Turks and Caicos Vacation

To celebrate our 7th anniversary, my successful surgery (new quality of life), and life in general we took a 5 day trip to Turks and Caicos. It is a group of islands in the Caribbean, north of the Dominican Republic and southeast of the Bahamas. We stayed at a Beaches Resort. All inclusive and tons of fun. We took over 230 pictures and I have posted some of the best.


Sesame Street is a sponsor of Beaches so, Elmo, Cookie Monster, Bert, Ernie, Zoey and Abbie were all there. They put on singing and dancing shows daily and they were always walking around. We were kinda nervous about the wandering characters, because Spencer was very afraid of the Easter Bunny, but he was so excited and showed no fear after his initial hesitance.

In our room, James and I had a fabulous king sized bed and Spencer got to sleep on a trundle bed (from under the couch). He was so excited about a big boy bed. We gave it a try the first night and decided to never request the crib. He never got out of it during the night.

This was at our first breakfast buffet. Breakfast was always very tasty. This is our little stinker putting bacon on his face. Spencer always ate really well and breakfast, the other meals...not so much.

This is the pool outside our room (one of 5 in the entire resort). Spencer is in the baby side, it only came up to his waist and James is on a raft in the deep end (only 5 feet).

There was also a water park in the resort!!! Spencer loved this. This was the only water slide that the little guy could ride, and he had to do it with a parent. I believe he rode this daily.

Another part of the water park was this "splash pad". This was very refreshing. the floor of this was very spongy.

Mommy and son watching one of many Sesame Street shows. We had to wave at Elmo every time he came our way.

Getting Spencer to nap was very difficult. On this day, we got on an Aquacycle (those really big 3 wheeled bikes that float on water) and peddled out. He was gone in a matter of minutes, so we got back to shore and took him out of his life vest and he slept for like an hour on me. This was one of my favorite moments.

This was one of many HUGE island lizards. I asked some resort employees what they are called and all they said was "lizards".

Daddy and son on the beach.

Mommy and son walking on the sand.

Spencer being super cool with James' sunglasses on. This was taken right before we left Friday afternoon.

Erica's Results

All of my testing is done, and I had a small bowel obstruction. This caused everything to not digest and gave me super bad tummy aches. Doc says until it passes, which shouldn't be long, take some pain meds for the stomach aches. I found that Tylenol PM works better than the prescription pain meds. I've very relieved that nothing funky is going on.

Spencer is determined to potty train himself. I was really trying to hold out until we got home from vacation, but he is starting to ask on a semi-regular basis to go. Today I held him on the big potty and he still went! I NEVER thought it would be this easy...(I might be singing another tune later on, but staying positive.)

Erica's Health Update

Two weeks ago around 10 pm I started to get the most horrible stomach ache. It felt like a stabbing pain. It continued all night. Finally at 3:30 am, I woke James up and had him take me to the emergency room. My "new" insides felt fine but I wanted to be sure and I was in a lot of pain. All they did was give me some pain meds and called it gastritis. Gastritis is fancy for stomach ache. After I slept off the pain meds everything felt okay. So I was just writing it off as eating way too much (we had been to Ruth's Chris the evening it started). Until Sunday night it came back. The stabbing pain was super intense. I did not eat as much as I had the other night and the pain pills that were prescribed to me didn't do a thing. This time the pain lasted until about 7:30 am Monday morning. They went way when Spencer and I took Teddy on his morning walk. They returned Monday evening. Once again they continued through out the night and I called my GI doctor as soon as they opened this morning. I got an appointment and I start testing tomorrow morning. Wednesday, I go for a CT scan and blood work. Thursday morning, I'll go in for an Upper GI. My doctor is kinda concerned that he will not find anything, considering that I just spent a million years (3 weeks) in St Pete and a million tests (3) ran on me there. We are leaving for Turks and Caicos Monday morning and Doc wants to know as much as possible before I leave the country.

I'm just really upset that I finally get my health under rein and this pops up. I don't feel that I'm under any extra stress than usual, I should actually be feeling less. Doc is wondering if its stress from surgery and ups and downs of raising a toddler. I don't know...I'll keep everyone posted and I'm not looking forward to drinking that chalky crap tomorrow morning.

Spencer update!!!! He is paci free! Though he did ask me about it this morning. He is showing off his interest in the potty. Every time I change his diaper I ask him to sit on the potty and pee pee for Mommy. And he does!!!! Today he was running around bottomless and playing on his pony. He stopped and made a motion for me to come over and put him on the potty and he had the biggest pee. I get all crazy, we high five , and he gets to flush his pee pee down the big potty. I'll try to get a potty shot to post.

Paci Free

Everyday after nap Spencer gets a cup of juice and a snack. He loves this little treat. Today he was exceptionally cute. He crawled onto his chair and chowed down. He likes to watch "The Wiggles" while snacking. When he wants to watch his shows, he points to the TV and says "off". He is too funny.

As of today Spence is pacifier free for two days. He was really starting to take the paci out and about. Sunday, he took it on our morning walk and that was the straw that broke the camel's back. He was to only have it at nap and bed time. I knew this day would come. He is handling it pretty well. He has been crying for about 10-20 minutes before actually falling asleep. Oh my

Uncle Robert Graduates in Fort Benning

Robert, James' youngest brother, graduated from Basic Training in Fort Benning, GA May 1. So we drove up there to see the festivities. James and I decided to drive during the night so Spencer would sleep through it. Thursday morning Robert "turned blue." This is the blue honor cord worn over the shoulder. Then on Friday morning, we saw the actual graduation ceremony. After the ceremony, Robert was able to come back to the cabin to hang out with everyone until Sunday. When we were not eating, Robert liked to show off his new skill of not sweating while doing push-ups and some various ab exercises. Spencer got a kick out of that. Every time Robert hit the deck Spencer followed suit. It was soooo cute seeing Spencer copy Robert. These are some of the best photos.

This was a nice four day weekend. We got to see almost all of James' family. Spencer had time with his cousins on the playground and all of it was done outside. Outside is his new favorite thing to say. Everything has to be done outside. It's so cute the way he says it too, its like "ouse." He says "ouse" and then "shoes" if he doesn't have shoes on.