Birthdays...Cruisin' Style

Happy podcast Tuesday!! Stories sort of by the numbers this week...but don't worry. It's not like a math lesson.

 Listen here

As you may remember, the whole point of our cruise was to celebrate Ryan's 40th birthday, which took place while we were gone. It took place on a sea day, actually, and we had a lot of fun!

The fun started the night before, right after we got back from our day exploring Curacao. You're going to love this.

When Ryan booked the cruise, he marked that we were celebrating his birthday, so earlier in the week, we had received a handful of coupons in our room. One was for the spa! $50 off any service they offer. I told Ryan he should splurge and get something. So he consulted the price list and found that a shave/head/arm massage was the cheapest thing they offered. (Still not what either of us would call cheap - even WITH the coupon, but it was a fun different thing to do for his birthday.)

So the night before he turned 40, after Curacao and before dinner, we went to the spa for his shave. I took some pictures, and I won't bore you with them all, but here are a couple. Things we learned: Ryan is TERRIBLE at relaxing. He kept talking and talking to the lady, and finally I said, "I think you're supposed to be resting during this." LOL!!! She kept giving him looks like why is this guy talking to me???

I don't think he 100% loved it, but it was fun and different!

And then there was his actual birthday...which started with a brilliant sunrise. (Photo credit: Ryan. After all, he's the one that likes to get up to see these!)

Coffee together...

I couldn't bring his gift along (the weighted blanket...too heavy!!) but I did have some cards for him to open throughout the day.

BREAKFAST!!!

We really had a perfect and gorgeous day, so we went for a walk on the track and then Ryan wanted to do the ropes course again.

I was so proud of him on the ropes course...he started out just having his own fun, but before he'd gotten very far at all, he found himself near a kid who was TERRIFIED up there. And he was alone. His mom was down on the deck with me. Ryan ditched his personal fun to help the kid get through the course, walking with him at times and making sure he got safely through. His mom thanked me over and over and over for Ryan's help. (I marked out the kiddo's face, since we don't know him.)

We also played corn hole (or whatever your part of the country calls this game).

 Our best board:

 He won. Of course. ;)

Had some lunch...

And after a nap or two, we went to the onboard coffee shop. It only seemed appropriate to get coffee on Ryan's birthday. We were hot though, so we were looking at frappes and discovered they had coffee SHAKES. (Made with coffee ice cream!!) We went for that instead. DELICIOUS.

We went to dinner late that night, since we were still full of shake, but we did get dressed up and enjoy a nice birthday dinner. (I was sad that the waitstaff didn't sing to Ryan.)

When we got back to our room, though, we found that the birthday package we ordered had been delivered! It was a party in our room!

We were too full to eat the cake that night, so we had it the next day, but it was still fun to see it waiting on us!

And that's how it went when Ryan turned 40...at sea!

Curacao!

I told you last Friday that our first port of call for our cruise was Aruba, and we did the "Granny Tour" there (Ryan's term for it). We left Aruba pretty late on a Monday evening, and bright and early Tuesday morning, we arrived in Curacao!

Ryan had planned our excursion for the day, and he was really excited about it. Our plan was to rent a car and explore the island on our own. (I, Dateline watcher of the world, was appropriately apprehensive about this, but I trusted Ryan's instincts.)

The guy who rented us the car was fantastic. The car was clean, and he gave us a map marked with all the places he thought we might want to see. He had also pre-programmed a GPS with all the locations from the map, so all we had to do was punch in where we wanted to go. He was so organized, and we both loved that. The car was pretty sweet!

We decided to start with the farthest location we wanted to see. It was only about 30 miles from port, but it took us an hour to get there. The car rental guy had told us not to leave anything in sight when we got out of the car, and that made me so nervous. The farther we went from port, the more I saw how poor and apparently crime-ridden the island was. ALL the houses and businesses had bars on the doors and windows. I had a really hard time relaxing!

Our first stop was at a little beach that was supposed to be loaded with turtles. Right after we got there, a huge tour bus showed up with a snorkeling group, so I felt a little bit safer. We did see a lot of turtles from the pier, but the beach wasn't really very comfortable or inviting, so we didn't stay too long.

(This was the first time we used our new waterproof camera, and it was definitely a learning curve moment. That's a turtle in the last photo. Also a large fingerprint on the lens. #facepalm. We also figured out how to turn off the date eventually.)

After leaving the turtle beach, we went to a free public beach, and it was beautiful AND comfortable. We stretched out our towels and stayed a while!

(This was also the beach, if you heard the story on the podcast, where I totally lost my balance getting out of the water. It made for a fun photo sequence, but I'll just leave you to imagine it. Sigh.)

After we left this beach, we headed back toward the port area, which included roundabouts. Help me.

We also had the gas-buying adventure, which was another podcast story you may have enjoyed.

We parked our car back near the port and walked around the area immediately around the ship. It felt like a safer area (to me). We also saw our first and only Starbucks of the trip!

 (Hello, tourists!)

After we officially turned in the car, we got back on the ship. We were SO HUNGRY!!!

So...my thoughts on Curacao? The water was GORGEOUS, and we really did love spending some time at the beach. I have a feeling the shopping areas near the port were probably really nice, though we didn't walk over to them. But I couldn't get past how poor the main part of the island was, and it made it hard for me to enjoy it when I knew there was so much poverty and (apparent) crime. Ryan did a great job with the driving, though!! And putting gas in the car from the gas attendant from Oz!

We had lunch when we got back on the ship, and then later that evening, we got all spiffed up for dinner!

That was the night we ate the ox tongue...

 My favorite dessert of the week: a s'mores parfait!

The Shafferland Shuffle

I feel like we re-entered life fairly well this week. Always sad to see a vacation schedule go away, but we also welcome our beloved routine!

* We had church on Sunday, of course, and there were some big prayer groups during the service. That never gets old to witness! Ryan's birthday present arrived (still weird to me to get packages on Sunday!) and he was so excited! A weighted blanket! And my favorite thing about Sunday? I finished Matthew! The first of the four gospels - all done!

* Ryan was still off work the first two days of the week, so we took it easy on Monday. He made breakfast for us, and we got all unpacked/laundry done/groceries purchased. Braeya was so happy he was home, and she camped out on his lap every single moment he sat still. The saddest part of Monday? Our coffee pot died. Like DIED.

* For our last day of vacation, we had one last little hurrah. We went shopping a bit on Tuesday, had lunch at Red Robin, and found some interesting things at the Treasure Mart! (No purchases there...just interesting finds.) That night, our small group had a cookout to celebrate the end of our study year. Some of the grillers are featured here...all the guys eventually hung out by the grill!

* I sent Ryan back to work (with great sadness on my part) on Wednesday. I wasn't the least bit sick of having him around and was most sad to see him go! I also had to get back to cooking that day - which wasn't terrible. I had kind of missed it. :) Since he returned to work, so did I...because I had a speaking event sneaking up on me! We also got back to work helping his dad at the house they're going to sell. More painting!

* Thursday I had a dentist appointment, and though I was nervous about it being the longest I'd gone between appointments since my surgery, I got a great report! Thursday was also our monthiversary - 77 months! Ryan planned a special date for our evening and took me out for strawberry shortcake! (DELICIOUS!!)

* Ryan was SO EXCITED to come home from work on Friday and find out our replacement coffee pot had arrived. (Then we proceeded to accidentally make the boldest cup of coffee on the planet. It's a wonder we slept at all that night!) We took one last picture of Braeya Jo before she became a teenager...and we found an interesting treasure in Aldi. (Whoooooo wore the glasses better?) (See what I did there?)

* Yesterday was a busy day. I traveled up by our beloved lake to speak at a mother/daughter brunch at a church, and Ryan had to work, so he couldn't go with me. (That was sad!) Last night we went to dinner with my parents to celebrate both our birthdays. (They take us out for a birthday dinner every year.) AND our girl turned thirteen. She's nailed the teenager look!

The Saturday Six

** A happy birthday to my sister and to our Braeya girl today! **

One.

I find silicon baking cups both adorable and fascinating...and I still don't own any. Womp womp. But I found this post with ideas of ways to use them beyond the baking! (And I also learned that there are many more shapes available than I knew!)

Two.

Dashing Dish posted a list of Christian songs to listen to you while you work out! If you're looking to update your playlist, check out her ideas! (Spoiler alert: David Phelps is nowhere on the list. He's usually my entire playlist.)

Three.

I stumbled upon this little post this week, and not only did I learn a couple of things about seagulls, I learned a good life/soul lesson. It's a quick read...check it out!

Four.

STOP. IT. How adorable is this little pin holder??? Hello, Up! fans...you might need this for cuteness alone!!

Five.

The end of the school year is approaching. Do you need a gift idea for a teacher? I loved this one. I'm not a teacher, but I'm always accepting these - ha!

Six.

A couple of years ago, some friends of mine introduced me to a friend of theirs: Christy Cabe. She was on the verge of releasing her first book, titled Brownie Crumbs, and I shared about it here on the blog - and interviewed her about the book, too! I found out a few weeks ago that she had her second book ready, and much to my delight, it has a food-related title, too! If Only it Were a Piece of Cake officially launched this week, and I want to tell you about it!

Though it included other things as well, Christy's first book talked quite a bit about some of the harder pieces of her life: losing her mom when she was very young and walking through her son's cancer diagnosis when he was very young. In her new book, Christy's chapters look at the general difficulties we all face in life. She shares some of her own experiences with things like anxiety, disappointment, loss, regret, and more...and then she offers hope for each season.

Christy and I have many things in common: we're almost exactly the same age, we love a lot of the same things, and we process life in many of the same ways. But our lives aren't identical. Christy's a mom of three and she's experienced things I've never known in my life. But in the similarities and differences alike, I found her incredibly easy to relate to in the pages of the book.

In fact, I just about turned into a bobblehead while I read, because I identified so much with her thoughts! From living every moment of life just waiting for the other shoe to drop...to drowning in guilt over the smallest mistakes...to wrestling with God's will...I understood her. And I felt like she surely understood me, her bobblehead reader.

With sprinkles of Scripture and excerpts from her blog incorporated throughout the book, Christy doesn't leave you wallowing in the hard feelings. After she helps you understand that she understands, she shares what she learned in those seasons of her life so you can learn in your own seasons.

I giggled with her as I read, I nodded in agreement, and sometimes my breath caught hard in my throat as I entered that place of deepest heart exchange. The best of all the feelings in one book.

I'm excited for Christy on the release of her new book, and I'm excited to have a sneak peek at it myself. If you enjoy a book that feels like a conversation with a good friend, grab a copy. And for goodness' sake, have a piece of cake while you read!

* Christy provided a digital copy of the book for me to read, but all opinions (and excessive head bobbling) are my own! *