In January, we went on a cruise from Fort Lauderdale.  Here we are beforehand.

We visited the Fort Lauderdale Science Museum, and the whole family got to try a simulated space mission.  Here Ramey is getting strapped in, then completing some steps of her mission.

Here are Ramey and Ari relaxing on the beach in Ft. Lauderdale before the cruise.

Eli operating a robot in the science museum, while Randy and Ari watch.

Ramey and the kids watching turtles.

Here is a picture of our ship.  It held about 3000 passengers.  The kids were really excited...

When we first left, the weather wasn’t very good.  But it got nicer after a day.  Here is Ramey relaxing on the cruise ship once the weather cleared up.

We all enjoyed the 4-course dinners every night, where the kids could order what they wanted, but not from a child’s menu.  Here is the view out the window of the dining room.

And here Randy and Ramey are enjoying a quiet lunch without the kids.

The ship had a climbing wall built on the back.  Here Ramey is climbing the wall.

And Eli...

The housekeeping staff would turn down our sheets, give us mints, and make animals out of our towels every evening when we got back from dinner.

Here are Randy and Ramey dressed up for dinner one night.

Exploring Key West on a shore excursion.

The ship also had a bungee jumping / trampoline that we all did several times.  It was a real workout!  Here’s Randy jumping.

And Ramey, doing a back flip, showing off as the former gymnast.

Click here for a video of Ari doing a double back flip, of course showing off as the more recent and younger former gymnast.  Unfortunately we taped it with the camera on its side to get the height, and now I can’t figure out how to rotate it.  Simple low-tech solution: tilt your head!

Here’s Ari on the beach at Coco Cay, our other shore excursion, in the Bahamas.  I used a snorkel to beat away several young guys.

Eli was a veritable fish, except that he had to use a snorkel and mask instead of gills.  We collected about 20 shells that we found before we found out that we couldn’t take them out of the water, so we had to take them back and re-distribute them.  We also saw some weird creature looking out at us from a rock - an octopus?

Randy and Ari looking slightly less cool than Eli, getting ready to snorkel.

Kissing swan towels when we got back from the Coco Cay shore excursion.

We ate so much that Ari took it upon herself to do hundreds of ab exercises every day.  Like she needed it - she should have forced all the rest of us to do them.

By the end of the trip, we were all going a little stir crazy on the ship, even though it was only a four-day cruise.  It was fun, but cruising isn’t really our thing.