The Queen of the Veendam

(This is Ella). Are we still writing about this cruise?! I guess we don't get out much. But I do promise this is the end of it.

As mentioned, the majority of the passengers on our cruise were AARP members. There were some non-gray-haired people, but there were very few kids. And when I did see kids it was as they were being shuffled around in the Kid's Club group. You had to be 3 to be babysat in the Kid's Club so Jane was one of the only visible children around. Add that to the fact that she was having the time of her life and was in such a mood as to greet everyone she saw with a "Hi there!" and Jane may have been the most popular passenger on the Veendam.

After a couple days my sister-in-law told me that they were in the elevator with some other passengers and they asked her, "Are you with the couple that has the little girl?" So from then on I started noticing the comments going around and eventually thought her fame was so funny that I started writing them down.

I overheard comments such as:
"Oh, look, it's the girl you love!"
"You're the girl from the show last night." (Jane was not in a show but they must have been sitting by us).
"There's the little girl that likes to run."
"Oh, there's the girl that loves the stairs."

And after we skipped a couple nights of bringing Jane up to the formal dining room for dinner some diners asked us later, "Is that the little girl who sits upstairs in the dining room? Where has she been?!"



We even had someone ask if they could take pictures of her "because my wife just loves her."

And Jane won over the hearts of many when during a small cruise-ship game the emcee began his question with, "Now imagine that the whole ship started sinking..." And as if right on cue Jane screamed at the top of her lungs "Aaaahhh!!" The entire room erupted with laughter and it wasn't until several minutes later that the emcee was able to continue. Which brought about other comments throughout the cruise like, "Oh look, it's the perfect timing girl."

But what cracked me up the most was that Jane seemed to sense her royalty status. She walked around the boat as if she owned the place greeting people with smiles and waves or the aforementioned "Hi there!" She loved all of the attention from her aunts and uncles and I think she was often aware that she had an extended audience as well. It's no wonder that she had the vacation of a life-time. If only she could remember it in the years to come!

As for now, though, she definitely has fond memories. When looking at pictures of the cruise on the blog she said with nostalgia, "Ah, big boat. That was fun. Do again later."

I tried to interview her about her experience but she was so into talking to me that she wouldn't allow me to write down what I was asking her. I was barely able to jot down some things she was saying before she would turn my face back to look at her. For most of you, it will not make a lot of sense, but it should ring a bell with those of you who were there.

Big boat. Jared. I need Jenni hold you.

Big boat have a bath tub. big boat. big one. (There was no bath tub but that's what she calls swimming pools).

Don’t let you fall in the toilet, big boat (She almost fell in)

Bathtub. pool. swimsuit on my belly.

Lido deck. dolphins. have a flower in the pool. (Her favorite floor, the Lido deck, had a pool with a dolphin statue, and was one night decorated with a florescent flower fountain for a party)

Go to the big boat, get pizza, pink ice cream. Not chocolate ice cream, pink, share mommy, yummy get more

Go outside stairs, windy, go outside.

Windy hold my ear, this ear (referring to riding in the little electric car in Key West when Gaylene was kind enough to block the wind from one of her ears).

Jane yellow slide, don’t like the big daddy’s pool (The "big daddy's pool" had the giant water slide, but Jane preferred the little yellow slide on the land right next to it).

I definitely need to make Jane a mini photo album of her experience on the "big boat" so that she can remember it for as long as possible! Thanks family for the awesome memories!