The Dominican Repubic, Part Two: Zippity-blue-dah

Part Two!

Whip out the popcorn!

I think this is the modern-age way to make your friends sit through slides of your vacations, right?

You're all pretty great friends, did you know that?

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What should I show you next? 

How about Scape Park.

This might contain the coolest stuff we did while on vacation.

First up, ziplining.

Now, if you know me, I have chilled out considerable since high school and freak out at doing anything adventurous.

I don't like rollercoasters {but am working on it for Tyrel's sake}, hate cliff-jumping, and will never go bungee-jumping or skydiving.

Because I am a wuss.

But this was neat-o.
We didn't go fast on the ziplines, and it wasn't scary at all {not really even leading up to it}, but the views were killer, and the last one was 450 meters long.

That's long.

And that sunshiiiiiine.

And the harness wedgie!

And the line even gave me a rope burn on my wrist which might be a lifelong scar.

Viva the DR!

After we finished up the ziplines, we waited for our next tour to Hoyo Azul.

Are you digging my post-baby hair-regrowth as much as I am? Blergh...

We had the nicest tour guide who showed us all the native plants and what they were used for.

 But this was the part that made the whole excursion worth it.

Wanna see why?

It's gonna make you jealous....

Look at that.

Amazing, right?

When we first got there, it was filled with lots of crazy Brazilians, but once they left, our little group {8 of us} had the entire thing to ourselves.

The water was chiiiiiiiiilllllllly, but so worth it.

I was planning on throwing in a video right here, but we will see when time permits me to do it.

And you know how I said at the end of the last post how I was only going to do two more posts?

Well, I can hardly squeeze half of one in during the T-Man's naptime, so it might be more than that?

Sorry?

Not sorry?

24/52

Kemry: This sweet girl wants to spend all day riding in the bike trailer behind our bikes. She asks every day. And she likes to hold Tate's hand while we are cruising down the street :)

Tate: Tate is still only crawling on one knee {and using the opposite foot to help push along}, but he is walking all over while pushing his little walker {and also RUNNING in his little contraption pictured above}. If he didn't already keep us on our toes...

The Dominican Republic, Part One: Tiny Tenders and Tender Mercies

Whoomp, here it is!

The vacation that has been four years in the making has sadly come and gone.

But, guys.

It was the best.

I came back a better wife, a better mother, and with so much more appreciation for all my tiny blessings.

And I guess we had a little bit of fun while we were there, too ;)

I suppose we should start with some background information?

Tyrel and his brother both served two-year missions for our church in the Dominican Republic when they were in their more youthful days ;)

I stalked both of their Facebook pages for pictures during their time there, and this is all I could come up with {sorry boys!}:

Aren't those the cutest babyfaces ever?!?

Needless to say, they fell in love with the country and its people.

In college, Brandon and Tyrel lived in the apartment complex behind Kristen {now Brandon's wife} and me.

The summer after Brandon and Kristen got married, Tyrel and I sealed the deal too. 

After our first anniversary, the talk of going back for our five year started.

And, naturally, we got B & K in on it, too. 

Being poor, broke college kids, we figured out how much to save each month for the next four years so we could slowly afford the trip without even stressing about it {which isn't very expensive, by the way!}.

Next month Tyrel and I celebrate our sweet five years of marriage, and by golly we took that trip!

It was terrifying leaving Tate {who STILL doesn't take a bottle...}, but he was in good hands and survived on Lil' Crunchies and Capri Sun ;)

Kemry was more than excited for us to leave and was ready to head to Grandma's again the minute we got back.
I think we are hoping to make this an regular trip every five years, but the boys are set on buying a home there together for super cheap and seeing where that could take us.
We'll see.
Tyrel has to write his New York Times Bestseller first ;)

Here they are, chaps. 

All those pictures you are dying to see.

{They are a mix from my camera, my phone, a GoPro we borrowed from a friend, and Kristen's waterproof digital camera.}

After landing in Santo Domingo

We picked up our rental car and loaded in two huge sets of golf clubs which we had to fit around.

Three-hours later, we made it to our resort. Please note my receding hairline and Kristen's mohawk ;)

 I had been having nightmares about getting to our resort and finding out they had no record of us there.

Which totally almost happened, guys.

And no one speaks english there.

Luckily, our two dashing princes are fluent, so they got the problem all figured out.

When we pulled in that night, it was too dark to go and do much.

We meandered down to the beach in the pitch black and stuck our toes in.

It was seriously the greatest feeling ever.

The resort was nice {but got a meh on the food scale}.

What the food lacked, however, I think the beach and pool made up for:

Mmmmmm....

While we only saw one topless woman {who was the only girl on a large team during a game of volleyball...all those men must have been just very serious about the sport, I guess ;)...}, there were quite a few little toddler boys running around with their "tenders" hanging out, if you know what I mean.

It was hillarious.

Much bocce ball was played. And I'm proud to say that us girls held our own, thank you very much.

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We also decided we wanted to attend church while we were there.

The thing about our Church is that it is the same everywhere you go.

The same doctrine is taught, the same classes are held, the same everything.

While driving around FOREVER Saturday night to find where we needed to go the next morning, we got lost.

Well, not lost really, but we couldn't find where we were going.

Google Maps failed us plenty of times out there, no locals knew where we were trying to go, and the layouts of the towns/cities are nuts {plus the drivers, goodness, let me tell you...}.

Just as we were about to give up and head back to the resort, we spotted two men in white shirts walking along...those darn missionaries!

We pulled over, and they were pretty exited to chat with us.

PLUS, we had pulled over directly in front of the church building.

There you go.

Tender mercy.

Boom.

I think I will wrap this up in two more posts.
But, really, don't you want to go to the beach now?
I sure do.

23/52

You know that phase where you come back from vacation, and you are so behind on everything that you never seem to catch up?

Just me?

Well, that is the big hole I have fallen into.

I feel like we came back to a whole different life.

With all the new greenery outside, good friends that have moved away, saying adieu to my lovely Young Women, a summer residency grad school hubby, and two kids that wanted us to go back on vacation the minute we walked in the door, I don't feel like I have a grasp on life.

The small one is waking up at 4 am for the day while the slightly-bigger one has so much disobedience in her system that she seems to HAVE to get out.

I haven't seen the gym in almost a month, practically every dish we own is dirty, despite cleaning them every day, and my energy levels are loooooooooow.

BUT!

We must soldier on!

Summer is here, and we aren't going to let it escape!

With all that said, here are LAST WEEKS kid pictures.

And thanks for the patience with the vacation pictures.

Y'all keep asking where they are, but I promise I'm not ignoring you!

Tate: This little guy eats non-stop. He would finish off a box of graham crackers in one sitting if I let him.

Kemry: Currently in time-out and fake hyperventilating, this one is just full of crazy energy. Some of it is used for good {most of the time, thankfully}, but wahoooooo, I tell you!

22/52

We're baaaaaack!

Last weeks post is late because the hubs y yo were vacationing it up in the Dominican Republic for 10 days.

It was so much fun, and although we are very glad to be home, we are finding it hard not to greet and thank people in Spanish.

Courtesy of my mom and dad, here are the pictures of the children for week 22 of this year, both from the long trek to Grandma and Grandpa's house.

Tate: Dude got two teeth while we were gone, and is almost crawling. Heck, he is almost walking. Also, he had no interest in nursing when we got home, but alas, we have finally grown accustomed to each other again, and we are back on the bonding wagon.

Kemry: has atttitude. Sweetness, yes, but SASS. While we thought my parents would have their hands full with Tate only, she certainly proved that she could be just as big of a bugger those last few days. We still love her, though ;)

I'll be back soon with a post concerning paradise.

I think we are already ready to go back.