The BIG 3-0

The day of my big 3-0 started with just a little relaxing and reading on the beach.  

After a morning of a whole lot of wonderful nothing.....we went to our now daily water aerobics class and then pulled up a chair for a lunch of chips and guac.  Let me just tell you, I do NOT like guacamole.  But I LOVED the guacamole at the resort!!  Apparently you should go to Mexico if you want good guacamole!  

My sister was appalled that I was turning 30 and had never taken a shot before.  I think shots sound disgusting.  I don't want to be drunk and so I don't really know what other purpose there is for a shot.  But to appease my sister, I agreed to trying one on my 30th.  She made some kind of peachy thing that really didn't taste very good.  (And if it doesn't taste good, why would I want to drink it???)

I sipped mine.  :-)

After my first shot (which I don't anticipate experiencing again), we hung out at the little outdoor bar for a while longer and just enjoyed the view.  While we were relaxing, our favorite server, Pablo, (who is also a mighty fine salsa dancer), walked by, grabbed Meredith out of her chair and danced a few minutes.  It was quite entertaining!

We decided to head back to the beach shortly after.  I was lying on our cabana...

when I heard my mom call my name from our room.  I turned around, and who was standing there?  PABLO!  He had been combing the beach for us because he had a birthday cake for me!  He had a candle and everything!! 

How sweet is that?! 

After a lovely day relaxing on the beach, it was time to get cleaned up for the official birthday celebration!

For my birthday dinner we went back to Maria Marie's.  We ate there the night before and it was so delicious we wanted more!  The servers were wonderful!  They brought me out a birthday cake (my second of the day!) and sang happy birthday to me.

Meredith really likes this pose.  It drive my mom crazy.

After dinner we headed back down to 5th Avenue.  The streets were really crowded this night!  We stopped to look at a few things along the way.

These last couple of pictures are from our last day in Playa del Carmen.  

All in all, I'd say this was quite possibly my best birthday ever.  

If I have to turn 30, Mexico was the place to do it!

Goodbye 20's....Hello Mexico! Day 2 and 3

 Our second day in Playa del Carmen began with a room change.  This was our new view from the patio. You open the gate and you're on the beach.  We had a cabana reserved every day just for us.

Our room was beautiful, too.

We spent the morning on the beach...

And in the ocean...

At noon we took a break for water aerobics...

And then headed back to do some more reading...

That night we got cleaned up and headed to dinner.

Day 3 was just about identical until the afternoon when we took a bike tour through Playa del Carmen to see some somewhat lame Mayan ruins.  The ride was nice, though!

Mr. Iguana was hanging out on the ruins and was not thrilled to see us.

That night we headed to the fancy resort next door for dinner at Maria Marie's. 

Ah.....Mexico.

Goodbye 20's....Hello Mexico! Day 1

I have been freaking out about my 30th birthday for a long time.  I cannot believe that my 20's are gone.  It is just flat out bizarre to me to think that I'm THIRTY!!!

But, thankfully, my mother is flat out amazing and made my 30th birthday one that I will never forget.  I was told in the fall that I would be going on a trip for my birthday.  I was told the dates of when I'd need to take off work.  

And THAT'S.  ALL. I was told.  

For this Type-A-I-want-to-know-the-agenda-of-everything-before-we-leave girl.....this was challenging.  However, I loved the surprise and the build up!  It really made the trip that much more exciting!  

So, the week before we left I was told two very important pieces of information:

1.  I needed a swimsuit.

2.  I needed to bring my passport.

Now, you'd think that once we got to the airport the morning of our flight, the surprise would be over, I'd have my boarding passes, and I'd know where I was going to be spending my 30th.  NOPE.  That's not how this was going to work.  

Friday morning, February 24.....we left the house at 5:30am.  Let me just tell you....I was SOOO EXCITED!!  We got to the airport and I was forced to stand a good distance away so that I couldn't see my boarding passes.  Do you think Meredith is having a little fun with this game?

As I was waiting, I couldn't help but do a little detective work.  Our flight was leaving at 7:15.  So that means I'm either going to Cleveland or Houston.  I'm going to bet on Houston.

After we got through security, we sat down to wait for our boarding time.  I called Michael to tell him one last goodbye.  (I had also been informed that because we were going out of the country, I wouldn't be able to use my cell phone for the next four days.)  This also gave Meredith the opportunity to tell Michael where we were going because he was just in the dark about this as I was.  

We're on the plane and heading to the first stop of our trip!

Meredith wanted my "I'm-really-excited" smile.  Attractive, right?  ;-)

We made it to Houston and walked very quickly to catch out next flight.  This is the moment I knew....

I was going to LOVE my 30th birthday!

Our first sighting of Mexico!

We finally touched down in Cancun!

I was excited to be in Cancun, but that wasn't our final destination either.  We had a 45 minute drive south to our resort in Playa del Carmen.

Getting checked in

The view from the lobby of our resort.

 This is what happy looks like!!  (And tired and a bit sweaty....but definitely happy!!)

 The resort messed up our room the first night (we were really unhappy with them from the get go of our trip).  We had a balcony room the first night and then had to move to a different room for the remainder of our stay.  But this was the view from our room on night #1.  

I could barely contain myself at this point.  So even though it was 4:00 in the afternoon, we threw on our swimsuits and headed out to explore our resort and take a walk on the beach!

We weren't out too long before our hunger won out.  We went in for a quick dinner and then crashed early.  It was a long day of travel, but well worth it!