Sunday Jan. 25th Key West
Mommy Meltdown & Key West Butts
I wake up at about 7:30. Marie had mentioned last night that she wanted to walk on deck 4 at 8:00. I was very non-committal and told her I would call her room in the morning. Well, now its morning and I dont really feel like walking. I know I should but I just dont want to. This is probably why my weight yo-yos all the time
Im just not committed to the exercise lifestyle. Oh well!!
Marie doesnt sound too disappointed. Her room sounds very chaotic with the girls awake. My room is very peaceful with everyone still asleep. I get myself moving but I dont take a shower. Im secretly hoping we can get all 3 in their respective clubs and check out the adult pool.
The kids wake up and we are up at Topsiders by 8:30. My family loves Breakfast at Topsiders. The McDonalds style hash browns, bacon, doughnuts, omelets, chocolate milk, Mickey waffles, bagels with lox and tomato (OK, only I eat that)
does it get any better than that??
We try to convince Kevin to go to the club to make flubber. He says he doesnt want to. Surprise surprise. Chuck asks him what he wants to do and he says swimming. Tommy agrees to go to the Stack where the 8-10s are having icebreakers and magic tricks. Steph is jealous that Tommy gets to hang out in the teenagers club, a fact that contributes to his decision. I cant say that he wanted to go, only that he agreed to go. Steph only wants to do Bingo at 10:30 and with Kevin not going to the club, I give up the adult pool idea.
Steph and I walk Tommy to the Stack, take him up the stairs and take a quick peek around. We say goodbye and head over to the hair braiding station. I meant to make an appointment yesterday during the sailaway party but I completely forgot. Steph takes some time looking through the book filled with braided heads and we make an appointment for 3:00 this afternoon. Why not? Might as well get it over with and this way she doesnt have to fuss with her hair all week. Im not concerned about formal night pictures. We are on a cruise after all.
Chuck and Kevin had gone back to the room so Kevin could change into a bathing suit. Steph and I head to deck 4 to check out the shops. My daughter is a shopaholic, which is in complete contrast to my frugal anti-shopping nature. We look around and I spot a gray zip-up
DCL sweatshirt that I like a lot. Steph sees many things that she likes a lot. I notice a sales rack in the hallway outside. Theres a navy zip-up sweatshirt for $25, which I can justify more than the $45 one inside. Steph likes it too so we agree to share it.
One thing I forgot to mention before. Last time we cruised, I was forever wishing I had a navigator on me. I never knew what activity was happening when. This trip I wore the
Castaway Club lanyard with the cardholder so I simply folded up the navigator and shoved it in the cardholder. Also, the black and red Castaway Club beach bag that was in our room? That became my pocketbook for the week. I carried that around everywhere I went
stuffed with my camera, the sweatshirt we just bought, Kevins inhaler and Breaking Dawn. You know, the book I was hoping to read at the adult pool?
Anway, back to the trip report
Steph and I meet Chuck and Kevin at the Mickey Pool. Steph wants to hang for a while and reads her book on a chaise. Maries crew is in the pool and Chuck had scored 3 chaises. Maries kids are going on the Mickey Slide and I ask Kevin if he wants to go with them. He says he doesnt want to. Déjà vu is knocking me upside the head with the slide from last night. Ugh
why wont he just try it, I KNOW hell like it.
Chuck warns me that Kevin is in a mood. He offers to stay with him while I go read my book at the adult pool. I dont take him up on this offer. I dont know why.
Kevin swims for a minute and comes out and complains that the pool is too crowded. Its not too bad but it is more crowded than yesterday. Hes whining and its getting on my nerves. I look up at the stairs and tell him the Mickey slide is not crowded at all. He says he doesnt want to go on the Mickey Slide.
OK, this is when I start to feel myself losing it a bit. Since were keeping it real, Im going to tell you exactly whats happening. [Guys, you may want to stop reading
TMI moment coming!!]
I am having serious PMS. Thats right, I said it. The Disney Magic does not have ENOUGH Magic to combat that!!
I can feel it coming on, my brain is registering whats happening, but I cant control myself. I know in a small part of my conscious mind Im losing patience with Kevin but theres not anything I can do about it. Plus it doesnt help that I havent showered yet today and Im feeling particularly skeevy along with my lovely mood.
I tell Kevin that Marissa will go up the stairs with him. I yell for Marissa at the side of the pool and ask her to take Kevin on the slide. She tries to get Kevin but he says no. So heres where the mommy meltdown officially begins. I actually tell my 6 year-old son that he either has to go on the Mickey slide or go in the kids club. Now most kids would love to do either choice. But to Kevin, thats like saying you can either eat cauliflower or lima beans.
Part of me regrets giving this ultimatum out loud. But the PMS part of me is sticking to it and I repeat the choice to him a few more times. Hes whining saying he doesnt want to do either. Now Marie is listening to my craziness and shes actually agreeing with me. I suspect Marie is in the same bodily predicament as me and it doesnt help that shes supporting my madness. But I stick to it at this point.
He says hell go on the slide. Marissa walks with him to the stairs. He goes through the door but I never see him on the stairs from the outside. He comes back out in an instant complaining that its too windy up there and hell go on the Mickey slide when its not so windy.
Mommy dearest comes to life as I put his shirt on him, tell him to put his
crocs on, take his hand, tell Chuck hes going in the club and proceed to the elevator. I try to take as many deep breaths as possible on the way down to deck 5. The 5-7s are in the lab doing flubber. If he doesnt want to do it, I know he can at least play all those cool computer games I saw yesterday. Again
something that hell like if hell just give it a chance.
We get to the gate and I tell the counselors Im checking him in. He gives a little screech of protest and pulls away. The counselor looks anxious and says I can bring him in as she unlocks the gate. I half-drag him in and point to the computers and tell him hell like to play on those. There are 2 other counselors right inside the gate and I tell them this one will need a little extra attention. They react immediately to speak to him and one counselor tells me that I can stay for a while.
My heart has a little tug-of-war
I realize Im being completely irrational with him BUT and this is a huge BUT
most kids have fun here. This SHOULD NOT be torturous for him. This is a FUN place. I shake my head to the counselor and walk through the gate and leave. I feel angry and sick all at the same time.
I make my way back up to the Mickey Pool where I sense that everyone is a little afraid to speak to me. Chuck asks how it went and I shrug and say "hes there." He makes sure the pager is working.
I head over to the Stack to check on Tommy. Its almost time for Bingo and I don't know if he's interested in that. The counselor sends me upstairs to find him and I see him in the group of kids laughing along with everyone. He spots me and comes over. I tell him we're going to bingo and ask if he wants to stay with the club for animation or come with us. He chooses bingo.
We meet Chuck and Steph back at the Mickey Pool and pack up our stuff. The four of us head over to Rockin Bar D for Bingo. We get settled in our seats and buy our bingo card. We settle on the 6 game card that has to be punched out. As were waiting for Bingo to begin, Chuck heads up to deck 5 to check on Kevin, you know, just in case the pager isnt working.
He comes back and reports that he went in and spoke to Kevin. He was playing on the computer while the rest of the kids were making flubber. Chuck asked him if he wanted to go to Bingo and he actually said no, he wanted to stay there and play on the computer. Im not as remorseful as I should be but this news does make me feel a thread less guilty.
This Bingo game is the Diamond Jackpot Bingo of which we win neither diamond nor jackpot. What we notice is that every single game is won by someone holding the red electronic bingo thingy. Next time well have to buy one of those. You just cant win with just the punch cards, the electronic players odds are just too much better. Lesson learned.
In the middle of the 2nd game, the beeper goes off. The message is clear enough, Kevin wants to be picked up from the Oceaneers Lab. Chuck goes to get him and brings him back to Bingo. I hold my arms out to him and he sits on my lap. I kiss his neck and cheek and we make up.
Chuck says that he looked upset when he got there. Apparently they transitioned to a new activity in the lab, from Flubber to Circle of Fun. A counselor came over to Kevin, who was happily playing on the computer, and tried to convince him to join in the Circle of Fun. I roll my eyes, I dont need to hear anymore of the story. I know exactly what happened. Ugh, I know its nobodys fault but why couldnt they just leave him on the computer?
Anyway, bingo ends and I must take a shower. I have to put the morning behind me and start new. The rest of the family hangs in the room watching TV and checking out the cool things that have come in the fish extender so far.
After I get myself human again, we head up to Topsiders for some lunch. The boat is docked at Key West but we want to make sure no one gets hungry while were in Key West. Lets eat the food weve already paid for!
After lunch we head off the boat. Last time, we never got off the boat in Key West. Part of it was because we were watching the Giant game but the other part was I wasnt entirely sure Chuck would get back on. Today he is completely fine, youd never know he suffers from motion sickness.
So its about 1:00 by the time we leave. We have no plan except to walk around and find the CVS to get some drinks for the room. Here we are getting started for our afternoon. Kevin doesn't look too scarred from his morning with his crazy mother:
Tommy is wearing Chucks (or my old) sunglasses to take the picture. Well have to find a place to finally buy him a pair. We take 4 or 5 steps away from this picture spot and my boys see it. The butts. The naked butts. This sends them into a tizzy. I snap a picture of the butts:
Aside from Michael Harrison, this is the funniest thing theyve ever seen. Apparently not only don't my boys get out much but they don't get much culture either. But they're really good at the Wii!!
We follow the streets, having no idea where were going. We look around in a couple of stores and then find the shell shop. This grabs everyones interest so we head inside. We are still in the U.S. so I have my cell phone in my pocket. Im not a big texter, in fact, I dont text at all. This is mainly b/c my daughter does not yet own her own cell phone. I know once she does, well get unlimited texting and I will become a texter. But anyway, even though I dont text, I recognize the beep on my phone that I received a text. Its from my friend Jamie and then I realize that right at this moment, were missing the football awards banquet.
Jamie texted me that she got Tommy a sweatshirt and they miss us. Then a few minutes go by and my phone beeps again. Chuck and I exchange a look. Yes its Jamie again
we are not missing the first playoff game for indoor football, our team has a bye in the first round. Great news!! OK, thats not what the look was about. The look is for something entirely different, something the kids have no idea about. Until that very moment, we forgot all about the football banquet but now Chuck and I are on high alert. We are hoping that Tommy gets the lineman award for the pee wees. We never said anything to the kids, especially since we werent going to be at the banquet.
So we look around the shell store and see all the weird stuff. Kevin is into snow globes so he gets a Key West snow globe with fish in it. Steph finds a shell painted like a softball and must have it. Tommy digs into that section and finds a football shell. OK, souvies of Key West taken care of!
Heres Tommy with his football shell. You can see some of the store behind him:
We finish at the cash register and head toward the door when we hear my phone beeping a 3rd time. Chuck and I exchange another look
this one much more excited than before. I open my phone and read Omg tommy got the bubba award great job tommy
YESSS!!! He got it!!!! We tell the kids what the text is about and theyre very excited. Chuck is so happy, hes a bit teary-eyed!! I want to share in the excitement so I hit the number for Jamies phone. She answers but she cant really hear me. I can hear the boys in the background and I can hear the buzzing of the banquet. All of a sudden, screams erupt on the other end of the phone. Jamie yells that Dylan (their teammate) just won Most Valuable Player. Even though being on vacation is such a wonderful thing, I'm feeling a bit sad that we're missing the celebration at home. But Im happy I got to hear everyone's reaction for Dylan's award.
We disconnect from the football banquet and walk a few blocks more with Tommy being happy and Chuck being a thrilled-to-death proud papa! That news just made our day!!
Steph sees a Ron Jon shop and wants to check it out. We go in and see some kids sunglasses and Tommy picks out a pair. Theyre not too expensive. But the brown flip flops Steph likes are $48
no way!! We finish at Ron Jons and are ready to head back. We had forgotten all about CVS until we got to an intersection and looked to our right and there it was. Oh yeah, we wanted to go to CVS.
We pick up a case of water and a 12 pack of Coke Zero. Case of water on the ship? $35. Case of water in CVS? $6. We carry our drinks back to the ship. Thankfully its not too hot and we dont die carrying our liquid through the streets of Key West. We make it back on the ship at about 2:30. We spent an hour and a half walking around. But now we have water!! And Chuck got off the ship in Key West and more importantly, got back on the ship in Key West! All in all, a successful excursion!
Up next
hair braiding, Shutters conspiracy theory
So glad to know its actually possible to get packed and wait for the books for the cruise - unless you have a great deal more moral fortitude than I... which is entirely possible
I am a total cruise newbie and we are thinking about doing the Western in October 2010 so, of course, I am obsessively collecting info(I am a Disser after all
but reading it to see if its for us! Looking forward to more!
