Vacation Cruise!!!

On Saturday I returned from an AMAZING vacation!! Ashley, Lindsay and I went on a 7 day cruise from New York to the Bahamas and back. It was SO relaxing and fun!! I am going to post a little bit about each day following this, so check out our vacation!

Cruise- Day 8

This was the last day of vacation, so sad!!

We got up, ate breakfast and then headed off the ship. It actually took a while to get off the ship and through customs, but it wasn't too bad. Ashley's friend got stuck in traffic on her way to pick us up, so we ended up spending some time hanging out in the cruise terminal. We actually didn't mind, we were so relaxed from the cruise, not much was getting to us!

Once we were picked up we decided to spend some time in NYC before driving home. We made a stop at the NBC Studios store so I could pick up some Christmas presents, and then walked around a really fun outdoor market where we found the biggest (and yummiest!) cupcakes I have ever seen.

The hilarious part about the cupcakes is that we didn't want to eat them right away, but they didn't have any boxes for us to put them in. So, we carried with around New York with us for several hours, haha. In fact, we had to carry them all the way home! They were definitely worth all the effort. :)

We left New York around 1:30 and expected to be home no later than 3:30 or 4. Unfortunately, traffic was out of control in New Jersey and we were stuck there for 3 hours! No accidents, no road work, just way too many cars. That part was pretty miserable, but we survived and made it home just in time to go to Chick Fil A for dinner (with some of our free meal coupons!).

One of the best decisions I have ever made was to clean the house completely before we left. So, we came home to a really clean house!! All we had to do was throw our clothes in the washer and relax at home with Gizmo (he missed us)!!

Overall, I can't think of how this vacation could have been any better. It was so relaxing and we had so much fun!! God is tooooooo good to me!!

Cruise- Day 7

Day 7 was our last full day on the cruise. It was another full day at sea, so again not so many pictures.

We did try and spend some time out by the pool, but it got a bit chilly, so we went back to the spa. :)Sorry for the lack of pictures, but it was our last chance to just relax! I finished my second book of the cruise, Ashley finished her book and Lindsay continued to fill up her sketch book. Oh, and of course we ate really yummy food.

A great final day on the ship.

Cruise- Day 6

Day 6 was Thanksgiving!! Unfortunately (at least for the purposes of this blog post), we didn't do much that warranted pictures. We spent the day doing pretty much the same thing I always do on Thanksgiving... watching football and eating. :)

We did get a little dressed up for our official Thanksgiving meal, and we even had some tiaras, haha.

I promise we did leave the room, haha, but we really did enjoy relaxing. Besides, why leave the room when this is your view during the day:


And this is the one at night:

Thank you Jesus. :)

Cruise- Day 5

Day 5 was our last day on land before heading back north and we got to spend it in the capital of the Bahamas, Nassau. It was another beautiful, sunny and warm day, and we loved it!

We decided to get off the boat again and booked a tour on a glass bottom boat. The name of the boat is a bit deceiving as the entire bottom is not glass. However, they do have glass squares on the bottom of the boat, so you can see all the amazing sea life underneath. Plus, we got a really nice water tour of Nassau. :)



After the boat tour, Ashley decided to do some shopping. Lindsay and I aren't so into shopping, so we decided to go back on the boat and hang out by the pool.

We decided to make this night our "dress up" night, so we spent some time getting ready and then going to a fancy dinner. But it wasn't just any dinner; we signed up for a Mystery Dinner. It turned out to be so much fun!!

First, we were put at a table with 3 other people. All 6 of us were given a character and a story line and it was our job during the meal to figure out which one of us was the murderer.

The 3 ladies we sat with were SO fun! They were on vacation with their families, but wanted a girls' night, so they came to the dinner. We laughed with them a lot and had a great time! And it turns out, I was the murderer! Whoops!

Anyway, after the dinner I made everyone take a few pictures, before we changed clothes and got ready for...

That's right, there was a chocolate buffet that night!! SO MUCH CHOCOLATE!!! It was awesome!!

Thankfully, we were able to pile our plates full of chocolate and take them back to our room, to relax for the rest of the evening. It was yet another awesome day. :)

I'll leave you with some of our photos from the night. :)






(This last one is my favorite!)

Cruise- Day 4

Day 4 of the cruise was absolutely my favorite. We spent the day at Great Stirrup Cay, the private island that Norwegian Cruise Lines owns. Our ship anchored at sea and then we took a smaller boat onto the island for the day.

Because Lindsay and I had booked a jet ski excursion for the morning, we were able to be one of the first people on the island, which was awesome! Ashley went and reserved lounge chairs for us while Lindsay and I went on our excursion.

Unfortunately, because we were on the water the entire time, I wasn't able to take any pictures of our jet ski tour, which stinks because it was my favorite part of the cruise! We got to drive the jet skis to several different islands, over crystal clear water. We could see all the way to the bottom!

One of the islands we went by was a former drug smuggling island. Apparently no one knew it existed until a plane crashed on it, alerting the coast guard. They discovered an 18 year old and two 25 year olds running a drug ring off the island (its only about 125 miles from Florida). The 25 year olds got 10 years in jail, and the 18 year old now works for the FBI. :)

The last island we went to was called "Starfish Island". It was AMAZING! We got off our jet skis and were surrounded by starfish, conchs, and even some sea cucumbers. We got to touch all of them, and then just put them back in the ocean. It was sweet!!

After we returned from our tour, Lindsay and I met up with Ashley for a barbecue lunch that the ship provided. Then we went swimming for a while; with the fish! The water was just so beautiful!

Of course, we also spent some time just relaxing in the lounge chairs and enjoying the beautiful Bahama sun. SO GREAT!!

We got back in the boat just before sunset, and we spent the rest of the evening just hanging out on the ship; mostly in our balcony. Another great day!!

Cruise- Day 3

Day 3 was our first full day docked at a port; we were in Orlando, FL. Pretty much the only thing to do off the ship was shop or go to Disney, neither of which we wanted to do. So, we stayed on the boat for the day! It was nice with so many people off the boat. :)

We spent the morning in the spa, and then the afternoon hanging out by the pool for a while (it was finally warm!).


In the early evening, it got a little chilly outside, so we decided to enjoy some time playing cards together.

Then, we (and by we, I really mean Lindsay) decided to try out the Rock Wall.

And finally, we tried our hands at shuffleboard.

We discovered that Lindsay is an awesome rock climber, but none of us are very good at shuffleboard.



It was another really fun day!

Cruise- Day 2

Day 2 was spent completely at sea. It was a little warmer outside as we made our way down the east coast, but not quite sunny Bahamas just yet. So, we spent most of the day like this:

Hanging out in the spa; reading (or drawing for Lindsay) in between time spent in the whirlpools, sauna and steam room. I can't remember ever feeling that relaxed!

After hanging out in the spa for several hours, we went back to our room to enjoy something else we love:


Football!! We were so excited to get to see the Eagles beat the Giants while on vacation!

Other than that and eating some really yummy food, we didn't really do much else. It was great!

Cruise- Day 1

We had been talking about this cruise for months and couldn't believe that the day was finally here! After some really really tough weeks for all 3 of us, we were SO ready to get away for a while! The best part about taking a cruise was that our cell phones wouldn't work, so we couldn't be distracted from relaxing. It was SO great!!

We were able to drive Ashley's car to New York and leave it with her best friend for the week. Then her friend came back and picked us up so we could drive home (after spending some time in NY, hehe). It was really nice to not have to worry about the travel at all!

We got to NY around noon and were able to get on the boat pretty fast. Our room wasn't available until after 2, so we decided to start off by getting some lunch.

After lunch we decided to take a tour of the spa, which turned out to be the best idea we had! They not only offered every service you could imagine (hair, nails, acupuncture, hot stone massage, sea weed massage, and SO much more!), they also had their own "relaxation" area. This was separated into male and female areas, as well as a common area. In the separate rooms, they had a sauna, steam room, and two individual whirl pools.

In the common area, they had a therapy pool (massaging bubbles everywhere!), a hot tub, heated stone lounge chairs, and cushy lounge chairs looking over the bow of the ship as we head from port to port.





Needless to say, we fell in love. At the end of the tour, they mentioned that we could buy an unlimited pass to the spa for the week. The best part was that although there were over 2000 people on the ship, only 84 would be allowed to get the unlimited spa passes. So, it would never be crowded! That sold us and we bought our passes! Oh, and each time we went in, they gave us a really comfy robe to wear. We spent a lot of time there throughout the week, and it was awesome every time!

After our spa tour, we were able to get into our room... which we LOVED! We had a king size bed and then a couch that pulls out into a bed. The bathroom was a good size (for a cruise), and we actually had storage space for all of our clothes, so we could store our suitcases away for the week.


And the best part: we had a balcony!!!

We slept every night with the doors open, listening to the waves. It was so great!

As we were hanging out in our room, we started to sail away from NY. We watched NY float by from our balcony, at sunset. It was beautiful.

From there we went to a really yummy dinner and then saw a comedian in the main theater. It was fun! And then we went to sleep listening to the gentle waves of the Atlantic ocean. It was a great first day. :)

In a Daze

Laura Jeanne Casteel (July 29, 1980-November 6, 2010)

I am sitting down to write (I am working hard to actually keep up with this blog!), but my mind is honestly in a daze. I am living in survival mode, just trying to make it through one day at a time. I can't complain, of course, since I am going on a cruise in 4 days (The Lord knew in September that I would be desperate for a break now!!). Still, there is so much going on, I don't even really feel like I could process it all even if I wanted to.

I spent the weekend in VA mourning the loss of an incredible woman. Her death hit me A LOT harder than I would have expected, and I certainly have not recovered. At first, I didn't think her death would linger with me. She cut herself off from me and our other high school friends years ago. I can't really remember the last time we talked, and while I often prayed for her over the years, she was not a part of my daily life. So, her passing has not left a physical void in my life. An emotional void, however, is there.

She committed suicide. This incredible beautiful, intelligent (she became a board certified pharmacist while pursuing her MBA), kind and overall amazing woman came to the point of complete hopelessness. From what I understand, the last few years of her life she was so overwhelmed by darkness that she could see nothing else. While I trust that she is finally at peace with her Lord (she was a believer), I can't seem to escape the thoughts of her struggles... especially the absolute despair she felt in her last moments. If only she knew...

Here we all are outside our favorite coffee shop, posing in Scott's parents' convertible. We met at the coffee shop regularly every summer during college and when we were in town for breaks.


The chapel was packed for her memorial service and the place was filled with pictures of her with so many people that loved her. ALL of my high school friends made the trip into town for her, traveling from San Francisco, Boston, Charleston, Indianapolis, Nashville, Philadelphia.... all at a moments notice, because she was so loved. She just couldn't see it.

The weekend it self was a roller coaster, to say the least. So much joy at seeing so many people that I love, so much sorrow as to why we were there. After the memorial service we went to Laura's parents house for a small reception. We had a lot of good times in that house in high school; working on school projects, taking pictures for school dances (they have a beautiful back yard!), and just hanging out. Her mom told us it was really nice to hear our stories and laughter in her home again. I have to agree with her.

I believe this picture was taken New Year's Eve in 1999, but I'm not positive. We are at Laura's house:

I laughed a lot, cried a lot, then laughed and cried some more. I am SO incredible blessed to have such incredible people enter into my life 18 years ago, and still be there today. We got really real with one another this weekend, sharing our joys and our struggles and committing to continue to pray for one another once we all went our separate ways. The crazy thing is, I really think we will do it.

Then... I believe this picture was taken in 2000 or 2001. On the left is the crew of girls who came from Cave Spring Junior High, and on the right is the Hidden Valley Junior High group. This is one of my favorite pictures of all of us, though I am not sure why Laura isn't in in.


And here we ALL are in 2010 (except Melissa, she had already gone home).

As if all of this wasn't enough, we have had some pretty intense things happening at church. I can't really go into details, but the situation has been very hard on MANY people in our congregation (me included) and it will take a long time to recover. All I can say is, sin is SO painful and affects MANY more people that just those who commit the sin.

As a result of all of this (and actually a few other things that I also can't really post here), I find myself tired, confused, and really evaluating my own life. There is a lot of sin in my life (like everyone else). However, I have chosen to either ignore it, or convince myself that it isn't a big deal. But it is, sin is a big deal. MY sin is a big deal. God's heart is broken by MY sin. My Savior was nailed to a cross because of MY sin.

And the enemy tells me lies. And I often believe those lies. Sometimes I am too tired to fight the lies. But if I don't fight them, I become surrounded by darkness. If I stop fighting, the darkness will hide the light. There was light in Laura's life, but she couldn't see it. No matter how hard other people tried to show it to her, she just couldn't see it. She fought for years to see it, but eventually the fight became too overwhelming.

Yup, just kind of in a daze right now. I know it seems like my mind is all over the place, but really, I have kinda stopped letting my mind wander. I'm just focusing on each day and the tasks of the day. And in 4 days I go on a cruise. All the rest of this stuff, will have to wait until I get back. :)

Sadness

I promise (fo real fo real) to write more about this later, but I am packing now to fly to Virginia tomorrow (technically I am flying into North Carolina and then driving 2 hours into Virginia, but you get the idea).

Why? Well, this past weekend a good friend from high school, Laura, committed suicide. Those of you who know me know that I am still very close to many of my high school friends. In fact, many of them are my supporters financially and ALL of them support me in prayer and encouragement. We all talk/email/facebook regularly, see each other as often as possible and even went on a big vacation together a few years ago with plans to do it again asap. It doesn't make sense outside of God's blessing, but over the last 15+ years (some of us met in junior high, others in high school); despite going to different colleges, moving to different cities, getting married and having kids, and each of us going through all kinds of changes, we have managed to all stay close.

Devastated, sad and confused are the only words I can think of to describe how I feel right now...yet they don't even begin to encompass everything. Please pray for her family.

I got the phone call on Sunday (she was found on Saturday) and by Wednesday literally ALL of my close friends from high school (including me) had plans in place to be in Roanoke by Friday for the Memorial Service. We are praying that we can be an encouragement to Laura's family as well as one another.

My friend April is flying in from Indianapolis and was able to get a flight with a layover in Philly, both going to and from North Carolina. Thankfully I was able to get on the same flight as her into and out of North Carolina. I think the least amount of time I have to spend alone the better (which is unusual for me!).

I fly out tomorrow (Thursday) and will be back in Philly Sunday morning in time for church. Its going to be a quick trip, but I am SO thankful that I am able to go. I don't know many people that are still so close to so many of their friends from high school; I feel incredibly blessed.

Now, I am off to one of the hardest weekends of my life. She was an incredible woman and actually one of the first people to introduce me to missions. Yet, at 30 years old she was so overwhelmed by darkness and depression she felt that her life was not worth living. I can't even imagine the despair that overwhelmed her at the end of her life. I am praying that she is finally at peace, but it will be a while before those of us left to mourn her find that peace again.

My friend April said it perfectly: I am grieving the loss of someone who was deeply loved by God and never understood it.

I Hate Camping....

unless it's for free food!! I, along with 6 of my friends, spend 24 straight hours camped out in a Chick Fil A parking lot in the hopes of earning free meals for a year (52 free meal coupons)!! Not only did we ALL last the entire 24 hours, but we all agree that it was totally worth it; and even pretty fun!

If you haven't heard of this (which I hadn't until recently), whenever Chick Fil A opens a new store, they have a contest for the first 100 customers to receive free Chick Fil A meals for a year. The catch is that they start counting at 6 a.m. the day BEFORE the store opens. If you are a part of the first 100, you have to stay on the Chick Fil A grounds (not even going to your car) for 24 hours. At 6 am the next day, everyone who has survived, is awarded a Chick Fil A t-shirt and 52 Free Meal Coupons! Several of my friends participated in this a few months ago when a new store opened near us, and I knew I wanted to do it some day. We heard about another store opening in Philly, only about 15 minutes from us, so we made a plan!

Because Chick Fil A doesn't want people lining up before 6 am the day before, they don't actually do the FIRST 100. At 6 am the day before the store is to open, they let everyone who is in line into the store. If there are 100 or less, then everyone gets to participate. If there are more than 100 in line, they hand out tickets and then do a drawing to determine the 100 who will participate. (People who's numbers are drawn 100-110 are allowed to stay and participate, but will only receive the free meal coupons IF someone else drops out or is disqualified).

So, at 5 a.m. on Wednesday morning Ashley, Lindsay and I got dressed (in 3 layers of clothes; it was about 30 degrees outside!) and packed up my car with a tent, air mattresses, camping chairs, sleeping bags, books, drawing supplies (for Lindsay, she doesn't like to read, haha), and everything else we could think of that we might possibly need! We then met up with Pastor Andy, Jen, Dom, and another friend named Andy to wait in line at Chick Fil A! We were really hoping we would all get to participate!

The first obstacle we had to overcome was getting Lindsay in. They ask for a picture ID (they need to make sure everyone who participates is over 18), which she doesn't have yet. So, we brought her school ID and birth certificate and hoped that would work. Thankfully, it did!! (Parents who participate ARE allowed to have their kids with them, and the kids are fed for free along with everyone else. They just can't win the free meals. How awesome is Chick Fil A??) The rest of us showed our IDs, got our ticket and hoped that there were less than 100 people in line.
Unfortunately, when we all got inside we found out that there were 115 people, so we had to wait for our ticket number to be called. That was a nerve racking time!!!

Lindsay was called first in our group, she was #4. Pastor Andy came next in the teens, and then Ashley was called in the 20's. So far so good! Only 4 people left! We didn't have any of our numbers called in the 30's or 40's and half way through the 50's we started to get really nervous. Finally, Jen's number was called at 58, and then Dom at 69. There were only 2 people left (including me!), but we were quickly running out of numbers. Andy and I sat nervously as numbers really close to ours were called, but not ours. Finally, Andy's number was called at 85! But, with only 15 numbers left to be called and 30 people still waiting, I was starting to accept the fact that my number might be the only one not called. Then, at number 92, with only 8 left to go, they called my number. WHEW!! We all got in!! We were SO excited!!!

The drawing ended around 7 am and we were all given 20 minutes to unload our cars and set up our stuff in the parking lot. We had 3 tents among us, so we put them all up next to one another and settled in for the long haul.

We didn't have too much trouble setting our tent up (thanks Varasos!!) Andy on the other hand...

Andy had a little bit of trouble with his tent, haha. Eventually we were able to set it up, though. :)

Thankfully, Chick Fil A definitely takes care of its first 100. They fed us a breakfast sandwich, a lunch sandwich and we were given an entire meal at dinner and then ice cream just before bed time (and thankfully Pastor Andy brought tons of snacks for all of us to share!). They also had coffee in the morning, hot chocolate at night, and unlimited sweet tea and water all day. It was awesome! (And yes, we could go into the store at any time and use the restroom). At random times they would call a line check and we would have to line up by our number. If you weren't there for line check, you were disqualified (unless you were in the bathroom).

They are serious about the rules too! This pic is of a sad Dom who's football is just on the other side of the barrier. He had to wait for someone to get it for him because if he went to get it he would immediately be disqualified! (He did get it back right after this picture was taken, haha).

Other than that, for the first 10 hours we were pretty much left to entertain ourselves. Unfortunately, despite how prepared we all were for cold and rain, none of us brought games!! Thankfully, plenty of people around us had games, and we had a lot of fun meeting people (including the couple participating in their 65th first 100!).

I spent a lot of time reading and writing thank you cards to some of my supporters, and idea I got from watching Pastor Andy spend a lot of his time writing. Ashley and Lindsay spent a lot of time drawing, and as expected, Jen and Dom spent a lot of time socializing. :) The other Andy did a little bit of everything, haha. 10 hours is a long time to keep busy! (Did I mention that it was cold?? Finally around 3 p.m. I was warm enough to take off a layer, but I put it right back on 3 hours later!).





Chick Fil A also hosted a few competition games. Lindsay and Dom won free milkshakes by winning games of Ninja, and I won one by winning the scavenger hunt (which I sacrificed a sock for, haha). It was fun!

They started dinner around 5, at the same time Pastor Andy's wife and kids showed up to visit him and bring us some games (YAY!!). Chick Fil A is so awesome, they let his entire family go in and eat with him, giving all of them free meals (he has 4 kids! Although the 9 month old doesn't eat much chicken yet, haha).

From 5-10 they had a DJ there, playing music and leading more games. Most of the games were fun (all 7 of us won a mug or a mini cow by knowing a TV theme song! I was the only one who knew the Doogie Howser theme song, haha), but the music was mostly frustrating. Despite Chick Fil A being a very Christ centered organization, the music that the DJ played was NOT. In fact, he chose some of the dirtiest songs out there ( of course, there are plenty for him to choose from!).

In order to try and ignore the music, we spent most if the evening playing games and laughing together. It was too dark to read or draw, so we just had fun together and it was great!! At 11:30 they asked us all to be in our tents and we attempted to get some sleep. At this point, it was REALLY cold outside, so it was actually kinda nice to be squished in a tent with 3 other girls, the body heat was very helpful!



I think most of us did get some sleep that night, but not a lot. It started raining around 2 a.m. and our tent kept us dry; but it didn't keep everything dry, haha. As we were packing up in the morning we discovered several places where water had seeped in and soaked a few things. It was all okay, though, they are all washable.

Finally, at 5:30 a.m. they called us inside for our final line check. By 6 am we had our t-shirts, a Chick Fil A pen and our 52 free meal coupons! WE DID IT!!!

Unfortunately, it was still raining, so packing up was a bit of a challenge. Thankfully, Pastor Andy helped A TON! He took our very wet tent to the church and draped it there so it can dry (we were trying to figure out where in the world we were going to lay it out to dry in the house!). We were able to get everything else in my car and immediately into the laundry room when we got home. Then, Ashley got ready and went off to work while Lindsay and I cleaned things up, started the laundry and then took a nap. We were exhausted, and still really cold!!

I am still recovering from the lack of sleep, but I still say it was totally worth it. Now, we are looking for more openings to attend!