Father's Day

Alright, I have slacked a bunch on the whole blogging thing, which I knew I would. I totally planned on blogging about surviving one month here on the island, but that never happened. I've been so busy with work, cooking, cleaning, and my new calling in church that I haven't had a second to blog. I knew I had to make sure that I blogged today, Father's Day. I want my dad, or Daddio as I like to call him, to know how much I love him. My dad is a pretty awesome man if you didn't already know that. I am grateful for his love and the sacrifice he's made to make sure we had a great childhood. I have amazing memories that I will keep with me forever. He has taught me how to be a hard worker and a good person all through his example. My dad is the most genuine and caring person that I know. He always sees the good in people and I love his zest for life!

Dad, I want you to know that I love you so much and I'm so thankful for the things you have done for me. You are the best!

Definitely one of my favorite pictures from my wedding!

I hope you aren't getting sick of me posting pics of the beach, but let's face it there isn't much else to do on an island! Yesterday we enjoyed Clarke's last Saturday off for a while down at Hull Bay snorkeling.  We saw some cool things we haven't seen before:

A founder fish we stumbled upon. Clarke tried to spear it with a piece of glass.
He didn't even get close to touching it! LOL!

One of the many sunken boats at the bottom of this bay. 

I have no idea what this is, but it was sitting on the boat and it kinda looks like an ocean spider.
Clarke was brave enough to pick it up.

Clarke wanted me to take a picture of him sitting in the boat at the bottom of the ocean.

Tiny little hermit crab. There were thousands of them right by the shore. (please don't  laugh at my pruney fingers!)

These squid were all in a line from biggest to smallest. I'm not sure if they planned that. :-)

The eyes on these things are so big!

The Not So Glamorous Part of Living in Paradise

1 ~ Bugs! We've gotten a control of the cockroaches, but we haven't figured out how to get rid of the mosquitoes!

2 ~ Saharan Dust. I had no idea what this was until it hit us a few days ago. It causes a nasty haze, heat, and allergies. Wikipedia explains it here.

3 ~ Power Outages. It sucks! Need I say more?

4 ~ Crime. I am always thinking about our safety here. Just this week, two police officers and a tourist were shot in separate shootings. It worries me just a bit.

5 ~ Humidity! 90% humidity causes me to be a gross greasy mess. I wash my face at least 3 times a day and I still don't think that is enough.

6 ~ Lack of Friends/Family. I am missing home like crazy. It is so difficult to be so far away from our friends and family.

7 ~ The Cost of Living. I honestly don't know how people afford to live out here. I just can't get over how much groceries, gas, and electricity are!


Is it bad to already be counting down the days until we get to move back to the states even though we don't know when that is?! It has just been a tough week so of course all I can focus on are the bad things. I know that anywhere will have its good and bad. I'm sure that the longer I live here the easier things will be to deal with.  Here's to having a better week!!!

Memorial Day Weekend Part 2

Happy Memorial Day everyone! We had a great weekend off and I hope everyone else did as well! Today we did a little shopping and shopping here means you drive around the whole island to every grocery store until you find which store has what you need. Oh man, do I miss Target and HEB! Anyways, it was fun to drive around and check out parts of the island I haven't been to yet (and will probably never go again). There was one cruise ship in town today.

Sorry for the reflection of Clarke's legs in this one!

We went to walk around the shops at Yacht Haven Grande which is an upscale shopping center right in the harbor where the cruise ships and yachts dock. The yachts that are docked here are amazing! How would it be to own one of those?!

Really? This is too funny:

10 miles per hour is just too fast for this parking lot! We continued our drive around the island in search of a scratching post for our cats (which we never found) and we ended up stopping by Home Depot. Now, everything on the island is scaled down because of the lack of flat ground to build things on, so the Kmarts and other stores are much smaller then you would find in the states. For some weird reason they built this Home Depot super sized! Anyways, we stocked ourselves up on roach killer and bug bombs. We are having a hard time with all of the nasty cockroaches and mosquitoes we have in our house. We came home and locked the cats up in our bedroom and we bug bombed the kitchen/living room. It was a perfect time to head down to the beach while we bombed the house. We have a quiet little beach that is just 5 minutes from our house called Hull Bay.

I love these little blue fish!

We chased around these large school of fish.

That long skinny fish is called a Trumpet fish (the name is totally fitting) and they are super fast!

We were finally able to get a picture of a turtle!

We followed it around for a good half hour! Who knew snorkeling could be such a great workout!

 We are now all beached out, if that is even possible. I hope everyone had a safe holiday and let us remember those who served our country!

My Grandma, Uncle Brett, and Mom at Camp Williams at my Grandpa Clifford's grave.

Memorial Day Weekend Part 1

Is it possible to have too much sun, fun, and beach? Too much sun, yes! It doesn't matter how much sunscreen we slather ourselves with it, we get fried. It must be that our skin is white (go figure) and that the UV index is an 11! But, we did end up having so much fun on the beach! We went over to St John again and stopped by Trunk Bay, which people say is the most beautiful beach in the islands... and it was! It was a little crowded, but still lots of fun. We had our waterproof camera this time and so we were able to catch lots of pics of under the sea. Unfortunately, we didn't see any sting rays or turtles this time. Sorry in advance for the lack of pictures of me. It's hard to take pictures of yourself when you are the photographer! Anyways, get ready for lots of pics!

Best money we ever spent on this cool waterproof cover for our digital camera

On the ferry to St John. The weather was perfect!

I can't control my hair no matter what I do. Clarke's freshly shaven head is about to get sunburned!

Trunk bay which is part of the Virgin Islands National Park.

Trunk Bay. Clarke wouldn't look at me. 

Trunk Bay. The water was like bath water and it was so clear!

They have this cool snorkel trail that had these information plaques to tell you about the sea life.

I had to get at least one picture of me under the water.

This is one of my favorites. I love the shape the fish are making.

Clarke trying to touch the fish but they always seem to escape

I love the red coral.

Clarke chasing a mammoth fish. This picture is deceiving. That fish is at least 3-4 feet long!

This fish kept going around and around chasing the little fish. 

These fish were my favorite. I love their neon blue color!

I'm not sure what this beach is called.

Work. Work. WORK!

I'm pretty lucky that I get to literally roll out of this:

That lump under the covers is our cat Harley (his new hiding spot).

And go straight to work sans makeup and sometimes clothes (I know that is TMI but that is the beauty of working from home. Plus, you wouldn't want to put on clothes too if your office was 85 degrees and 90% humidity!)

The kitchen table was the perfect spot for my desk. I just need to figure out where to put all of my papers!

I love love love being able to work from home! It's such a blessing that I was able to keep my job with my company. I haven't had a melt down out here (yet) and I think it is because I am able to work from home. I think things are going well and I hope I can work like this for the whole time we are out here.

We are going to check out a few beaches around St Thomas this weekend. I'll be sure to take lots of pics! I have my waterproof cover for my digital camera now so I should be able to capture some cool underwater shots!

*Bonus points for anyone that can guess what movie my title to this post is from (something me and my Dad always quote)!

St John = Amazing!

Well my first week here in St Thomas as been pretty uneventful. I have been stuck indoors from Sunday to Friday (due to not having a car, work, and just being terrified of getting out on my own). When Saturday came around I requested we get out and go to the beach! I mean, what else do you do on an island??! So we knew we had to go out to St John which I had heard has some of the most beautiful beaches. I'll just let the pictures do all the talking:

Sitting on the Ferry fixin' (for all my Texas folk) to leave to St John

We chose a really windy day to cross. We were getting rocked by 6 foot waves!

Not sure what bay this was, but isn't it so beautiful!?!

Cinnamon Bay - where we decided to have our lunch and do some snorkeling

Clarke soaking in the sun (we wore sunscreen and we still managed to get sunburned!)

On the ferry back to St Thomas

Leaving St John

I wish I could have taken more pictures. I have an awesome waterproof cover to go over my digital camera that we just received yesterday in a package we shipped three weeks ago. I will be sure to make good use of it. We saw some awesome fish and coral while snorkeling. We even swam with sting rays and sea turtles. It was pretty awesome and a great way to spend a Saturday!