Coco Palms 2012 NYE

Our first morning on the beach, here are the kids with one of their favorite Uncles, Shayn. He is amazing with the kids and they love him to pieces. No for real though, we have to make rules about not smothering him for his own safety!

 Cecily and I took turns staying back in the bunglow with Scarlett and Ander for naps. When we came two years ago and Ander was a baby he slept out by the pool a lot. Scarlett was good but not quite that chill. She definitely prefers to go to sleep in her own bed.

 We got lunch including freshly cut mangos on the beach one afternoon, yum!

It rained off and on a few of the days but most of the time was truly beautiful. We had to put sunscreen on very often. No one believes me that the UV rays are more intense here. But after some initial burns of the doubtful *cough*Shayn*cough* even though sunscreen had been applied (just not frequently enough) I earned a little credit. It is gorgeous but that sun is intense.

 So grateful to have Cecily's extra pair of helpful hands around! Ander loves his Cecily.

 Also thanks to Cecily, Nathan and I got to go out with just the adults almost every night. It felt so awesome to be able to get the kids settled, then leave them in Cecily's capable hands and go have dinner with adults. We were actually able to enjoy our food, have uninterrupted conversations, not have to stagger our eating/soothing babies. Glorious. That was definitely a highlight of the trip for me.

 They set this contraption up on New Years Eve day for the party that night but Nathan and the kids got to break it in first. LOT's of fun, and surprisingly, no tears!

 Shayn and Nathan spent a day on a gorgeous course. These boys seem to make a good pair for golfing. They always have a good time. They also went and watched Muai Thai Fighting one night. I am a little disappointed because I would've liked to have seen some but when we parted ways it was really late and us girls thought for sure they were going to miss it. It turned out that it ran later than we initially thought. The boys talked about it for days afterwards; even got a knock out on video. Pretty cool. 

 New Year's Eve the Coco Palms put on a huge dinner with "entertainment" and games for the kids etc. It was their first time putting on a big NYE party and you could kind of tell. But we made the most of it and the children ran around to the different games winning prizes and having a blast.

 Randomly, this pic reminds me of how everyone seems to have their own opinions on who Scarlett looks like. To us she looks a heck of a lot like Kennedy did as a baby. Either way, she fits in.

 One of the first pictures of all of us. I love it. I love my family.

 And I love my seesters. We had a fabulous time together. (I am LOVING this chicken!) And they were forever patient with the considerable entourage that is my children. Nathan and Shayn decided two years ago when they were visiting us over Chinese New Year that they would meet us in Thailand to ring in 2012. I still can hardly believe we pulled it off.

 The live music was really offensive on the ears and I kid you not, I could've given a better performance of the songs they were singing karaoke to. It was a bit painful, to the point of giving us giggles.

 Eventually we gathered the kids up to do a few fireworks of our own before sending them off to bed.

 As the New Year approached here were fireworks and lanterns going off and lifting off everywhere. It was truly as magical as we'd been led to believe it would be. On our particular beach the lanterns they had for you to use didn't seem to have enough kerosene and had difficulty with lift off. After a little trial and error Nathan and I were able to launch several successfully. We felt like old pros.

It was a wonderful week and I am so grateful we got to spend it with family. What wonderful memories we made... And what a great way to welcome in 2012.