Cancun trip 5 of 5

On our last day in Mexico, we went down south to Playa Del Carmen and went on a ATV tour through the jungle. So fun! We were the only ones on the tour, so we had a private tour guide. While in the jungle, we saw some men with large knives and guns! They waved us on.

After the ride, our tour guide took us snorkeling in a cenote (a cave, partly filled with water, with an opening above). Thanks, in part, to my open water training for triathlons, I could relax and enjoy it. Last year, something like this would have been impossible with the anxieties I was dealing with. It was such a neat experience. We saw cool cave formations, fish, a turtle (the tour guide had never seen one there before) and some bats. They flew right over our heads. The water felt wonderful after the hot, dusty ride.

After the tour, we ate at a wonderful Thai restaurant. Then we went over to the beach. The view from this lighthouse was so pretty. After a walk along the beach, we walked down the main street of the town. There were some fun things to see. Ken got friendly with a bronze mexican. We saw some more ruins, did some shopping, sat by a pretty fountain, and saw some interesting street entertainers. After that, we went to a restaurant that was down in a cave! We had another amazing day.

The trip home was long, but we continued to enjoy just being together. We're so glad we decided to get our teeth fixed in Mexico!

Cancun trip 4 of 5

After attending the Cancun ward, we went back to the island called Isla Mujeres and spent the day exploring it. It was such a beautiful place. We rented a scooter to get around.

The water was so blue. We just kept marveling at the beauty. We got several people to take our picture, so we were in a lot of them together on this day. We thoroughly enjoyed spending so much time together on this trip. Ken is so much fun to be with.

I loved this lighthouse. The view from the top was amazing!

We also toured an interesting cemetery, saw some ruins, drank from a coconut, saw a house that looked like a seashell, walked along the beach and napped on some lounge chairs.

Watching the sun set at the Sunset Grill was one of my favorite things we did. The food was great (we had a mexican burger) and the atmosphere was so relaxing and exotic. Such a great way to end the day!

Cancun trip 3 of 5

On day 3, we went back to the dentist, making it 8 hours in the dentist's office all together. The first set of temporary teeth were crooked, so we had to go back and get new ones. The second ones were straight. After the dentist, we took a ferry to an island called Isla Mujeres to go snorkeling. It was a cool experience.

There were a ton of iguanas at the beach club we went to. We had some fun with them.

When we went back to the mainland, we drove over to the main tourist area in Cancun to buy some vanilla. On the way, we saw a chimpanzee hanging out of the window of a van! We saw a lot of other interesting animals on our trip: two huge snakes, a black panther, two cockroaches (one flew into the shower with me!), bats, a turtle, a gecko, a dead terrantula, a huge grasshopper and some cute little monkeys.

We went to a mall (where this picture was taken) and saw some pretty interesting things, including a trapeze show. Haagen Daz tried to sell us one scoop of ice cream for $7! When the sun went down, we had a glimpse of Cancun night life. Pretty wild. No wonder Cancun means "serpent's nest".

Cancun trip 2 of 5

We spent most of the 1st day at the dentist. On the second day, we went to Chichen Itza, some Mayan ruins. In the Chichen Itza park, there was this beautiful cenote (sink-hole). Those are roots growing down to the water. We weren't told that we were going there, so we didn't bring our swimsuits. It was already hot at 10:00 am, so we wished we would have known. It ended up being 100 degrees that day, with 90% humidity!

The main temple at Chichen Itza was pretty amazing. Twice a year, the sun creates an illusion of a snake slithering down the steps. This is one of the reasons this temple is one of the 7 wonders of the world.

There were many other ruins close to the temple. The reason they have not been destroyed after all of these centuries is because they don't have earthquakes on the Yucatan Peninsula. Many descendants of the Mayans still live nearby. They fed us at a restaurant, danced for us and tried pretty hard to sell us all kinds of things.

We left our camera in a taxi the night before, so we bought a disposable camera at the ruins. We couldn't check to see that this "holding up Chichen Itza" picture is a little off. We were hot, in pain from dental work, had to drive for almost 5 hours all together, but it was all worth it. Such an interesting day.

Cancun Trip 1 of 5

We needed about $10,000 in dental work done, so we decided to go have it done for half price in Mexico. They took x-rays and confirmed that I needed to replace two loose teeth with implants. I was pretty traumatized by the experience of them pulling out my teeth and screwing metal posts into my bone. I was in pain for several days. Fortunately, we had a lot of activities to distract me from the pain.

Ken succeeded in getting me to smile with my toothless smile. It looks so funny!

That huge number on the receipt is in pesos. We got $7,000 worth of work done and we spent $3,500. We spent about $3,000 on the trip, so we came out ahead. I need to do the second part of the implant process in a few months, for another $3,000. Fun.

Strauss Festival

We love the Strauss Festival! I have 11 family members who have been in a Strauss Festival. I'm sure that's a record. I feel like listing them. Camille, Amber, Joel, Ken, Kathy, Kon, Sheryl, Mike (well, I was related to him at the time), Karen, Amanda, and Devin. Sheryl is in this picture and Devin was in the polka troupe again this year.

Camille, Rachel and Ben sat on our blanket with us, along with our friends the Worthingtons- Lauren, Mitchell, Kristen and Sean.

Elizabeth wanted to make shirts that said "I love Strauss", but we convinced her to just make labels and stick them onto white shirts.

Natalie, Nick and Kate all fell asleep. Ken, Camille and I each carried one of them to the car when it was over.

East Lawn races

Natalie and Nick ran their first race! Natalie ran the whole 1/2 mile. She got second place for the girls. That's pretty good, considering she got carsick on the way to the race and threw up. Her number is pinned high because they didn't have any more clean shirts for her to change into, if you're understanding what I'm saying. Nick fell down during the race, but got right back up and only stopped to walk for a "few seconds". They were thrilled to get their medals.

Elizabeth ran in the race for her age group and ran the whole way. They were pretty exhausted afterwards.

Ken ran and tried to beat my fastest time. The key word there is "tried". He almost did it, so I'd better step it up. This is the first race that I had been to that I hadn't been participating in. It was relaxing to just sit and watch everyone push themselves. Ha ha. I, actually, was planning to run it, but I wasn't quite recovered from a nasty 5 weeks of pneumonia. I was proud to cheer on my athletes.

Sophie

We got a dog! It's pet central around here with the rat, the cat and now the dog. My friend's mom wanted to give little Sophie to a family that could give her more attention. She has certainly gotten that. She is a Shi-Tzu Maltese. The kids are loving her and Ken and I are already pretty attached. She's so cute, we forgive her right away for her bad behaviors. As I'm typing this, one of her messes has been discovered. She is doing better, though. Today, she has diarreah from some gum that we found out she ate. Ha ha! TMI! (too much information) We love her, anyway.

Kate's Birthday

Kate celebrated her 4th birthday with a princess party. Her friends that came were her cousin Rachel, Katie Moore, Mazzy Barker, Katie Thygerson, and Violet Summerhays. They pinned a kiss on a frog, played musical magic carpets, decorated crowns, and hunted for Cinderella's slipper. The little girls were so cute. Kate enjoyed being the center of attention.

Nick's six!

For Nick's sixth birthday, he wanted a dirt cake with worms on it. He wanted to go jump at a big trampoline place called Sky Zone. He was excited to get a Zhu Zhu pet from his friend Max Summerhays. Noah Bitter also joined him for his birthday fun.

Camping

The Penner Family reunion was held at a campground south of Monterey. Ken and I felt awful and we mostly just sat in the quarantine section and watched everything that was going on. The kids had a blast with their cousins. Amber made them all "Cousin Power" capes that the kids just loved. In this picture, the kids were having a relay race- one of the many activities that Amber organized. By the way, the relay race did not involve taking off clothes. I'm not sure what Kate is doing.

Penner reunion

Even though Ken and I were sick with a pretty bad virus that ended up turning into a month-long pneumonia, we still went to the Penner reunion in Monterey. Fortunately, we both felt a little better on the day we all went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. We went to Carl's Jr. for lunch and Kate and her grandpa enjoyed the pig stickers in the kid's meal. Grandpa loves pigs.