i wrote this while one the boat...

but at 75 cents a minute for wireless, didn't post it. i think i wrote it on saturday night. nick's about to get back to work, so i'll pick up from there tonight and fill you all in on the vacation. the short version is that all is peachy!

as i write this (7:40 eastern time, 9:30 current time, but 10:30 when we set the clocks forward again)...well, i was about to write that the girls are sleeping peacefully, but...

as i write this (7:49 eastern time), the girls are sleeping again. maggie had woken up, which made nina stir, but things seem settled again. the girls are taking up the entire king size bed, looks like nick and i will have to fight over the bunk (we have the room arranged as one king-sized bed with one bunk above that. we could have two bunks--they fold down from the ceiling--but maggie sleeps with us. it's not like i can put her in a bunk.

well, we are having a wonderful time! i am comfortably cocooned in the bathrobe and slippers the boat provided and nick is lying on the bed (kind of squeezed into a corner, the girls really are monopolizing the whole thing) watching a movie on TV (cadillac records is the name he says, but adds that he can't really hear it, it's practically on mute.)

poor little maggie is a bit sick. :-( she started running a temperature last night and it has come and gone since then. it's gotten as high as about 102, which is high for her, but i gave her some tylenol and she seems to be feeling better now. we'll see in the morning... i talked to the nurse on board this evening (i needed a medicine doser, she wouldn't drink the tylenol from the little cup that comes with the bottle), and she's at the medical center all night and said to call or come by if i'm worried. i might take her in in the morning if she's still not herself. we had gotten the travel insurance and that covers the cost of medical care on board, so it will be free. assume all is well if i don't update the blog tomorrow (it's 75 cents a mintue to get online. i'm typing this in word and will upload later).

nina is having a blast though. she loves the kid's play room. last night she went for their movie night (kids go in their PJs and they set pillows and blankets on the floor and watch movies). she loved it, but was too tired to go tonight. we tried leaving maggie there once too... she had a great time for like, 10 minutes, then started crying. they give the parents pagers though, so they paged us and we were less than a minute away. oh well.

the food is delicious. we've mostly eaten in the dining room because it's so good we don't want to miss a meal! we did have lunch at the british pub and the fish and chips were excellent. tonight i had manderin duck and nick had the sea bass. last night it was lamb and salmon, respectively. yummy! there were appetizers too but i'm not really sure what everything was called. many french names... and of course numerous dessserts.

entertainment is also great. there's a deck and pool off of the kids' room (it's called the play zone) with a little playset and lots of riding toys. there's also a pool that's only 3 feet deep and a second pool that's about 8 inches deep (that's where all the babies hang out. there are a couple of kids close to maggie's age, but she seems to be the youngest. we've met a few 17-18 month olds, but no one younger). maggie is also developing a bit of a following on the ship--people are recognizing her and saying "hey, there's maggie!". it's very cute.

today we went to the planetarium (nina keeps calling it the planaquarium. she asked if there were going to be scary animals.) it was a 25 minute show but we only made it through about 15... maggie fell asleep and then got startled awake by noise, so i took her out, and then nina wanted to leave too, i think because it was too loud. she was probably also getting bored. she's open to trying again though now that she knows what to expect and that it's not very long. we'll see).

we've also ridden on the glass elevators a lot--there is one on the outside of the boat, from decks 7 to 12, so you can look out over the ocean as you go up. it's very cool.

ok, that's enough i guess... the plan for tomorrow is to wake up early (since the girls went to bed at 7:30 pre-clocks going forward time), run around on the big open upper deck, get some breakfast, swim a lot, eat some more, and check out the on board art gallery. oh, no sea sickness to speak of. i did get a headache on the first day out but i took some tylenol and felt better. nick was satisfied with some relatively small portions of food, so in retrospect something was off with his stomach, but he didn't get nauseous, so all good there. the boat is really very stable, on a slight bit of rocking. definitely beats flying. of course now that i'm focused on it i can feel the movement, which is making me a bit queasy (can't have anything to do with all of the desserts i ate tonight of course!).

i might update again, or i might wait until we're in austria. it depends on whether nick wants to check his email again this week.

oh, we got the new camera and are taking great pictures! will definitely share them ASAP!

sorry about the typos, notepad doesn't underline my spelling mistakes so i'm flying solo here. scary!!