Cruisin'

 We went on a cruise. 2014 was the year to celebrate. I turned 40 July 15 and technically Georgia was the present for me this cruise did match the importance of heading into another decade. Ella had her 8th Birthday, Sept. 7. Our tenth anniversary was Sept. 13. Binyam's 36 birthday was Sept. 24. We head out on the cruise Sept. 5-13. And the icing on the cake of it all was that we could do the cruise because Binyam became a US citizen July 24. So many things to celebrate!!!!!!!!!!

 The kids get a first close up view of the boat. Ezra insisted on calling it a "big boat" It was big, however seemed a little smaller when no land was in sight and the captain was making announcements that the ocean depth was typically 15,000 ft. It was grand, but intimidating at times. Ella didn't like AT ALL the announcements on the TV about how to wear the life jackets. This general unease morphed into a full on melt down when they did practice for the lifeboats at the muster stations. Crying ensued. I had to tell her I didn't know of anything happening on a big boat in the last hundred years, hiding in my heart that 102 year ago one sunk right to the bottom and stole our hearts. She got over though and we cruised on....

 Our first steps onto the boat.

 We were really sailing along....

 Anchored in the harbor.

 We went on the Carnival Sunshine to the Exotic Eastern Caribbean.

All and all we loved being on the cruise. It was a vacation like no other. Did I mention that we were truly blessed!!!!!!!!!! I mean that deeply and seriously. When I was a kid my parents were very into vacations. We did some neat things even though we weren't rich. We vacationed in Vermont once at a cabin in the woods. Another time we rented a house a few block from the ocean in Atlantic City. And countless times we camped and visited New York. Then the can of worms that is Teen Missions. It created in me a desperate and deep wonder lust. I am perpetually bored unless there is a trip being planned or cherished. Many people questioned bringing our kids on the cruise with us, I wouldn't think of doing it any other way. I loved having them around (although they did spend a ton of time at kids camp) I loved that we exposed them at very young ages to foreign places. They might have had waters that glittered like sapphires but they had streets that reminded me of any street in India. They had poverty. They had a need for Christ unlike many places in America. I loved that they were there with us. They experienced history inside a fort built to fend off new world invaders in the 1500's. It was amazing.....As a parent I know lots of folks can't do this. We are blessed to live a stone's throw away from the "big boats" and it is quite cheap when you don't have to factor in flights and layovers.....Seventeen percent of Americans have been on cruised which leaves a huge lot of people who have never been. Blessed seems like an understatement!!!!!!