Reflection on 2011

This has been quite a year. I can honestly say I didn't think I had a very exciting life, but it seems I was told more than once, this year, that I have a very busy, fun life to talk about. And looking back through my blogs, I guess this year in particular, I did! So much, in fact, that it's worth a look back.

I can't say it started out so great. Unemployed, with a house for sale, and a very frustrated husband on my hands (understandably). For me, I was just going with the punches and trying to keep my sanity. Harder than it looked. But things started to take a turn when I found some contract work (that led to my current permanent position at a different company) and then the sale of my house. In the midst of it all, I got away for a quick trip to FL to see my family and try to forget about woes back home, even if only a brief vacation. But a trip to the beach has always been my serene place where I can forget it all and refresh myself. And it got me to my first anniversary. Wow. That was a stressful first year on a marriage! But it looked like it was finally all coming together.

So besides my quick trip to FL, I had a few other trips over the year where I could see people thinking I just travel a lot... wish I could say it was the norm. I had a couple of trips to Chicago to see Cubs games, a trip to PA to see my cousin get married, Niagara Falls, a trip back to Auburn (FINALLY!!!) for a mini reunion and football game, my first cruise (with the girls!), my much delayed honeymoon to Costa Rica, and finally, my trip home to FL for Christmas (with the added bonus of a trip to Fort Lauderdale to see my niece play in a soccer tournament). All a lot of fun.

Then there were the concerts! I saw way more concerts the I normally see! There were a few Indianapolis Symphony shows, a few with Time for Three. Plus there was Britney Spears, LMFAO, Katy Perry, Amos Lee, and Jimmy Buffett! Had a blast at all the shows!

Then there was the stress of the house remodel/renovation. Won't go into details... I'll just leave it at that it's still going. And going, and going, and going... with plenty of issues along the way.

So yeah... Guess it has been a pretty jam packed, fun year. I'm sure I'm leaving stuff out, too! If only I could've let the stressful stuff out. I really think that's why I had so much fun going on... to counterbalance the stress from earlier!

Here's hoping for another great year to come, though... There's still a lot of living' to do.

Soccer Star and Brotherhood

This post is simply me being a proud aunt and braggin' a bit about my niece and nephew a bit.

Our Christmas travels were skewed a bit because of a soccer tournament my niece was playing in in South FL between Christmas and New Year's. I don't get to see her play much, so naturally, I wanted to take this opportunity to do so!

Her tournament started yesterday with a 9am game and went through today, where they played two more games. They won two of their games, and tied one game, and ended up in tomorrow's Final game playing the team they tied to on the first day. I hope her teams walks away with the trophy tomorrow... (if there is one... not sure about that).

So the braggin' part... yes, her team is good. They are a travelling team, after all... typically hand-picked to play on the team. But I'm impressed with her skills, too! I didn't play soccer growing up - it was softball, for me. But I loved watching her on the field! I'm also amazed at how fast two 30 minute halves go by... sure doesn't seem like an hour! I think youth soccer is more exciting the pro-soccer - there's more action since they AREN'T pro, including more sideline throw-ins and goal kicks, etc. Professional soccer is too, well, professional!

Now onto my nephew. He's been thriving and striving in the Boy Scouts and was recently nominated to the Order of the Arrow, which is the Boy Scouts Honor Society (from what I know). I've done a little research since I found out about it and it's pretty prestigious, from what I can tell! He hasn't gone through his Ordeal, yet, but it's on the calendar. Wish I knew more or had pictures to share, but the actual induction hasn't happened yet. Just that he's been nominated is something to brag about, though.

I'm a proud aunt!

Christmas in Jacksonville

Another Christmas has come and gone... already! But Ihave to stay, despite the 'flexed schedule' we had this year, I think it was a pretty good Christmas this year... all of them.

I flew down to FL the Wednesday before Christmas (Eric flew down two days later because of his work schedule), which I haven't done in awhile. So I haven't had the opportunity to do the pre-Christmas stuff in FL in a few years. And I had a nice surprise when I landed in Jacksonville... my niece and nephew were already in Jacksonville! They decided to surprise ME for a change! I loved it!! It gave us that much more time together. Too bad my Sis and BIL couldn't be there until later in the week, but I'll take what I can get, sometimes!

So that gave us Thursday to do some shopping! I was done with my Christmas shopping, but there were a few things the kids needed to pick up, and my Mom also wanted to do one last scavenge of stores. We had a productive day. Stayed ot longer than my nephew wanted, but then he is a teenage boy and that's just how they get, right?

Friday we had a day of baking! I baked my cookies and my Mom made some pies. It made for a long day in the kitchen, but it should made the house smell good! I actually did a bit more cooking than usual, this year. I just had so many recipes I wanted try out or introduce to my family. It was fun!

Friday night, Eric and I took the kids out for a night at Dave and Buster's. It was mainly to just get out of the house for the evening (especaially since we were there all day!) and also spend some time with just us and them. They had a good time, as did we. I'd love to do this every year - not necessarily D&B's, but go out somewhere and do something with just us and them.

Saturday (Christmas Eve) I made a yummy breakfast/brunch for the family before heading out shopping (again) with Eric. He wanted to do some 'research' on a shopping center during one of it's busiest shopping days. We had to pick up a few things, anyway, so why not? It isn't as stressful if you're not shopping, believe it or not... not having a deadline looming makes it seem less crowded, even.

We actually did midnight mass that night with the whole family - haven't done that in years! We all stayed awake, for the most part, but it wiped us out enough to make for a late Christmas morning start! Christmas morning... always a magical morning. Even withthe kids at the older ages, it's still a blast to all sit around the tree and open gifts. I think everyone got most of what they wanted (though I'm sure there were some things not received). Regardless, there were a lot of smiles and fun that day. Of course, there were also naps... something about being all cozy at home (plus midnight mass) just brings the naps on on Christmas Day.

I love Christmas!

We capped the night off with a big ham dinner, completes with all the fixin's! It was really yummy! Afterwards, we just enjoyed each other's company the rest of the night. It's nice not having stores open to entice you to leave the house. Not that we were itching to get out of the house. We were all happy just where we were.

Indy Christmas

A few factors have shuffled around our Christmas plans this year and we celebrated our Indy Christmas last night with Eric's family. The change made things a lot more stressful in the week leading up to hosting everyone... suddenly, hosting responsibilities were combined with getting all shopping done, out of town stuff shipped, and cards in the mail. Yeah... just a little stressful. And it was pretty obvious I was stressed... at least when I was home, looking at the list that needed to be done. But you know what? I got it all done!

So luckily, we had almost all of Saturday to prepare for dinner and Christmas festivities at our house. We needed all of that time, too! Since we had the party the night before, none of the typical 'do it the night before' things were done (like desert). The day started with that and we had to finish that before moving on the the normal 'day of' stuff. We were smart and didn't choose any difficult sides for this meal - kept to the simple basics,  for the most part. Eric got a little creative with a couple of sides, but nothing crazy. So dinner ended up being ham, green beans, mashed potatoes, roasted yams, and white cheddar mac'n'cheese bake. And a spiced apple cake with carmel sauce for desert. Wait... back up to the ham... Archer Farms (Target brand) is an AWESOME ham! Comparable to those $80 hams you find out there! Yum!

So dinner was good, obviously. Then we had gifts to open. Four kids and gifts are interesting. I can only imagine what they're like at their house after Santa comes! But I guess relatively, they didn't get too crazy. But they did love all of their gifts! They immediately had to open them and either play with them or put them on. I remember being like that. LOL I think we did good on gifts this year. I almost forgot what it's like to buy for younger kids, not that they're any less picky. But I guess if you just watch and listen, it's pretty easy to figure out what they like.

So all in all, we had another great Christmas in Indy. Still can't believe I can say this one is in the books already. Where did this year go? Where did this last month go??

Ugly Sweater Party

Our old neighbors (meaning they used to be out neighbors, but no longer are) have been hosting an annual 'Good Dish/Ugly Sweater Party" for three years now. Eric and I have gone every year, and though I've never tried hard to win at either the dis or the ugly sweater, Eric has been determined to win. He came in 3rd for his dish the first year, and 2nd for his dish the second year. Never came close in the sweater department. So he was especially determined this year.

Problem was, we didn't have much time to prepare since our honeymoon was just the week before, PLUS, he traveled to Florida TWICE this past week for work. But he felt he found a pretty good 'ugly sweater' while on one of his FL trips. But the dish was still unknown. In fact, it was unknown until the day of when i was looking online for ANYTHING to make since he wouldn't have time. Then I found it... the perfect dish (or so I thought)... Buffalo Chicken Bites. And then I was off to buy the ingredients. Looked like a simple enough recipe, though maybe a little time consuming with the coating. So I had no time to waste!

Sure enough, I was making them to the last minute, which may have been a good thing since they're best served warm. Eric donned his ugly sweater, and I my $8 sweater I bought at the same time as the ingredients, and we were off. As soon as we walked in the door, people got a kick out of his sweater. And as soon as my dish was revealed and tried, people were throwing out the compliments. Was this our year?

Time to vote. Since it's not an overwhelmingly large party, everyone got two votes to hopefully help keep the odds of any ties down. Amber tallied the votes... the ugly sweater winner - Eric. The best dish winner - Kara. We swept it this year - both contests we won! I must say, Eric was thrilled. I thought it was a trip, myself, considering how last minute it all was for us.

So Eric went home with a big grin on his face, vowing that next year we wouldn't try so hard and not try to win it all again next year. we'll see how that pans out.

Costa Rica (part 3)

So far, a very busy week for us. But we're not done yet!! Who says you get to rest on vacation?? Or, in our case, our honeymoon.

Wednesday we had another 'planned' excursion, this one to a volcano. And then some. We'll start with the volcano, Poas Volcano, to be exact. We though, as we drove up there, we'd have a clear view of the crater because it was a beautiful, clear day! But as soon as we got to the park, we found ourselves in a cloud (literally). And there wasn't enough wind to blow it out of the valley where the crater was, so we only had a vague glimpse of it when the wind blew just enough to blow the cloud off a bit. We could see the edge of the lake and the steam coming up. But no full view, unfortunately. Maybe next time we can see a good shot of this one or another one.

But luckily, this wasn't the only destination for this tour. The next stop was Doka Estates coffee plantation - "The Best Coffee Plantation in Costa Rica" - to learn all about this huge export for Costa Rica. For starters, Starbuck's apparently buys a majority of this company's beans, accounting for about 75% of the bean sales for Doka. That should tell you something. But what I found interesting was the whole process. Did you know that the coffee bean is actually a fruit? And what most people consider the 'bean' is actually the seed in the middle. The fruit's skin and outer pulp is removed, which actually leaves a sweet tasting seed (not to eat, but you can suck on it) to dry, most of which is done in the natural sunlight. And it's an off-white - it's not brown until roasted and the roasting is what gives it it's flavor. The longer it's roasted, the richer the flavor. I had no idea so much went into a pound of coffee - it takes 10 lbs of the fruit to make 1 lbs of the coffee as you know it!

After our little tour of the coffee plant (and another great lunch at the plantation!), we headed to our last stop of the day... the Sarchi artisan shop. When Eric and I arrived, we saw an abundance of these little carts being used as decoration throughout the hotel. We later learned that these were replicas of the ox-carts built and painted by people in this very shop we were going to. It used to be the primary way to transport things around the country, which is why so many of their roads are so narrow. The detail that goes into this painting is amazing! And the fact that they still do it as an art form now is very cool - and just as much detail goes into it. The ox-cart seems to be almost a symbol of the region we were in - and I'm glad we got to see the shop because it made us clearly understand and appreciate the little gift the hotel gave us (miniature replica of the cart that we plan to use as a Christmas ornament).

We got back to the hotel in time to enjoy a bit of pool time before our dinner reservation. There was a great breeze blowing across the resort that made it actually a little chilly to go into the water, but it made for great sitting by the pool and having a glass of wine weather! So it was a nice way to wind down before dinner. Which,once again, was a wonderful meal. It was also nice that they kept portions in check, because the food was so good, you could easily eat too much of something! But, oh, it was so good!

Thursday rolls in - our final full day in Costa Rica. We decided to drive down and hit one last National Park (they have about 25% of the nation reserved as National Parks). Carara National Park is know for it birds, specifically Macaws. We already saw a couple of Macaws playfully fighting in a tree along the side of the road on Sunday, so we didn't need to go to see the Macaws. But we did want to see a true rainforest environment, which the southern part of Carara was. There were trees that towered at 150-160 ft in height! It was amazing to walk among these giants! We did see a few animals as they emerged for their morning breakfast. And there were a couple of Macaws circling the tree tops, squawking at each other the whole time. But the craziest things we saw were the ants! Yes, ANTS! There's were thousands of them, all very organized, carrying leaves back to the colony. They were so organized that they wore a path not only in the dirt, but on the gravel trail we were on! We were both fascinated by this for some reason... It made for a nice last day adventure.

After we had out fill of the rainforest, we went back to the hotel to pack up. Unfortunately, we had to head back into San Jose that night and stay at a different hotel. When we initially booked, our flight left pretty early. When it changed, we didn't change our hotel, and we should have. But instead, we took the same, longer, mountainous route we drove on Saturday night back to San Jose and actually enjoyed the views. It was worth it. And the hotel was another nice hotel that helped us unwind some more before a day of traveling. And that's all Saturday was for us... some brunch, and off to the airport we went.

Costa Rica was absolutely wonderful! Eric and I would love to go back now that we know the lay of the land a bit better. And hopefully we will get to do that one day in the future. Until then, we have many memories and MANY pictures - We took over 1200 pictures!! Well, mainly I took them cause I'm camera happy on trips like this. But it was worth it! You can see some of our handy work on my Fotki page. But even that is just a handful of what was taken!

Costa Rica (part 2)

So Monday was our first 'planned' excursion - a canopy zipline tour. We did a zipline tour in Mexico a few years back, so we kind of knew what to expect, though we also knew every one is different. But this one blew the one in Mexico away! First, it started with a 30 minute horseback ride to the top of the mountain. It also had more cables, plus two rappelling lines, and a suspension bridge. To top that off, we took a break in the middle where we could swim in a pool at the base of one of the 11 waterfalls we crossed. I personally took full advantage of this - it was a great way to cool off! Plus, it's cool to say you swam in a waterfall. But the ziplining, itself, was great - it was over twenty cables long, so it was an all day thing, followed by a lunch provided by the adventure company that we did the tour with. And it wasn't just a box lunch of something... it was a full on meal. Again, another awesome meal! Did I mention Eric LOVES plantains and they're served with almost every meal??

We took it easy that night. The ziplining actually wore us out pretty good, but it was absolutely perfect! It turned out that we missed a drenching downpour at the hotel - we barely had a drizzle at the very end of our canopy tour up in the mountains. So it was a good day to be away from the hotel. But we finally we able to watch a sunset at the hotel, and it was a beautiful one! It seems like the sun disappeared in seconds once it started going down. But the colors were amazing every night. We actually ate dinner at the hotel's buffet that night, as well. They definitely had the food pegged!I guess as we looked around, they were still cooking for the majority of nationals that were there - it wasn't quite 'season' yet for tourism, as the wet season was just coming to an end. But I was honestly surprised at how many non-international tourists were there. We really only saw 'tourists' on our excursions!

On Tuesday, we did our own excursion again, this time a little further south to one of the national parks - Manuel Antonio National Park. This was THE park to go to for wildlife per all the tourbooks. At least along the west coast. It was about a 2 hour drive, so we tried to get as early of a start as we could, which was still later than we wanted. But we also made an additional stop along the way... when we went to Jaco, we noticed a crowd parking next to a bridge and walking to the middle of it, looking down. It wasn't just a rare instance - it was constant. They even had a policeman at one end to help control traffic. So we were curious. We stopped on our way to Manuel Antonio Park, and not to surprising, it was crocodiles that were intriguing everyone. Not just a few... probably about 20 of them! Just sitting on some high areas in the river, sunning themselves. Eric and I couldn't, for the life of us, figure out what f=drew them to the bridge. The only thing we could figure was they were soothed by the sound of the traffic. There were other sandbars further out with none at all, so unless they get fed by locals, who knows?

After that worthwhile stop, we got back on the road for the remainder of out drive. We passed through a Black African Palm Oil Ranch, which we didn't actually know it was that until later in the week. Just row and rows and acres and acres of obviously planted palm trees with some sort of harvesting facility in the middle. Then we finally made it to the little town, Quepos, just outside of the park entrance and headed up the winding road that ended at the park. We thought about hiring a guide for just a moment, but then decided to go at it on our own, which turned out to be a good call. There were so many that DID have tour guides that all you had to do was stop when you saw a group of people stopped and someone, usually the guide, would point out the animal they were looking at. Along the main path there were a few monkeys and quite a few sloths. At least on the way in. On the way out we saw, of all things, a deer. And some other animal we're still trying to figure out... guess that's where a guide would've come in handy. I think the highlight (besides the monkeys on the beach) were the Toucans we saw on the way out! A guide was stopped with some people and pointed it out. He said seeing them is always a rarity... and we saw two as we left! A very pretty bird!

Regardless, Eric and I thought the best part was the beaches at the end of the trail - one on either side of the peninsula the park was on. Yet and FOURTH type of beach. This one was comprised of the soft, white sane that everyone has come to expect. No rocks, no seaweed, just a beautiful beach in a cove with no commercial development to be seen. I wanted to stay here for awhile... a LONG while! We both agreed that if we make it back to Costa Rica, these beaches, alone, are worth spending a day at. Unfortunately, they kick you out of the park just before sunset. We took some pictures at the beach outside of the park, first, and then drove a bit and then watched the sunset at the top of the mountain between Quepos and the park and watched it form an open air restaurant with a cargo plane in it. Another beautiful sunset...

Costa Rica (part 1)

Finally... Eric and I were able to take our honeymoon. Destination... Cost Rica!

We were there for a week and I have A LOT to cover, so this will be broken up into multiple blogs. Mainly cause I have a good feeling that my hands will get tired from typing! So here goes part one...

We headed out on Saturday afternoon... go figure - there's limited flights to Costa Rica! So, after all the flying and airport time, we picked up our bags close to 9pm and headed to Hertz for the car.And what a fun car we got! A Diahatsu BeGo! Didn't even know this brand still existed! Pretty much everything in Costa Rica is of the Asian brands... and a Volkswagon truck that they don't sell in the US for a good mix. Very few American brands... we weren't too sure about 'Beep Beep' at first (the nickname Eric affectionately gave it), but it turned out to be just what we needed.

So getting to the hotel... that proved to be interesting... at night. We knew we wanted to get the the 'new' highway, as the locals call it. We asked directions at Hertz, and it seemed easy enough. But we got on the road, and couldn't tell what road we were even on! They don't sign their highway (or any streets) well at all!! We finally broke out the compass on my iPhone and saw we were heading the opposite direction (east) of what we wanted to be heading (west). So, after finding a way off the highway we were on (VERY limited access), we literally drove through a nighttime construction zone (we just followed the locals that were doing it) and got back on the highway, heading in the other direction. Finally, after passing our initial starting point, we saw a sign for Puntarenas, but it wasn't via the highway we were looking for. But the fact that we were heading in the right direction was good enough for us. The county is smaller than West Virginia, how far off could it be??

Turns out we were within 1 mile of the new highway when we were heading in the wrong direction. They didn't explain that we had to head into San Jose to get to it (which was east of the airport).But none the less, we did finally make it to the DoubleTree resort, which more than welcomed us after the long drive! Check-in was easy and they took us to our room, which was thankfully far from the 'nightlife' part of the hotel. We walked into our room and it was decked out is rose petals and a bottle of wine for us, with a note welcoming us to our honeymoon. Which could finally begin after this long day of traveling.

Since we arrived so late, we had no plans set for Sunday. But we had our car. So after a late breakfast and a little pre-planning for excursions later in the week, we headed out in the daylight to see what we could find. Our first destination was Jaco, which was a surf town. It was about a 45 minute drive south along a highway that paralleled the coast (it wasn't a coastal highway, as you only saw the water for a few miles of it). We got to Jaco, which seemed to be a lazy little town you'd expect to find in California. There didn't seem to be much surfing going on, but we found out why a short time later when we headed to Playa Hermosa just a few miles south. To our surprise, the Costa Rica Surf Championship was happening there. What are the odds of exploring that beach on that day?? It was packs full of both surfers and spectators.

Even more interesting was that in our third beach visit, we had a completely different type of beach. The beach at our hotels was very typical looking, though a little more course than what I'm used to in FL. Still beautiful, though. Jaco was a sprawling, flat beach with a darker tan-ish gray sand. And here at Playa Hermosa was a nearly black sand, obviously volcanic by the color, but some of the softest sand I've felt on my feet (rivaling some of the powdery, white sands you find on the west coast of FL). So not only does Costa Rica have an array of ecological systems to explore, they also have a number of beach types to explore!

At this point, we could tell it was nearing sunset. Sunset occurred around 5-5:30ish this time of year in Costa Rica. We hoped back in Beep Beep and drove back to the hotel. We had a dinner reservation to make, so we didn't want to be late. And this would be our first major meal in Costa Rica. To this point, we had just done the breakfast and lunch buffet at the hotel (gotta love all-inclusive places), but even that food was great! So we had even greater expectations for the individual meals. The place we went specialized in seafood, which made sense being on the coast. And it was amazing! First, there was the Ceviche - three different kinds, plus sashimi! Then for an appetizer, I had this seafood bisque type soup that had full pieces of crabs and oysters still in the shells in a tomato based broth. YUM! I'd tell you what Eric had, but I was too engrossed in my meal! The main course was just as delicioso! I had these shrimp kabobs with these huge shrimp on it that were marinated and grilled to perfection. Eric had a sea bass dish that he practically inhaled! So the food completely hit the mark we were hoping!

So our first full day in Costa Rica was a hit and were were even more excited about what was to come in the remainder of the week!