Puerto Vallarta

Our Holiday trip to Puerto Vallarta was absolutely fantastic! There are so many things that I want to touch on so I decided a top ten list would be the best and quickest way.

Top 10 Puerto Vallarta events/things:

10. Isla's "Puerto Vallarta face". She had a hard time opening her blue eyes in the sun and was squinting the whole time, so the whole family nicknamed the look Isla's "Puerto Vallarta face". These two pictures capture the face quite nicely:

9. The cousin banana boat ride. Yes, we did it. The ultimate touristy thing to do - go on a banana boat in the ocean. My cousin Krista and I were half laughing/half crying the whole time due to our fear of deep water. We swear that jaws was right beneath us the whole time preparing to attack. It didn't help that we fell off the darn thing about six times. I also got a sore neck from the ride - I'm too old to do stuff like this:

8. Beck's birthday party. Isla's second cousin, Beck, turned 1 while we were in Puerto Vallarta and we celebrated with a "Where the Wild Things Are" themed party complete with party hats. Here is the birthday boy all dressed up for his party:

And the rest of the crazy family dressed up as "Wild Things":

7. Isla's naps. Isla turned out to be a wonderful nap taker while we were in Mexico. She fell asleep by the pool a couple of times and in her stroller when we were out at dinner. She never does this so I was so thankful as it allowed me to spend more time with the family:

6. The view from our room and our roommates, The Mojibi's. Isla had so much fun playing with her second cousins, Emma and Beck:

5. My cousin Drew participating in water aerobics every day at the resort. He even used two beer cans for added weight during the routine:

4. Isla learning to love the water. It took some time, but she finally decided that the pool wasn't so bad:

3. The iguanas. There were a couple of iguanas that lived at the resort and these things were down right huge and scary. They would just lie around the pool and bask in the sun. I steered clear of them as they freaked me out. Whenever I went swimming I was always looking behind my back for fear that they would be right behind me:

2. A visit from Aunt Anna. Anna was in a town 45 minutes north of Puerto Vallarta with her boyfriend's family and they came down for a day to visit us (well mostly Isla):

1. Spending time with the Detwiler family. We had kids of all ages (from my Grandaddy at age 91 to Beck at age 1) and it was so much fun just being together. I especially enjoyed being with Isla and watching her interact with all of her cousins.

If I could change one thing about the trip, it would be that Ryan was there with us. We missed him very much and were so happy to see him when we got home. Happy New Year to everyone!