critters at the botanical park

this fella roams the park at will...better watch your step!
this guy was on the woodland trail--he seemed dead, that is until Kirky started pulling on his tail!
saw this cute sign as we were walking to our car in the parking lot
and unbelievably...there was an iguana...funny, huh?

Queen Elizabeth Botanical Park

A couple of weeks ago, Kirk and I went to the Queen Elizabeth II Botanical Park here in Cayman. The last time we went there Sage was just a baby! We saw all the growth of the different gardens.
this is a poinsietta (sp?) tree! you know, the Christmas flower!
we call this one the firecracker flower
beautiful water lilies
they were having an orchid sale at the gardens too--this cool guy was for sale
as we were walking into the gardens we heard this really loud squawking and we knew exactly what they were--Cayman parrots! we saw about 6 fly away and there were these two left in the tree

NO...DON'T DO IT!!!!!

Had these guys over for lunch last week.
guess where the missionary on the far left is from? Star Valley, Wyoming...he wore his Star Valley tie JUST FOR US! Jackson and Star Valley are BIG rivals!

Really...the Blow Holes

On our way around the East End loop we visited the Blow Holes.
big
bigger
front row audience
BIGGEST!

Blow Holes

Blow Holes

Wreck of the Ten Sails

Took the girls to lunch at Portofino's on East End and then continued around the loop.
Went to the Wreck of the Ten Sails Monument
Giant propeller of the Ten Sail
Bottoms Up...
Face Front!

Henna

Maya got a henna kit for Christmas and was giving everyone a henna
Maya and Sage's henna
Mari's "stash" !
Mom's bracelet

Before and After...

Before...the sun is so potent here it fades everything so fast.

During...

After!! A beautiful new house sign!

Quiz Time!

Guess who's going to BYU next year?

It's this cute girl! Way to go Mari...we love you!

S'mores at Sunset

I have always wanted to make s'mores on the beach, so we dug a hole out on the beach and put some charcoal in it and ta da...you have an instant fire pit. It was challenging to roast the marshmellows with these short skewers, but we did it and enjoyed s'mores! We also enjoyed a beautiful sunset at the same time!

Kara's here!!!

Kara flew in on Wednesday afternoon and will stay and play over President's Weekend. The girls are excited to have her here, especially Lea, who has her all to herself while the rest of the gang "goes to school". They hang out at the pool and Kara has even taken Lea out on the waverunner for a little ride. Check out how dark Lea is compared to Kara. She's turned into quite the local.

Flowers

Thought I'd show you the flowers in my garden. We have a beautiful yard/garden here at my home in the Cayman Islands. I also have the hottest gardener on the island!

Rain is falling all around...

Last night we had a wonderful rain storm right after dinner. The wind was coming from a different direction than it normally does and it blew over our Hobie Cat sailboat. It's never done that before! Having a rainstorm was a breath of fresh air....it's so normally hot here that it cools things down. Another advantage is that it fills our cisterns with much needed water. What is a cistern, you ask? Well, it's a large concrete holding usually situated under your house that holds water to use in your house. No, we did not have city water until about a year or two ago. We used to have to buy water and a truck would deliver it to your house and deposit it into your cistern for your household use. Did we drink it? NO. We buy bottled water for drinking. So, when it rains, we are HAPPY. Why? We don't have to buy water! And yes, it's expensive!! But now we have city water too, so we don't have water trucks deliver to us anymore. But getting FREE water from a wonderful rainstorm....EXCELLENT! So, here's a photo of our little rainstorm.

Groundhog Day!!!!

I don't know what Groundhog Day means to you...but after yesterday and all the fiasco's we had, it definately has new meaning for us...especially Kirk. He just kept saying "it's not my day"! And after I tell you his story, you'll know why. The day started beautiful...flat and calm waters, so instead of school in the morning, he took the girls snorkeling. Then he took them boating to the other side of the island. That was the good part of the day. When they left the dock, they put a hose in a trash can and was filling it up with water, BUT they forgot about it. I walked out to the pool @ 10 am and heard water just running into the bay! Later in the day, we had mirror installed in the bathroom off the kitchen. Well, "someone" was screwing the light fixtures back onto the mirror and well, yes, you guessed it....CRACK! Ok, so we're having everyone's favorite for dinner...tacos. After dinner, Kirk goes to check his cistern project where he is pumping out of one cistern and putting into another one....well...YES, the hose had come out of the one getting the water and it was running into my game room! Some of us were sweeping water away from the house, others were grabbing towels and soaking up the water...IT WAS A MESS AND A NIGHTMARE! "Someone" kept saying that it just wasn't his day. I would concur. How was your day?

Sunrise, Sunset...swiftly go the years...

We brought the DVD of "Fiddler on the Roof" to Cayman and spent two nights watching it. Since then, we walk around the house singing various songs from the movie. My kids now realize that the songs are from "Fiddler". Anyway, Cayman sunsets are BEAUTIFUL, but this morning as I was out walking, I had to quickly walk back to the house and get my camera to get a picture of the sunrise which was MAGNIFICENT this morning. Enjoy.