Another Bimini weekend

It started off with a very, very long 6 plus hour delay at the airport for DAP and I. He was on the mend from a stomach virus, so his desire to be super cuddly and sleep on my chest made the wait so much easier to bear.

Our airline decided not to fly and arranged for us (all 6 passengers, lol) to fly with another airline...that flew out of another airport. Transportation was even arranged for us....two of their employees, the mechanic and the check-in guy, were going to drive us to the other airport.

Conviently enough they had a carseat to accomodate my (and Daniel's) special needs. At this point, Justin was having a near melt-down because we were supposed to be in Bimini hours ago and we were being transported by young guys in their personal vehicles.

I wasn't particularly-excited about it either, but after waiting for hours on end, I was determined to get to Bimini on Friday instead of driving two hours home and then two hours back in the morning to catch another flight.

After we were under way with the mechanic I caught a look at his long and dirty fingernails and started to understand the dread in Justin's voice when I was orignially telling him the plan about our ghetto transportation and situation in general. I began thinking to myself that "This is the stuff headlines are made of....."

I felt some sense of security that we had a man, besides the long-fingernailed mechanic, in our car. I asked if he had any kids, and he told me that he had 21 children. I was positively stunned! He looked very young for having 21 kids. I prodded him further and he told me he was 59. Then I had to ask about grandchildren; I was dying to know. He didn't act exactly proud when he told me that he had 69 grandchildren. That was not a typo...he has 69! So, a guy that is 59 with 21 kids and 69 grandkids has to have enough energy to fend off an axe-murderer with long, dirty fingernails, right? That's what I told myself anyway...

We arrived at the other airport and waited there for about 2 hours until we were able to board the plane. Thankfully we arrived in Bimini just before the sun went down.

Everyone was excited to finally have us there, and our arrival calmed a lot of nerves.

Daniel went straight to bed and slept soundly until the morning.

There were awesome thunderstorms with loud, rumbling thunder and bright, blinding lightening that night. The rain continued in the morning, but as soon as it skies cleared we headed out in the boat.

Here's a pic of the boys. Justin, Toby and Daniel (he's thrilled about the life jacket, can't you tell?):

Here's a pic of the little Dapper Doodle with his Daddy! That's Uncle Ben is in the background.

I couldn't resist a posting this pic of DAP's little feetsies! Thanks for the great pic, Toby!

I love the "cheese" in this picture:

That afternoon we headed to the Bimini Big Game Club to try their Goombay Smashes. Very yummy, just ask these 4!

Bright and early Sunday morning Justin, DAP and I headed to church. We love the early morning ferry ride, and the smells on North Bimini in the morning are the best. You can smell breakfast cooking and bread baking....much better than the standard hot-beer-from-the-night-before smell that starts wafting about midday.

Can you see the smile on D's face and the wind in the back of his hair? He enjoys the ferry, and on this particular ride he was dancing to the gospel music that the captain was playing.

When mentioning D's whimpy mood on our departure day, I failed to mention that he got his second tooth that day which contributed to his sad mood! If you look very carefully in the picture below, you can see the new to tooth! He was showing it off before our little adventure to play at the beach.

The fourth of July on South Bimini is a big deal, so are graduations! So on Sunday we put on our party shoes and headed over to a friends house to celebrate their son's graduation from high school. There were so many people and the food was SO GOOD!

Here's a picture of the whole crowd before the party. Justin, D and I are on the left, Uncle Ben in behind D, grandma is next to me, and Toby and Shelly are on the right.

We headed to the fireworks after we left the graduation party and put Daniel to bed. The show was AMAZING! It was a little scary, at times, because they were going off very close to the ground, and a few shot out at the boats anchored up for the show, but other than a few close calls the show went off without a hitch!

We were sad to have to leave the next day. We quietly packed our bags and prepared for the flight home the next morning.

Howard was kind enough to fly us home. He's such a good pilot. His landing was so smooth that D slept right through it!

So, Daniel got another stamp in his passport, and we're hoping that he gets a few more before the summer is over.