Countdown to Cruising 2019 - need a catchy name

I need a catchy phrase for our 2019 vacation.  This is a repeat of a cruise we did 9 years ago, so maybe somethings x 2, or do over.  We're going to the Bahamas and it's for our anniversary, so any of those things could be used for the name also.  We're sailing on Carnival Glory, out of New Orleans with my in-laws.  Ok, that's about it.  Any ideas are appreciated but I'm having a block.  I can't come up with any catchy hashtags to name the cruise.  We are cruising on a different ship out of a different port.  So it's not a repeat of the Glory or New Orleans, just so there is no confusion on names.

Other than that, we are down to we leave for the drive in 4 days.  Saturday morning about 4:00 a.m. can't get here soon enough.  Bags are almost all packed, final arrangements made for house sitter, dog sitters, grooming for the dogs while we're away has all been taken care of.  Working on finishing up final instructions for work stuff and wrapping up final projects and doing last few days of "daily" work.

Tuesday is work and hair appointment day.  Everyone has to have a fresh hair-do for a trip.  Getting my highlights done and a haircut.  If it's called a haircut when you are growing it out in front.  I realized after I cut off my hair this last time, that I wasn't able to wear my CC Beanies in the winter time as my hair was to short.  I looked bald.  So now I'm working on growing out some hair for a stacked bob so I can wear my hats in the winter time.  The things we do to have a warm head in the wintertime.

I'm off Wednesday to spend the day celebrating Kaleb's birthday and pampering my fingers and toes.  I'll pretend he's there with me.  That would have been funny.  One his feet were ticklish so he'd have never made it through the pedicure and would have been overly dramatic about it and two he'd have given us every fact about how pedicures came to be whether they were true or not, I'd have had to look them up to see.

Thursday is a full day of work.

Friday is drop of Rex at Kamp K-9 at 8:00 in the morning when they open.  He's staying the full time at Kamp K-9, while Goober gets to stay with Ryan at the house the majority of the trip.  Rex is still an overgrown puppy and needs a little more oversight than Goober does.   This way he gets lost of play time and other dogs and people to play with, while Goober will get some one on one time with his boy.  Then the next Friday Ryan will bring Goober out to join Rex and they'll both get groomed on Saturday.
Anyone that is ever looking for a boarding place for your dogs and they are over 6 months old and have all their shots, Kamp K-9 is the best place ever.  Our dogs love it.  After drop offs it’s to work for the day and then home to make sure everything is packed.
Then off to bed that night, after checking to make sure EVERYTHING is packed and that the boarding passes are accessible and in the carry on luggage.  Hopefully this cruise I don't lay a bag down with my camera in it and walk off the ship.  I might have ducked security while they were busy and ran back on the ship to grab my bag.  Hey, I love my camera and it had all my trip pictures on it and we know how I love pictures and photo ops!  I just thanked him and smiled as sweet as possible as I passed him my 2nd time exiting the ship.  Oops.

Saturday - up at 3, leave our house at 4:00 to get to inlaws and get everything in the truck and loaded and ready to leave by 5:00.  On the road to New Orleans!

Here’s to a great no name vacation!

Learning the Ins and Outs of Cruising with Wifi

It's been about 6 years since we've been on a cruise and the cruising industry has changed quite a bit.  Six years ago, people unplugged when they cruised.  They only using their phones in ports where they could find wifi available.  Or they paid high fees from their mobile plans to use their devises while they were away.  Data fees were outrageous. 

I remember locking my phone in the safe for the 7 days, and realizing to late that I didn't bring a watch so I had no idea what time it was because I depended on my phone to tell me.   Then on that 7th day bringing my phone out and spending the whole drive home catching up with the real world.  What happened while I was away on vacation.  And uploading tons of photos to store forever in clouds somewhere for safe keeping.

Now, wifi plans is available on most ships.  We are going to cruise with Carnival and the ship we will be on, the Glory, offers 3 different plans:  Social, Value & Premium.   This is how in touch with the world everyone has to be, 3 different plans so everyone's needs are met.  We don't unplug, even when on vacation anymore.  I've always kept a journal on our vacations to remember the great times we had, the places we visited and the people we met.  This time I've decided to blog our trip instead, which brings me to having to learn about wifi on cruises.  I've never dealt with using digital devices while on a cruise.  We cruised fairly often for several years, but then haven't cruised in the last 6 years.  Sometimes life happens and plans change.

I've posted on the Shipmate app with some questions regarding which plan would be a good choice for our ship and my plan to blog to get input from people who have cruised recently on the Glory.  I'm not trying to reinvent the wheel here, just trying to learn about what people do every day without racking up crap tons of data charges. One person says Glory has extremely slow and non-existent in places wifi, another person says getting the value package should work fine and that they are going on the Glory in July and will try and remember to update me on the speed/accessibility of the wifi.  Which it's not the end of the world if I can't post as the cruise goes along.   I'd like to be able to communicate with my kids occasionally during the week but if I can't post my blogs until we disembark that's fine.

It's been so long since we've cruised and almost a year since our last vacation, I'm definitely ready for a weeks vacation.  I read an article about a company that started paying their employees $2000 to go somewhere for vacation.  They only received the money if they actually scheduled a trip and went away for a true vacation.  If they didn't have the money to afford a plane ticket up front, they could put it on the company credit card and then the remainder of their trip would be reimbursed up to the $2000 limit.  It was a way of encouraging their employees to take scheduled time off and recharge their batteries.  Some people work and work and never take more than a day at a time.  Then you have others that are always off.  The ones that never take a week of vacation will experience burn out in their positions.  So this was their way of controlling employee turn over.  And if you think about it, the cost of training new employees, not just to that employee, but for the other employees that are picking up the work load while the new employee is training is quite significant.  so compare that to $2000 to hold on to your already trained employees.  I could see how that would benefit companies.

Not sure how I got off on that topic, but it is an interesting thought.  I've always been one to take at least 1 solid week vacation per year.  I need time to recharge completely.  And actually going on a cruise and turning off the email, skype, texts is the only way I will truly leave work at work.  If I stay in the country, I'll continue to work so cruising is a perfect vacation.  With the WiFi package this time I'll have to make a conscious decision to not check in at work.  I'll speak to people there as friends, but I'm truly check out this year on vacation.  So be prepared in about 51 days for hopefully daily blogs.  If there are no blogs happening after I say I'm on vacation, then there will be 7 blogs all at once when I get back because I look forward to sitting on the Lido deck, or in one of the picture windows staring out at the ocean on a sea day and blogging away.  Lost in my own world. 

Happy Birthday Jimmie

Today is a special day.  The love of my life turns 59.  I'll never be able to say with words how special he is to me, or how much he means to me.  He spoils me and treats me like a princess.  But those aren't the reasons that I love him.  I love him because he will sing to me when I least expect it.  He knows what my favorite things are even when I don't.  He understands that I'm never still and sometimes get lost in my head.  And he's ok with that.  He's a family man and not afraid to let anyone know it.  He's stood by my side through the best of times and through the worst of times.  We've ridden together on 2 wheels, 4 wheels, 6 wheels and sometimes even no wheels.  He may say he HATES my driving, but I think secretly he's a fan of it or he wouldn't have me drive so often.

Now we both have a strong personality, so when we disagree, you can bet we strongly disagree, but we know at the end of the day we'll be there for each other.  There's nothing that is going to come between us.  Just because I don't know the correct names of a X screwdriver and a flat screwdriver or the difference between a wrench and pliers or wire cutters and he just doesn't understand it, don't mean he doesn't love me, he just might not have much patience with me sometimes.  Lol  Like after he's told me fifteen times to bring him the blue handled pliers and I bring him needle nosed something or others.  Why you gotta have so many tools anyway.  I can be a pain in anyone's behind with all my questions and suggestions on how we could do things faster or better.  I don't mean to be bossy, I was just born that way.

In a couple more months we'll be celebrating our 16th wedding anniversary.  He's planned a vacation to celebrate it.  (see I am spoiled)  So anyone that runs across my husband today, tomorrow, this week or heck even the rest of this month, wish him a Happy Birthday.  He deserves it for putting up with my speeding, daredevil driving, opinionated, bossy self.

Happy Birthday to my husband. You are the best!

Mental Health Awareness Month & Blogging

With May being Mental Health Awareness month I’m posting a lot more than normal on Kaleb’s Story Facebook page. There is always certain times of the year that I will post more than others.  If it was a perfect world, or if I ran a blog page or non-profit page full-time this might not be the case but as it stands I do still have other priorities.  That’s not to say that makes this any less important. It just means there are times of the year that I spend every lunch hour, evening or weekend searching out the best quotes of the day, or researching statistics, working on fundraising and writing meaningful blogs.

When I began this blog page I decided I’d never write a blog just to fill a quota or to have something to post that day. That’s why sometimes it’s months between them and sometimes only days.  Sometimes they are so personal I leave them as drafts and never post them.   A lot of my posts are about suicide prevention, grief, healing after loss and mental health but that’s not all that we are.   In the coming months we will be going on vacation and I plan on blogging each day as WiFi allows and sharing on my personal Facebook since it’s not related to Kaleb’s Story page.

That’s one thing that some people may not have a grasp of. Yes, we lost our son and our life changed forever, but our daily lives are just like anyone else’s. We get up, go to work to earn a living. We work around our house and we go on vacations. The difference, everything we do, we do with a piece of our heart missing.  Anything might remind us of him. Looking at souvenirs on vacation we might find his name spelled correctly or we might find one of those machines that flattens pennies. He collected those everywhere we went. Those little reminders will put a smile on our face as we remember the good times. Or on a bad day they might bring a tear to our eye as we get frustrated or sad. We might see an awkward gangly teenager that looks just like him from the back and for a split second forget our life changed forever.  But we are a normal family 90% of the time.

I hope if you chose to read our vacation blogs that you enjoy them. Those will be posted in August. If I’m unable to post them each day of the trip then I’ll post them all when we get back from vacation.  If you don’t want to read them  then you’ll probably want to skip the August blogs labeled Vacation. I’m excited to return to cruising after a 6 year hiatus from it.

Here’s to more posts and more blogs to bring awareness, tips, and statistics to each of you in the near future. I’ll try and do the research for you and bring you motivational quotes when you might need them most.  Because you are important! You Matter! And Most Importantly YOU CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE!!  #BeKalebsVoice

Springtime & vacation

I LOVE SPRINGTIME!!

Spring and Summer are my favorite seasons.  Seeing everything come to life.  The brown ugly branches of trees, blossoming with fresh green foliage, flowers beginning to bloom and listening to the gurgle of streams flowing with spring rains.   These things bring me such Joy!  

What brings you happiness?  What brings you joy?  I have simple answers now.  My husband, kids, family, friends and sunshine.    What's better on a sunny spring day than driving with the sunroof back and the windows down?  You get the wind in your hair, sun on your skin and you just feel your body soaking up the freshness in the air.  

We traded my Jeep Wrangler over the winter.  As soon as I mentioned I was considering trading it in, my husband jumped on it.  I had already looked at some vehicles and I told him my list of requirements for a new vehicle. 

1.  had to be a Jeep brand   

2.  had to be 4 doors  

3.  had to have a sunroof  

He tried to debate that a sunroof was not a necessity.  That's a deal breaker for me.  I'm a Jeep girl and going from a Wrangler to an SUV type vehicle, it wasn't an option to not have a sunroof.  My trailblazer before my Jeep had a sunroof even.   I can't handle a car with a closed in roof and drive it every day.  I don't use my A/C often.  I use windows and sunroof not because I like to be hot, but because I love the wind and the sunshine.  In hindsight the black leather seats weren't the brightest choice, but I love my Jeep Cherokee Limited WITH a dual pane sunroof that is MOST of the roof space.  Sorry to anyone riding in the backseat with the sun beating down on you, but my sunroof is awesome!

We have a cruise planned in August for our 16th wedding anniversary.  The last few years we've planned our vacation around the anniversary of Kaleb's death.  This year we are vacationing around a celebration and there is nothing I love more than travel and cruising. Just planning for the cruise makes me happy.  Thinking about the sunshine and knowing the wind that will be present on the ship while it's sailing keeps my mood up.  We've visited the ports we're going to previously but it was during the winter time and during an arctic blast.  It was actually 2009 the year of the ice storm here at home when everyone was without power for so long.  We missed it all.  We were on a ship cruising.  I won't say enjoying the weather, because that is still to date the only cruise we have been on where we froze most of the cruise and had to buy jackets and sweatshirts in ports.  We were not packed appropriately.  So we are redoing that cruise but in the summertime.  I'm hoping to blog throughout our cruise and post about our days on the ship and in port.  We haven't cruised in about 7 years.  The difference in the internet access is amazing.  We'll still be unplugging from society for the most part.  No work, phones for pictures only.  Internet for blogging.  It will be nice to unplug and get a rest from the screens for a large majority of the daytime.  Live life instead of reading about it, or seeing it through tv shows, or other peoples pictures or vlogs.  It will give us time to recharge our inner batteries.  

While we won't be vacationing around Kaleb's anniversary I'll always take off for his birthday in August and a couple of days for the anniversary of his death in September.  Those will always be times that I need to take for myself away from others.  That's the way I deal.  I unplug from people.  I don't think that's always a bad thing.  It's a way of recharging me.  Same as a vacation recharges you body and soul.  Those days recharge me mentally to face another year.  Same as trees go dormant through the winter to bloom again in the spring.  It's ok to go quiet for a little while as long as you bloom again the next day or the next year.  Each year that passes maybe my blooms will get a little brighter.   

Jeep Worthy!

Have you ever had something that you are more attached to than a normal person should be?  My Jeep is that way to me.  I LOVE my Jeep.  Loved it when I bought it.  I'd wanted one forever.  My husband was never a fan of it, not enough head or leg room.  He didn’t think it was safe enough for me. It definitely doesn't ride like a car and there isn't an electronic piece of equipment on it, from roll down windows, to push in locks and a key you actually put in the door to unlock it.  Who knew those things still existed. We couldn't take it on trips so it added up miles on his vehicles because my Jeep was only driven during the week by me to and from work.  Or in the beginning hauling Kaleb around until he got his drivers license. 

 It's a 2013 and I've owned it since the day it drove off the lot.  So why do I love my Jeep so bad.  In the beginning  I loved the freedom of taking the top off when I wanted, the wind in my hair, sun on my skin.  Didn't matter if I had to have the heater on while this was occurring, it was the point that I could do it.  I can park it anywhere, it zips around town, or curvy roads quickly and we all know how I like to drive.  I probably didn't use the air conditioner the first couple of years I had it, didn't matter how hot it got, I used the windows because that's why I got it.  I love to be outside and feel the sun and the wind.  Don't get me wrong I still do these things to this day.  There are just new reasons I love my Jeep now.  

But the reason has changed.  This is the Jeep that Kaleb learned to drive in.  He took his driver's test in it.  Who else goes to take their driver's test, parks in the state police parking lot and someone else taking their test backs into your vehicle.  Only Kaleb.  Thank goodness it was a Jeep, they only hit the spare tire on the back and scuffed up my cover.  But the look in his eyes when the State Trooper walked in and asked who was driving the Jeep Wrangler and he had to say him.  Priceless.  This is the vehicle we made our Braum's runs in and hid our napkins in the console until we could get to a trashcan so there was no evidence.  Speaking of Braums, never buy ice cream and try and drive with the top off.  It sprays everywhere, as we found out one summer day on a trip back from Lake Fort Smith with Ryan and Kaleb.  It's the memories that are in this Jeep that make it special.  I can't make new memories with Kaleb in them.  He'll never be in a new car with me.  

It's also the vehicle I was driving that last morning when I left him at the gas station getting gas.  The last time I saw him alive.  As I waved goodbye and said I love you.  Same vehicle I drove home that day as I was given the news about his death.  It's made many countless trips to the cemetery with me.  So when is a car not a car?  When it's a Jeep that holds your precious memories that are irreplaceable. The memories will always be in my heart, but to not be surrounded by them every time I drive will be hard as I trade in my Jeep that has been my baby for almost 6 years.  To be a grown up and let practicality outweigh the sentimental attachment is hard.  There is no Blue Book value on what my Jeep is worth to me.  It's Priceless.  No one will be able to love Zippy as much as I do.  They'll never appreciate the memories that were made in it.  But maybe some family will get to make new memories in it.  

"My Journey" Making it Memorable

     

For those that know me well, you know it's getting close to that time of year when I struggle.  It doesn't matter how happy I am in life, because let's face it, I'm surrounded by a pretty awesome group of family and friends.  I live in the most beautiful and peaceful surroundings imaginable but the next 2 months will always suck for me.  We were watching drag racing last weekend as we do most Saturdays and Sundays when its that season and there was an interview on there with Clay Millican labeled "My Journey" and he discussed losing his son Dalton at the age of 22 to a motorcycle accident.  He talked about the knock at the door and hearing those words.  It hit me in the heart.  To hear another parent talking about " that moment" hurts my heart so bad.  Because you can't even describe that pain.  Even though our losses were two completely different kinds of loss, they are still the same.  We both are left without one of our sons.  You also realize there are so many people out there on this terrible journey with us.  I guess I don't remember this happening because it's so close to the time we lost our Kaleb.
   
     I'm thankful we as a couple have been strong enough to be able to beat the odds.  I'm thankful we as a family did not crumble.  When I have down days, one of my best friends always tells me, "we're going to get through this, even if I have to push, pull or drag you through it".  I have no doubt she would do that.  We couldn't ask to be surrounded by better people.  They know when we need space, and they know when we need to have people around us to keep us busy.   I'm not always able to go to family gatherings, or attend holidays because it might not be a good time for me.  One thing people don't always understand is if I cry when we talk about Kaleb, it's not always because I'm sad.  Sometimes they are happy tears because of the joy of remembering him and talking about the memories from his journey.  Or remembering something new.  And if I ever happen across a new picture or a new video where I can hear his voice that I've never heard before, you can bet I'll cry.  Not from sadness but just from joy of a new memory I get to experience.

     My blogs have gotten further and further apart.  Sometimes I still blog, but I don't post the blog.  I leave it as a draft, or don't share it.  It still helps me.  So here's to year 3.  August 14th, 2018 he'd have been 20.  No longer a teenager.    Wondering what would he have been like, what would he be doing, is hard.  But probably what's harder is trying to remember his laugh, his smell, and the feel of those bony sweaty arms as he'd try to give me a gross sweaty hug just because he knew it'd bother me.  September 15, 2018, yeah, don't expect to hear from me that day.  The AFSP River Valley Out of the Darkness walk is the next day.  We did the walk last year.  We opened a team up this year, Kaleb's Army, but last year, it was a almost a month after the anniversary.  I'm good with collecting and contributing donations, but I don't know if I'll actually be able to go to the event this year.  Not sure I'll be ready for crowds and to be able to give that emotional support needed to attend it.  I'm not much of a people person on my good days.

     I know most everyone has seen the tragic news about the Ride the Ducks tragedy in Branson and I'm sure so many of us have ridden those very same Ducks either there, or in Hot Springs.  The people who lost their life that day had no idea their journey was going to end.  I'm sure they had plans for the future.  Tomorrow isn't promised to anyone.  I thank God everyday for giving me one more day and Blessing me with those around me.  Our move last year had a lot to do with living our dream life.  When you decided to down size and live in a 28 foot camper for a year so that you can save and get a house onto your property in the middle of no where, that's taking a chance.  We could have just kept saying "someday".  Finally we said no, if we're going to do this, now is the time.  The opportunity presented itself and we jumped.  Now when I walk out on our porch, and look out over the pond, there is a feeling of Peace.  This is our little piece of Heaven and I can only speak for myself but I feel closer to Kaleb there.

     Each of us are on our own Journeys.  To anyone that has outlived their child, your journey just took an alternate route than other people.  It doesn't have to make it a bad journey.  We only get one journey what have you done to make yours memorable lately?