I can get a lot done if I do nothing all day

I spent the day knitting.  Perhaps it is a case of guilt…you know buying wool for a project I don’t really need when I have dozens of unfinished projects and who knows how many balls of wool in the stash.  I feel less guilty if I can manage to actually FINISH the project.  I didn’t finish…that would be freakishly amazing.  But I made a good dent in it.

Two toned 1880’s dress

I’m enjoying an 1880’s carte de visite I acquired some time ago.  The lady in the couple is wearing a two toned dress and I’m trying to decide if she managed to pull it off.  I’ve always liked dresses with mixed fabrics but I think it is hard to do it harmoniously.

I like the bodice but I’m not so sure about the skirt.  I wonder what it looked like in color.

Mildly sucky vacation equals interesting stories

Before I left for vacation, I did a little reading program with the seniors where I work.  I found some amusing stories about vacation mishaps.  I used my announcement that I was going on vacation as my lead into the program.  Next year, I can use this blog post instead.

My vacation started out fine.  We had an afternoon flight to Cuba so we had plenty of time to pack and leave instructions for the boys (aka dog sitters) in the morning.

The boys drove us to the airport and we arrived with plenty of time.  Good thing too.  The hubby borrowed the older boy’s suitcase and did not properly heed the warning that the zipper was somewhat damaged.  He unzipped it to far when packing so by the time we unloaded it from the trunk of the car, it had begun to fall apart.  We thought we could fix it but by the time the boys had driven away, the suitcase has completely ruptured and was never going to make it to Cuba.  So we had to buy new luggage at the airport and try to get rid of the old one without getting detained for leaving suspicious bags behind.

Hubby is in the check in line with the new suit case. He is texting our boy, telling him we had to pitch the one he lent us.

Ten seconds after repacking his luggage, the hubby remembered that he forgot his sunglasses.  Back to the airport shop for sunglasses.  Luckily, there was a sale in the store so it wasn’t a total robbery.

But just wait…a half hour into the flight the hubby remembered that he forgot his bathing suit.  I think next year I will have to check his bag before he zips it.

So we arrive in Cuba, get through Customs and wait with all the other folks on our flight for our luggage.  An hour later, everyone from our flight is gone but no sign of our luggage.  There is luggage from the next flight on the belt but no sign of ours.  I was convinced our airport screwed up but the hubby was convinced we had been robbed-he always assumes the worst.  We are just about resigned to the idea of going to the hotel with no luggage when we decided to look one more time.  The hubby picked up a bag that was similar to our new one and low an behold it was ours.  It was just so beat up that it no longer looked new.  Yippy! He had his bag.  There now was nearly no one left in the baggage claim area. I turned around to look for the lost and found office and there was my bag standing in the middle of the room.  Someone must have taken it off the belt and then realized it wasn’t theirs and left it where it stood.  I only saw it after the room emptied out.  We had our luggage but missed our shuttle to the hotel.  Luckily, the next shuttle was able to accommodate us.

It was late when we were finally in our hotel but hubby had to do a midnight walk on the beach.  And thus I started my collection of sand flea bites.  Lucky me.  I am one of the chosen few who has a rather nasty reaction to the bites. I learned about this tendency of mine last year and had been taking allergy pills to combat this.  They didn’t prevent the reaction but did make me horribly tired.  Near the end of the trip and several bites later a beautiful angel/staff person told me about putting vinegar on the bites.  I grabbed a cup of balsamic vinegar at the near by restaurant and dabbed it on the bites.  I have never felt such quick relief!  The itching stopped instantly and the redness and swelling was visibly better with in hours.  I slathered it on a few more times but I really didn’t need too!  I don’t know if it works with white vinegar but guess who is now travelling with her own personal bottle of balsamic vinegar.

Some of my bites and a glass of balsamic vinegar.

Anyway, back to the forgotten bathing suit.  It was raining our first day in Cuba so we decided that it was a good day to go shopping for a new suit for the hubby and to play ALL of the games we brought with us.

The following day was reasonable so hubby trotted off to the beach in his new suit and sun glasses and I hung out by the pool….fewer bugs.  We did this for a day or two and one day hubby comes back.  No sunglasses.  The new ones he bought at the airport got swept off his face by an ocean wave.  Sigh. We didn’t replace those because the price in Cuba for cheap glasses worked out to be $150 Canadian dollars.  Nope.  Not gonna do it.

At least we had our lovely 5th floor view. 

At least it was lovely until 5 out of the 6 elevators stopped working (one by one over the week) and the one that was working opened up on the wrong side of a locked 5th floor gate.  Five flights of stairs with crappy knees are not a great pleasure.

Some good moments in Cuba but as you can see on my face, I wasn’t feeling like it was the trip of a lifetime.

The long dress in the above photo, was my final attempt to fend off the sand fleas.  All the while I was thinking I might have to make myself a pair of 1950’s beach pants.

My next post will be a vacation post but of some of the more positive moments.