visitors: my mom

My mom recently came to visit for a week - her first time in Cayman. It was so, so wonderful to have her here to see our new home and to get some quality time with Joshua. He warmed up to her very quickly - we were worried that he might not recognize her and would treat her as a "stranger" for the first few days, but even by the next morning they were best buds! I guess all those Skype calls and Google Hangouts have really helped him know her. :)

Brett, Joshua, and I got to the airport a little early so we could watch my mom's plane land. The Grand Cayman airport has a small deck above the airport which overlooks the runway and the pathway the travelers will walk to the airport. We also thought Joshua would like getting to see so many airplanes... and boy, were we right.

The plane he's pointing at is the one my mom flew in on.

And here she is!

Mostly, Mom just hung out with us while we did normal things - I think we even ended up at three different grocery stores throughout the course of the week! - but we did take her to do some tourist-y things.

At the Observation Tower at Camana Bay...

Standing under a palm tree in January... (When I asked her what she was excited to do while we were here, her first response after "hang out with Joshua" was "take a picture of me under a palm tree in January"... check!)

And here she is making progress on that first thing on her checklist...

We went to Spott's Beach... we didn't swim, but even just standing on the pier we could see several turtles.

And Joshua had a blast walking around in the sand.

Is there anything cuter than baby footprints in the sand??

We also visited the Turtle Farm (that was the third item on her list). No, Joshua didn't hold any turtles... but he liked seeing Brett pick them up!

We also visited the Botanic Park.

We bribed Joshua with snacks to behave while we were there. That's good parenting, right?

The Botanic Park is home to the Blue Iguana. Since it's endangered, there's a Recovery Program centered at the park. One wandered over to us and got very friendly.

Thanks for visiting us, Grandma! Come back and visit soon. :)