Christmas in Punta Cana ~ December 21st -22nd 2011

For  Christmas this year our family went to Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic. I think we are starting a new tradition of going on a family vacation during Christmas time. Besides August, it's the only time of the year that Aaron can take off a week of work.  The flights there and back were so nice since we were in 1st class. I had so much room to wrestle with Audrey and Aaron there to tag team. How am I going to go back to general seating?!? Its nice to be spoiled every once in awhile. The picture below was taken right after we got off the airplane as we were waiting for our stroller.  The airport  was open air (only part of it was enclosed with windows) and had a beautiful thatched roof made of cana palm fronds.  It was really neat and was beautiful the second we stepped off the plane.

We stayed at the Melia Cariba Tropical Resort. We picked this one because it had a Flinstone Kids Zone for AJ and Audrey to go to during the day if we wanted. Our room was a beautiful one bedroom master suite. It had a large jacuzzi tub and small porch off the master bedroom. AJ slept on a sofa bed and a crib was brought in for Audrey. We really enjoyed staying there. Below is a picture of us our first morning there having breakfast. We were too tired to go to breakfast, so room service brought it. The resort was all inclusive and had 14 restaurants or room service for any time of the day. It was a large resort with several (10) pools and of course a beautiful white sand beach with aqua colored water. A true tropical paradise with various birds, palm trees, flowers and no bugs to bother us since it wasn't summer. To get around we walked, or rode in golf carts and 3 "trains" constantly picked up and dropped off people where they wanted to go around the resort. Audrey and AJ loved the carts and trains. They are also true beach babes and loved playing in the water and sand.

Paella is the seafood rice dish I'm eating. It was yummy. It came from the huge pot shown below. We ate at this restaurant a lot since it was just off the beach. There was always a huge variety of foods, fruits, breads, drinks and desserts. We loved when they played music and even did a salsa dance with one of the workers. The beach view was amazing from the outdoor seating area.  Audrey loved the birds that flew around. Luckily there weren't very many of them.

Our maid made this elephant for us every day. We loved it and never touched it. She would put new flowers in it daily. She also left chocolates on our bed, and put stockings with candy canes as a center piece on our table on Christmas Eve.

We loved these fan palm trees.  There were so many neat tropical plants and trees. A beautiful scene everywhere you looked.

AJ constantly looked for coconuts. He started collecting one for each of us but ended up with 8 or 9 and had them lined up on our porch table. This picture shows AJ with Aaron's since it is the biggest one.