After a week in paradise, reality & recovery...

So, the party's over... our 25th anniversary trip to Hawaii is done, and it's back to real life...

Like piles and piles of laundry...

We came home to a huge pile of mail... there were some nice surprises in the pile: the lunchbag I won in a sweepstakes, a refund check, payment for some puzzle-proofing assignments, and some gift cards I had ordered from MyPoints, but there were a few bills and a bank statement showing a pretty low balance that brought me back to reality: it's time to get back to a very disciplined lifestyle, in many areas of life: eating, exercise, and spending! 

So, I guess I won't be getting a birthday present for our pet goldfish's 5th birthday... Sorry, Nemo! You'll have to settle for wearing my tiara for a while... (this is what we found when we got home... the girls gave Nemo the royal treatment for her birthday):

So, I'm working on a plan... just taking it day by day. For each day, I will have five goals:

• To stick to healthy eating
• To get in at least 30 minutes of exercise
• To drink plenty of water (5 bottles)
• To keep my purchases to the bare minimum... planning meals around what's in the freezer/pantry
• To work on getting my Etsy shop open and stocked - working on a craft each day

 

Current Project: Granny Square Purses

I also want to develop my blog more. I have a few product reviews in mind, just need to find the time to fine-tune them!

June is right around the corner, so I'll start my new resolutions today, and carry them through the month of June. At the end of the month, I'm hoping I'll be able to say the following:

• I'm back down to the lowest weight in more than 20 years
• I don't wince when I look at the checkbook balance and worry if I can pay the bills
• I have my Etsy store opened and I sold something! 
• My blog made more than last month! (considering I made $8 in May, that shouldn't take much!)

I'm off to a good start! I uploaded about 200 pictures from the cruise to various photo sites and used up from credits I got for free prints, ended up paying $5 for the whole lot of them PLUS a personalized mug with some pictures from the trip... but don't tell Ron! It's a Father's Day gift! 

Home Again...

Well, after about 24 hours of travel, we are back home again, after a wonderful 25th anniversary trip. Things went well for the first two plane trips, from Honolulu to San Francisco (where Ron had a bowl of chicken stew in a sourdough bread bowl) and San Francisco to Chicago, but we got "fogged in" at O'Hare. The plane we were supposed to take to Buffalo at 7 AM got diverted to Indianapolis, so our flight home was delayed to 8, then 8:30, then 9, then 9:30, then 10, and then 10:30, but it was almost 11 by the time we took off. We got home at 1 PM, and the girls had dinner pretty much ready, in the crockpot. We exchanged stories while we had dinner, then headed to the living room to hand out gifts... Connie's birthday presents, and the souvenirs we brought home for the girls (t-shirts, necklaces, and pens... Candy loves her pen with a sea turtle on it!)

Now it is almost 9 PM, about 36 hours for me with only brief, uncomfortable catnaps on the plane and in the airport. I'm hoping to sleep soundly through the night and get right back to Buffalo time.

We came home to a beautifully clean house... the girls were very busy yesterday! They did a great job of making their own meals (including a campfire meal) and doing the shopping and all. I guess we'll have to leave them alone more often!

Just a few last minute notes from the cruise...
Our waitress, Staci, was wonderful! With Freestyle crusing, you're not assigned to a restaurant or a table, but we made a point of requesting Staci's table whenever we went to dinner. She got to know us, and made sure I got my gluten-free meals the way I needed them, and brought us plenty of hot water for a cup or two of tea after dinner.

I thought this was funny... outside the doors, we had a little sign that said "Welcome". It wasn't until the day after we got on the ship that I realized that the sign had a little knob to rotate the sign, and change it to "Turn down room", "Make up room", or "Do Not Disturb." I guess we weren't the slowest ones on the ship, because on Saturday morning, when we were getting ready to leave, I overhead a man saying that he just figured out how to change the sign on Friday night!

There was a strange sense of deja vue on Saturday morning. On Saturday the 21st, we stood on the balcony of our hotel room and watched the ship come into port. On Saturday the 28th, we stood on the balcony of the ship and watched as we passed by the hotels.

Our favorite airport of the trip was San Francisco. Ron loved the models of World War II airplanes hanging from the ceiling, and he's still raving about his delicious bowl of chicken stew! Any any airport that offers free wi-fi to its customers gets brownie points with me!

Rise and Shine on Kauai

On Thursday morning (Happy Birthday, Connie!) we sat on the balcony and watched the sun come up over the waves. We sailed into Kauai closer to shore than we have ever come on any island. As we cruised past a golf course, I thought that if a golfer stood at the edge of the cliff overlooking the ocean and hit a ball toward the ship, he would probably be able to hit it! As the tug boats tucked the ship into place, I thought I heard a rooster crowing. Then I heard it again... and again. I figured somebody must have a small farm with some chickens right by the port.

Sunrise in Kauai

We had a leisurely breakfast in the Aloha Cafe. I found a big pot of oatmeal, so I added that to my breakfast fare. I also had an omelet, made by Pam from Indianapolis. I told her that my girls went to school in Indiana, so we talked about Indiana winters. She couldn't believe that I thought Buffalo winters were worse in Buffalo.

We left the ship around 11:30 in the morning for our last shore excursion: Exploring Jungle Falls by Kayak. It was a very short ride in the excursion team's vans over to their harbor, but we saw lots of chickens. The driver explained that chickens have no natural predators on the island, so when some escaped from people's farms, they thrived in the wild. There were wild chickens everywhere! Another bit of wildlife trivia: Kauai has no snakes! That makes it a very popular location for film companies to film jungle scenes, since you don't have to worry about a boa constrictor putting the squeeze on an unsuspecting cameraman. I need to get out the movie "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and watch for the scene where Indiana Jones is running from natives and swings from a rope swing into the water where there is a plane waiting. We kayaked past that rope swing! They had to film the plane in another location... the river is way too narrow there for a plane!

Kayaking up the river to the jungle trail was quite a challenge, but fun. The only problem is that I got distracted while putting on my sunscreen. I was trying to listen to the talk on how to paddle and how to keep from tipping over and how to get into the kayak, and apparently I forgot to put sunscreen on my left leg. Well, my legs were stretched out in front of my on the kayak for the whole trip, so I have sunburn from my ankle up to my shorts line. I've been putting aloe on it, and hoping it doesn't blister and peel. When we go into town today, I'll have to wear long pants to make sure I don't get any more sun on it!

Just call me lobster leg!

So, we got to a jungle trail and walked along a trail for 10-15 minutes, hearing about some of the local plants, like the kukui nut. I found out that it has a few other names: the candle nut, the prank nut, and the 1-2-3 nut. The "Candle Nut" name is due to the fact that there is a high oil content in the nut, and if you smash it down and light it like a candle, it will give you light for a good while. The "Prank Nut" is because the nut in the center looks like a macadamia nut, but their composition is very different. The Kukui nut has such a high oil content that it has a laxative effect... so if you empty out a package of macadamia nuts and put in kukui nuts, you will quickly find out who it is who has been eating your snacks! The 1-2-3 Nut is along the same lines.. as the guide explained it: "One nut will help move things along. Two nuts will clean you out. Three nuts... Aloha!"

We had to hike down about half a mile of stairs to the jungle waterfalls. Again, we got some talks about the local plants. There were fruit bushes beside the trail: None fruit (looks ugly, tastes awful, but is good for you, like castor oil), strawberry guava, pineapple guava. At one point, we found a bush with some ripe strawberry guava. Ron and I shared one (it was about the size of a cherry), and it was pretty tasty. Lots of seeds, though! We didn't swim at the waterfalls like some people did... the water was freezing! We just waded in and took some pictures (on the waterproof cameras, so it will be a while before we get those back). Then we had to trek back up the hill for lunch! Now THAT was a rough hike! Half a mile uphill... oh, my aching legs! We had a quick lunch (deli sandwiches for everybody else, a salad for me) and headed back to the ship, where we had a little time to clean up and rest up before dinner.

We were lucky enough to get a seat in Staci's section again. She's our favorite waitress. She remembers details and makes sure I get my gluten-free bread and that the little box filled with varieties of tea is well-stocked before it gets to our table. All of the regular selections for dinner last night had gluten, so I had a steak and baked potato from the gluten-free menu. Ron had a chicken breast with mashed potatoes. He said that Bethany, our household connosiuer of mashed potatoes, would approve of their mashed potatoes. For dessert, Ron had a piece of lemon cream pie that he said was the best lemon cream pie he'd ever had, and I had a flourless molten chocolate cake. It was good, but I liked yesterday's Creme Brulee with semisweet chocolate layer better.

The original plan was to go to the magic show after dinner, but we were just too wiped out. We came back to the room and collapsed. I played games on the laptop, and Ron "rested his eyes".

Today we have a quiet day in Kauai (well, as quiet as you can with roosters crowing every five minutes). We'll try to find some free wi-fi, and be back to the ship to set sail at 2 PM. We will sail through the night and leave the ship around 8 am for our flight back to Buffalo... via San Francisco and Chicago. It's going to be a long trip!

The Big Island

It's 4 am and I'm out on the balcony again! I'm still not fully adjusted to Hawaiian time. I'm so wiped out by 9 PM local time, so I go to bed early, but then I'm fully awake at 4 am! Oh, well, I enjoy sitting out here with the ocean breeze and the sound of the waves.

We left Maui at 6 o'clock last night, and we are cruising to Hilo on the big island of Hawaii. Ron and I are going on a bike tour of Volcanoes National Park. I'll be sure to take plenty of pictures!
Yesterday was a quiet day in port for us -- no shore excursions. We had a leisurely breakfast in the main dining room, so things were a bit fancier than our quick breakfasts in the Aloha Cafe. Ron had Eggs Benedict with smoked salmon, and declared it the best breakfast he's ever eaten. I had a mushroom omelet and grilled ham, and when they brought me my gluten-free bread, I got apricot-mango jam. It was delicious! Of course, one of the first things that popped into my head was, "I wonder if I can find a recipe online to make this myself?"

We took a free shuttle into town, to the biggest mall on the island, and sat outside Starbucks sipping chai lattes, uploading pictures, and checking e-mail. I had about 300 e-mails to delete! Then we came back to the ship for lunch in the Aloha Cafe. They were serving up roast chicken at the carving station, so I made myself a nice salad and had chicken on top. I was chatting with the server at the station with hot dogs, hamburgers and pizza, and asked about gluten-free stuff. He said they have gluten-free pizza crusts, so when we go there for lunch on Wednesday, they're going to make me my own gluten-free pizza. Yeah, I can have Hawaiian Pizza in Hawaii!

After lunch, and my mandatory afternoon nap, I went to a class to make a kakua nut lei. Our Hawaii ambassadors, Kaleo and China, told a great bit about the history of the kakua nut.Then we used a wire needle to push ribbon through two dozen of the kakua nut beads, tieing knots between them, to make a necklace. I'll have to get Ron to get a picture of me wearing mine.

It was dress-up night for dinner, so we took a little extra time getting ready. We went later than usual, and the dining room was crowded, so we didn't get a table with our usual server, Stacey. We still had a delicious dinner - Ron had fish and I had steak. Ron had an apple bread pudding for dessert that he said was absolutely delicious. Too bad I couldn't try it... maybe someday I can work up a recipe for a gluten-free apple bread pudding!

We're getting closer to the big island. I can see lights in the distance. We dock around 8 am and leave for our biking adventure at 8:15! We have SPF 70 sunscreen!

Wednesday morning update:
Sorry I’m late… I actually slept until 5 am! I managed to stay up until 10 pm, watching the movie "The Blind Side" and reading the novel I downloaded from the library website.
So, yesterday we had breakfast in the Aloha Café, with their awesome breakfast buffet. We were supposed to meet up with the shore excursion staff for the bike tour at 8:15 am, so we wanted to have a hearty breakfast. It was raining as we ate, but the waiters were reassuring us that the rain would clear up and we would have a beautiful day in Hilo. It’s always like that, they said.

We headed out and met with ten other bikers. There were two sets of newlyweds, another couple celebrating their 25^{th anniversary, a couple celebrating their 30th, and another couple who weren’t celebrating an anniversary, just enjoying Hawaii. It was nearly an hour’s drive to the park where we would be biking, and it rained all the way. The driver kept saying how it would clear up when we crossed the summit heading into the park. It didn’t. Oops. When we got to the park and started walking around, it was still raining, so the tour staff handed out jackets. Half an hour later, we walked down to a lower parking lot to get our bikes and safety speech. It was still chilly and raining, so they also gave us gloves! We got sweet 21-speed high-tech bikes where you just flick one of four switches to go up or down. I spent most of my time cruising around gear 2-5, but I admit, on the "Challenge Hill", I got down to the "Granny Gear" of 1-2, and on a long straightaway, I was in 3-4 keeping up with the group. Eventually, the sun came out and we were able to peel off some of the layers of clothing. We hiked through a rainforest and through a lava tube and had our snack at a site where lava flow had destroyed a section of road. There were lava fields on both sides of the road (which was reconstructed once the lava cooled). I think that incident happened 14 years ago, but there were already plants taking root in the lava fields. We stopped at a big candy store on the way back to the ship. They had a big plate-glass window overlooking the work area, where ladies in hair nets and coverall aprons dipped chocolates. I had to get some pictures. It reminded me so much of the Lucy episode where Lucy and Ethel worked on the chocolate assembly line!}

Morning in Maui

Ah, what a life. It's 4 am (10 am Buffalo time)  and I'm sitting on the balcony in my PJs with my feet up on the railing, enjoying a cool breeze and looking over the lights of Maui. LOL, probably the only thing that could make it better would be if I could check my e-mail and Facebook, but I'm too cheap to pay 50 cents a minute to get on the internet. Later today, Ron and I have a free day, so we're taking the free shuttle into town. We'll go to McDonalds or Starbucks, get a hot cocoa, and use their free wi-fi to check in.

So, I guess I'll back up to Friday. We had an alarm set to get up at 4:30, but I was up way before the alarm went off. Everything was packed and ready to go, so we just had breakfast and headed out the door to the airport. When we scanned out passports at the check-in kiosk, I got a message that I needed to pick up the help phone... our plane from Buffalo to Chicago had a 30-minute delay, so we would miss our connecting flight. The staticky voice on the other end of the line said that we would arrive in Hawaii at 7:30 pm instead of 3:30. When she put me on hold, I said to Ron, "Now we're getting there 4 hours later. Good thing we booked the night before... we would have missed the boat!" The reservations agent said, "I can help you. Tell them you're working with me." He searched and clicked and shook his head and searched and clicked some more and finally told us that we were on a direct flight from Chicago to Honolulu and we would get there at 1:53 PM Hawaiian time, nearly two hours earlier than our original flight.

The flight was long, and frustrating (United Airlines, when you have somebody on your planes for 8 hours, you could at least give them a pack of complimentary peanuts or pretzels). They were all out of the best option for a gluten-free lunch (a spinach-chicken salad), so I had to shell out nine bucks for a "turkey wrap" that had about two tablespoons of turkey and two tablespoons of shredded lettuce and carrots (the only parts I could eat) in a big tortilla. Oh, well, live and learn. We'll grab something in the airport for the flight back.

Our hotel, the Marriott Waikiki, was beautiful. We had a balcony room on the 11th floor, so we had quite the view of the surrounding area, including the beach. Norwegian Cruise Lines had an office where we were able to sign in and get a priority boarding pass. They also gave us beautiful leis made with real flowers.

View from our balcony.

We made reservations for a Pearl Harbor tour (leaving at 6:45 am, yikes) and strolled down to the beach for a quick dip. (Sorry, pictures of that are on the waterproof camera that won't be developed until we get back.) Brrr, the water was cold! I only waded in. The sun was intensely hot, and I was afraid we would get sunburns, even with our sunscreen, so we didn't stay out very long. We walked around a bit, checked out the Hawaiian ABC stores (there were two in the hotel and two more within the block or so where we walked around), and picked up some stuff for breakfast (the hotel doesn't give a complimentary breakfast, and we had to be out so early that we wouldn't really have time to go to a restaurant, so we got cereal, yogurt, a little carton of milk, a hard-boiled egg, some fresh fruit and a granola bar at the ABC store. The stores are little, but they have a little bit of everything!

The sun was still shining brightly, but my body was telling me that it was midnight in Buffalo, and it wanted to sleep! We managed to stay up until 8 PM, then collapsed into bed. I think we slept until about 4:30 am. Around 5 am, I gave up on trying to sleep any more and got up to work on the puzzle-proofing assignment I brought along.

Pearl Harbor was a very sobering tour. The grounds were beautiful, the museums and exhibits were very informative, but it was all so sad. At the USS Arizona memorial, there was a Pearl Harbor survivor named Sunny handing out little flowers to toss into the water as a memorial. I was in tears as I dropped my flower into the water, thinking of all the families who lost loved ones when the Arizona went down. 

As we drove around in the tour bus, I was amazed at the beauty of Hawaii: the moutains cloaked in clouds, the flowers everywhere, the birds, the waterfalls, the trees. We've only been here for two full days, and already I have about a hundred pictures. It's going to take me a while to get them all uploaded to Facebook and captioned next week!

The tour bus dropped us off at the pier. We could see a long, long line of people waiting to get in for the cruise. I didn't look forward to waiting in line... but then I discovered the joy of "Priority Check-in" from having a pre-cruise hotel stay... they opened up a door and ushered us directly into the building, where we went through security without a line. We were on the ship in about fifteen minutes. We got our picture taken with two cast members of the Polynesian show...LOL, it turned out really well, considering we had been travelling for more than 12 hours, but the picture is $19.95, and I'm too cheap to buy it! The rooms weren't ready yet, so we made our way to the Aloha Cafe and had some lunch. There were buffet stations all over the room, with a fruit bar, salad bar, hot entrees, pizza, tacos, soup, and dessert. I was able to find plenty of gluten-free options and had a nice salad with some chicken and fruit... topped off with a piece of apple pie with ice cream on the side. (I nibbed the apple pie filling out from between the crusts). By the time were were finished, our room was ready. I love having the balcony. We can have fresh air in the room instead of air conditioning. I went to sleep last night to the sound of the water lapping against the boat.

Sunday morning, we woke up around 5 am (still a bit on Buffalo time) and got ready to leave for our Snorkeling adventure. We took a bus to harbor and took a 9-mile (45-minute) boat ride out to a coral reef inside an underwater volcano crater. There were three ways to get off the boat: you could ease off into the water from the dive platform, you could jump off the side of the boat into the water (I think that was a 6-foot drop), or you could go down a slide into the water. We did the slide. It was FUN! The water was cold, and the waves were rougher than any snorkeling we'd done before, but the water was crystal clear. We snorkeled for about 45 minutes before I got seasick and needed to head back to the ship. Ron snorkeled at the second site (Turtle Town) by himself as I stayed on the boat with my head back and my eyes closed. I'm sorry I had to miss the turtles. Ron took plenty of pictures... I just have to wait until the underwater camera gets developed! There was a mix-up, and the gluten-free lunch that was supposed to be provided wasn't, so I skipped lunch (even with the dramamine a fellow traveler gave me, I still didn't feel much like eating), but by the time we got back to shore, I was feeling better.

We got back to our room to find a towel puppy waiting for us (photo 90), got cleaned up and got ready for dinner in the Liberty dining room. As we were getting ready, Ron said, "I could really go for a nice turkey dinner." Sure enough, when we got down to the dining room, turkey was on the menu! Even better, scallops were a choice for appetizer! The kitchen staff were accomodating enough to give me rice instead of stuffing to make my dinner gluten-free, so we both had a delicious meal! I even had a piece of flour-less chocolate cake with raspberry sauce.

So now I sit here on the balcon as the sun rises over Maui, looking forward to a quiet day of exploring and relaxing. Tomorrow we do a bike tour of a volcano park, so we're resting up today. After all, this is vacation!

I need a vacation!

Last night, when I crawled into bed, that's what I thought: I need a vacation. Actually, it was this morning when I crawled into bed, since it was after midnight. There is so much I need to get done this week. I stayed up until after midnight to finish reading a book that's due back at the library tomorrow. I could have just returned the book, and checked it out again to read after vacation, but no, I had to stay up late and finish. That's been the story of my life this week. We leave on vacation in less than 48 hours, and I'm still trying to finish up projects here and there (like updating my blog) instead of just doing the bare minimum that needs to be done. 

 

So, back to the book. I got excited when I saw that there was a new book in the Bug Man series. Nick Downs has written a series of suspense novels based on the character Nick Polchak. Nick is, shall we say, an unusual character. He loves the world of insects--he'd rather spend time with bugs than with humans! Nick is a forensic entomologist: he helps to solve crimes by studying the insects on and around dead bodies. These aren't the kind of books you read while you're eating lunch, but if you enjoyed the old Quincy TV show, they'd probably be right up your alley. The series started with “Shoo Fly Pie” and “Chop Shop.” Then there was “Plague Maker,” “First the Dead,” “Less than Dead” and “Ends of the Earth.” The newest book in the series was the one that kept me up last night, "Nick of Time." Nick is getting married, but days before the wedding, is drawn into investigating the murder of a long-time friend and fellow scientist. I loved the book, with its quirky humor and plot twists that caught me off guard. The end left me thinking that there is definitely another Bug Man novel on the horizon. Hooray!  If you want to read "Nick of Time," I would strongly suggest that you start at the beginning and get to know the world of Nick Polchak first. Have fun!  

Time to get back to my to-do list!

Just Keep on Keeping On

Today was the kind of day when I could get discouraged. All week long, I've been trying really hard to stick to healthy eating and exercise.

I have this poster on my fridge:

Each day, I'm checking off when I get in my exercise and stick to healthy eating and take my vitamins, etc. I've been getting in some great workouts and eating. So, today, after five days of A or A+ days, I figured I'd break my pattern of Monday weigh-ins and see how much weight I'd lost this week.

The scale was not kind. The scale said I'd GAINED three pounds. You know, usually that would be enough to send me off the deep end with an attitude like "I eat healthy all week and I still gain weight? Why bother eating healthy? I'm making chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast!" This time, I didn't slip into that thinking. I had my usual breakfast (two eggs and a strawberry smoothie), and headed off to work. I think I finally figured out the cause for the gain: we had homemade sauerkraut with dinner last night, and it was very salty. I was probably just retaining a lot of water.

I stayed the course with healthy eating today, and after lunch, headed over to my daughter's school for their "Race for Education." The kids do laps around the soccer field for an hour to raise money for school. I told my daughter I'd walk/jog with her. The weatherman predicted rain and thunderstorms for the afternoon, but it was sunny and clear and 80 degrees. After the first mile or two, it was getting harder and harder to keep up the pace. But, we just kept plugging away, and we did 4 miles.

On the way home, we were both hot and thirsty and tired and hungry. We stopped at the grocery store to pick up some fish for dinner, and I told Bethany she could pick out a treat. She picked up a single-serving cup of ice cream... Double Chocolate Fudge. She doesn't usually eat ice cream with a fork. It was the only silverware I had in my lunchbag.

It would have been easy to justify getting myself an ice cream, too. After all, I just worked out for an hour. I stuck to my diet for most of the day. I stuck to my guns, though... this was my treat: 

 Yum! 

Hopefully by the time I do my official weigh-in on Monday, all the sodium will be flushed out of my system, and I'll have a good loss to show for this week's efforts. I'm learning. I'm getting there, one step at a time, one pound at a time. Today was a good day, despite what "Mean Old Mr. Scale" had to say to me this morning!