our upcoming vacation

totally snuck up on me. Granted, we booked it pretty late (for us). But still - omg, we're leaving SUNDAY! As in 3 days from now. woohoo!! I am SO looking forward to time away, sunshine, warmth, relaxation - with my honey. :-) All I want to do is lay in the sun and do nothing!

We're taking a night flight to Miami, spending the rest of Sun night at a hotel near the cruise line port, then boarding Carnival Fascination Mon for a 4 day cruise. Then 3 nights at Miami Beach. yay!

If I haven't said it recently - I LOVE cruising!! Tues we'll be at Key West, Wed we'll be at Cozumel, Thur will be a sea day, and then back to Miami on Fri. I honestly don't even know right now if we'll even get off the ship at either Key West or Cozumel. Been there, done them both. The unusual thing for us is that this sailing is over Christmas, which we haven't done before. There should be holiday decorations and Christmas music throughout the ship. I just hope they still have the normal music and shows too. Another unusual thing for us - we've never done a short cruise before, they've all been 7 days or longer. I'm thinking that I'll just be getting into cruise mode, and then we'll be done.

We tried desperately to find relatively decent priced accommodations beach side anywhere near Miami - could NOT do it. The cheapest places were going for $250/night, and those were not necessarily good places. But we were able to use our Choice points (Comfort Inns, Quality Inns, Clarion Inns, etc) to get a place for three nights. It's across the street from the beach (Miami Beach), but that's good enuf for the price! lol It looks online like an architecturally interesting place, nice pool area, so hopefully it'll all be good.

We'll be flying back to the great white north on Mon, New Years Eve. We won't get into O'Hare (Chicago) until 9:45pm, assuming the flight is on time. So by the time we get luggage and car, we won't be able to drive up to Milw to celebrate with friends or family. We're thinking we MAY drive into downtown Chi and celebrate on Rush St. But we'll just figure it out that night. No worries, either way.

Well, this may well be my last post for the year. So Merry Christmas to everyone! Have a safe and happy holiday season!