Woo! What a journey it was for us to get here. First of all, I'll tell the story of how we came to be here. 4 years ago, for Piper's 5th birthday we went on a Disney Cruise. It was absolutely AMAZING. Sully was a baby but we said "on his 5th birthday let's take them on another Disney Cruise." So we saved up for 2 years and then booked it. That was about 2 1/2 years ago. We were SO excited. It was a Star Wars themed cruise and everything. We seriously couldn't wait. And then Covid.... well, the cruise was planned for Feb 2021 so we assumed it would be up and running by then since Covid hit in March of 2020. But, as you all know, cruise ships weren't open by February. So we had it rescheduled for May when they would for SURE be "re-opened." Well, they weren't. Again. So we rescheduled for this week. This is now our 3rd attempt at going. And yes, the ships opened up, but with SO MANY LIMITATIONS!!!! It was not the Disney Cruise we were expecting. We called Disney and asked about all the limitations and all the things that wouldn't be part of the cruise experience and it was like half the cruise would pretty much be shut down, but the price was still the same. We debated because there is nothing like a Disney Cruise. But some of the stuff we loved most wouldn't be in operation. So we decided to just cancel the cruise once and for all, take the money and turn towards our bucket-list to find another trip to go on. I do want to go on a cruise again. Badly. But I want to go when things are a little more back to normal. It's stressful right now! Anyway, after looking at all the Bucket List places we had, we determined that since Turks and Caicos is the closest destination to us on the list, we should go there. We booked the trip 4 months ago and I was crazy excited once again. This was one of the places we wanted to go that didn't make you quarantine or anything crazy like that. We started planning everything but didn't want to tell the kids about it until we KNEW we were for sure going to be able to go. Covid was starting to climb in the states again and I just felt like the borders could close again at any minute and I didn't want to disappoint the kids. So we got them their passports and told them it was just a "good idea" for everyone to have a passport. Then we bought them all new snorkel gear but kept it hidden. We booked a doggy daycare for the dogs, etc. And then one morning I woke up to an announcement that Turks and Caicos was now going to mandate the Covid Vaccine for everyone 16 and up. Shawn was very against the Vax for reasons I don't want to go into, but he was. So I started crying and said "Ok well now we can't go. I'll start cancelling everything." He felt so bad because he knew this was a Bucket List item, so he started researching ways to maybe get a Vaccine Exemption. We just had Covid in July so we had the anti-bodies in us. I guess last year TCI (Turks and Caicos Islands) used to allow documentation that you HAD Covid within 180 days to get on the island. We emailed TCI's Ministry of Health and asked if that would be sufficient and they said "no". He reached out to his doctor to see what his doctor could possibly say that would qualify as a "medical exemption" and his doctor said all he could say was that Shawn had anti-bodies in his system and wouldn't need the shot. We asked TCI if a written doctors note would work and they still came back and said no. They said the ONLY medical exemption you could get would be if you had a severe allergic reaction to one of the ingredients in the vaccine that could cause death or serious illness. You had to have that documented and then they would exempt you. Clearly Shawn doesn't have that so he went back and forth. Back and forth. He didn't want to the get the shot but he didn't want to be the sole reason we cancelled this trip. So he said he would get the shot. I said "no because then you'll resent me forever." And HE said "yeah, but if I don't get it, my family will resent me forever because I will be the only reason we can't do fun things for who knows how many years." So we went in circles about it. Eventually he said "I'm getting it because I have to, but I still do NOT support it." It was really hard for him. It was hard for me too, because I watched him do something he didn't want to do :( Anyway.... he got the vaccine and here we are! We also had to take Covid Tests 72 and 48 hours before we came and prove they were negative. We had to buy a Covid Specific travel insurance policy (they won't let you visit without one in place), we had to fill out hours worth of paperwork and submit everything and just wait for them to approve us. So about 60 hours before we left is when we submitted the Vaccine cards, the Visa Letter from Insurance, the Passport info, the negative Covid Tests etc, etc and we waited for them to deny or approve us. We woke up 48 hours before our trip with approval letters from the Islands and that's when I knew we could FINALLY let out the breath we had been holding and announce it to the kids! It was so much fun announcing it to them- showing them pictures, giving them their new swimsuits and snorkel gear, etc.
So THEN we had to wake up at 3am to be able to leave our house by 3:45 and get to the airport by 4:15 for a 6:50 flight. We had ZERO flight delays, which I was so thankful for, because I've been hearing all these horror stories about flight cancellations due to walk-outs and all that. I was so nervous about it all. Anyway, the kids stayed awake the ENTIRE day! Well, Sully and Piper took short naps on one of the flights but besides those little cat naps they had been up since 3:30. When we landed in TCI we had to wait in Customs for almost 2 hours. By this time its 4pm and they hadn't had a real meal all day. Just snacks! They hadn't eaten much, hadn't slept, the Customs building was HOT as heck (no AC on a tropical island) with hundreds of people crammed in, and they were ANGELS. I'm not kidding. They didn't complain even ONCE. Which is not like them... they waited for close to 2 hours and I know they were starving and tired. And they were perfect. I was so sooooo proud of them. And then we had to wait for a shuttle to take us to the car rental place to get a car. That took another 45 minutes. And through it all, they were so sweet and patient and obedient. I could cry just thinking about it.
We made it to our Villa (by the way, driving here is scary because it's on the opposite side of the road! Along with the steering wheel- it's on the right side of the car and the blinkers are on the right side of the steering wheel too, so whenever we go to put our blinkers on the windshield wipers start going instead! Hahaha!!!)
Today we went to the grocery store- oh my gosh the prices are outrageous! We brought tons of snacks and cereal with us from America because I was warned of their prices. A regular box of Ramen that is $2.00 at home is $10 here!!! A tiny carton of Strawberries is $9. Steak is $25 a pound. Salad dressings are about $9 each. I know it all has to be imported from the Mainland, but my goodness! It's crazy!
Anyway, after that we just walked down to 2 different beaches. Our Villa is across a little walkway from one beach, and across the street from another beach. We went to both and just swam and snorkeled for about 4 hours. The sun rays this time of year aren't strong so none of us even got sunburned and (besides on our faces) we didn't use sunscreen. But the water is literally postcard perfect. TCI is famous for its beaches. One of them is the #1 beach in all of the world!
It's gorgeous here. Truly paradise. It is sooo lush and bright. Our villa has a coconut tree right outside our deck. All the flowers and trees and plants are amazing. They're famous for Conch shells too, so they're literally everywhere. EVERYWHERE. The kids are so excited to each get to bring one home. It's the most beautiful place I've ever been. Tomorrow we are taking a boat out to a good snorkel spot so I need to get to bed so that I am rested for all the swimming we will do!
Good night for now!
But I'll back up a bit. Yesterday (Sunday) we took a boat out to the 3rd largest Coral Reef in the world to go snorkeling
, and we made a stop at Iguana Island
, (hundreds of Iguanas everywhere!), AND they let Shawn drive the boat! It was incredible from start to finish! The boat fed us snacks and drinks and even sandwiches for lunch. There was a slide off the back, and after snorkeling they let us go down the slide and also jump off the boat for a bit. Snorkeling in that clear of water was the coolest thing I've ever done! It was amazing! The first largest Coral Reef is in Australia, the 2nd is in Belize, and this is the 3rd. It was SOOOOOOOOOO beautiful! Then they took us to Iguana island which is cool because no one lives there- just Iguanas. They roam around everywhere! You can't touch them though- not because you're not allowed but because they're so crazy fast. We tried, haha! And it's crazy because there are pine trees all over the island! Pine and Palm, right next to each other. One half of the Island is the Atlantic Ocean, and the other half is the Caribbean. So you get 2 different bodies of water separated by one tiny island. It only takes you about 5 minutes of walking to get from one side to the other. But isn't that cool??
Ok. Here I am on the flight back to America. It feels sad, but also I AM a bit relieved to be going home. Only because Christmas is right around the corner and we have so much to look forward to and celebrate; it will be nice to be home-sweet-home in just a few hours.
But back to Turks and Caicos- I’ll just continue where I left off!
We had pictures booked for Tuesday. I joined a Turks and Caicos tourist website months ago and scoured the site for local photographers who wouldn’t charge an arm and a leg. Do you know how hard that is to find in TCI? EVERYONE charges an area and leg for EVERYTHING- but I got quotes and figured out what we wanted and what we could afford. And I fond someone. I “reserved” him back in July and even that was not that far in advance. Most photographers are booked 6 months out. They are BUSY. So Tuesday was the day. 11:30AM gives you the brightest colored water you can get. It hadn’t rained all week, and it was sunny on Tuesday morning when we woke up. Pictures were 30 minutes away so we had to leave by 11 and getting a family of 5 ready for pictures takes a long time. All of the ironing of the NEW photoshoot clothes being rumpled in suitcases, doing my make-up extra carefully, the girls intricately braided and curled hair, styling Sully’s new haircut, curling my hair extra tight because I knew the curls would drop a lot in the intense humidity, etc., etc. We drove to the picture place and it was still sunny as we loaded up…. About 5 minutes before we were to arrive the sky suddenly started getting really dark. Like, really. We looked at the forecast and it said rain would be starting in 30-45 minutes. My heart sank but I thought “it’s ok. We can get a LOT of shots in 30 minutes.” We got out of the car and the photographer said “it’s dark, so you’re not going to get super bright water. But I can’t reschedule.” I couldn’t reschedule either! So we agreed to work fast and get as many as we could. On my list I wanted one of all the kids together, one of each kid alone, one of Shawn and I, and then the rest family photos, both posed and candid. I was paying for 15 edited pictures. We hurriedly stood and smiled for a minute before he told us to move over to some rocks and smile again- none of them poses that were cute at all because we were in a hurry. Just your standard poses that we always do:( Anyway, maybe we had been smiling for a total of 90 seconds, and then the sky just dropped and the biggest, heaviest raindrops fell instantly. Not a light rain where we could still make it look cute and run around smiling. No. Rain so heavy you can’t see a foot in front of you. Wind that whipped you all around and you could hardly walk against it. We all RAN to the car as best as we could. We were soaking wet. Completely see-through clothes, hair a rats nest of tangles, makeup smeared down my face. It was horrible. The rain and wind was pounding our little car so badly that we couldn’t even drive anywhere so we sat in the parking lot and waited for it to lessen. Well about 15 minutes later it did. For a minute. The photographer had a drone that he said he could take out to take SUPER far away pictures of us so that you couldn’t see our ruined hair and makeup and we decided to try it. We got out there, sky still black, and walked along a stretch of beach and then BOOM! The rain pelted us again. Once again, we ran to the car and were forced to call it a day (it rained for another 2 hours after that). We were miserable. I’m so sad because this was our one chance to get family pictures in paradise. The most beautiful place I’ve EVER been and we couldn’t get the pictures I had envisioned forever. It was our last year where Sully will have all his baby teeth. It was a place we might not ever get back to. The budgeting I did to buy us all new clothes. I had to buy 1 new outfit every paycheck because it’s expensive to buy a new outfit for a whole family at once. And to still have to pay for it since he did get a few pictures (like 3 or 4). Turks locals are not generally friendly. After living in Oklahoma where everyone is extra nice, we notice rude people more acutely than we did before. And Turks & Caicos are some of the rudest people we’ve ever met. Not necessarily saying the photographer was rude, but I just mean he wasn’t about to do any favors for us so I still had to fork over the money. That’s just the way they are down there. We are used to visiting places with happy people but I would never describe TCI people as happy. Now they live in the most beautiful place on earth, but most of them have never left their island and probably don’t know how fortunate they are because it’s all they know. They survive off tourist’s money, yet they don’t treat us as if they want us there. It’s strange but besides that, it’s heavenly. We were mostly just on beaches everyday anyway where we didn’t have to interact with many people so it didn’t ruin the vibe of the vacation for us.
Anyway- Tuesday evening was back to being sunny and dry so we went Canoeing/Kayaking. It was fun to say we canoed in the British West Indies :)
Wednesday was back to being hot and sunny but it was SUPER windy. We went to a beach that had huge waves because of the wind and actually had to pack up and leave because it wasn’t safe for the kids to swim in. We went to a different beach that only had tiny baby waves that were perfectly fine and fun to play in. We also had to go get Covid Tests because you have to have negative tests to be allowed back in the States. They are TOTALLY non-invasive and easy for the kids. We were all negative (as I knew we would be) but it was one more sigh of relief that we knew we could actually come home on time, haha!
Also on Wednesday, Piper chopped 9 inches of her hair off! She’s been going back and forth for months. She finally decided that night that she wanted her hair cut in a foreign country. 🤣 I asked if she wanted to go to a salon and she said no- she didn’t trust them 😆 She wanted me to do it and NO ONE else. So I did! I asked if she wanted layers- no. If she wanted an A-line- NO. If she wanted a bob- no. “Just straight across.” Easy-peasy. And my goodness, she looks adorable! If you’ve ever seen “Blue Crush” just imagine the main character (Kate Bosworth) and that’s what Piper looks like now- even though her hair is short she looks even more like a “surfer chick” than before! She can’t wait to surprise all her friends at school! She’s never cut her hair before- at least not more than maybe 2-3 inches or just a trim. But she’s always had LONG hair. So this is totally new and exciting for her. And she LOVES it!!
Thursday was Thanksgiving and we wanted a Thanksgiving Dinner on the island. It wasn’t fancy at all, and we didn’t have all the ingredients needed for fun/extra decadent food, but we did have a Hen to roast, boxed mashed potatoes to fluff, boxed Stuffing to eat (our favorite kind anyway), and packaged gravy to mix up. As I said- not fancy. No homemade bread or desserts, but enough to fill our bellies! (Side-note: we looked at the pre-made packaged pies in the grocery store and the TINY ones that are only like 4 inches wide were $41!!! CRAZY!) But the chicken was delicious. We had brought a yummy rub with us and Shawn prepped it the night before. We stayed on the Villa property all day so that we could periodically check on the bird while we swam. We had the most relaxing Thanksgiving in the history of all Thanksgivings! Truly! We snorkeled and swam, saw more stingrays, listened to the sound of the ocean as a soundtrack to the day, and then the last hour of swimming took the paddle boards out and played on those for awhile. It was complete bliss. We went around the table talking about the things on the trip that we were most thankful for and really made sure to give thanks for God’s beautiful creation and Shawn’s hard work in getting us there. I’m thankful for a lot of things, but this week I was extra thankful for my baby cakes💘. He not only paid for this dream vacation of ours, but he works hard every single day to provide for our family. We have pretty much everything we need because of him. And also, I’m thankful for the fact that on this vacation he didn’t open his work email even ONCE. He didn’t check voicemail and he didn’t log into anything work related at all; his laptop was left at home!! This is the first vacation in YEARS that he has completely checked-out from work. Usually he will respond to a few emails or phone calls, even on his “off” days. But not this week. We had 8 days of his undivided attention. It has been amazing. He was calm and happy and unstressed. He was fun and patient. He was everything I love about him for 8 solid days! I’m so SO thankful for HIM! I’m sure everyone found many blessings to be thankful for on Thursday. It was truly a very Happy Thanksgiving 🦃
We made it through customs very quickly. We were told that Thanksgiving weekend was nuts so you CAN NOT be there less than 3 hours early. Well we must have hit a wave of calm before the storm because we were checked in and through security within an hour. After we were through and ordered some lunch, we looked out at the masses coming in and knew those people would be waiting for the full 3 hours. It was crazy. At least going through customs on the way out of the airport was air conditioned. And the kids, once again, were amazing.
They were so good all week. ALL WEEK. They did have their screens at night, but not during the day at all. we didn’t buy any candy at ALL for them throughout the week. They had ice cream once but other than that, no sweets. They played in the ocean all day everyday and got along perfectly. There were literally NO BAD DAYS. It was a trip of a lifetime. I’m so, SO sad to leave paradise. I’m sad to go home and deal with the day-to-day grind. I’m sad that the kids no-fighting streak will be coming to an end. I’m sad that they’ll want screens again other than sand and ocean. I’m so sad to leave it all behind. But as I said- we have Christmas to look forward to (and Piper’s birthday) so at least we are leaving a magical place and coming home to a magical season.
