Cruising the Atlantic: 3 Glorious Days!

BKay and I ventured out last weekend to another one of our amazing adventures. We planned the trip early in January since Eliot was headed to Vegas to have "Big Fun" with his guy friends as a last bachelor hurrah. Of course in the middle of final wedding preparations long with the many bashes, it only made sense to go as beginning of summer fiesta!

Mid-morning on Friday, BKay and I set off to the Port of Miami to hop the Carnival Imagination and sail the great blue sea towards glorious Nassau. We arrived with perfect timing onto our ship found our roomy quarters and were amazed at the amount of space we had considering that everyone had told us that ship rooms were tiny. We attempted to get the lay of the land by the "It's a Small World" ship crew keep ushering us back to our rooms to get our personal floatation devices and meet for the safety seminar on the Lido deck. Following orders we did just that. We hunkered down in some comfy chairs under cover since rain was eminent and waited. Lucky we are lazy because the Florida skies opened up and we watched the heart of an enormous thunder storm hover the Carnival that was the safety session. Every lifeguard regulation I ever knew was zipping through my head as the waters rose on deck and over 300 people avoided getting hit my giant lightening. I kept telling myself that it must be safe. It just must be.

Safety instructions mumbled over, skies bright blue again we were on the ocean, and wishing for a drink. Quickly we understood the glory of being on a cruise ship. Our wish was their command. A fine gentleman holding a fruity something or other by the name of "Fun Ship" with the appropriate umbrella hanging out of it came by. And there it began. A weekend of abundance. No need to move food, drink, and entertainment always seems to come your way. One Fun Ship led to another which led us to our first dinner with cruise mates.

Cruises will assign seats and we had hit the Imagination jackpot! The table mates were of the very best caliber. We enjoyed hours of great food and great conversation. Later on headed together to a stand-up comedy show and salsa dancing until 4 AM. The next morning we rose and indulged in a hearty breakfast at the shore of the Bahamas.

The islands are small and perfect for one full day of exploration. BKay and I saw the sites. Colonial state buildings, Straw market, sampled tasty conch fritters and toured the Pirate museum. Arg Matey, it was a mighty treat. We took a ferry to Paradise Island and wondered the world of Atlantis. The many twists and turns of the acreage exposed beautiful aquatic animals, glorious beach shores and extravagant shopping.

At the end of our day, we found a cozy spot on the serenity deck (adults only) and rested before another evening of fun. Another eventful meal and this night a cheesy show and roulette table entertained us. By morning, we watched the Imagination disembark from shore. Sunning, eating, massages…a true day of leisure; an art auction, nap, Captains dinner, karaoke, another comic, dancing and more dancing. Cruises are amazing! The morning met up with the Miami shore where the required stop by the bakery and tasty breakfast fueled us to a nice drive home!

Bon Voyage!

Summer Gardening Summer Projects

Summer is here. Therefore all the ways to use my time effectively have made into a nice organized to-do list. I will refer to this list each day in hopes of not spending an entire summer sleeping until noon and watching entirely too many hours of Nick at Nite which will surely eat way my brain cells. I can also feel fulfilled in my daily endeavors and remain an active part of normal society. That's the goal.

There are some simple but time consuming items on the list such as beginning a new masters program (which I am, a Masters of Counseling and School Psychology through UMASS), actually get physical therapy for my knee (since a wedding and a vomiting husband has really taken up some of my time. This also involves finding exercises that will not negatively impact my knee, so my cleats are still hung.) and finally getting our house/yard in some sort of respectable order. We have discovered that we have termites. After two different opinions, these tiny wood eating monsters need to be suffocated in a tent filled of poison. The process will take two days and we will need to evacuate. We are still waiting to schedule this exciting event.

The other pest issues is located outside. Before our wedding we started to notice black moths with red torsos and white markings surrounding our house. We dismissed it, because to be frank we were too busy to deal with it, plus we were pretending that our home was protected by these lovely flying creatures. In the meantime, these distant cousins of the beautiful butterfly ate our bushes down to the bone. They have found a nice home only on these bushes (thankfully) These funky caterpillars line the stems. Today I finally sprayed Sven on them and trimmed down the bushes. I figure I will do this again tomorrow and see if the bush will survive at the moment, until we have to tent and everything dies. Homeowner ship rocks!

We are still working on getting Eliot at 100%. Thank you to all for the love, support and prayers. Keep 'em coming a little longer. I will blog more on this later. :)