{"id":562,"date":"2014-09-01T16:30:44","date_gmt":"2014-09-01T22:30:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/esmithy.net\/sparks\/?p=562"},"modified":"2014-09-01T16:30:44","modified_gmt":"2014-09-01T22:30:44","slug":"cruisin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/esmithy.net\/sparks\/2014\/09\/01\/cruisin\/","title":{"rendered":"Cruisin’ Firsts"},"content":{"rendered":"

For our family vacation this year, we decided to go on a cruise. A large part of the appeal was a reduced planning effort compared to our previous epic road trips. No decisions about how far we’d go on a particular day, where we’d sleep, how long we’d stay somewhere, etc. It also gave our family a chance to experience several “firsts”.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

So, in the spirit of the ubiquitous listicle…<\/p>\n

Five Firsts for the Family<\/h3>\n
    \n
  1. First cruise<\/b>. None of us had ever done a cruise before, though friends and family had told us it was great.<\/li>\n
  2. First time out of the country<\/b>. Neither Shannon nor the kids had ever been out of the U.S. before. The cruise out of Long Beach went to Catalina Island (still in the U.S.) and Ensenda, Mexico (only slightly different than southern California because everyone spoke English and accepted U.S. dollars).<\/li>\n
  3. First time Ethan had no excuse to be hungry<\/b>. Ethan at 4 PM: “I’m hungry.” Dad: “Well, just a couple of hours until dinner.” Ethan: “Two hours<\/i>? Forget that, there’s hamburgers on deck right now<\/i>“.\n
  4. First time for Afton to fly<\/b>. She thought it was pretty cool.\n
  5. First time for Shannon to not freak out flying<\/b>. She did super-well. Maybe we’ll do it again!\n<\/ol>\n