Honeymoon #2 - MEXICO!

I think it is going to take me ages to catch up and I will never be in the present day... I will be blogging about February adventures in June and that is just not ok! So I am going to do my best to be better and more frequent in posting, so you aren't reading 6 months ago! haha.

However, before I can tell you all about my present life, I have to go back to the middle of December and tell you about my amazing honeymoon! This is the big one! Disneyland was just prelude to the tropical honeymoon everyone always dreams about!

I already blogged about how we came to the decision of choosing Mexico for our honeymoon (read here)... so I'll just get going on telling you how amazing it was!

Arrival into Cancun airport

Flights were good, transfer was good, arrival to the hotel was awesome!! We were dropped at the hotel in the evening and so we were quickly shone around the place in the dark and then we basically unpacked and settled into the place.

The next morning we woke up and went exploring! Check out our awesome view and roof top deck!

View from our rooftop

Our awesome private patio! Complete with grill, jacuzzi, lounge chairs, covered area with couches, and patio table.

I had full on plans to spend a lot of time up here! Our accommodations was actually a condo and so there were 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, full kitchen, living room, and rooftop balcony of course. There was full room service from neighboring hotels, cleaning service, and DVD rentals in the lobby.

After some exploring  around our accommodations we were down for breakfast. There was a wonderful restaurant called Imprevist just on the first floor of our condo building and they gave the guests free breakfast every day... yummy options from eggs benedict and french toast, to Mexican breakfast favorites like Molettes.

our table for breakfast

entrance to hotel

We then wandered over to the grocery store to grab some snacks for the room. We thought about possibly making our own lunches and dinner for the week... we never did. Ha! There were too many good restaurants to try!

If I remember correctly (see I get forgetful if I wait too long to blog about something), we just walked around the beach town and the 5th avenue shops all day. We walked along the beach for about 15 minutes, but didn't settle in too much. We had lunch at a delicious restaurant that served yummy tacos and this spectacular salad! Ok lets be honest... anytime I talk about food I am going to say it was delicious... it seems that when I go on vacation I get ravenously hungry and think everything is delicious even if its not. haha!

Magarita!!!

 That night we went out to eat at one of the towns restaurants and got a little dressed up. I wore my rehearsal dinner dress! It was so warm in Mexico!

 If you can see my shoes in the picture, please note this is when they died... the last known photo of one of the cutest pairs of shoes I have ever owned. It rained that night and I ended up stepping in a HUGE puddle and destroyed my cute floral flats... sad day... they died for a good cause though :)

Look at these pretty ladies!

The next day was beach day! We woke up, got out bathing suits on and plopped ourselves down at the condo's private beach club! They had such comfy chairs at it was right on the water. The sweet sunshine was heavenly!

A pina colada and the beach... what more could anyone ask for!

bathing suit picture!

That night was fancy night! We went to an italian restaurant that we had walk passed during the day and it was super swanky... so we got fancified!

The next day was Tuesday and we had a tour to Chichen Itza booked! It was the one thing we had set in stone all week and we were excited to go and see some history and culture! Chichen Itza is one of the wonders of the world and so it was not to be missed (alright, in all actuality after going to it, I was glad I went, but it was not super-duper-incredible-your-life-is-incomplete-without-visiting-the-site).

I think my opinion of the whole trip was probably tainted by the fact that it was a 3 hour coach ride away and while our coach was clean and had a bathroom on board, it was also freezing and the roads had a lot of potholes... I was not feeling so great by the time we got there. Luckily it was warm outside so once my body defrosted and my stomach stopped churning, I was good to go!

Excited to see a big pyramid!

There it is!!

 Ok Chichen Itza is actually pretty cool. I knew what it was as far as it was a big pyramid down in the Yucatan peninsula, but if you would have asked me before going I would have told you it was probably a tomb... no sir! It is actually a Calendar!

Fun facts:
- Every bit of the pyramid represents pieces of the Mayan calendar - number of days, months, seasons, etc.
- The main stair case (behind us in the picture above) is actually a snake. One day a year on the spring equinox, the sun hits the sides of the stair case to form a snake!
- If you stand on the north side and clap your hands, it will sound like a bird is calling from the top of the pyramid
- The bird noise actually sounds like it is screaming "ku-kul-kan",  which is the name of the snake deity that appears on the equinox!
- There is more than just the pyramid on the Chichen Itza site. There is also a sports arena, an observatory to the heavens, a tomb of Mayan soldiers, and even more than has yet to be excavated yet!

In the Arena

The sporting Arena on site at Chichen Itza is where the Mayans would play a game much like soccer and basketball combined. Fun fact: the captain of the winning team would be rewarded by being BEHEADED!!! There was not greater honor to the Mayan gods than for their strongest warriors to give their lives and their blood.

After 3 hours of wandering in the now scorching sun, we boarded the bus to head to lunch. We stopped at a restaurant and market with a full Mexican food buffet! I had delicious tortilla soup, chicken with Mayan spices, and salad. During the meal, traditional dancers entertained us by dancing and spinning around the room while balancing bottles on their heads! remarkable!

 
Surrounding the eating area were little ponds and hammocks! After filling ourselves to the brim with food and ice cream, we lounged for a bit in the hammocks.

Then we wandered through the handmade markets. After a bit we all left and headed to our next place, which was a Cenote!!!

A Cenote is an underground water hole. You walk down into a cave of sorts and come upon a little nature made swimming pool!

This cenote had been updated and made safe for tourists, so the stair case down, the deck where we waited our turn to jump into the water was all man made.

Aaron jumping into the water!

It was so much fun to jump into the water... terrifying, but awesome! The water is actually 150 feet deep... SUPER DEEP! Which creeps me out, but I couldn't not dive in! Sadly my jumping picture is super blurry.

Quick note... and this will be important later... when hitting the water both Aaron and I confessed that we inhaled a lot of water... Mexico water... see where this is going? Just wait... it'll all make sense soon.

After the a dip in the Cenote, we loaded and up and headed home. Aaron and I decided after our long day and long drive that we would not be leaving our condo and beach for the rest of the week. It was an exhausting trip and a long drive back... but like I said, I am glad I can say I saw Chichen Itza, one of the wonders of the world.


The next day we woke up, went for breakfast and decided to walk around the town to wait for the sun to come out. Half way through the walk I started to not feel well, but I told myself it would pass. When we got back to the Condo, I told Aaron I needed a nap to hopefully get rid of a churny stomach and he confessed too that he wasn't feeling so great. We slept for over 2 hours and when we woke up we were worse... low at behold like clock work - almost exactly 24 hours after diving into the cenote Aaron and I both threw up every bit of food in our entire body... (does the cenote water make sense now? It is our best guess for the thing that gave us food poisoning). It was like a scene out of Sex & The City... you know the one where Charlotte and her husband Harry get food poisoning at the same time and take turns running to the bathroom... yeah that was us. I have never been so thankful for a a two bathroom condo! We each had out own territory. I think Aaron got it worse than I did... but thankfully by midnight that night we were both asleep. We spent the entire evening taking turns being sick and drinking purified water and watching TV... a marathon of Keeping up with the Kardasians was on... note: that was Aaron's choice, not mine ;)

I have never had food poisoning before, but I am SO thankful it only lasts 24 hours... by morning we were able to get out of bed and take down some crackers and water. We were both super bummed we lost a day, but it was actually rainy the whole time we were sick, so its not like we would have done much anyway!

Our morning after was spent here... yes that is a bucket of popcorn... it was the only thing that sounded appetizing. We read and laid around in the cloudy rainy morning. Aaron was reading Pride & Prejudice again and I was reading Harry Potter 6 for the 3rd time. It was much needed and afforded us a chance to build up energy to make our way down to the beach.


The rest of the week was pretty much laying on the beach and sleeping... man I am jealous of myself right now as I sit at my computer... wish I could go back right about now.

On our second to the last day, Aaron and I finally tried some Mayan hot chocolate! My favorite movie is Chocolat! In it, Juliette Binoch plays a woman to moves to a tiny tightly wound village in the French countryside and shakes things up with her Mayan chocolat. Every since seeing the film I have dreamed of trying some! and after getting sick and then being afraid to eat anything unsual for my tummy's sake, I kept putting it off. It was really yummy! It has a spicy bite from the chili pepper they put in it, but it is definitely a fun treat!

My Mayan hot chocolate in front and Aaron's regular hot chocolate in the back.

Some more beach pictures!

Ok before you judge me for post two pictures of me in a bikini, let me make a point that I will not look like that forever... heck, I don't even look like that now... so forgive me for wanting public documentation of my hot husband and I!

The picture above is of our last night! It was so warm out that night and so we ate at a patio restaurant! I had... wait for it... a DELICIOUS pesto shrimp ravioli dish and Aaron had yummy grilled prawns... but seriously I have had dreams about that ravioli since then... I miss it.

And there you have it! Our time in Mexico. I applaud those of you who made it to the end of this post! It was a doozy... looking back I should have divided it into two posts... ah well. If you have made it to the end, feel free to leave a comment :)

Wedded Bliss Part 2...

After Disneyland one would assume that life would start getting back to normal... not for us, though! Not 2 weeks after our mini Honeymoon was Thanksgiving. Our first married holiday. When we picked the date for our wedding, we were so excited that we would be able to spend the holidays together, we did not fully think through the strategic planning that would go along with family holidays as newly weds. It seemed that everyone we spoke to after the wedding no longer asked about wedding details. Instead, they asked if we had figured out the holidays yet... as if everyone know it was going to be stressful.

Luckily Thanksgiving was a breeze!! We spent the morning with The Mertz's for breakfast, we had full thanksgiving dinner with my family and cousins, and then we went home! Aaron went shopping for black friday late at night and I went to bed because I had work in the morning. But overall an excellent day of family and good food!

Here is the Thompson family Thanksgiving!

Sadly we didn't get pictures with the Mertz's that day.

Our first order of business was to start getting our house in order. I wanted to try to get our Master Bedroom painted and arranged first because where you sleep is the most important room in the house... maybe that isn't true, but it was definitely an easier room to tackle than the living room or bathroom. All it needed was a new coat of paint and the furniture moved in!

Aaron's parents did all the painting for the room the day after Thanksgiving while I was at work... this also happened to be my birthday - awesome. I came home though to a beautifully painted room! After a couple days of letting the paint fumes air out, we moved the furniture in! We also set up my little Christmas Tree in the corner to have a little Christmas in our home!

Back to my birthday - it was blissfully low key. I am a big person with my birthday and want something special to celebrate it. It might be because it is so close to Thanksgiving and other things seem to overshadow it, but I am very protective of my birthday. However this year, I just wanted to go out to dinner with my husband and watch a movie. With a wedding and Disneyland Trip, I felt like I had been celebrated enough. Aaron took me to the Arrogant Butcher downtown and I had a steak... the most delicious steak EVER! Then we went home and watched a movie.
The next night, my family came over for dinner and Elisabeth joined us. That was a fun time of celebration! Good food too... I made Olive Garden's Zuppa Toscana and my mom brought my traditional birthday cake - an ice cream cake with an oreo crust, cookies and creme ice cream middle and chocolate syrup on top. Good food and family and my new husband... what more could a girl ask for :)

Honeymoon #1 - DISNEYLAND!

To continue the story... I woke up Friday morning, my fever broken and feeling like I was becoming myself again. I had planned on going to work that morning, coming home early and us leaving for California around 2p. However, with the lack of restful sleep, instead I fell back sleep for another couple of hours and when I woke up, I was ready to go!

We were on the road by 10a and were so excited to get to the park early! With our early arrival we decided to head to the park for the evening shows and maybe a ride or two!

I cannot tell you how much that I love the fact that my husband loves Disneyland! I'll admit I was nervous because he was so anti-Disneyland when we started dating. In his words, it was immasculating and for little children. As someone who loves and knows him, I could not take this as truth, but ignorance... I knew he would love it if I was the one who got to show him :) 5 months into dating, we did a weekend trip to the Happiest Place on Earth with 2 of his college friends, Herb and Katie (Herb was a usher in our wedding) and it was a BLAST! He fell in love with it! He fell in love with the romance, the nostalgia, the ambiance, the rides, the history. His favorite part about Disneyland is just walking around taking it all in... rides come second to just enjoying the atmosphere Disney masterfully creates. Magical!

We arrived into the park all decked out for Christmas... the Christmas festivities at the park had not started yet, but the fireworks show and the snow fall on mainstreet were starting that night. We however were going to see Fantasmic, as Aaron had never seen it. We got to the park, grabbed bread bowls of soup in New Orleans square and then dessert at the Critter Country sweet shop. We took a ride on the Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Caribbeane and then settled along the Rivers of America to wait for Fantasmic. Before the show started the fireworks lit up the sky above the park and snow began to fall on us in New Orleans square! I literally started crying! ha! I was sitting in the middle of Disneyland, next to my HUSBAND, and "snow" was falling all around us. It was amazing!
We headed back to the hotel pretty quickly after the Fantasmic show to try to get to bed somewhat early due to recovering from sickness still.


Aaron and my mission this trip to Disneyland was to ride all the "lesser" rides of the park. We had gone crazy in February with Katie and Herb, riding all the biggest "must-ride" rides, so this time, Aaron wanted to focus on the smaller rides that aren't as popular and we both wanted more of an opportunity to just sit or walk around the park and not have to race from ride to ride.

The morning of Day 2 in the park, we got down Main Street and grabbed some breakfast at the Jolly Holiday bakery and sat on a park bench in the middle of the circle area in front of the Castle.

You can see it very well in this picture, but the night before Aaron and I had gotten the "Just Married" pins from Town Hall to mark that this was our Honeymoon! I have it pinned to my scarf and Aaron's was on his backpack. Everyone from ride operators, to street sweepers, to fellow guests of the park would stop and congratulate us... literally the best part of the weekend!! It was a constant reminder than this was our HONEYMOON because just a week before, we got MARRIED!

Aaron's first visit to Tarzan's Treehouse

Pirates Treasure on "Pirate Island" - AKA Tom Sawyer's Island

Mark Twain's Riverboat!

Disneyland has a PETTING ZOO!! This is Stitch the goat :)

I love Disneyland at Christmas

Of course... a churro

Aaron and I had a super blast in Disneyland enjoying all the Christmas decor! It is my favorite time in Disneyland.

Over to California Adventures!

In the Carthay Circle Restaurant

 This was my first time seeing the newly re-done Buena Vista Street in California Adventures. It is so much better than the previous entrance to the park.

For a wedding gift from Andy and Carissa (Andy was a groomsmen in our wedding) and Andy's parents Tom and Joyce was a dinner at the Carthay Circle Restaurant in California Adventure!! It is the super nice restaurant in the center of the park! They made a reservation for us and gave us money to pay for the dinner. We felt so classy! The restaurant is usually booked for weeks in advance! The restaurant building is styled after the theater where Snow White premiered and has a very 1vintage Hollywood feel to it. I ordered a glass of wine from one of the Disney vineyards and Aaron had a very manly cocktail. We dined on their delicious firecracker duck wings and delicious entrees. Then we enjoyed a piece of pear pie for dessert. With our meal we got special passes to the World of Color show that night too!

After dinner we walked around California Adventures going on a couple rides, taking the character quiz in the Beast's library - I was Belle and Aaron was Tigger. Then we walked through the new Cars Land! Aaron has a love of neon signs, so he was in heaven!

We watched World of Color and then called it a night!

The rest of the weekend was fantastic! We took our time riding rides and enjoying walking around the parks. We never waited too long in lines and had so much extra time that we even were able to head back to our hotel room for a nap - seriously being sick took a lot out of us.

 Another fun story on our trip was the Sunday night we were there we had dinner at the Carnation Cafe on Main Street. Of course the server congratulated us on our wedding - thanks to the pin. It was the birthday of the boy at a table near us, and so the servers at the restaurant brought out a sundae and sang to him. Then our server brought us a ice cream sundae all on his own and told us, "getting married is a big deal! Congratulations again!" Such a sweet guy!

having fun in Toon Town

We finished off the trip with a visit to the Mouse that started it all! Mickey!!! We waited a long time, but it was worth it. He took my hand when I walked in and admired by wedding ring! It is always nice to have Mickey Mouse's approval.

Overall a wonderful weekend away with my love in once of my favorite places in the world!

Wedded Bliss Part 1...

DON'T WORRY!!! I will not be breaking down each week of marriage by week, but the first week of marriage was particularly eventful, so I wanted to share a few fun details about our first week of wedded bliss.

Lets start with our awesome wedding night hotel!!! I am a travel agent in an international programs office (no, I can't help you plan you vacation to the Bahamas, or find you hotels in Southern California for cheap... I work in an international programs office, so unless you are studying abroad with one of the universities we work with, I can't do much for you...), and every so often I find some pretty sweet agent discounts. It is rare and most of the time I can find an equally go deal for the general public on Trip Advisor or Kayak. I wanted to take a chance for our wedding night accommodations and low and behold, I found it!! Note: I have checked a couple times since November and have not found this deal at all since!

Aaron and I got to stay at the Royal Palms hotel for the night for 85% off!!!!

The Royal Palm hotel is one of the fanciest hotels in Arizona, nestled at the base of the iconic Camelback Mt. It boasts to be the most romantic hotel in the Valley. So gorgeous! What a treat! It was such a sweet gift for us and something we never expected. With the low cost, Aaron's parents paid for it as a gift.

So as Aaron and I drove away from our wedding, we drove to the Royal Palm hotel, gave our car keys and baggage to the valet and walked into the lobby. It has been a dream of mine to walk into a public place with my wedding dress... to have people stop and stare and know that we just got married. I think it is because I love when a see a bride and groom at a hotel or Disneyland or around town taking their wedding pictures... it just makes me so happy to know this is a magical day for them. So walking through the Royal Palm lobby was everything I wanted. People congratulated us and asked us how the party was. So fun!

We got to our room, which was an upgrade from what we booked. They put us in a private room in the back of the property. Very secluded and romantic. The back patio opened up to have the most gorgeous view of Camelback (however, we couldn't see it till morning).

"Have you met my wife, Miranda Mertz?" - Aaron posted this on facebook just moments after we arrived at the hotel

Just moments after getting to the hotel room, there was a knock at the door and Carl (our booking agent) had sent over a platter of chocolate and fruit with champagne!

Thanks Carl!

There was a fireplace in the room too... and although it was probably 67 degrees outside at the time, we turned the AC up to make the room chilly, so we could use the fireplace - hey, we aren't paying the power bill :)

The next morning we woke up early and ordered room service to eat on the patio. It was such a yummy breakfast and after a week or pre-wedding nerves, my appetite was coming back and I was starving! We walked out onto the patio and this is what we saw...

Seriously Phoenix! With all it's heat and desert and brownness... there are moments when we get a glimpse of majesty and beauty! Good job Camelback Mountain! Way to look awesome for my first day as Mrs. Mertz!

We requested late check out, so after an early breakfast, some relaxing and a nap, we left in the late afternoon to head home. Both of us were so ready to be at OUR HOUSE! To go home for the first time TOGETHER to the SAME PLACE! After living 45 minutes away from each other for our entire dating relationship, this was a definite highlight so far of being married!

When we walked it another joyful sight met us...

GIFTS!!!!

All our lovely wedding gifts filling our guest room to the brim! We immediately opened all of them! Just the two of us... husband and wife... opening the beautiful things people gave us for our new home! It was so much fun to be in our house, with Aaron... my husband ;)


We had monday off of work and so we spent the morning around the house and then Aaron and I went to pick up Carla from Elisabeth's house (my old house) and bring her back to spend the afternoon with us before her flight back to London. We ended up taking her to Chelsea's Kitchen at Sky Harbor Airport for dinner (I love that the airport opened up some awesome restaurants!)

So hard to say goodbye!! She was here for a whole week and kept me sane leading up to the wedding. What a blessing it was to have her with us in all the celebrating :) Love her so much!



The next day Aaron and I went back to work... and then things got interesting! Aaron went home early on Tuesday with a horrible cold... and by Wednesday night I also was righteously ill! Seriously I have never felt that miserable in a long time... chills, aches, weakness, fever, runny nose - the worst cold! I was glad to have a companion to be sick with, but I was sad we were both so miserably awful. We also had our Disneyland weekend honeymoon scheduled for that Friday through Sunday and I was so worried I wouldn't be better in time. I went to bed praying my fever would break during the night and finally at 5:30a my fever broke and I was so thankful! Disneyland plans were not be thwarted!

In the words of my brother Shawn, "Disneyland IS the cure."