saturday.  jan. 9.  2016

poor alex, she has not had much time to get her schoolwork done this week, so today, we had to leave her.  we said our good-bye’s to alex, and jumped in our mini-van with great mexican covered car insurance.  we drive near tulum, searching for a a beach we had located online, and aren’t quite sure what we are doing.  we drive down this narrow road, parallel to the beach, and finally find a place to park.  we walk towards the beach, and it’s just beautiful-playa paraiso.  we have a rating scale, for what we think is a good beach, or not.  this was a 9 for sure-out of 10.  if it was calm waters, and not so windy, we are sure it would be a 10.  white sands, clear water, super warm, shallow for a long time.  it made jumping waves and boogie boarding a lot of fun though.  i haven’t played in the ocean since-well, i can’t even remember since-probably when jarom graduated from byu-and we went to the bahamas.  i do not like being tossled about too much, and i don’t like being cold.  so it was a fantastic beach meeting many of our requirements.  we just soaked it in.  we had our yummy apples, almonds, and fruit bars to get us through to dinner.

which, speaking of dinner, we found another side of the highway stand that was rated 5 stars-antojitos la chiapaneca, and got fantastic chicken, beef, and pork tacos.  if you are ever near tulum-you must stop here!

alex got her week of school caught up, after working all day and into the night…hopefully she does well in these classes-they are college courses and go on her college transcript.

we decided to eat dinner up on our outdoor terrace under the stars, and sit in the hot tub.  today made me think again, why are we doing ordinary things back home…why aren’t we traveling around the world full-time?  yes, we need a paycheck, but we are going to figure that out.  i’m happy selling everything-it’s just stuff.  so many other people live the life of wonderful adventure…people who grow tired of acquiring “things” they think will make them happy, and seeing the world instead.

 

friday.  jan. 8.  2016

sleeping in, grocery shopping, napping.  totally lax day, plus we are all sunburned from yesterday, so just giving our skin a little break.  the wi-fi in our condo isn’t great, so we were told to go to the wellness center, where people can sit, study, and use the wi-fi.  it’s about a 2 minute drive from our complex.  we pull up, and it’s this amazing zen area, in the middle of the jungle.  beautiful lap pools, exercise room with glass walls, classes for free up on the top floor(if you live or rent here-so it’s free for us too:))…it was beautiful.  we dropped alex off here for about 4 hours to get going on her college classes.  the rest of us went across the highway where we can also go for free and use their pools and go to the beach-it’s all part of the bahia principe.  it was beautiful!  but i definitely love being away from the touristy areas in our own area.  we have got to find a good beach…tomorrow.

 

 

thursday.  jan. 7.  2016

i was the first one awake…which NEVER happens…but i was, and got everyone else up with me:)  it was already 9:30am, and we had some beach to hit…jarom had a little bit of work to get done, and then we got to the xpu-ha beach about noon.  even though it was windy and cloudy, we had a great time.  all of our skin is pink now, and after 4 hours of leisure, we decided to head home to make dinner.

two cool things about today-we loved watching the pelicans eye a fish, and dive to grab it-it was our own nature channel.  the other was the kite surfing going on-some of these guys are amazing-flying by probably 30-40 miles an hour on a small board, and a large kite pulling them across the water.  it’s pretty impressive.

a benefit of being in mexico, or any central american country, is the fresh avocado-it’s unbelievable.  our yummy tostada dinner was fresh and delicious that we made-with some of the best avacados we’ve ever had.  thank you lucy for introducing us to beans in a bag when we were in guatemala-they are the best!

 

 

 

jan. 6.  2016

up at 3:15am, everyone else at 4:00am, in the car at 5:00am.  made it through security, made first plane, layover in texas, second plane, and then…the car rental.   be aware, in mexico, they require additional car insurance, that no matter what a website says you are covered for, you have to pay for more than that. our deal for a car for a month was $286…supposedly.  then, they wanted to tack on $19/day for additional car insurance, $7/day for additional driver.  that blew our deal out of the water.  but you have to roll with the punches. and their negotiating deals for you never are better than you had planned. after sitting in line in the national car rental office for probably an hour and a half trying to come up with a plan, someone else said they booked through expedia and their insurance covered them through the online booking.  so we made a booking through expedia, went over to fox car rental, and same thing…except they wanted $29/day for insurance.  after being there for an hour, they agreed to match the first place’s prices, and gave us a free upgrade to a minivan, which is awesome…because i really don’t know how we would have fit 6 people, 6 suitcases, and 6 backpacks in a premium sized car.

we stopped at a roadside little restaurant because we were STARVING, and ate some of the yummiest food-and only was $20 for all of us to eat.  then we went to the mega grocery store-it was huge-like a costco, that even sold 4 wheelers.  got groceries, boogies boards, swim noodles, and tons of food for just $135.  i love mexico so far!

we then finally made our way to the condo, which is part of a huge resort.  it’s pretty awesome.  the owners are living in germany right now, gave us a steal of a deal, and he was a filmmaker in hollywood for 30 years…pretty cool.

we got situated, put food away, and climbed into bed at midnight.  we made it!

ps-the shot of the traffic-there is a guy on a unicycle juggling bowling pins in between the cars-very entertaining while sitting at a light.

pps-the drone shot via jarom of our condo building is pretty awesome-you can see our huge upstairs terrace-we are the closest one in the picture.

 

 

 

 

 

 

jan. 5.  2016

as we prepare for our next trip, (leave tomorrow) to the riviera maya for a month, the excitement is mounting.  nothing is as exciting as an adventure, and finding good deals and learning how to work points on flights so we fly for free and renting homes or condos for cheap is becoming something we are getting good at. staying for a month gives us the opportunity to really get to know the area, get in some culture and history, get to know some locals a bit, practice our spanish…hopefully it’ll be a good break.  plus going somewhere for a week is exhausting…you finally start getting the hang of things and then you have to go back home.

there is always stress packing, getting all the school stuff together, the energy it takes…but it’ll all be worth it i keep telling myself.  i have plans in my head for all the great things we’ll do, and hopefully we’ll be able to do a lot of fun stuff.   but getting in some school is important, and alex is doing college courses right now, so hopefully it’ll be a good balance of working our minds, and getting in a lot of site seeing and beach time.

guatemala touched our hearts and souls, and was definitely a life changing family humanitarian trip.  this trip is us just being tourists, and having some fun, and getting some sun.  hopefully it will be a great adventure, and drama free.  here we go.

jan. 1.  2016

upon reflection, looking back, 2015 was a pretty good year.  we had many trips, growing opportunities, family experiences, and continue to see our kids growing like crazy and becoming who they are.

we had quite a few trips this year:  jarom and i went to new york with friends to the fallon show, the family went to newport beach for a week,  jarom and alex drove to utah to switch out our yukon for a navigator, we went to guatemala for 6 weeks, moved two weeks later to a new house and new city, alex started college classes-finished her personal progress-and got her license,  jarom took the girls to zion national park and hiked the narrows,  jarom and alex drove to texas to buy a third car for our family, took alex and madison to a of monsters and men concert, jarom and i went to san diego to see of monsters and men,  we went to utah to go to a byu football game and see friends and family, jarom and i got to go to las vegas for a first class trip jarom had earned through work, and run through the warehouse.

it was a good year overall.  i continue to struggle with my health, but have found a path that i feel will be a healing one.  lyme, epstein-barr, candida, co-infections of lyme, food allergies, exhaustion…it’s all going to be turned around this year.  i will be 40 this year, and it’s time for a new chapter.

the best is yet to come.

our final week in guatemala was a perfect wind-down week.  jarom joined us again-and brought his trusty friend-the drone:)

wednesday-went to the docks, played with the kids, painted nails, played ball and frisbee

thursday-nadia and i were sick, cam and madison went down to the village by themselves and played with the kids-i have such great kids!

friday-alex, madison, and camden went and played with kids in the village today.  the kids ended up yelling and waving from the village for me since i hadn’t made it down that day.

saturday-we hit para for groceries and our regular pizza stop, dropped off alex and madison at the church for a yw sleepover at the jensen’s house, and nadia and i brought back the groceries by ourselves…that was not fun:)

sunday-we cooked a cake, and cam carried it with hot pads down our mountain, through the village, on the boat ride, and up through pana, to the church.  a bit different than just getting in your car to take a cake somewhere:)  we had our last dinner with the jensens, and jarom had flown in.  we picked him up by the church, caught the last boat to our village, and girls and boys were waiting on the dock for us:)   the girls stayed the night with the jensens, having more fun with Lucy and the rest of the crew of course:)

monday-the jensens came out, we did our “store” for the village kids.  the kids had to fill two bags with garbage, to earn two coins.  they could then come into the store, and buy two things with their coins-we had brought lots of girl clothes, and our ward had donated lots of boy clothes.  we also had bought toys with our donation money-and the kids were so excited-we then went down to the docks with the jensens and village kids, and after bought ice cream from the ice cream man with our very last donation money.  he made about 60 quetzals, and it made his week you could tell.  the kids were happy, and we were so grateful to have been able to help this man also.  the jensens stayed the night at our place-so fun!

tuesday-jarom and alex went on the zip lining tour that juventa and i had done-it was breathtaking!  so glad they got to do it too!   we then met up with them and shopped in pana to get any last memorabilia, and headed home and watched some movies.

wednesday-the kids swam, we played with kids one last time, dinner at Hans’ place one last time, jarom tried to show the kids his drone, but it wouldn’t work, so we just played tag out on the yard in front of the village next to the lake.  it was beautiful, started raining, and we just loved it.  it was an awesome last day.

thursday-we headed home, back to the states.  the culture shock we experienced was amazing, even though we had grown up in the states, lived there all our lives, and was only gone 6 weeks, it was really weird to adjust.  even the grocery stores seemed extravagant and ridiculously overkill.  but we were back, and had two weeks to pack, find movers, and move into our new house we had found while in guatemala.  back to reality…bummer.

 

tuesday.  july 7.  2015

we decided today with the jensen’s, to meet and kayak and have a picnic lunch.  when you kayak at lee’s place, you get to hang out in hammock’s and relax until you are ready to go.  it’s fantastic.  our whole group was together, and we headed out.  it was such an awesome kayaking day.  we enjoyed visiting and talking, everyone did a great job-small and large kid alike.  we headed back to lee’s, dropped off kayaks, and ate our picnic lunch.  we then caught a boat to pana, and shopped for a couple of hours, trying to help juventa find some good gifts for her family.  she then caught a shuttle to take her back to guatemala city.  her visit went by so fast…it just seemed like a day!  but it was a blast-so grateful she came.  it made our week so much more fun with her there.  the girls and i headed back to the house, always enjoying walking through the village and seeing and playing with the kids on our way up the mountain.

monday.  july 6.  2015

i think the thing i love a lot about being in guatemala, besides the breathtaking views, is the no-schedule life.  it’s pretty nice.  i mean, we play with the kids, monday-wed-friday at 1:00, but besides that, it’s pretty nice just deciding what our lives are going to be like, and what we want to do, instead of what we have to do.   luciano shows up sometimes in the morning, bringing fruit from the house garden…this morning was a mini cantaloupe…so yummy.

today, we decided to have lunch at hans’ place…mainly because we are tired of our limited amount of food…eggs and toast, pasta, and protein balls.  and, it was meatball monday with papas(potatoes), so we couldn’t pass that up!  so our cheap lunch at hans’ is well worth it.  we then head out to play with the village kids for the afternoon, which of course, i absolutely love.  juventa reads them the giving tree book, which they love.  we try and teach them checkers and four in a row, but it seems like a race of putting the pieces in instead of strategy.  juventa’s daughter knitted a hat to donate, and we dropped it off at grabielle’s house-we were told there was a baby there.  if you can see in the picture, in the middle of the room, is a round swinging basket for the baby.  it was pretty cool!  they were grateful for the hat, and we saw it on a larger child the next day…pretty funny.

the village kids have become amazing at using their imaginations, and being resourceful for toys and play. nobody has taken the time to do anything with the village kids…they run around rampant, climbing, destructing, cutting things with their machete’s, or really, sitting in the streets.  i’m not sure if we are the first people to give them a little structure and things to do, but it seems like it.  since we have been here, they have done really well, learning to take turns a little better, waiting for their turn, sharing toys with each other, instead of hoarding them and trying to steal them.  i’ve seen some positive changes in the kids.  it’s been a real adventure!

sunday.  july 5.  2015

going to pana is always fun.  going to church is even better.  riding the boat to pana, if i haven’t mentioned it a hundred times already, is the best.  even though i don’t speak fluent spanish, it’s fun still going, and partaking of the sacrament.  juventa had helped camden write a testimony in spanish, and camden and juventa both went up and bore their testimonies.  it was awesome.  juventa translated relief society for me, it was nice knowing what was being talked about:)

we headed to the jensen’s for dinner afterward, and visited for like 5 hours.  we headed back the trek to our mountain house in our small village.  it was such a good sunday.