What's more domestic than making apple pie?

Nothing says "I'm domestic" more than preparing apple pie from scratch. It conjures up every image of a 50's house wife wearing an apron with perfectly curled hair in a suburban subdivision that I can think of. In reality, I would run away from fitting into such an image and have a severe lack of domestic intuition but I'm trying to become more "at home" in the kitchen and when I have a success, I am quite proud of myself.
Lucky for me, a woman from church volunteered to be my apple-pie-making-coach. She is an expert in my book, having grown up with a fruit farming father and a pie making mother, so I really couldn't ask for a more ideal leader. I had never even cored an apple so my coach truly had her work cut out for her!
The pictures ended up out of order but I will walk you through it......

STEP 7: Bake. We made a second pie more of the Dutch Apple persuasion for Hubby's enjoyment. I took it home, tossed it in the oven for about an hour and we both had a late night apple delight before the first episode of the new season of The Walking Dead. Amazing show, and, if I do say so myself, AMAZING PIE!!!!! Hubby really liked it and he's picky so I was extra proud. And I thought it was pretty scrumptious, too. Or maybe I could just taste all the heart I put into it:)

STEP 5: Sugar and butter!!!

STEP 4: Pie crust rolled out and placed in pie tin, apples and crust meet for the first time.I was ridiculously awful at using the rolling pin on the crust. I did, however, use my rolling pin like a foam roller on my hamstrings on Friday night and it was really helpful:)

STEP 3: Cut your apples. Again, having never even cored an apple, I felt a bit arthritic at the end of peeling about four of them. Thank goodness for the help or I might have thrown in the towel at this point.

STEP 1: Wash your apples

STEP 2: Dough. We used a "miracle dough" recipe that included vinegar and I was told this was extra hearty and forgiving. Putting the Crisco in was pretty revolting but 1 3/4 cups spread over 5 pie crusts eases the pain a little, I guess.

STEP 6: Pie crust on top, fluting on edges (tougher than it looks) and knife hole decor on top and viola!! I actually bagged this one to stick in the freezer. How much apple pie can a family of two really consume at once?

Hotels.com shall hear my wrath

I feel a little bad being so negative but, as a consumer, I care about other people's experiences with services and, therefore, feel like I have to share my experience with Hotels.com.
In the Spring of 2009, I used their services to book a single night in the DC area. We went to visit some friends who were house sitting for family there and stayed with them for a few days. The final night, we needed a hotel so we could be closer to the airport and catch our flight. Long story short, when we got to the hotel, they didn't have our reservation. After a long day of train rides and frustration to get there, the last thing I was in the mood for was 2 hours in a hotel lobby. I had to spend a long time on the phone with multiple customer service reps to get things cleared up. They offered me a measly peace offering but it was just not enough to balance the trouble they had caused. I was able to talk them up to something that felt like a better reimbursement.
They sent me out a voucher for "hotel bucks" for a future stay. I didn't realize it had an expiration date but, luckily, I found it before it expired. I called customer service and asked if they could extend it or apply it toward a hotel I was booking the following month. At that time, I received some excellent customer service by a woman named Fatima. If she is out there or if anyone else linked with Hotels.com reads this and somehow in the very large company knows this employee, I want her/them to know that she is exceptional, in the true sense of the word; she is an exception to the rest of the experience I have had with the company. She made the phone call and the process easy and a pleasant experience.
The new voucher was set to arrive within 4-5 weeks. Fast forward 3 months and my patience has run out. So I called to see what the hold up was all about. The first woman I spoke to was at least capable. She understood my dilemma and was communicating with the appropriate department on my behalf. She put me on hold and I waited. And waited. And then, after 15 minutes or so invested in this process, the phone disconnected me! They had my number, as I had just reiterated it to them, so they could have called me back but they didn't. I called them back and got a new customer service rep. Thank goodness I don't know her name or I would publicly rally for her to never be employed working with people again. She could not grasp what I was explaining AT ALL. She kept referring to my reservation number, even though I kept telling her it wasn't about a reservation and that I had a "case id number" instead. She referenced my most recent hotel booking with them even though I made it clear this had zero to do with that. Finally, at my wit's end, I asked if I could just speak with a manager so I could get this resolved once and for all. She was not very pleased about that but grudgingly put me on hold. For 23 minutes of silence. Literally 23 minutes. Who knows how much longer it might have gone on because after 23 minutes, I had another commitment I had to attend to. The whole process took nearly an hour and I still have no resolution. Actually, I have to call again today!
It's extremely unjust and poor service if the olive branch they extended I fought for to make up for mistake #1 turns into mistake #2 and when I call to remedy that, results in mistakes #3 and #4! No one should have to spend this kind of time fixing someone else's problem (and I fix problems for a living!).
Oh, and in the midst of all this it became clear that the hotel bucks, should they ever be figured out, actually won't cover the hotel stay I booked through them explicitly to use them up. There's some distinction about prepaid rooms. Point being, I am going to have to use them again to redeem the reimbursement they owe me.
This is ludicrous in my book. I have had positive experiences with Travelocity and will keep my business there and, while I don't recommend any particular travel assistance site for you, I do caution you that if you have a problem with Hotels.com, it will be a headache to get it resolved. Good luck and good day.

Iceland: Off the Beaten Path

We had the unique opportunity while in Iceland to actually connect with a friend of a friend who lives there. Overall, my experience was that the people of Iceland were extremely welcoming and glad to have you visit their stunning country. This guy, though, went above and beyond. He visited our hotel before we even arrived and left us a note along with local treats (which we appreciated even more once we realized how much food and drinks cost there!). Then, he offered to pick us up on our final day in the city and drive us to the airport, stopping to show us some less seen sights along the way. It was so gracious but also an amazing opportunity to see the Iceland that the tours don't show you: the raw natural landscape, hidden gems and daily life of it's citizens unfolding.

There are geysers or hot spring activity spots along the more touristy routes, as well, but it's very cool that they are actually everywhere! These pictures are just from a spot along the side of the road in the middle of nowhere.

Outdoor swimming is actually one of the most popular recreational activities in this cold spot. Pretty much every community has a local pool that is fed with the geothermal, naturally heated waters. Going to these spots is an absolute MUST DO on your trip to Iceland. They are shockingly cheap to access, as well. I liked this one because of it's elaborate slide, of course.

I thought it was adorable that our guide brought us to this beach; it is a hotspot for them because it is their only white sand beach! While this is the norm for most of us, black volcanic sand is the norm for them so this is a rare beauty that he wanted to show off.

the best souvenir? traveling with a friend and liking her more at the end

I am really lucky because I have a lot of longtime friends who still live close to me. I am also very lucky that my husband is so flexible about me traveling with friends. One more area of luck? I have a full handful of friends that I have traveled with in the past and come back liking them even more!

There are plenty of articles out there about choosing your traveling companions wisely and I could not agree more. On one of  my recent trips, tension mounted consistently with one member of the travel posse and things literally came to blows. The rest of felt like we had to keep her safe as she drank a lot and wandered off on her own. That's not the kind of environment you ask for time off from work for! I have also had the experience of going away with someone and needing a good amount of space from them thereafter. Let's face it: some friends are great to meet for dinner but you couldn't spend a week with them.

Nothing brings out your friends flaws and annoying habits quicker than a week in confined quarters. Or, frankly, your own flaws and habits that other people have to deal with. Traveling helps you to learn about yourself but you also have to have some degree of insight about yourself before traveling with others. With one of my friends, we had a pre-travel meeting and talked about our fears of being together in a foreign country for two weeks. It helped us open the lines of communication to make a plan for how we would deal with certain situations if they came up. Most of the fears never came to fruition but it was a helpful and rather enlightening conversation, which I would recommend to others who are planning to head off on a journey together.

Despite the bad experiences, I have had  many more positive ones. That was actually the point of this post! One of the girls I went to Spain with has been my friend since nursery school (amazing, right?). We haven't always been priorities in one anothers lives but we have been connected for that long and as life has evolved, we have grown closer and closer. Prior to Spain, we had only done a brief road trip and weekends away together so there was a lot to be determined during two weeks far away from home and unable to escape one another. It ended up being a great experience that only strengthened our friendship. We already have tickets to Costa Rica for November together! And we email almost daily (and while that isn't much different than before we traveled together, it's a huge testament to our appreciation for one another afterwards!).

So don't worry if you will run out of things to talk about; you won't. While all of the bad traits are amplified, so are all of the great traits. I think traveling with your friends is one of the healthiest, most fun things you can do for yourself and all of your relationships. Bon Voyage!

Beautiful Bermuda

This is Jobsom's Cove. If you go to Bermuda and want to go to the southern beaches, famous for their pink sand, I highly recommend this spot. The rest of the beaches had crazy waves and super strong undertow; I was running for my life, clutching my bathing suit bottoms, more than once at Horseshoe Bay, the most popular beach in that region. Jobsom's Cove, however, has this cropping of rocks that create a calm swimming hole. (It's easily accessible by public bus, too, although you should hold on tight if you ride the bus. And don't expect friendly service)

Many of the beaches felt like a scene out of the opening of Grease, where Sandy and Danny were on the beach frolicking.

This was our ship, the Norwegian Dawn. I will have a whole separate post about my thoughts comparing and contrasting NCL to Carnival but the sneak peak morale of the story is that one is clearly superior to the other. I think you might be surprised by the answer...

What would a post about a cruise be without showcasing one of the towel animals the cabin steward leaves while you eat dinner? Cruises boast lots of perks and cheesy additives but towels folded into shapes and given eyes are a topic of conversation every time!

This guy is rocking the Bermuda look: All the guys wear their Bermuda shorts with hiked up socks. I don't get it. Doesn't that negate the purpose of the shorts??

I love the colorful architecture, although this shot is from Hamilton, the capitol city. I have to say that I was not wowed by this city. If I had to do it again, I would skip Hamilton altogether and instead head to the more historic St. George and/or the Crystal Caves.

I took a whole series of photographs of the sun setting. This is the last one where the sun is still visible. It's really overwhelming in the most positive sense of the word, to be on the vast open water and see nature at it's finest.

Home Sweet Home!

The sign from landing in Boston was going to be the last photo but I thought I should personalize this one. This is officially the first photo of myself on this blog. This is me and my mom, on her first trip out of the country. It kind of felt like roles were reversed as I was so happy to see her joy at experiencing everything for the first time. Our group of 8 all agreed that no one on the ship had a better time than my mother:)

A Crappy Story with a Happy Ending

I haven't written in far too long and I have lots of great excuses.
On Saturday September 17th, I had fun plans. I woke up and was getting ready for the lovely day ahead when I smelled something funky. The hunt to locate the cause began. My nose led me to the basement where I stepped onto the carpet. But it was wet. Not damp. Wet. (Pic 2)
My first thought was to blame it on a cat but another step revealed a wet spot much larger than a domestic house cat could produce. A few more steps, heading toward the laundry room, and I found a small pond. Stream might be a better word for it because, as my brother came over and showed me, it actually was running water, bubbling from the place where the wall and the floor met. Super.
Long story of a hard day made briefer, the town had to come out and shut off water to my whole building. The condo maintenance man had to ask neighbors if he could connect our building to their water sources. Fast forward to Monday. The rug is now getting really stinky. Men had to come back into my house to jackhammer a hole in the cement next to my washing machine. This began at 7:30 am, by the way. What a great start to the week.
I think I have neglected, to this point, to mention that this week was already very chaotic because work has been blowing up AND I had plans to go out of the country on Friday.
So I spent the week trying to call my home owner's insurance, the condo association, and an assessor to come figure out the mess, what to do with it and who would pay for it.
At the same time, mind you, I was trying to wrap up my cases at work to be away for a week and to launch a new cycle of support groups to start in my absence. That involves calling over 50 people, coordinating facilitators and helping to figure out childcare.
Oh, and I had to try to do laundry in the crazy yucky basement so I could pack for a week away. And we had to clear the basement of all its belongings: a couch, a tv, etc, as well as my entire food storage collection.
On the day I left on my trip, one person came in to rip out the carpet (top pic). Other people came to set up huge fans. On the day I got back, I finally met with the assessor, though it will take another week and half to get a quote of how much they will cover.
So now my job is to find a contractor to come look at my walls and give me an estimate of how much it will cost to fix them. I also have to price out new carpeting for the finished basement. Will they cover the stairs, too? Or will I be cursed with red stairs and tan carpet on the floor?
Here's the good news.....I went on a cruise to Bermuda with my hubby, my mother and father and a couple of my dad's friends. It was my first time in Bermuda and it was my parent's first cruise. Actually, it was my mother's first time out of the country. She had never even been to Florida. When we got off the boat, she was excited to see her first palm tree.

I will post more pictures of Bermuda, the cruise and all the other good stuff but the happy ending to the crappy story is that despite all the drama that kept me away from blogging and brought me to tears a couple times, I realized how spoiled I am. I have seen and experienced so much. More even than my parents have had the opportunity to see and do. Isn't that what parenthood is all about? Making sure your children have better options than you had? I'm so lucky that I have had the resources to go on the trips and do the home improvements and other fun things that I am able to write about in my blog. And I'm grateful that you read about all of it!!

Packing Fashion Show

I have seen a lot of blogs that write about travel that have posts about what/how to pack including lists and pictures. Only tonight, though, did I realize I actually have something unique to add to the conversation. Basically, I determined only this evening that the process I go through to pack is probably not the way other people do it and it's entirely a ritual/fun past time for me.

It starts with a good, old fashioned list. The number of casual, dressy, workout outfits is determined. I make sure to actually write out basics like socks and underwear just to make sure I cross them off when they are legitimately in the suitcase, lest I forget something essential like bras. I also list out all the toiletries one by one so nothing is forgotten. Of course, the list also includes the entertainment section with notes about ipods and cameras and corresponding chargers. This list is typically drawn up days in advance during some downtime.

Packing doesn't really begin until the night before, to be honest. The week leading up to a trip includes more laundry than usual and some strategic work outfit choices so I don't sully anything I want to bring but might not have time to wash again. I find it hard to pack well in advance because I need all my toiletries each day. Even when I pack them the night before, I keep them all contained in beach bag/tote bag so I can access them in the morning before departing.

So here comes the fun part: the fashion show. I like to know I am going to be comfortable on my trip and that the outfits I put together will be appropriate for the climate and activities I am heading off to enjoy. Unlike a friend who brought a skirt to Spain only to try it on there and find it no longer fit, I don't want to bring items I am not going to use. Also, I don't want to pack an outfit that ends up making me self concious. Sooooo, I pull all potential items out of the clean laundry bin or closet. i lay them out in piles: tops, bottoms, pjs, dresses, etc. Hanging items get to stay on the hanger but rest on a dresser knob or closet door so they are more visible. Then I start trying combos on. If something is too __________________ (fill in the blank with the word of your choice), it get's vetoed. It's like elimination rounds. The final contenders have to be paired up into actual outfits and I bring enough for the number of days I will be gone plus one or two, just in case. I make sure I have a couple outfits that are specifically for night events and there's a separate set of outfits for multiple days of workouts. Undergarments are chosen based on what wins a spot in the suitcase. When it comes to footwear, I try to get the most bang for my buck and choose multiple outfits that can be worn with the same few pairs of shoes. Tonights winners in the shoe category: one pair of heels for night time, one pair of sneakers for workouts, and two pairs of flip flops: black and brown. I'm debating bringing my mesh Merrell things, too but I'm not comitted to it yet.

This process has served me well. My selections end up having more variety, greater comfort and are overall more user friendly than if I had just tossed items together. Are pre-vacation fashion shows abnormal? I'm guessing not everyone handles packing this way.

Creeper in the Bathroom

So there's this guy who works in my office building (which only has three floors and houses only a few companies) who always uses our bathroom and I think it should be stopped.
My organization takes up two suites = the whole top floor. This guy works on the basement floor. Point being he has to walk up 4 flights of stairs to get to our bathroom. Oh, and those four flights are in a structure that is topped with glass that acts much like a greenhouse, creating intense and often uncomfortable temperatures the higher you climb. For further illustration, he has a bathroom (technically two) on his floor and the same options on the floor in between us. For purposes of gender identity inclusion, we don't have a "men's room" and a "ladies room" but rather two restrooms that anyone could use. One of them, "the suite", is a one person stall and you can lock the door and have the space all to yourself. Which one do you think he comes up and invades? You guessed it. He hikes up four flights of stairs in the grueling heat past two other sets of bathrooms to muck up the one place no one will knock on the door and disrupt you.
A firm believer in citizen justice leagues (and if you know how I can start one of these, please let me know), I feel it's my duty to confront/shame/stop him from this intolerable practice. It's gotten to the point that if the door to the bathroom suite is shut and I don't know all my coworkers whereabouts, I sometimes hide behind the office door, peeping through a tiny window awaiting a glimpse of the bathroom hog. Usually it ends up being a legitimate coworker who somehow fell off my radar. And this guy is good.....he seems to only physically appear when I have a client with me or am otherwise truly busy with the important work that goes on here to be able to stage my planned bathroom intervention. But I hear rumors of him being around much more often than I see him and just the thought of him in our sacred spaces creeps me out.
Most fascinating to me is his motive. What is going on with this guy that he has to go so far away from his coworkers for his bathroom break? It can't be that he is embarrassed because he shows absolutely no pride in busting onto a floor that is soley occupied by one company and, I might add, IS FILLED SOLELY WITH FEMALE EMPLOYEES. We didn't  need a men's room so we got rid of it and he keeps coming up here and imposing his will!
What's up with this guy? I am now accepting hypotheses.

Sassy Side Table

 

Since the blue paint on the bookcase went over well last week, I thought today I would share what I did with the rest of that blue paint. As mentioned in my last post, the whole point of the blue paint on the bookcase was to add some color to a bland room. A bland room that also needed a side table next to the bed. So I went to Savers, which if you don't have these near you (they are new in my area) is kind of like a Salvation Army store. It's filled with donated, second-hand items at cheap prices. The table above is part of a set of TV tables that was missing one. I was able to score it for $3!!

It started out as black wood.

For $3, I figured I could experiment and if the result was icky, I wasn't really at a loss. So I slapped some of the blue bookcase pant on the legs of the table!

I had purchased some mod podge a while back  that I intended to used on a mini bookcase turned tv stand in the basement but I never got to it. (I still may.....). The plan for the tv stand was applied to the side table. As a person who keeps a journal and saves mementos as part of that history, I have all sorts of pictures, race bibs, you-name-it laying around. I pulled together a medley of these items to personalize the table and put these things on display. The items I chose included the following: A card a magician had signed with my name on one of our cruises, the cd from our wedding that was given out as a favor, a picture of Pat with a snake around his neck from a stop on our honeymoon, a race bib from the triathlon I am most proud of completing, a bunch of quotes and stickers, a letter for our last name, a room key from our honeymoon cruise, a bumper sticker from when I hiked Mt. Washington, a decal from the school I graduated from, and some pretty scraps of magazine clippings of brightly colored comforters I am not going to buy.

 

 

 

It takes a few coats and looks white and lumpy at first. It is definitely sticky and that's part of the point. However, it did crumple some of the paper items in the process and they had to be removed. It also starts out wet so it created some wrinkles in things I thought would be smooth. I guess that's part of the personal character now!

When it finally dries, it's a glassy, clear coating that seals all the items in place like a lacquer. You can see that the painted legs work really well with the comforter.

A few practical and colorful accessories later and it functions as a real side table!

And there it is, all happily completed! The rest of the clutter is another blog post.....let's just say the pictures are now on the wall, as are the little mystery squares sitting on the pillows. To be continued.....

Don't want to paint the whole room? How about the bookcase?

So last week I gave an intro to my home so I could start posting about some of the projects I have or want to undertake there and it wouldn't be coming out of left field. Then work got really busy and I forgot to post ANYTHING. Sorry about that! 
This project is one of my favorites because I love the bright color involved. Most of our walls are painted with very neutral, bland colors ala HGTV's "Designed to Sell". The idea is that buyers want to be able to picture themselves in the space you are selling so you want the colors to be kind of ho-hum, nothing striking that really screams "you".
The challenge is that once you move in, you either have to settle into your neutral, adaptable colors or you have to do a lot of painting. I had never painted prior to moving into this home and I fell into the paint can when I painted my bathroom this very lovely shade of yellow. As a result, a lot of our walls have remained blank canvases and I have tried to add color through furniture, art and accessories. 
Inspired by the amazing blog Young House Love and some creative pictures from Pinterest, I decided to infuse some color into our guest room by painting the backdrop of the built in bookcase (which had been painted to match the tan walls-not by me, by the way).

This is the color I chose because it so closely matched the comforter of the bed.

I loved this comforter so much that, even though I was trying to be fiscally responsible and not buy unnecessary bedding, I kept thinking about it and had to run back to the store to make it mine. It's just so cheery!! And I like the pattern a lot, too.

Voila! Here is Picture #1 bland bookcase reinvented with turquoise paint. I love that it's just the backdrop so the color isn't overwhelming; it just pops some goodness out from behind the books.

The bottom line: It was easy and quick and fun. Now, this otherwise dreary space has some excitement and it's one of my favorite features...maybe in the whole house!

An introduction to Our Home

Kitchen Before

Kitchen After

I have been so swept up in writing about travel lately that I have neglected writing about my blooming domesticity. While it's lovely to leave home briefly to see how other people live, at the end of the day I have a mortgage to pay:) And in making that kind of commitment to a building, I need to show it a little love, too.
Before I can start sharing posts about projects I am undertaking on the home front, I feel it necessary to introduce you to the history of my home. We moved into our townhouse in June of 2009, just over 2 years ago now. Of note, this was after living at a boarding high school for two years with about 25 teenage girls. During that time, we lived in the tiniest apartment on campus. The schedule and responsibility that came with our living arrangement paired with the tax rebates being offered for first time home owners made for a perfect storm to start a housing search.
 We chose the area we settled in for a number of reasons. Admittedly, the primary reason was that I wanted to be closer to my family and farther away from work. Although the commute is sometimes challenging, it's nice to be able to have the separation for both physical and emotional safety; I never run into clients I work with at the grocery store. While we may have preferred to be a tiny bit closer to work, all of the towns between the city we work in and the town my parents live in and I adore are big ticket towns. We either couldn't afford anything there or we could afford smaller, more run down places that would need more work. Therefore, a 45 minute commute was a compromise to have 1600 square feet, three levels of living, two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a finished basement and an attached garage. In the MetroBoston area, that's a decent amount of space for folks not working with huge cash flows.
Our upgrades began in the kitchen. It looked old and had some drawers that couldn't even open due to the layout. There was also a stenciled/painted ivy motif near one of the windows which, I hope goes without saying, had to go! We used the tax refund we got to pay for new cabinets and counters. I found a great deal on Craigslist for stainless steel appliances because not all of the old ones matched the refrigerator was spoiling my milk.
It took until August of 2010 to start thinking about really decorating. Beyond what we brought from the tiny apartment that we tossed up on the walls, we didn't invest in items for the walls or other accessories until I took a week off in the summer. When it rained most of the days I planned to go to the beach, I watched a lot of HGTV and got some ideas and inspiration and ran around to craft stores, department stores, home goods stores, hardware stores, and even book stores to begin to fulfill my vision.
It wasn't until this past Spring that we finally put up curtains in the living room and master bedroom (don't worry, we had blinds so the neighbors weren't getting a front row seat to everything). And it's still a work in process!
Here is what has been done:
kitchen cabinets, counters and appliances
painting accent wall in kitchen, and both bathrooms
removed living room carpet and had laminate flooring installed
food storage area in laundry room created
window treatments in both bedrooms and living room
basic wall decor and accessories in both bedrooms and living room
Here's my wishlist to do:
new bathroom vanities
more pops of color
repaint kitchen
paint dining room accent wall
new faucets
new shower head
greater development of style vision in both bedrooms and living room
clean the garage out (we still have the original stove in there)
pull together the basement man cave/sports and movies room
paint stairwell banisters (they just started peeling!)
at least one piece of customized art
remove caulking from tub

I'm sure there are more projects but my brain just flooded.......

Here Comes Hurricane Irene

It's hard to believe that we are batting down the hatches up here in New England to brace for Hurricane Irene. This is what the sky looks like at the moment: beautiful. Supposedly, the hurricane is on track to overwhelm us on Sunday. The Olympic distance triathlon that is part of the series I am participating in tomorrow has already been canceled for tomorrow. No fear, I still get to do the sprint distance race early, early in the morning Saturday.  Church has already sent out an email to prepare for disaster and cancellation. Rumor has it that a state of emergency has already been declared. The meteorologist says that the storm is on track to follow a very similar path to Hurricane Gloria, which I remember from when I was 6 years old and my parents wouldn't let me stand on the front porch to watch the storm because they thought I would blow away. A friend left work early to get batteries and has since proclaimed that there are no D batteries in all of Metrowest County. That's really too bad for me because, although I have enough cereal and even powdered milk to keep me going for a couple weeks, I don't have any batteries and I am not sure if I have a working flashlight. Woops. For now, it's hard to worry when the sky looks so lovely.

Home Sweet Home with a Case of the Mondays

So many of my posts over the last six months have somehow related to travel. Neighbors and people at church have begun frequently commenting on my adventures and I'm happy and proud to have another activity with which to identify.
For the past few years, doing triathlons has been a big part of my identity and a source of pride. It's funny how quickly things can flip upside down as this year, without the aid of a team to train with, I feel woefully unprepared for the one sprint race I registered for. It's this Saturday and I have had a stomach ache all day in anticipation. 4 more days of this feeling??! Somehow, I need to convince myself to not worry about the numbers and just enjoy the event. We use to placate ourselves with thoughts of it being more than most people do but it's still hard not to make comparisons, if only with your former self.
Identifying with travel as my hobby of choice slightly softens the blow of not being proud of myself for triathlons this season. At least I have something else exciting to fill the void, right?
That was all a tangent, though. My main focus when I started writing this blog hours ago before I got sidetracked about 419 times was to write about the mixed blessing of coming home again. After another week away, I really wanted to be at home.
Last week I was lucky enough to be invited to spend 4 days at a friend's beach house on the Maine coast followed by 3 days at a different friend's Cape Cod house. Both were relaxing, filled with good company and conversation, and wonderful venues to follow my own volition; to choose how I wanted to fill my time instead of sticking to frantic schedule that is my normal routine. With one night at home in between, I found it hard to leave again. I wanted to spend time with Hubby, to pet the cats, to clean the house!
When I finally arrived home last night, it was welcomed as I enjoyed my familiar surroundings, my own comfortable couch and bed, the TV shows I had recorded, the husband and the cats. However, it also brought a to-do list both at home and, today, at work as long as the neck of a giraffe. After a week of ignoring responsibilities, it feels like they have reproduced Gremlin-style, seemingly exponential in growth.
This post isn't profound or even amusing but it was really cathartic for me. I just needed to "say" that I'm glad to be home and glad to have a break before my next extended stay away from home but also that this kind of stress that I'm returning to is exactly what makes me want to drop it all again and lay in the sun without a deep thought in my head.

Beach Life

I just felt like I needed to check in quickly. I'm at the beach this week and beach life is wondeful! I have lost all concept of time and obligation. I'm having travel epiphanies just from driving up the coast and planting myself within sight of the ocean. Aren't the clouds just AMAZING?!

Follow up on the Stress Less Initiative

I wanted to update you on the state of my Stress Less Initiative. Returned from my first trip to mainland Europe and deeply impacted by the cultural emphasis on enjoying life instead of rushing through it, as the focus seems to be in the States, I made a vow of sorts. Instead of "Vacation Maureen" making an appearance slightly before, during, and as long as possible after my trip, I would strive to incorporate some of her better attributes into my "real life".
While there are days that are setbacks, overall, I think I have been pretty successful in making a shift. Similar to the philosophy that it takes 21 days of a behavior to make it a habit, I have been hanging on to a more laid back take on life for over two months now!
Here's what's helping and working:
1. It's still summer. I love the sun, the pool, the beach and all other things summery. Even though I haven't had a full summer vacation since I was in high school, there is something magical about the months that schools are not in session. Traffic on my commute is lighter. My actual work load tends to be lighter. Summer week days and weekend days seem to have blurrier lines than other times of year.
2. I have been immersing myself in travel daydreams. One of my best friends, with whom I most recently traveled, is also obsessed with exploring new destinations and is committed to planning future trips. In addition to having two trips planned for September and one in November, I have a week off this month for some beach time. When I am not actually going somewhere or planning to go somewhere, I read about other people going somewhere and get excited.
3. There are lots of fun things on the social calendar to look forward to. Leaving home isn't the only way to have fun! The Boston area hosts restaurant week in August and I have some great dinner plans on the agenda. It's also triathlon season and my race date is speeding toward me far faster than I will be speeding across the finish line. There are pool parties to attend and weekend adventures to embark on. Life doesn't feel stagnant at all.
4. I'm listening to myself more. You know that part in Eat, Pray, Love in Italy when they are talking about the pleasure of doing nothing? Americans don't even have a word for it! I have been trying to pay attention both to the little things that bring me pleasure and doing them more often and also paying attention to when my mind and body need to slow down. I have broken plans because I needed a day of nothingness. I have resisted booking up all my free time so that I can decide what I really am in the mood for when the free time comes. I snuck in some sleeping late, a nap, and good reads. Sometimes I eat toast with nutella on it for dinner because I would rather eat that than chicken. This is just a small way I can bring the cultural component from Europe that I so appreciated home to my daily life.
What is not working?
1. I'm not getting enough workouts.  In summers past, I have trained for my triathlons with a group, which was a huge motivation for me. This year, there were not enough people to form a training team. About once a week I get together with some tri friends from the past and we do a group bike ride and I love it. I also have a class at the gym once a week that I am very dedicated to; the teacher is wonderful and it's a great workout. Beyond that, though, in following what I really want to do, it's often more about laying by the pool with a book than it is about going for a run. I'm getting so good at indulging myself, in fact, that when I went for a run over the weekend, after 2.75 miles of dripping sweat I decided I really didn't like running and, even though I was still 2 miles from home, I chose to walk instead!
2. I play on the weeknights and am tired for work. In pursuit of the things that bring me pleasure, I have met up with friends frequently on week nights. We have had some amazing times!!! Until the alarm goes off the next morning and I have to go to work.....Yawn!
3. I can't seem to let go of the stress that housework creates. I'm learning to take work in stride much more but house work? Not so much. I could go on and on about this one but, for your sanity and my own, I will leave it at that.
So, overall, I feel like Vacation Maureen is a much larger presence in everyday life. Do I need a new name? If she is here so often, does Vacation Maureen even make sense anymore?
And yet, I am still fearful that as school starts again work will get busy and as fall descends and the days get shorter, life will feel less like a vacation and it's still possible that I may lose my grasp on the Stress Less Initiative.