A cruise with the whole family

The cruise was my mother's brilliant idea.

Mom doesn't turn 70 until Nov. 9, but she wanted to celebrate this milestone with the whole family so we had to do something before the grandkids went back to school. Where could we go and what could we do with 22 people? (That would be Mom, her four adult children and our spouses, and 13 grandchildren ages 4 to 22.) That's a lot of people.

We weighed the options: We could rent a huge beach house, go to an expensive resort or have a staycation. Then Mom said: “What if I took everyone on a cruise? We won't have to cook, clean or shop for food. And there's plenty of entertainment on the ship.”

It seemed perfect, my brothers and I agreed. Plus, apart from Mom, none of us had ever been on a cruise, so it would be a real adventure.

To say the least.

The idea of 22 people traveling together seemed a little overwhelming. Try going anywhere with such a big crowd and keeping everybody together and everything straight and nobody from getting hurt or lost or otherwise misplaced. The logistics were daunting, right from the start.

A travel agent booked us on a seven-day Carnival cruise from Baltimore to Port Canaveral, Fla., and Nassau and Freeport in the Bahamas, and she needed documentation and information for everything. She had to have everyone's birth date and name as it appears on their passport or birth certificate (and we had to make sure everybody had a passport or birth certificate to present when we embarked). A lot of hunting for paperwork ensued.

We also had to work out our preferences for cabin assignments so the agent could figure out how many cabins to book. Talk about complicated. You know how those family dynamics are. We ended up with seven cabins, all on the same floor (whew!) and down the hall from one another. Three four-person cabins, two three-person cabins and two two-person cabins. Five were balcony cabins, and two were inside cabins for some of the grandkids.

Got that?

The week of the cruise, two of my brothers and their families drove to the Washington area from Ohio, and my oldest daughter, Monique, flew in from Kentucky. We hired two stretch limos to take us to the port with our luggage. This was one of our better ideas, because some people in my family have a lot of trouble getting anywhere on time. No way, though, were the kids going to miss out on the limo ride, so they'd make sure that their parents were operating on schedule that day.

I can't imagine what the other passengers thought when the limos pulled up to the dock and disgorged 22 people and almost double that number of bags. But the Carnival Pride holds 2,124 passengers, so in that context we were just a drop in the bucket. Just 1 percent of the passenger list, in fact. And it wouldn't be hard to get lost among so many people, especially when there were so many of us to keep track of.

We'd thought of that, though. We made matching tie-dyed T-shirts so we could always find each other easily. I designed an iron-on that read, “Talentino-Sanders 1st Annual Cruise 2010. No Whining, No Crying.” That's a family code phrase, what my mother tells the grandkids whenever they start begging for something or complaining because they're not getting their way. The shirts were numbered according to age: Mom was No. 1, and Genevieve, the youngest, was No. 22.

I don't know whether it was the shirts or the sheer volume of us, but somewhere along the cruise, we overheard some kids remarking, “Those Talentino people are everywhere.”

Having never cruised before, none of us quite knew how things worked. Would we have to do everything together? What if I wanted to go to the pool and others wanted to go to the gym? Well, no worries. The cruise was really liberating. Being on a big ship with activities everywhere, for all ages, we could all go off in our own directions without worrying too much about someone being left behind or forced into something they didn't want to do.

The kids could go anywhere as long as they were with one other family member. There were no rules, no bedtimes, no real mealtimes. (They loved it!)

The ship was loaded with activities: basketball, dodgeball, table tennis, miniature golf, swimming and lots more. Early on, our kids wanted to play basketball, but all the balls had been checked out. So when we docked in Florida, my husband and I headed to Walgreens to buy a ball. After that, the kids and the adults could play whenever we could find a free court. Our kids became the envy of all the other kids on board.

Actually, there was one rule: My mother requested that we meet each night for dinner. We'd rotate among our five tables nightly so the same people weren't always sitting with one another. It was a great way to spend time with everyone and talk over what had happened during the day.

We also talked about how generous Mom is with her time and money. She adores her grandchildren and will travel miles to see their concerts and sports meets, so we all made an effort to make her happy, such as the evening we all wore our T-shirts for a group portrait.

In Port Canaveral, our first stop, Mom and three others stayed on the ship while the rest of us ventured ashore. There was a town shuttle that took passengers to various stops for $5 per day. You could go to a mall, Cocoa Beach or Walmart, or all three, then hop back on for the return trip to the ship. This was a fairly inexpensive way to travel with 18 people.

Next stop was Nassau. Everyone except Mom went ashore this time, but the taxi drivers wanted $15 per person for a ride to a public beach. Dream on! Instead, we bartered with a transportation company that approached us in the terminal and worked out a deal for $7 per person to the beach and back. (We didn't have to pay till they brought us back to port.) That price was really worth it. The kids were amazed at how clear and blue the water was: We could see the fish swimming at our feet. My daughter Monique negotiated a 15-minute jet-ski ride for $20 and took her cousin Douglas along. They can scratch “jet ski in the Bahamas” off their bucket list.

Freeport was more industrial, but it gave us a taste of the island life. The shops were overflowing with handmade purses, straw baskets, woodcarvings, T-shirts, jewelry and gifts. A band was playing in the square, and John enjoyed their music so much that he bought a CD.

As we said farewell to Freeport and headed back to Baltimore, a strange sense of sadness overcame us. One reason was Carlos, our cabin steward, who did anything we asked with a smile.

At night we'd all head back to our rooms to find the cute towel creatures that Carlos had created while we were dining. He would turn down our beds and lay out chocolates and the next day's list of activities. He told us that this cruise would be his last after 13 years with Carnival, so we decided to give him a little retirement party. On our last night, we made a card that everybody signed, and we ordered a piece of cake. My mom included a $100 bill as a thank-you.

But the main reason for our melancholy was that the cruise was drawing to an end. Soon we would all scatter again. We'd had such a wonderful time being together, something we rarely get to enjoy except for a weekend here and there, when it seems that someone always has something to do or somewhere to go. On the cruise, we were all laid-back, with no carpooling, no video games just relaxing and playing with one another. A priceless opportunity.

So thanks, Mom. It really was a brilliant idea.

Now, how about next year? We're all looking forward to the Second Annual Talentino-Sanders Cruise.