Friday, June 29, 2007

we didn't make it out today

My travel agent calls me early this morning around 6am and says that we need to get up to Newark airport immediately and check in with AirCanada. So we pack everything up and head up there (about 45 minute ride). we are prepared for anything. so we get up there and finally get through the long line only to be told there is nothing going out. we can be put on standby, but all the flights are overbooked and the chances for going out on standby are practically nill. so then she starts looking at saturday flights. we are thinking, ok, we'll meet up with the ship at its first port, Ketchikan. she finds us a flight to Vancouver (tomorrow) but can't find anything to get us to Ketchikan. she apologizes and tell us there is nothing she can do. unbelievable.

Our neighbor, Joe, had driven us up there and he works for Fedex. his specialty is getting packages anywhere, so he takes charge. he's determined to find a way to get us there (we are now THE PACKAGE!). he's got his wife at home on the computer checking out flights and they find a flight our of Seattle to Ketchikan on Sunday, which would be perfect. so now we just need to get to Seattle! So we finally get our travel agent - who is at work at her other job - so she turns the case over to her associate, Bonnie - who knows how to deal with these issues. she gets a head honcho at AirCanada and then her, bonnie and joe begin a 4-hour ordeal of dealing with this and getting us out somehow.

So here 's the plan: we are leaving Newark tomorrow at 11:30 and flying into Toronto. From Toronto we fly into Vancouver. Then we have a little time to wait and then we catch yet another fly and fly back to the US into Seattle where we spend the night. then we leave early in the morning from Seattle for Ketchikan where hopefully a representative from the ship will be waiting for us! after we got all that figured out and returned back home, my neighbor's wife, Jane, who was helping out with computer info, tells me she just got of the phone with Royal Caribbean and that they won't let us on the ship without a letter (on letterhead) from AirCanada saying they had cancelled the original flight. Huh? So back on the phone with Bonnie who does a conference call with AirCanada and Royal Caribbean to get the real story. yes, we need the letter and it has to be from the Newark airport. good grief. finally i am called later by bonnie who says, a letter will be waiting for me tomorrow at Newark (yeah, right! i'm thinking we should place bets on this!) So we will have missed 2 days of the cruise (no ports, just cruising - but one of the best parts of the cruise is when the ship launches and we missed that.

so that's where we are at. my husband was so stressed out that he made an appt. go get accupuncture! (he's goes once a month). and since my lowback was hurting so bad after sitting on metal chairs at the airport for 4 hours, he made me go too! (that will be another blog and i will take pictures of the session, which was pretty cool!)

thanks everyone for your well wishes - wish us a safe journey tomorrow and for me, PATIENCE! i will try to blog tomorrow night from our Seattle hotel!

Thursday, June 28, 2007

flight got cancelled!

dillon went to a graduation party tonight, so jeff and i went to dinner for "pre-cruise" drinks. while we are in transit to another stop for (more) drinks, i get a message on my phone saying our flight has been cancelled. the message says, please call back so that we may get you on another flight. so i call back, but because i am not at home i don't have any of the info they need (reference #'s, etc.). so i leave jeff and his friend and come home to figure this out. that was 2 hours ago and i just got off the phone! ugh.

basically ALL east coast flights have been cancelled. Air Canada had no other flights to offer and directed me to Continental who had a flight i should check. Continental had nothing either. then my neighbor,Jane (her son, Josh, is going with us) called me and said she found a flight on United flying to San Fran and then onto Vancouver -so we decided to book it. Then she calls back and says, "it just got cancelled"!

finally my travel agent calls me and says there is nothing in the morning. she 's going to start making calls at 6am when things open and seeing what she can get for the afternoon. if she can't get us out tomorrow, she's going to get us to meet up with the ships first stop. how much does this suck?

i'm kind of bummed right now. and as i am rolling my eyes, i'm telling myself "it will all work out". blah blah blah!

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

finally got this finished!


i've been working on this pendant/charm for myself for a few weeks. i've just sort of been doing bits and pieces of it here and there until i got it just the way i wanted it! a couple of times i didn't like what i had on it, so i just started over! but now it is finally right.


it is 2 large dominos that i glued together. i did the edges first with different colors from StazOn stamp pads (green,blue, red). when that finally dried, i made gold dots around the edge with a paint pen.


next i gessoed the dominos and then watercolored them. i actually did a couple layers of watercolors for strength. then i stamped the image (which is from Tiponi/teeshamoore.com). then i stenciled some small black diamonds next to the face to add some contrast to the text i was going to add. the text is my favorite saying: "to seek that which nourishes my soul". then i gave a quick spray with copper kettle Color mist - my favorite colormist color.... (outsidethemargins.com). finally i added my bails to hold my chain and viola! done!
I will be wearing it at some point on the cruise, which is why i finally finished it!

We have a winner!


So dillon and i took over our hefty load of change to Commerce bank (for those of you who have a Commerce, you can use their change counting machine for FREE! you do not have to have an account there!)


On the way there, the bucket full of pennies fell over. when we got to the bank and opened the door, pennies spilled out everywhere! so that was fun picking them up! (it spilled when i was trying to make a left onto Route 35 - and for those of you that knows New Jersey, you know that trying to make a left is like taking your life in your hands!


So we get inside and start to use the machine, which immediately freezes up! dillon and i roll our eyes at each other, because this is a constant thing in our lives - NOTHING EVER GOES EASY! So a teller comes over to help out and has to pull out the machine and change out the bags which are all full. This takes about 15 minutes and a line is forming to use the machine.


We get going again - the change counter actually works pretty fast. so within no time we had poured in all our change and got our total. are you ready? our total in change was


$761.64!


So, the winner is Michelle, who answered my call out from the ArtandSoul Yahoo group to play - she guessed $755.11 - which was only off by $6.53! Not bad Michelle!


here is a picture of her prize. i hope she likes it! i will be mailing it out to her tomorrow.


thanks for playing everyone! look for posts from Alaska!

Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Contest!






I decided to go ahead and hold a contest. My husband and i have been saving change for about 6 months for this cruise. yesterday i started going through it all so that i could take it to the bank and cash it in. so you have to guess the total amount - closest to the actual amount will win a prize. I'll give you a hint: the quarters alone weighed 27 pounds!

flea market finds - closeups




Here is a wedding photo from the 7 large vintage photos i got for $10. the clothes are so beautiful. i also got this bride bisque doll for $6 and the wedding couple for $1
So we leave in 3 days for the cruise. the car is coming for us at 4am - ugh! that will be a long day with the flight and all. it will be nice to finally get on the boat. i still have to go to the bank and turn in all the change we've been saving for about 6 months. it took FOREVER to get it out of the glass jar (a huge vintage jar, which was really heavy) and then i had to sort it because my husband wants all the wheat pennies and certain state quarters. (i just sorted, i am not going through all those coins!) later me and dillon will run them over to the bank and get dollars for them. my guess is there is about $360 in coins there. i'll let you know the total later. i should have done a contest on this, because the jar was FULL!

Monday, June 25, 2007




So here is my first post on my new blog. i totally forgot that i set this up in May when my friend, Kim, suggested i might like blogging here better. then another friend, Tracy, started a blog here, so i was checking it out and when i noticed i already had one started! the only reason i might consider moving my blog here is that i can add more pictures per post. that is something i would really like! these are the art dolls i've been working on made from rusty old bed springs that my mom brought to me.

slide show!