St. Maarten Trip (Part 1)

We set off for St. Maarten on Friday, June 24th.
We went on vacation with Jeff's parents who own a condo in there.
Well, actually we set off for Denver, CO on Friday, June 24th.
Jeff's boss was super nice & let us use his credit card points towards our airfare.
If we flew out of Denver, we all got to fly for free!!!
So, we headed to Denver. =)
We got there a day before our flight and spent the night there.
When we got closer, Jeff decided that we had to go to Casa Bonita.
It is a restaurant that he had gone to as a kid.
It's kind of like a Mexican Chuck E. Cheese with cliff divers.
This was outside Casa Bonita:

At our table:

While you ate, you could watch cliff divers.

There was a huge cliff inside with a pool at the bottom of it.

Divers would climb up and then dive down into the water:

The food was OK, but the sopapillas were delicious!!

Definitely Zach's favorite part. ;0)

Since it was close to Lily's Birthday, we had the roaming mariachi band come and sing Happy Birthday to Lily.

I think she was a little overwhelmed by them singing to her, but she said she liked it.

Then we headed to the arcade where the kids got to play games for awhile.

The next day we got to the airport bright and early.

We had to make a stop in Miami.

The boys amused themselves with card games:

Then we were on our flight to St. Maarten!!!!

Lily finally crashed the last hour or so of the flight...

The boys were wide awake though! =)

When we finally got to St. Maarten it was dark. (It gets dark about 7:30 there.)

But when we woke up Sunday morning & pulled open the curtains, this is what we saw:

This was our beach. So beautiful!! You walk out of the condo & this is where you are.

I love it. This was my third time here (the 5th for Jeff), but I still can't get enough of this view.

The kids (who were here for the 1st time) loved it!

All three kids could not wait to get on the beach!

The boys headed straight to the water:

Lily's & my pink toes on the beach:

The boys just LOVED the water...definitely two little fish here....

Riley had no fear...which is why you will be seeing him in a life jacket from now on while he is in the water.....

Lily, however, was not too fond of the water the first part of the week. This is about as close as she got without holding onto someone:

My little beach bunny. =)

She did get in the water though:

But only with a life jacket and while either Jeff or I was holding her.

But she preferred being here:

She did get better by the end of the week. She would go in with one of us without her life jacket and didn't want to get out. =)
Lily showing off her new swimsuit wrap:

By the end of the day we had some tired kids:

Monday was Lily's Birthday!!

She got a present from us & from her Grandma & Grandpa!

After presents, we headed to the open air market in Phillipsburg, which is the biggest city on the Dutch side of the island. (where we stay.)

The kids all found things they could not live without! ;0)

Then it was time for the beach again!

We went to the beach at least once a day if not twice!

The boys favorite thing to do in the ocean was to body surf:

And by boys, I mean Zach, Riley, and Jeff.

Here's more proof Lily did actually get in the ocean. ;0)

But when Jeff got the kids buckets & shovels to play with, Lily liked the beach even more!

She also liked to do "sand angels"

She slowly got used to the water....

That night we went to a BBQ at the restaurant on the beach.

They have a steel drum band that plays there:

All of us!

Lily & Grandma:

After dinner Lily got to blow out the candles on her cake:

I think she had a prett good Birthday!

This was just the first few days of our trip....stay tuned for more! =)