept complaining that I landed on her. I told her it wasn't my fault! Then poor Juan who cannot swim (well he really can, but he sykes himself out if he thinks he cannot touch the bottom) thought he was going to drown and Julian was holding onto the back of him while Juan was scrambling and Julian kept trying to tell him "you can touch the ground Juan, you can touch!" He finally put his legs down and was like "oh". It was so funny.
You could buy fresh pina coladas for $25 pesos on the beach, then you brought it back to your area and put rum inside of it. They were delicious. Celine absolutley loved the water, it was hard keeping her out of there. We eventually bought her a boogy board, so that kept her even busier.
Addison was more interested in collecting shells near the water and building sand castles.
Christian only wanted to go in the water with an adult, which was fine. He liked jumping the waves. The girls got their hair braided on the beach early in the vacation, but wanted it to stay in so they could go back to school with it, but the first one was getting a little fuzzy, so we took them back a day before we went home so they had fresh braides in their hair. The water was incredibly warm, it didn't seem natural. The days seem to go on forever when you are there. We would wake up at 6AM, find Nana who was already up and cleaning the floors with diesel and tidying up, getting her famous oatmeal ready for the kids, then we would find her on the front patio drinking her coffee.
We would all sit out there and talk and then Nana would prepare breakfast for us. One morning she made banana pancakes, then another time, she made eggs with cactus. It was actually really good. We typically ate dinner at the house, but a couple of the nights, we decided to go into town and eat at a few different restaurants.
We found ourselves going to be at 8PM, because like I said the days seemed so long! One day we decided to wake up early and go for a walk on the beach while it was still semi-dark out. It was Me, Juan, Julian, Carlos & Nana. By time we made it to the beach it was becoming light outside. Julian even jumped in the ocean! It was fun to see all the fisherman bringing their boats in with that days fresh catch to sell on the beach.
Later that day, we decided to go to the swap meat that was in the town of La Panita. There was also some type of parade going on since it was a holiday, so there were tons of people down there. We decided to have lunch at a pizza place before going back to Nana's.
Another day, me and the boys drove to Pueto Vallarta to go to Home Depot, because they were trying to hook up the venting system for Nana's dryer. Then we went to Walmart down there and they had a huge grocery section. Its weird to see all of the eggs just sitting out in the open on pallets in the middle of aisles since they do not refrigerate eggs in Mexico. It was very comforting being at the Parents house because the house was so big and even if they went out to the front of the house, they have 9 foot gates with a large chain that secures the fence so nobody can get in and the kids cannot get out. Another thing that is so different in Mexico is just seeing all of the dogs running around the place. None of them really have homes and they don't treat them as pets. There was this one dog named Vanessa that was the only one we would let our kids touch. She was a sweetheart.
But one of the nights, I was kept awake, because all I could hear was dog fighting out front and it was breaking my heart. We didn't see any Iguanas at Nana and Papa's but we did see little brown geckos all over the place. For being so little, they make the loudest "kissing" noises. At one point, there was one in our room and we were about to go to bed and it was freaking Julian out, so he kept throwing his sock at it to make it get out of the room. We slept upstairs in one room, then the kids all slept in the other room up there. There were three twin beds all pushed up against eachother. Plus it was nice because there was a bathroom between both bedrooms.
At night we spent time out in the back of the house which is what Nana calls her Pavillion (party room). We would bring drinks and music down and have so much fun.
One day we decided it would be fun to all drive into Puerto Vallarta and stay in a hotel for the night. We got three rooms at the Sheraton. It had the most amazing room with ocean view.
Plus it had a really cool pool with a swim up bar. We got there and spent a lot of time at the pool.
Then in the evening we all went out to dinner at this place called Lyla's. It was rather fancy. Then, me and the boys were going to go downtown Puerto Vallarta to hit a tequila store, go to a couple of bars and watch some UFC fights. Nana and Papa stayed at the hotel with the kids. We ended up watching the fights, then went to a couple clubs, but didn't stay long.
The next morning we all got up and went to breakfast down at the hotel. Then we went back to the pool and stayed there for hours. We finally go to see an Iguana. It was on an island in the middle of the pool. Once everyone caught site of it, all the kids were looking to see what it was going to do. At one point, it actually jumped in the pool and swam crazy fast to the edge, climbed up the side of the pool, then sauntered towards a different edge of the pool. It was almost as if he was going to to stop and pose for pictures. Then it hopped in the kiddy pool and onto another island in the middle of the pool. It was fun to see.
Juan was leaving that day, so he took a taxi to the airport. We checked out of two of the rooms, but Julian extended our check out to later that day, so we combined everything into our room. The plan was that Julian, Carlos and I were going to stay in PV to watch the Seahawks game and Nana and Papa were going to drive the kids back home, but my gut feeling was to stay with the kids and have the boys go hang out and watch the game together. We got back to the house and relaxed while we waited for the boys to get home. They finally made it home, which made me feel better, because I didn't like the idea of them driving through that jungle in the dark. The day before Christian's birthday, Nana and I drove into town and ordered his birthday cake which was a Tres Leches cake and it would be delivered to their house the next day. Papa and Uncle Carlos found a Spiderman Pinata that was about 4 feet tall, so they filled it with candy and they strung it up on the balcony on the back of the house. Nana had invited her neighbor (the lady that always watches the house when they are out of town) and they came over and celebrated Christian's birthday with us. All of the kids took turns hitting the gigantic spiderman pinata. It was very tough, so Julian and to get involved to get the candy out. After we sang happy birthday, he sat on the floor and opened the few gifts that we brought for him. How cool to spend your 3 birthday in Mexico!
The next day we went back to the beach for the day and Nana''s best friends brother, Ciro and his wife Lupita joined us at the beach and were going to stay at the house for a couple of days. Then the next day, it was time for us to start packing. Before the taxi arrived, we took one last family photo.
We said our tearful goodbyes and were on our way back to the airport. We flew out of Puerto Vallarta and flew into Portland Oregon. We made our way through customs and were held back because something on Julian's name was flagged in their system, so me and the kids had to go and sit in a room and wait. Finally Julian came in and waited with us. We had to wait for the guy to get the rest of the passengers through, then he came and talked to us. Apparently it was a mix up for something that had happened in the past, but it was a differently SS#. So he might have to go through that every time. We finally made it through and had to find Carlos. We found him and then we took a shuttle to the hotel we were staying at the night, then had to wake up early to get to the airport to get us home. We made it to Sea-Tac and one of Julian's friends Russ had just flown out and left his truck in the airport parking lot, so we were able to take his truck home. We feel so lucky to have been able to go. Home Sweet Home.
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