If you know me well enough, you'll know a little teeny tiny photoshoot is compulsary!
Of course, I never say something like that out loud... I just put nice respectable clothes on the girls and drag my camera along. No expectations! Actually, speaking of respectable dresses, Phebe is wearing her 'Cuba' dress and Lilah is wearing a dress I bought last year, from a store on Etsy called Palm Tree Princess.
And I was very proud of myself, because I only did the 'photoshoot' thing once in the whole seven days of beautiful and amazing photoshoot possibilities! Ha! Right? I know, very proud of myself. And on top of that, it was very casual... not too many stand, smile and look at the camera moments... well, mostly because a 5 year old and a 2 year old have a very hard time doing just that. And with my limited experience of two kiddies, casual is definitely the easier way to go, and the natural shots are always, by far, my favourites.
I was not expecting it, but when we got quite a ways down the beach, the sun was starting to set and another family came walking by. Much to my joy, they kindly offered to take a photo of all of us. It meant so much to me, and it meant even more when I realized it actually turned out quite nice too. We don't have nearly enough family pictures.
I absolutely adore my family. God is SO good.
The beach was so nice that we didn't spend much time at the kids pool. In fact, only one day - which is kinda too bad, because it was really nice, and really really quiet... ie - we had the whole pool to ourselves! I guess everyone else liked the beach best too!
The girls brought their (dollar store) lilos along and had plenty of fun! You'll see in my pictures below, that Phebe learned how to work the water squirter too. Yep, that grin she's wearing is a result of making her Mama squeal, especially when she aims said water squirter at her Mama! So much fun! Oh, and in another picture you will see my girls lying up in sunchairs with their buckets, they would take it in turns to run back and forth, filling their buckets with water and then lying up in the sunchairs and pouring it over themselves!
Now that, is the life!
As a side note, I bought their cute bathing costumes online from the Garnet Hill store. I love their clothes and well, you know me, I may have a slight weakness for chevron!
This year we vacationed at the Memories Flamenco hotel in Cayo Coco.
I had previously done a little bit of research on the best beaches in Cuba and Cayo Coco seemed to be the place to go! It did not disappoint! After searching around holiday packages I found the Memories Flamenco hotel, one of the things I liked about this hotel is that is was basically brand new and had just opened a year ago. Also, the bus ride from the airport was only about 20 minutes, which was great.
One of the main things we love about Cuba, apart from the fantastic weather and great beaches, is the people! They are always consistently friendly and kind... and ever so happy. It is a joy just to be around them. Mind you, if you had heard my two girls say "Hola Amigo" to everyone they met, including the tourists!! ...well, you might have had a grin on your face too!
It was such a wonderful trip and I have SO many pictures, I hardly know where to start! But I figured I'd start with the best part - the beach! The weather was so ideal, every single day and the water was that perfect blue/turquoise with the sun shining down. Every single day the first glimpse of the water gave us that 'WOW!' moment. It was absolutely stunning.
The first day we introduced Phebe to the water she wasn't so sure about it, which is mildly strange because she LOVES getting bathed and even pours water over her own face - she has no fear of water whatsoever. Anyway, that first day she decided playing in the sand was so much more fun than water! However, by day two, she was sold on the water. It was so beautiful and warm, like a gigantic bath! It got to be that each morning Phebe would say "Mama beach. Mama water. Mama swim!" and her eyes would light up! She was so excited when I showed her how to swim one day with her armbands on... she talked about "swimming" non stop after that! The other two items she learned the name for were the rake and the hoe - two sand utensils that rarely left her hands!
Lilah loved the water, she wanted no part in the kids pool this year and begged to go to the beach every day... like we were going to say no! Ha! She spent a good part of her time sitting and playing in the water - I could hear her chattering away to herself have a jolly great old time. She was in Caribbean heaven! The only problem for me was having to drag her out of the water into the shade every now and again, as I was afraid of her getting too much sun exposure, even though I put Factor 50 on her several times a day!
Anyway, here's an overload of beach pictures... just because, it was *that* good!
We arrived home yesterday evening, after a fabulous week in sunny Cayo Coco.
And I've been on my toes ever since - I'm still working on uploading the pictures to Flickr!
I leave you with this postcard... "Wish you were here!"
I just love the colours of the Caribbean.
