August Jamaica Trip! Part III: Photo Shoot on the Beach!

In addition to all the water activities we enjoyed while at Beaches, we also had fun doing a family photo shoot on the beach!  (Okay in all honesty, it is more stress than fun, but we definitely enjoy the beautiful pictures we have to look back on.  They only bring happy memories!)

We also had some photos in our package of other memories made on our trip:

August Jamaica Trip! Part II: Sea Turtle Conservation Excursion!

While in Jamaica, we stayed at our resort the entire time except for a sea turtle conservation excursion we took one afternoon.  The whole family enjoyed and appreciated this experience more than words can describe.  The conservation effort was led by a British researcher who moved to Jamaica 16 years ago to follow the sea turtles.  His team's efforts have saved the lives of thousands of sea turtles from being hunted by the locals (eggs and adults alike).  The local men follow adult female sea turtles at night when they come ashore to lay their eggs (they can lay up to 200 eggs at a time) and hunt them and their eggs for meat and because it is considered a sign of power and manhood in their culture.

The research team saves the eggs by hiding the nests until hatch time and then releases many nests' baby turtles at one time.  These baby turtles then make it out to sea (where half survive the journey to the deep) and then the females come back to the same beach decades later to lay their eggs!  The day we witnessed the conservation effort, we released 52 baby sea turtles into the ocean (the smallest release they have had in a while).  Two days before, they released 432!  Just imagine!

We all got to wash our own sea turtle in the ocean water and bring them back to their nest so they could crawl out to sea by themselves!  It was so surreal and interactive, like nothing we've ever experienced before.  Even the boys took care of their own baby sea turtle, and appreciated it so much!  We were so fortunate to have such an amazing experience, and being a huge animal lover myself, I especially appreciated witnessing this phenomenon occurring in it's natural environment!  The boys were so mesmerized as well.  They couldn't stop raving about it even after our vacation!  Arjun even thanked Jai Jai Bhagwan for the sea turtles all on his own during prayers that night and for several nights after.  It was so sweet!  I'm pretty sure the sea turtle excursion was their favorite activity of our entire trip!

Sea Turtle Nest

Krish's Sea Turtle

Arjun's Sea Turtle

Washing our sea turtles

Releasing Sea Turtles 

August Jamaica Trip! Part I: Beaches Ocho Rios!

This summer, we went on an amazing vacation to Jamaica!  The whole family had been anticipating it since July.  We all couldn't wait for our trip, especially Arjun who loves flying in planes and visiting new places!  He has been a little jet-setter ever since our trip to Oman!

Arjun excited to see our airplane!

On the way to our resort!

In Jamaica, we stayed at Beaches Ocho Rios, a family-friendly all-inclusive resort which, in addition to beach and pool activities, included live entertainment for children from the Sesame Street gang of characters!  The boys absolutely loved this aspect of our resort, and we have never seen them so enthusiastic and happy!  It was one of our best trips to date, and we can't wait to have another similar vacation experience!

We stayed in Jamaica for seven days, and every day was completely relaxing.  It was the perfect vacation for Daddy too, who lives a fast-paced lifestyle while balancing work and family life.  During our time there, we felt like we were in our "vacation home" as the staff was so friendly and hospitable.  Various staff members came to know us by name, and they would even offer to take Krish to the restroom for us if we were in the middle of a meal!  Now that's paradise!

Every day, we would wake up in the morning, have a buffet breakfast, go swimming in the resort pools or head straight to the beach for a swim or boating activities.  After our morning water experience, we would eat lunch at one of the restaurants and head back to our room for Arjun's nap and a wind down.  That's when Krish enjoyed playing a board game with Daddy and Momma.  In the evening, we would explore our resort and enjoy some Sesame Street character activities at the Kids Camp.  Then we'd head for dinner at one of five restaurant options and end the evening with a live Sesame Street stage performance and family show.  One evening we even celebrated Jamaica's Independence Day with a special Emancipendence parade and celebration!  We stayed at our resort the entire trip except for a sea turtle conservation excursion we took one afternoon which the boys absolutely loved!

Photo collages and videos of the awesome activities we enjoyed at our resort!

Enjoying the nightly Sesame Street live stage
performances as a family!

The boys' favorite Sesame Street jams!

Super Grover's Super Science Fair,
glass bottom boat tour,
playing croquet,
and sliding down the big tube slides!

Arjun fascinated by the air hockey table in the kid's lounge,
Jamaica's Emancipendence Day celebration,
Daddy taking the boys kayaking,
Daddy and I on the shuttle to our resort!

Krish sporting Momma's vacation hat at Breakfast,
Krish and Arjun meeting Super Grover at his Science Fair,
Daddy and Arjun loving the tube slide,
Arjun giving Elmo a hug at Elmo & Abby's Tea Party!

Jamaica's Emancipendence Day Parade,
Daddy and Momma on the beach,
Krish watching his coconut, nutella crepe being made,
Arjun enjoying his daily helping of a soft-serve ice cream cone!

Fun on the beach! Momma in the kayak and Daddy on the
paddle board!

Glass-bottom boat tour,
Chocolate chip cookie baking with Cookie Monster,
Science experiment with Ernie,
and Momma and Krish on the Banana boat ride!

Krish enjoying one of the resort pools,
view of the island from the glass-bottom boat,
enjoying family time and nightly Sesame Street show,
Daddy and Arjun having fun in the big pool!

Lounging and playing games!
Momma taught Krish how to play pool!

Daddy and boys playing in the "ring of fire" as they called it
with "magic dust" (sand),
Krish meeting Oscar after Oscar's mini performance,
Arjun sporting Momma's hat,
boys helping Daddy build his very first sand castle ever!

More pictures!

Glass-Bottom Boat!

Daddy teaching Arjun croquet!

Krish making a beautiful tropical island painting in Kid's Camp!

Krish and Elmo!

Beautiful view overlooking the ocean from
Neptune's mediterranean restaurant!

More science experiments testing objects that float
and sink with Zoey!

Daddy and Momma on the beach!

Daddy about to dig into his delicious,
spinach, mushroom & gruyere
savory crepe at Josephine's Creperie!

Beautiful view from Venetian rooftop restaurant!

In addition to the resort activities,
a huge thing Arjun and Krish loved about
this vacation was sleeping in the bunkbed
style double pull-out bed setup in our
family suite! Arjun especially got spoiled
sleeping family-style with all of us in one
bedroom!

Arjun Loves Sweets!

The one thing I have not been keeping up with on my blog is documenting Arjun's developments as much as I documented Krish's when he was younger.  Arjun is growing up so quickly, and his vibrant and sassy personality allows for so much cuteness to be shared!  One of Arjun's favorite things we have noticed for a long time now is sweets!  Of course any child would love them, and we were so strict with Krish when he was younger that we never witnessed some of the things we have seen now.

In addition to loving the actual act of baking with Momma, he loves our KitchenAid stand mixer obsessively, and all baked goods and sweets ranging from brownies, cookies, and cake to doughnuts!

One of Daddy's favorite bonding activities with Arjun is taking him out for doughnuts on Saturday mornings.  Despite Momma's protests, they have actually kept up with this tradition on and off for several months now.  I want to say it started back in January of this year when we discovered Arjun's love for the gooey, yummy treats!  His favorite are chocolate iced doughnuts with rainbow sprinkles.  He especially loves the sprinkles!

Here is an early video from January when we first discovered Arjun's love for doughnuts!

His love for sprinkles has even spread to sprinkled cookies!  Here is a video from this past July.

Going back in time...

Since I've recently undertaken a massive project of cleaning off my phone and computer (both crashed recently), I've come across many meaningful memories I never got a chance to share on my blog.  So I may be going back in time a bit, but I would love to document our family experiences here and get up to date all at the same time!

Something Krish Accomplished Last Spring...

...Learning how to ride a two-wheeler!  It was such a proud moment for Daddy and Momma!  Although we haven't been out riding since then (Texas summer months), we are totally ready to get back on our bikes again this fall!

As Krish was helping me clean off my phone and computer, we came across this hidden gem which completely inspired him! Our little boy is growing up so fast!

May 2015

Krish's Pre-K End-of-the-Year Play: ONE

Things have definitely picked up and become busy this last month of summer!  Although I can't wait to blog about our amazing Jamaica vacation at the beginning of this month, I have recently been cleaning off my computer and phone and came across all these wonderful memories from this past school year I just had to post.  Before Krish's Kindergarten year and Arjun's first year in school begins next week, I have to share some memorable moments from this past year first!

Krish's Pre-K year at Greenhill School was absolutely amazing, and we all just fell in love with the school.  They did a lot of special things in their class, and we are all very excited about his upcoming year in Kindergarten!  Towards the end of the year, their class performed a play of the storybook, One during their Week of the Young Child celebration, and all the parents were invited to their music hall to watch.

All the kids were absolutely adorable, and it was such a treat to see them singing and performing together and catch a glimpse of what they do in class everyday.  Krish loves watching this video, and it's so sweet to see how excited he gets while watching himself and his friends perform!

After the play, the kids took the parents to explore their labyrinth project, a structure they all built together as a class by laying one brick at a time, and it almost looked like the parents were having more fun than the kids walking through the giant maze!

We can't wait to see what the next year in school has in store for Krish!