Guests

We have been in Barbados for 14 months now, and much to my surprise and relief, we have not had that many guests (that may change after this blog entry).  Both sets of parents have made the trip, of course.  My brother has come twice, once with our parents and a second time with two friends.  He is planning his third trip as I write this and may have booked his tickets for all I know.  For more than a year, that was it.  Lots of people have talked about coming down, but life, money, reality intervene.  So, I was thrilled when I learned that my bestie TZ was going to come for nearly a week in early Dec.  And then one of my first cousins decided to visit with his girlfriend (with girlfriend, huh? Things that make you go hmm?!) in early Jan.  We did very similar things with both sets of guests, and I feel like we have this down pact.  We know what beaches to take them to if dropping them off on their own while we are at work.  We know that one day of the weekend will be spent driving them to the northernmost point of the island and then all the way down the East Coast so they can experience the breathtaking views of that rugged side.  We know they will likely want to spend a day on a catamaran.  I don't mean to make this sound rote because we definitely enjoy it too.  It's nice to have family and friends experience this island and get to see where we live.  By taking them around, we get to play tourists too (albeit experienced ones) which is a nice change from our day to day.  We vary it up based on the guests' interests, i.e. parents are more into gardens and such, the younger set is more into rum punch... well, never mind... it seems everyone wants the rum punch (and I am definitely the good hostess with a pitcher in the fridge ready to go when we have guests)!  You get my drift.  Throw in a bit of playing with S and his normal cute, charming self, and they all have really good visits

In our remaining months, we already know to expect the parents and my bro one more time.  It will be interesting and fun to see who else makes the trip.  Meanwhile, I'm playing like a tourist and making a list of all the things I still have left to do here so that I can make sure to get it in before it's pack-out time.