In Malaysia and off to Thailand

Sorry, I started this post a couple of weeks ago (well, now it's going on a month ago) and never got around to finishing.....so here it is:

My parents arrived safely on Sunday evening and Jennifer, Evan and I went and picked them up in Singapore on Monday morning....yes, all by ourselves.....and managed just fine. Our driver's mother passed away on Sunday, so he obviously couldn't take us and Andrew had an important meeting to attend....so we went alone and it was a piece of cake. It was a pretty good feeling to know I could navigate so comfortably in such a new and crazy place. I was pretty impressed with myself...as were my parents as I had us running all our errands around town as well. Anyhow, they had a day to recuperate from their jetlag and then we hauled them off to Phuket on Wednesday morning. We stayed at a place called Laguna Beach Resort...it was beautiful....nice rooms, with a great view of the Andaman Sea.....a gorgeous pool and other nice amenities. It was raining on the day we arrived and alot of debris had washed up on the beach, so we were a little disappointed about how dirty the water and beach looked, but the next eday verything cleared up and it was blue skies and nice, clean sandy beaches for the remainder of our stay. We didn't do much other than hang out at the pool everyday....Jen went on a snorkeling excursion one day and said while it was nice to see some of the other islands ....there were way too many people there and the reefs were ruined by how commericalized it had become. She said when you pulled up to Phi Phi Island, there were 30 other speedboats there taking other people on the same excursion....and this is during their offseason. Evan really enjoyed watching the elephants they would bring daily to play the harmonica, give the kids rides and play in the sea. Well, Evan probably had more fun watching the other kids watching the elephants. He spent alot of time bonding with his Boss during the trip. Boss was the designated babysitter to stay in the room with Evan while he napped. He even changed a couple of poopy diapers....way to go, Boss!!! He even stayed with Evan one night while the rest of us caught a cab into Patong Beach...to check things out. This is the infamous place in Phuket where they have all the outdoor market shopping.....as well as tons of outside strip clubs....with women hanging out ready to spend a night or weekend with whoever might pay them. It was actual quite disgusting as you saw all these older (much older!) men (mainly European), with these young (very young) Thai girls! It was actually a very sad sight.

We had a great time with some nice, relaxing pool and beach time, some really good Thai food, and some good shopping.....did I mention how dirt cheap everything was!! And we couldn't have had better weather. It was wonderful the entire time we were there until the day we were leaving. Actually, while we were in the airport.....it began pouring down rain. So yes, we were delayed.....for 2 hours!!! Of course, given the latest accident at the airport, we were all quite okay staying put on the ground until it passed. Evan thought it was a joy to spend his entire birthday in a airport!!! Thankfully, we made it home safely and prepared for Evan's birthday party the following day.

I thought everyone might like to see a few pics from our trip: Evan and BeBe in the Hotel reception....Evan with a big bite of something in his mouth!! Evan and Boss checking out the pool areaThe baby elephant goes for a dip...and yep, gotta love those in speedos!!!Evan and Dad hanging out at yet another pool bar.....teaching him early!!A view of our pool.....that's Andrew and I in the back going to take another ride on the fun water slide

BeBe gets her hair braided....Me and Jen pose for a quick picture after one of our many, great Thai dinners!The baby elephant gives Evan a kiss...Dad and Evan pose for a picture on the lawn outside our hotel room....this is Evan's silly face he makes when he meets new people or just feels like being silly!!Evan posing in front of the water with his new monogrammed shirt he got for his birthday....he is going to love me when he gets older!! By the way....he still loathes the sand...he hates to get it all over his hands!!BeBe and Evan posing after BeBe has her hair braided.....One last one of the the gorgeous sunset we took in every night we were there!!