I was experiencing the kind of dread and anxiety I have only read about! I stayed up all night researching any loophole in the paperwork, on the Cruise Ship's website, on the booking agents website, EVERYWHERE I could think to read, I read and read and read, but to no avail!
We decided to head out Saturday morning anyway. Dena was doing me a HUGE favor, and meeting a notory at the hospital where the weekend manager was going to give a letter that Alyse had indeed been born there and who her parents were. Then she would bring it to California since their family had booked the same cruise. I gathered every bit of information I had on Alyse, from the documents I was given in the hospital when she was born, to the most current insurance and immunization records I had on her. If none of it worked, the plan was for Kim, Kierra and Dalton to go on the cruise and Alyse and I would spend the week in California. It was far from a good alternative but rather than staying home, we had to try! In the hotel that night, I tried to prepare Alyse for the possibility that she wouldn't be able to go, but that I would stay with her and we would still find a beach (her main objective :), it would just be in California. She was dissapointed and sad, but being the super sweet girl that she is, she didn't cry, and she started trying to comfort me, saying "It will be okay mommy, we will go to the beach, that will make you happy."
We got to the port Sunday morning, Dena gave me what she had, I organized all my information and we got in line. I was shaking and scared. If they didn't let us on, it was a year and a half of planning down the drain over one major oversight on my part! Kierra said, "M
om, show them that one" (picture attached) and I said "I don't want to show them that one, it is handwritten, I don't want them to think we are trying to get one over on them because anyone could have written that."We got to the front of the line, I presented everyone's information, and the kind young man (looked a lot like David Archuleta) said, "I don't think I can take this, I have to call my manager." We were sunk! The manager came down, told me they were mandated by Homeland Security and the notorized letter wouldn't work, but he would call his manager and check. They sent us to sit in the Guest relations building. The "BIG" manager came down, we brainstormed idea's, I told her there was a way to order birth certificates online, could I order it and have it sent to the port, then by the time we needed to get off (which is when Homeland Security is involved) it would be there, she said there would be no way to get it to the right people. Dena's attorney had said when you ordered the birth certificates online, it was possible that it would show you a picture of the birth certificate, so I got online in with the manager, ordered one (quite expensive) and what it showed me was a generic, so no go. She said there was just no way to let her on the ship, I was starting to get hysterical, then she said "If you only had the temporary birth certificate you were sent home from the hospital with." I couldn't believe my ears! All this turmoil and heart ache, and the "legal" document they were willing to take was the handwritten birth certificate??? Kierra was RIGHT!
I said, "WAIT, I HAVE THAT!" I capitalized that because I am pretty sure I YELLED it!
I sifted through my papers, pulled it out, she looked at it and said "I can take that!"
Then I Lost it! Tears, hyperventilation and the biggest amount of relief I could ever imagine! We were saved by a hand written (1/2 of it was my handwriting, the hospital didn't even write her name) child-like temporary birth certificate!
This trip could be full of rain, crappy food, beligerant people and it wouldn't matter because we we made it on with the whole family!
It turned out to be an AMAZING trip and Alyse not only saw the beach, she saw the beach in Mexico!
Kayden, Kierra and Braxten, Ready to Board :)
Arnold, Brita, Ashley and LaLoni Anderton were on the ship and this picture was after we all went ziplining in Puerto Vallarta. 
We spent two days in Cabo, this was saying goodbye on the last day. We Love it there!
Alyse's favorite of the Towel Animals
The sunset on our last night on the ship.
