Week 188 motherhood – cruising continued, 16 months old, home sweet home

Walking the buffet every day after she’s done eating

Week 188 motherhood with 3.5 year old and 16 month old.

April 18 to 24, 2024:

Baby girl turned 16 months old on the cruise! Walking and waving with hands in the air, so joyful and happy, smiling all day, ready to eager to explore all the time. Likes to high five and wave. When eating something she doesn’t like, she will spit out everything from her mouth all at once. Splat!
April 18: Day 5 of the cruise: Every day, we are so used to loading the kids into the stroller now to go to breakfast. The older one has showed an interest in sitting in the front part of the seat so we put the younger one in the back where it’s actually meant for an older sibling. She was able to hold on to the bars though and it worked.
Today was port day at “Perfect Day at Coco Cay”. How smart of Royal Caribbean to name their private island this name lol. Beautiful blue waters and bright sunny day. This place had a waterpark with rides and lunch served too. It was bright and sunny. The 16 month old still didn’t want to wear her sunglasses or sat.
We grabbed some food first when we got to the island. As usual, we disembarked from the ship pretty late. Actually, I was unnerved because one of the female servers asked me during our breakfast, “You’re not going off the ship today?” Me thinking “Umm?!? ” I said, “Yes, we are. We’re going after breakfast!” Geez. It grinded my gears because instead of assuming something about us, she could have asked instead. A simple, “Are you going to the island?” or “What are your plans today?” would have been more appreciated.
Anyway, so when we got to the island, it was around 1:30 p.m. The older child wanted some ice cream and she did have some. Both kids played in the white sand for a bit. It was a new experience for them. I had a Cuban sandwich and guacamole too from the served lunch before they started closing it around 3 p.m. Then we got them changed and played in the water park. It was a really nicely built water park. Clean. There was a big water bucket that would fill up and then dump out its contents on the people under it. It was really fun. There were some water slides too but our kids are too young to go on them.
The 3 year old looked so “taan” (relaxed) sitting on the chairs and drinking her drink. She wasn’t too into the sprinklers. Meanwhile, the little one looked like a “wet water chicken” (“sup shui gei”/濕水雞) from playing in the water haha.
We returned to the ship around 4 p.m. and rested on our balcony before dinner. The 16 month old was of course tired from all the water play and passed out in my arms. It is nice this way because I actually get to eat — well, all of us get to eat — without being disturbed or having to cater to the younger one. The older one eats well in her own seat or one of our laps for the most part.
April 19: Day 6 of the cruise: Sea day. Woke up naturally at 6 a.m. and decided to peek out the balcony to look at the sunrise. It was so beautiful. Sat out there to use my phone for a bit before retreating back indoors where the wifi was lol.
The 16 month old loves walking off after breakfast to explore around. All the staff love interacting with her. She enjoys washing her hands a lot too and she likes to throw the used paper towel in the garbage herself too.
We had the soft serve ice cream again on the deck and also watched some of the international belly flop contest. The 3 year old was quite interested in it and we walked up to the upper deck to see what was going on. We went for pizza at the pizzeria. DH and I ordered two alcoholic cocktails from the bionic bar — from the robot bartender! This was fun. The cocktails tasted pretty good too. I got the “Pure NRG” drink while he got the “Liquid Marijuana”. Both were green-toned. We watched a bit of the bingo on the screen at the two-70 venue.
For dinner, it was the second “formal night” again. However, it was more a “dress to impress” night and so people were less dressed to the nines. So lucky to get a really good server finally in the American Icon restaurant! This was the only server who was easy to understand, listened to what we needed, and exemplified what good service on a cruise should be like. He deshelled our lobsters for us too.
We sat on our balcony afterwards for some photos and to enjoy the view.
Had to visit the buffet after dinner again. I had their “ramen” because I was curious to try it but it’s definitely not authentic. It was just thick “shanghai” noodles repurposed in soup and stir-fry ingredients. Even the older child didn’t like the noodles because they were so thick.
April 20: Day 7 of the cruise: Sea day. Spotted the beautiful sunrise at 6:30 a.m. again from our balcony. SO many people at breakfast time today. We had to get a table all the way at the end of the ship. Not sure why it was so packed. Last sea day.
We found a rubber duck near the theatre by chance finally. We dined at the specialty restaurant, Izumi, for Japanese food. Went to two-70 again to rest. Had our final hot dog from the hot dog stand — a chicken apple dog which I wasn’t a big fan of because it was sweet. Watched the sports centre host the bumper cars — so cool.
For dinner, we were lucky to get back to the American Icon dining room where we were served by the nice Wendel server again. So glad. Again, the baby passed out in my arms. We splurged our final room credits to get a lobster dinner each and they gave us free champagne in exchange. Grandma used her final credits to order an alcoholic-free cocktail from the robot bartender. We used some more final credits to buy some stuff from the gift shop. Packed and loaded!
The 16 month old was so rambunctious that she wanted to walk everywhere by herself and didn’t want to be held back. She wanted to go up the elevators and kept directing us to push the buttons. I remember there was one point where she was walking towards the theatre and a show must have just finished because there were hoards of people walking towards us. One person commented, “I’m surprised it’s not running!” Well, first of all, how rude to refer to my daughter as a “it”. It’s a human, not a thing. And secondly, this little human is just not afraid of anyone or crowds.
We also determined during the trip that this little person is an extrovert which is definitely a new thing for me. The rest of us are all introverts!
The 3 year old chose to eat mac and cheese four out of the seven nights we were on the cruise. The first day, she finished the entire bowl and didn’t even anyone anything to try. She didn’t clear the bowl the other three nights but still impressive she wanted to eat it again and again.
April 21: On the last day of the cruise, day 8, everyone had to leave our rooms by 8 a.m. and disembark from the ship by 10 a.m. Breakfast that day ended at 8:30. We set our alarms for 6 a.m. to get to breakfast in time and eat. There were actually less people than the day prior. I guess some people had already decided to get breakfast early and leave the ship. I didn’t even choose that many items to fill myself up anymore. Most of the breakfast items were the same and I think we were tired of eating the same things every day. In hindsight, the smart thing would have been to eat a lot that morning so we could fuel up and drive for a long time before stopping.
We disembarked from the ship, said our good-byes, found our car in the parking lot (yay — safe and sound), and drove to the hotel where we tried once more to find our lost bottle of omega-3s. Unfortunately, they once again said they couldn’t find it.
We then started our 4 hour drive towards the hotel. In between, we stopped at Olive Garden for lunch. This was a great idea for me because I passed out so hard after lunch from all of the heavy carbs but not the best idea for DH because he was the one driving. I slept so well and snored so loudly too in the car. The kids were either sleeping or snacking during the ride. I’m glad that we don’t have to bring extra activities for the kids to stay entertained during the ride. Look out the window should be entertainment enough. That’s what we did as 90s kids anyway.
At night, we went to Applebees for dinner. Crazy that even a simple salad can have so many calories in the states. The older one got to order her favourite mac and cheese kid’s meal with applesauce and a bottle of milk again. She is so used to ordering her own meal now.
April 22: On our drive home from the states, we woke up at 7 a.m. I was the first one up and everyone else was still sleeping. By the time everyone was up and we were eating breakfast, it was already 9 a.m. and by the time we were on the road, it was 10 a.m. In hindsight, we should have woke up at 6 a.m. and went on the road earlier. 7 a.m. was not early enough and the kids weren’t tired enough. They didn’t sleep once we started driving. They didn’t pass out which wasn’t a good thing. It was 2 hours and 15 minutes to Trader Joes. I was surprised we spent an hour there — our first time making a big shopping haul at this popular U.S. store. The 3 year old kept going for seconds and thirds at the crispy chocolate chip cookie samples. We spent $133 which is actually not bad at all. We then crossed the border and ate lunch at Arby’s — finally!
Another thing in hindsight is that we should have just ordered the food and ate in the car and started driving back. By the time we started the car after dining in, it was around 3 p.m. There was some wait time at the border and when we started driving towards the supermarkets for some Flashfood pickups, it was 3:30 and well into rush hour traffic. Sigh. My original plan was to hit up the liquidation warehouse since it was a Monday, but the kids were restless and couldn’t sleep. The younger one was wailing and we decided to stop at a playground to get them out and walking a bit. Thus, we couldn’t make the warehouse in time (even if we didn’t stop, we would have arrived right at the closing time).
But alas, we made it home. So glad I was able to pick up some essentials like bananas, vegetables, yogurt, and we ate some ready-to-eat items that night. Home sweet home. And we did it! We did a road trip and 7-day cruise with the two kids. Yay!
It’s always hot and cold with the 2 kids. On a good day and moment, the older one will feed the younger one with care and patience. She likes peeling the hard boiled eggs and then putting the egg yolk in water and feeding it to her sister. It’s also because she doesn’t like the yolk part that she likes to give it away. She will go between periods of saying “I don’t like my sister” to “I like my sister”. I just hope they will grow up playing together and have a loving relationship where they trust and rely on each other for life.
The older one likes to share bananas with her sister where she will ask me to cut the banana in two. She gets the part with the rounded end and the one with the stem will be for her sister.
We attended week 3 of the Playful Math program. This time, there were so many more kids and adults than week 1! I was so glad because week 1 was a bit awkward with just 4 sets of families. It felt like a regular EarlyON program with all the kids there. However, my child still clung to DH very firmly. She enjoyed the sensory play with the kinetic sand, scales, and nature items like acorns though. I really liked that during circle time, the facilitators sang a lot of new math songs. I’d have to hear them again to remember them.
My friend told me about a parenting book she is reading because she wants to get better at dealing with her son’s tantrums and whining. She sent me a screenshot of the chapter summaries and I’ve been applying the technique too. Instead of always yelling and talking sternly whenever she is misbehaving, I’ve been lightening up my voice and talking softly to her instead. It seems to be working. I don’t want to yell at her all the time… This is the kind of parenting my mom did to me when I was a child, but I don’t want it to continue.