Ice Skating

A few weekends ago we went ice skating with our friends Chad and Amanda. It was fun having Mya with us...except I don't think Justin's back loved it since he had to push or hold Mya the entire time. But we still all had a ton of fun.

It wore Mya right out!

Some Funny Quirks About Mya

I find myself laughing at Mya so many times a day! This new stage she is in is so fun! She's really into doing whatever you're doing...she thinks she's so big. Here are 7 things Mya frequently does that makes me smile.

1-She has to hold the tag on her blankets. When she wants to sleep or just cuddle, I hand her the tag and in goes her thumb.

2-Every time she brushes her teeth now, she coughs and then spits-no matter where she is at (this includes spitting on the floor). Her coughing is from watching me gag on my toothbrush so now she thinks she has to do it every time.

3-Every time she gets in her high chair she folds her arms, ready to pray. Sometimes she'll does his multiple times and we have to tell her we don't need to pray before every bite.
4-When it's dinner time and I'm cooking, she'll come in, get a pan or two out of the cupboard and pretend to cook. If I train her right, pretty soon I won't have to cook anymore!

5-If you ever tell Mya "I'll be right back," she'll start shaking her finger (kind of like "no no" but it means "be right back"). If she doesn't do this, it means she wants to go with you.

6-Mya loves the garbage can! If she finds anything on the floor that can get thrown away, she is quick to put it in the garbage. The only down fall to this is she is curious what's in the garbage...which explains why she came up to me yesterday with something all over her mouth, only for me to find an empty yogurt container she had pulled from the garbage and licked it a little cleaner.

7-When she looks in the mirror now, she'll pretend to do her hair. I guess she's watched me a few times get ready in the morning. She also likes to do her make up with me. I usually give her a brush and she'll rub it on her face.
I've noticed a lot about her modeling us with everything we do. If we drink, she drinks, if I wear a necklace, she wears a necklace. It's so fun and I just love my girly girl.

A Day At The Beach

This is my last post for our trip and I'm finally done! The last day we ported was in Mexico. While the rest of our tour group went to Tulum, we played at the beach.
We had to ride on some boats to get to the area we would be at.
The beach was gorgeous! I loved the color of the water. It was so clear and just that really pretty blue!

Mya had so much fun! She loved the beach and especially the water!
She kept trying to run out to the water whenever we went back in.
We went to one of the shops there and bought her a tube for her to hang out in.
She loved everything! It was a way fun day!

Belize

This was my favorite day. We saw iguanas, monkeys, crocodiles, the ruins were really cool, and the food was great. Our tour guides did a good job teaching us about the culture in Belize and letting us know what kind of animals are there (like jaguars, tucans-the national bird in Belize, anteaters, etc.).

We ported in Belize City, and drove to a place where we had lunch (this consisted of chicken, coconut rice, coconut tarts, fried bananas, fruit, salad, chips and onion salsa-which I didn't try because they said it is way hot) then went up a river to Lamanai where the ruins were.
This is where we saw the crocs. I only saw two-one on the way up and one on the way back, but others in my boat saw 4. I guess I'm just not a good crocodile spotter.
There is a log looking thing towards the back, which is a crocodile. There are also some birds on the lilly pads they call Jesus birds because they walk on water.
This is an amish community in Belize. They call them the Mennonites.
Cheesy smiles.
Riding up the river-it was pretty windy.
This is a crocodile we saw on the way back. It's on the log.
Right after we got off the boats, we saw these black howler monkeys.
This is the first temple we saw. I think it was called the Jaguar temple. John Lund was standing at the top and told us this temple was like the one King Benjamin was on when he spoke to the people in Mosiah. Because of the direction of the building and the accoustics of the area with the trees, he was able to talk in his regular speaking voice and we could hear him just fine.
This temple was so tall! We could see it above the trees when we were coming up the river.
We of course had to climb it and this is the view from the top. It was so pretty. I unfortunately have developed my mom's fear of heights, so my knees were a little weak once I got up there. It didn't help that the steps were so tall and narrow. I don't know how the Nephites did that daily.
If Justin wasn't up there with me, I would have had a hard time coming down. But the view did make it so worth it.
Just don't look down...
The last temple we saw. The temples actually have layers under them. Every 52 years (when everything lines up on the Mayan calendar) they would build another layer over the previous layer. Each layer had its own design and they've only found up to 9 layers. But this picture shows into another layer. There was also a tomb inside this temple.

Quirigua, Guatemala

I'm not sure what it was called where we ported, but Quirigua (sounds like Kitty-Kwa) is where the ruins were. This was the day Mya was really sick, but she did good and as you'll see, she looks pretty good.
This is what the site looked like. There wasn't any temples, just these pillars and rocks everywhere. The whole site was the size of a football field, and at the end of it was this ball court area.
These were actually really cool. John Lund explained what a lot meant on these. The big ears with earrings were Jade earrings which represented a ruler. The feathers coming out of his hat represents "of God" so a priest.
If you look under his chin, it looks like the star of David, but it represents the Urim and Thumim.
This is an alter.
This is the ball court. I didn't hear everything about this due to time, but I know the losers they would sacrifice and once a year they would sacrifice the winners, which was an honor.
A lot of this was 600 AD when the people were more wicked and things were getting twisted in the religion. When Christ came and told them to have a broken heart and a contrite spirit, these people started to take it literally and would cut out the heart to kill them-then the person being killed would see their heart out of their body before they died. They did things because of the traditions, but it was all getting misinterpreted. Some things I learned is there are two snakes or serpents, one with feathers and one without. The one without is Satan and the one with is Christ, because he came down from the heavens when he visited the Nephites. They knew he was coming again, and when Cortes came, a lot thought he was Christ coming again because he came the day they thought Christ would come again and he was a bearded white man like Christ, and when he came he wore black. All of the tribes down there except one thought he was coming back in black, but one group believed he would come back in red. Then Cortes took over the people because of the gold and the rest of the story is pretty much what you learn in history classes.
This is another picture of the 'Tree of Life.'
This pillar is the one Joseph Smith saw a drawing of and said it is like the ones he had seen in his visions. The narrower sides would have two columns of squares with one longer square at the top, which meant a date to follow and the squares below it was the date and what was going to happen.

More of Guatemala

I mentioned Mya was sick this day, so Justin made sure Mya was in the shade as much as possible:

We ate lunch at a resort in Guatemala. It was so pretty! There was a lake or bay or something right next to it. The food was so good! We had a little bit of everything. Chicken, fish (I actually liked it. It was breaded and it didn't taste like fish at all, more like chicken with a different texture), and beef and there were sauces you poured on them that was so good. Then there was rice, salad, fruit, and homemade rolls and I know I'm forgetting things. I loved eating lunches on the tours, they were so authentic.
This was the view from where we ate.
It was a very pretty resort!
We went swimming in the pool at the resort. We weren't in very long, just enough to cool Mya down.
The bus ride back. Mya got a doll (which I think we left on the bus! I looked everywhere and couldn't find it!) that her great-grandpa Ropelato bought her and a purse in Guatemala.
Guatemala was really mountainous. They talk about the high lands and the low lands in the Book of Mormon and it doesn't mean north for high and south for low like I have always pictured. It's because the low lands is like Mexico, where I had mentioned it was more flat and hot, and the hight lands is like Guatemala because there are such tall mountains and it's so much cooler there.
About to board the ship again. I loved this view getting off the ship that morning!

Joseph Smith Map

This is way cool (I'm not sure if I was allowed to take a picture of this, but I didn't want for forget about this). This map was turned in to Church history years ago by some men. Joseph Smith had drawn in the sand this map (and the two guys copied it onto paper) and said this was Moroni's travels that he had taken to re-bury the gold plates. In his travels, Moroni also dedicated areas for future temples, like our Manti and St. George temple. I thought it was really cool because it has on there Salt Lake Utah, Independence, Arizona, Adam-On-Di-Amon, Nauvoo, and Kirtland. Joseph Smith never made it to a lot of these places. Moroni visited Joseph 23 times. I have no doubt that Moroni showed Joseph his travels and the life of the Nephites and Lamanites. Some if it is kind of hard to read, but off to the side it says (I'm paraphrasing):
Moroni's travels from starting from Central America up to the sand hills in Arizona, up to Salt Lake, to Adam-On-Di-Amon, to Nauvoo, Indepence, then Kirtland. I can't read more, it's cut off, but it goes a little further to where he burried the plates. This was really cool and a testimony booster to me (along with the entire trip). Also, here are some quotes Joseph Smith said about this area:
"Central America, or Guatimala [sic] is situated north of the Isthmus of Darien [Panama]...the city of Zarahelma...stood upon this land..." -Times and Seasons 3:927
"...these wonderful ruins of Palenque are among the mighty works of the Nephites." -Times and Seasons 3:914
"...Quirigua...the city in question...[is] one of those referred to in the Book of Mormon." -Times and Seasons 3"927
Lehi landed "...a little south of the Isthmus of Darien." -TPJS p 267

Costa Maya, Mexico

On Tuesday, we ported in Costa Maya Mexico. The port here actually used to have a huge hotel and lots of shops, but a hurricane came a couple of years ago and wiped it out. You'll see in the picture that it looks like some frames from some old shacks and a lot of trees don't have leaves because of the damage from the hurricane. It was still beautiful though. They did have some shops developed, which is where we bought Mya's Mexican dress before we got back on the boat that evening. After getting off the ship, we went to the ruins in Chacchoben about 30-45 minutes away (I'm guessing).
There were a lot of Mayan ruins here. These were temples when they were righteous, but when the people were wicked, they used them as fortresses.
Also, there are tons of trees around these buildings now, but John Lund told us that none of those trees would have been there. The Nephites/Lamanites would have cut them all down out so far away from their temples so they could see if enemies were coming.
While we were standing at one of the temples, I started noticing these bees flying around us and I was getting kind of nervous. I didn't know what kind of bees these were, I didn't want Mya to get stung, and I'm allergic. Just then the guide told us that the bees in this area don't have stingers because the Jaredites would have brought them over. And because of the flood, there was no vegetation so they brought seed and bees to pollinate. But because they brought bees over in a boat, it was important that these bees didn't have stingers. It was kind of cool that these bees were brought over 2000 years before Christ. In fact, the Jaredites are known as the Omecs and lived north of the Mayans.
It was so green and pretty here! The one thing about the land was that it seemed more flat. But it was still just gorgeous.
Another thing I learned is that these used to be very colorful buildings. One of the temples you could see red on it where there used to be paint. It totally made sense to me. Even the houses down there are so colorful (especially in Guatemala). They were painted bright colors: red, green, yellow, even pink houses.
These temples are very similar to our temples. They said when they find these temples, they always find a large bowl shaped around it to wash before they enter the temple, an alter (which we saw at this one) before also, and then once you get in there are two rooms, one of which would be the holy of holies.