MEXICO!

Soooo my husband is pretty great! Actually really really awesome! He is such a hard worker and is very driven by his work (in a healthy way). He finds passion and fulfillment in providing for his family and pushes himself through work by setting personal goals and working toward them. I love his passion and drive! This last year he made President's Club at his work which pretty much means you are hitting your numbers and quota each quarter (which is super hard to do at AtTask.. they set their quotas high!). President's Club this year was at an all-inclusive resort near Playa Del Carmen, Mexico. It was the Iberostar Grand Paraiso Resort (rated #1 in the world for all-inclusive resorts). We had a blast having a week-long vacation to ourselves (no kids allowed at this resort so you didn't even hear kids crying, talking, yelling, etc.) It was so relaxing and amazing! We have some good friends that we have met through AtTask so it was fun to play with them and I think it was especially nice for Spencer to see his friends again since he doesn't see them everyday at the office anymore.

My mom came out to New York while we were gone and took care of Charley for the week. They both had so much fun and Charley grew to love her Gramma B! My mom said Charley was perfect the whole week and would wake up happy from her naps and hardly ever cried! Thank you mom for taking care of Charley! They went to the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens one day and my mom bought her books and wrote in them telling her of the time she came and stayed with her! So sweet!

Here are some pictures she sent while we were away. 

On a side note- when we got home and Charley saw us for the first time in a week, she started crying! It was actually really sad because on the plane home we were imaging how she would squeal and smile when she saw us! Well this was not the case.. she started to bawl her eyes out and didn't stop until we gave her back to my mom!:) So sad..

So back to Mexico..  I left a 4 page note for my mom about Charley's schedule, a fridge full of food and a freezer full of breast milk and we left for Mexico! 

 

Our first morning we ordered room service for breakfast. 

The rooms were always so pretty with flower pedals, chocolates and our clothes folded neatly back in our suitcase. 

 Our vacation was perfect because we had such a good mix of relaxing by the beach and also having fun doing some cool adventures. When we weren't relaxing at the beach or pool sipping on dirty monkey's (chocolate milk and banana smoothie) we golfed, went snorkeling, went to mayan ruins, swam in a cenote, went into Playa Del Carmen and ate some real authentic food and did a little shopping. 

My first time golfing! 

 Ah I just love the beach! 

Going to dinner one night. You had to dress pretty nice to go into some of the restaurants. 

Our pretty resort.

 One day we took a bus with quite a few people to the mayan ruins and did an LDS tour called Alma Tours. It was really cool and very interesting. I LOVE going to ruins and learning about people that used to live there and how they lived. I think it's fascinating. We went to two different ruins, the first was Tulum. When we started walking into the ruins at Tulum, Spencer said that the place looked familiar and asked if we had come here on our honeymoon cruise. I told him no way and that we weren't in that part of Mexico... but sure enough right when we walked in we recognized the ruins and we realized we came to Tulum on our honeymoon! So crazy! But still so neat and we learned a lot more this time since we had a tour guide. 

 Before going into sacred places, the people would put their hands on the stone. You can see their red hand-marks on the outside of the temple. 

 Can you see the baby holding onto his umbilical cord wrapped around him? 

Here we are in 2014...

 Here we are in 2011

 They used to play games with trying to get a homemade ball into the cement hoop. SO COOL! Sometimes the winner would be sent to the God's (die), and sometimes the loser would be sent to the God's... eee doesn't sound like a fun game to me! 

Next we went to Coba and got bikes to go around these ruins since they are 40 square miles. We biked to this cool ruin that has just about a million stairs that you get to climb up. It was pretty steep but fun to get to the top and see the whole valley around you. I tell you, those Mayans knew what they were doing. 

 To top off the day, we went to a cenote! It's this cool underground water hole that you can swim in. It's super clear and fresh water too. This cenote had some balconies that you could jump off into the water. It felt amazing after a HOT day in the sun. 

 Another day we went snorkeling at Akumal Bay and say turtles! So cool! 

 So my friend Ashley and I saw so many Europeans posing for pictures.. you know you have seen it- the no smile, awkward stance, sexy look.. well we tried our American best to bring this pose to the states.. try it out next time your at the beach, you won't regret it!:) 

One of the last days we were there, we went into Playa Del Carmen and did a little shopping and ate some real authentic Mexican food. The tacos were amazing!! We were also serenaded by these cool guys! 

 This horchata was HUGE!! 

 Oh Mexico you were too good to us! Let do it again soon!