Family Vacation `14: Carnival Triumph

Once we boarded our ship, The Carnival Triumph we ate lunch at the buffet.

We explored the ship until our room was ready, it was awesome and the views were spectacular! 

That afternoon we joined the sail away party and played mini golf, a few minutes after sailing we went through a huge thick patch of fog, it was kinda creepy!

At dinner that evening we were joined by pirates! I was very impressed at the extra things Carnival did for our kids like having a table magician come by at dinner and do magic tricks for the kids. 

One of our favorite nights on the ship was formal night, even my kids get excited about dressing up, eating a fancy diner and seeing a show.

James Henry talked all day about meeting the Captain of the ship, he was so excited!

Christopher eating Strawberry bisque on formal night

                                     

We loved going to the family friendly comedy club!

We spent a lot of our "at sea" days poolside! We love the sun, water and music!

 The kids and my husband were big fans of the twister slide!

In keeping with Carnival tradition, our room attendant was awesome at towel folding and every night my kids couldn't wait to see what she left for them.

There were a lot of fun things to do on the ship, including the giant chess board and the kids clubs. Both James Henry and Christopher really enjoyed their time at the kids clubs!

No cruise is complete without the yummy food. I was so proud of my kids for trying different kinds of food such as veal and lobster. One of their favorite things was room service!

 Our ship had a Guy's (Guy Fieri) Burger Joint!

 We loved the sea day brunches! This is Christopher's fruit loop battered french toast.

We spent time every day in the arcade!

Carnival has their own build-a-bear program.

 We took a towel folding class and my family loved it. James and Christopher are now professionals so if you come to visit us, you just might find a towel animal on your pillow.

Our ship was a blast, my kids are already planning their next cruise! They have requested Jamaica. 

Family Vacation '14: Galveston

Late in the evening in Houston we started receiving messages from our cruise line that Galveston was having heavy fog and the port was closed so there was a chance that our cruise would be delayed. While we were bummed we decided we would still get up early and head into Galveston to make the most out of our day.
 We started our day with breakfast at the hotel.

We started the 40 minute drive into Galveston and oh so conveniently there was an outlet mall, right on our way :)

 We scored some great deals and since we were the first customers at the Disney Store that morning, James Henry was able to use some of Mickey's secret magic to open the store. It was super cute!

After shopping we were hungry so we headed to Galveston's Pleasure Pier, it's normally beautiful but the fog was so thick you couldn't see anything!

We had lunch at Bubba Gump Shrimp Co, which is always yummy and a fun atmosphere.

After lunch we headed toward the port for more shopping and sightseeing.

We stopped at La King's old fashioned ice cream parlor, it was so fun!

After killing time most of the day and never seeing the fog clear the cruise line officially delayed our cruise at 5pm in the hopes we could sail the next morning. It was a big disappointment but we headed to Kemuh to stay the night and at least we were together, making the most out of it. 

We told ourselves we would sleep in and take our time since we had no idea when and if we would leave but the cruise line woke us up bright and early to head to the port for boarding. It was a mad dash to get everyone ready quickly.

This was our first view of the ship driving into the port.

Since the fog had delayed us and everyone received the message to board at the same time it was busy in the terminal. I am so thankful for my husband who carried James Henry on his shoulders through the long lines.

                               Finally we were boarding our ship for vacation and ready to sail!