Have Suitcase, Will Travel

I'll be the first to admit it's been a bit of a different summer around here. A sign of the times to come, no doubt. Our oldest has been off working at summer camps, home only for about 20 days between Mother's Day and August 16. We supported his choice, completely. We would support it again, and I'm sure between the two sons, we will be called upon to own those words. 

Our July 2014 Europe cruise that we booked in 2012 had to be cancelled, as the church youth group changed their historical summer camp week - and - yes, you guessed it - moved it right smack into the week we were to be cruising from Spain to Venice. We also supported our youngest son's desire to go on his Senior Beach Camp trip, and knew in our hearts we could not go on the trip without him. Wouldn't want to.

Our youngest did not really want a different family vacation, unless we could go to Alaska. Again. While we loved our trip there, and truthfully do dream of going again, we knew this year was not the year to plan accordingly. I don't know - something or other about two kids in private universities. We asked him to defer that plan, since we are not deferring tuition. He didn't want to go anywhere, and our oldest could not go anywhere.

So, the summer panned out with a grand case against a family vacation. Three strikes. We were out. I'll have to say it's the first summer in over a decade that we haven't had a trip. I'll have to say, too, that it's been harder on me than I imagined. I know, I know. Vacations are hard to plan. They are expensive. You come home more often than not exhausted - and wanting a vacation to recover from your vacation. 

It does seem silly to me when we travel and pay a lot of money each night to stay all squished together in a room that is a mere meager fraction of the size of our house. It's almost a ruse. "Let's get people everywhere to pay exhorbitant amounts of money to stay in (usually) lackluster rooms, share one small bathroom, trip over suitcases littering the floor, battle thermostats that struggle ineffectively, grapple with sheets that itch, and more often than not, tune out noisy crews on the other side of an all too thin wall."

All financial silliness aside, all cramped inconveniences shelved, all tedious master planning ignored, I will confess I love the family vacation. Love. It. Love it. We recently went to a hotel for a weekend, and we did it mainly so that we could be crammed into one room with our boys, just hanging out and being together. There is just something special about picking up little pieces of your every day life, shoving them into a suitcase, traversing this country, and exploring something new - together as a family unit.

Steve and I grew up as polar opposites in this family vacation paradigm. I can remember so very many vacations as a child. My husband took only one in his entire childhood, and it was to his oldest sister's wedding. Every time I ponder the juxtaposition of our pre-marriage travelogues, I cringe for him. I know we can't undo the past, and I know his parents provided for him and his siblings in many other ways, but I just hate that they didn't get to experience the annual family vacation. 

The gift for us as a family that erupted out of his childhood paradigm, though, is a near insatiable wander lust embedded deeply in him, and his commitment to plan and provide for his own family some wonderful trips. He and I started early on, with weekend road trips around Texas. So many fun memories. We started annual vacations early on, too. First for two, then four.

When the boys came, we altered our travel itineraries to mirror their capabilities and interest levels. I have enjoyed, thoroughly, watching my boys age and turn into such good, fun-loving, witty young men. They are just so enjoyable to be around.  In fact, in 2006, they were at such a fun age that we took two trips that year - the Grand Canyon and Sedona in May, and then Colonial Williamsburg in October. We have long been determined to gobble up as much of this short lived goodness while we could. We waited for them to be old enough to remember, and we knew we only had so many summers before the window began closing.

We have had some grand adventures together. I've photographed them all. 1,282 photos of our Alaska trip. 1,131 photos of our New York City trip. I won't dare divulge every trip and its jpegs. I will tell you that I pull those jpegs out and relive the trip - the stories and the discoveries and the laughter and the meals and the obstacles and the memory of everything the pictures tell me, and the details they cajole out of the deeper corners of my mind.

I won't believe yet that we are done. I simply can't. I am taking the summer of 2014 and cataloging it as an aberration. In fact, we have our 2015 trip planned out already. On the books. Deposit paid. I can't believe we are done because I can't believe we will ever get tired of one another. I can't believe we will ever fully quench our desire for adventure. I can't believe we can ever see everything. I know the next few summers will be challenging, with the boys' activities sandwiched in between college semesters.

We are content to let them have their own adventures during this season. We are even planning on having some of our own adventures. But, in my heart, I believe back when I taught them how to pack, when they learned to read, when I printed out a customized packing list for each child, for each trip, that I did more than create travelers. I like to believe that I planted in their hearts the wanderlust for travel, the desire to be an adventurer, the joy in being together. I think they, like their dad, like their mom, will always be ready. Have suitcase, will travel.

Oh, Alaska! I'll be back someday. Your beauty lives in my heart. The memories remain fresh. And I'd like to believe I'll once again be asking for a table for four. Get ready to serve up that incredible rustic beauty you offer, and save me some salmon. Adventure is out there! Have suitcase, will travel.

Oh, Alaska! ~ Ketchikan, Skagway, Juneau, and Tracy Arm, Alaska, and Victoria, Canada ~ July 2012

Sketch Credit: Scrapbook Generation http://scrapbookgeneration.com/index.php?route=product/category&path=213

Paper: Echo Park, Little Yellow Bicycle

Font: Pacifico

These Smiling Faces

I am a hopeless patriot. I'll never apologize for it. I can cry every time I watch Mel Gibson and Heath Ledger battle in The Patriot. I get goosebumps on the high note of America, The Beautiful. I loved singing, "This land is my land, this land is your land....this land was made for you and me," along with Mrs. Collins and her ukelele in elementary school. When I watch Les Miserables, I can lay the solemnity of that redemptive revolution over the grid of American history, and weep on both behalf's. 

I love America the Beautiful. Old Glory waves from my porch column more days out of the year than not. I can see her flapping in the north Texas breeze from the chair in which I sit and type. I have a tiny bound copy of the Declaration of Independence - in love with it's little book form as much as the words it proffers. I sing along with the national anthem any chance I can, and probably often when I'm not supposed to. I can watch the National Treasure movies over and over, enthralled by the history thrust into the plot.

It was chance that landed us with an anniversary on the birthday of our country. A chain of events involving more than ourselves led us to that day. And I'll tell you - it does not offer much in the way of romantic interludes and recollections of courtship. We have been teased relentlessly about giving UP our independence ON independence day. No matter. We did what we could, and picked the date in the summer of 1987 that worked for so many of our family, and we married on an incredibly hot, humid, summer Saturday afternoon in July. And it happened to be the fourth.

The upsides: we are off together every year on our anniversary, and if we are lucky, there are fireworks. We usually conspire some getaway, or even an extended vacation, during our anniversary. It is special in that we are always together as a family, and we are usually doing something fun together, and we also get to embrace the celebration of the land that I love.

When we contemplated celebrating our 25th, cruising with the boys, and our lifelong friend, Mark, that introduced Steve and I way back in January 1984,  aboard the Disney Magic seemed so appropriate. After all, anyone knows that hitting the 25 year mark of a marriage comes with plenty of fireworks, requires a fair bit of magic, needs the ability to stay afloat in any kind of weather, and has the goal of sailing in smooth waters. ;-) 

Steve and I have been extremely blessed. I always say that every marriage that stays together is one that consciously decides to stay together. Exit doors will pop up all along the way. We have seen those doors. We have pushed past them. We have reached the phase in our life together where we are deep friends and gentle companions. We miss each other when not together - not in the earnest sorrow of an eighteen year old, but in the sincere affection of wanting to share a moment, a memory, a word, a thought, with your most prolific friend, with one whom has seen all of your life events spanning, as of this writing, three decades.

I loved celebrating our 25th anniversary on July 4 in the waters off Alaska. I loved seeing the boys get excited over the dinner that night in Animators' Palate. I loved that Mark was with us to experience his first Disney cruise. I loved that all five of us embraced adventure and were equally mesmerized by the wildly extravagant beauty of Alaska. I loved that we ran into Americana Mickey. I loved that those silly shipboard photographers captured some of all of it for me. 

I can sit here and remember each moment in these photographs below - and I can remember a lifetime of moments spent together across our country. We have pieced together a story that is as rich as the colors in our flag. We have been blessed with a bountiful tale - a tale I love - our life, our liberty, and the pursuit of our happiness. You have only to look at the faces below. You can see it plain as day. I love all these smiles, and the stories that go with them.

It's always my joy to hear Happy Anniversary...and say Happy Birthday America. "This land is my land, this land is your land...this land was made for you and me." Chasing life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness freely in the land that I love is a rich gift, one for which I am forever grateful. Just as much as I am grateful for the life I have with these smiling faces.

Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness - Disney AK Cruise, Fourth of July - July 2012

Sketch Credit: Scrapbook Generation http://scrapbookgeneration.com/index.php?route=product/category&path=213 This is actually a Generations Kit by Debbie Sanders. She is an amazing talent and I only add a few trinkets here and there to complement her incredible layout.

Paper: We R Memory Keepers

Keeping My Eyes on the Horizon

I talked about cruises for a long time. I hinted, cajoled, teased, pleaded. To no avail. So, I eventually went on my first cruise without my sweet hubby. I went with my mom and my oldest sister in 2006. And it was actually a scrapbooking cruise. There were some hiccups, but overall, I loved it. I then knew it was only a matter of time before hubby was going to say yes. By Captain Hook or by crook. 

I finally discovered the missing link. Disney! I knew he would not be able to resist a Disney cruise. I was right! We took our first Disney cruise in 2008, a 5 day cruise to the Bahamas. We four immediately fell in love with all floating things a la Disney. So, naturally, we cruised again in 2009, going this time for 7 days. There was just too much goodness on that ship to explore and take in and enjoy over a mere 5 days. 

Admittedly, in retrospect, back-to-back was probably not ideal, but like I said, we fell in love. And we're never great at deferred gratification. Consequently, after cruise number two, the boys were ready to go back and do "some cities", so in 2010 and 2011, we did San Francisco and New York, respectively. But, as our twenty-fifth anniversary approached, my eye was back on the horizon. That beautiful line where the sky meets the ocean and all is calm.

We had always talked about going to Europe for our twenty-fifth, but as it approached, it just did not seem feasible given us working around the boys going to England on a student ministry mission trip. So, enter Plan B: a Disney cruise to Alaska. It seemed like a foreign country, right? And it would get me back on that beloved Magic. So, how does one have a "romantic anniversary cruise" with two teenagers aboard? Enter Uncle Mark.  We booked two cabins and the three single guys were together in one, we were in the other and odd we headed into the setting sun on our Alaskan adventure.

It was a grand experience, it truly was. I'll remember it all of my life. And if I forget, I have 1,118 photos to jog my memory! It was just the perfect way to get a glimpse into the many beautiful parts of Alaska, and whet our appetite to all desire to someday return. {The youngest son asked before a year was up if we could go back!} And there was no dull moment to the trip. Every moment there was something to see, because even when you were on the boat, you were whale watching, or taking in the glaciers. Truly a stunning glimpse into creation.

There was one really funny, okay ironic, moment. Disney always does a PIRATE night on their cruises. It's usually your 3rd or 5th night at sea, following your first 1 or 2 nights at sea and your first formal night. It's a clever way for them to push the Pirates of the Caribbean hook, if you will, and you get to see pirate Minnie and Mickey. Peter Pan and even Captain Hook show up. And if you're actually cruising in the Caribbean, you might even spy Captain Jack Sparrow. 

The pirate night has a special menu and everyone gets scarves to wear on their head and the photographers troll around to catch your pirate faces, After dinner, there is a show up on deck 9 that involves a zip line and a duel between Mickey and Captain Hook. Mickey always prevails. You know, good over evil. And rum punch is served and at the end of the duel, fireworks light up the sky. It's always really amazing to see the fireworks over the ocean.

Now, I've never seen fireworks that rival Disney. And we've been on cruises where other cruise lines tail the Disney ships on firework night, so their guests get a free viewing. It's just one of Disney's iconic things. And at this point, I should interject that our anniversary is actually ON July 4. Yes, July 4. So many firecracker jokes over the years, and understandably so. We've literally had fireworks on every anniversary we've ever had. So, who better to set off our twenty-fifth anniversary firework show than Pirate Mickey himself?

Well, anyone reading this that has ever been to Alaska knows where I'm headed. Apparently, unbeknownst to us until July 4, 2012, Alaska is an entire natural preserve. And, you guessed it. Fireworks are prohibited on the inside passage. {And maybe everywhere. Who knows?} I only know that on our silver mega anniversary, our giant celebration of all things July fourth-ish, we spent our twenty-fifth anniversary firework free. It was really so funny that we had planned on having such a grand fireworks show...and the only fireworks we saw that night were pictures on the dinner menu and the backdrop screen of the family photo op!

It was funny, to be sure. Like any good character, we followed the age-old "the show must go on" adage and went with it. We loved pirate night all the same. And of course, even without fireworks, it was my favorite pirate night thus far of all our cruises. We all wore the silly scarves and even stumbled upon Pirate Minnie for an impromptu photo op. And we had our photos made in front of the photo op backdrop with the fake fireworks going off behind us.

As the boys get older, they are so much more fun than I ever imagined. They are funny, they are fun, they make me laugh. They are the best of us. And I wanted to capture just a little bit of that fun, silly nature that runs through all of our hearts. That silliness that let us all don scarves and make pirate faces and become excited over Pirate Minnie. If only we were in fact able to sail the ocean all the day long. Oh, that would be a little bit of heaven to me. I can just hear Captain Jack leading, "Yo, ho, yo, ho, a pirate's life me!" and I would be there by his side, singing right along with him. 

Yo Ho, Yo, Ho, A Pirate's Life for Us! ~ Alaska Disney Cruise ~ July 2012

Sketch Credit: Scrapbook Generation http://scrapbookgeneration.blogspot.com

Paper: Fancy Pants
Title: Silhouette Cut File 9329