Archive for "Babies"
The Trip Home
Posted on February 12, 2016 by Ching under Babies, Travel, Zumba.
The ship looked so empty on debarkation day.
No more Zumba banners and window clings.
Even thought Brian and I didn’t have a flight until 3:45 PM that day, we got up early anyway. We had a nice leisurely breakfast and then went down to Café Promenade so I can have one more Creamice Mocha.
This drink is so delicious. I wish that I would have discovered it sooner than halfway through the cruise.
Anyway, the valets picked up our bags the night before and we were pretty much all set so we went ahead and got ready to disembark the ship at eight o’clock. We thought it would take a few hours to get off the boat and go through customs. Little did we know that our stateroom attendant hooked us up with these special, VIP tags that worked like magic. There were tags numbered 1 to 45 – the higher the number the later it would be before your bags would be delivered to the baggage claim/staging area. I think we were supposed to be number 15 according to Guest Services. Somehow, we ended up with these “Suites/Pinnacle” tags in our stateroom which we were grateful for because that mean our bags would be ready at the baggage claim area by 8 AM. “Suites/Pinnacle” had priority over all the numbered tags.
You basically had two options, you let the valets take your bags the night before and then they put it in the baggage area for you or you lug your bags with you. The downside of letting them valet your bag is that you’re at the mercy of their schedule, which meant the higher numbers would be ready last. Some people don’t want to wait to they decide to cart their bags with them. Brian and I only had carry-ons but I remembered that the elevators only go down to a certain floor on debarkation day and you have to take the stairs all the way down. I told Brian that I didn’t want to lug my bag around so if he insisted on taking our bags ourselves then he would be carting both carry-ons. Plus, I told him that we should use our ultra-special bag tags.
Brian was really glad that he listened to me as went down the stairs from Deck 3 to Deck 1. Since we went down early, the line moved pretty quickly and we were off the ship in no time. When we got to the place where they line up everyone’s luggage, there were only a dozen bags or so there but we easily spotted our bags. We used our red luggage for this very reason.
Several people got off the ship before us, and I think there were seven other ships disembarking that same day, so the line through customs had already started snaking. After grabbing our bags, we asked one of the port staff where we should go and she told us to stand by the red pole. It just happened to be the end of the long line. There were a handful of people getting in line so we let them get ahead of us and then fell in line behind them. We started to follow the line as it started moving but then the lady walked toward us and asked us to follow her. She then lifted one of the barricades and told us to go through and wait right there right in front of one of the customs officers’ stations. We were called up to next so we effectively bypassed the customs line altogether. I’m convinced we got special treatment because of our special “Suites/Pinnacle” bag tags.
It only took about 30 minutes from the time we got in line for debarkation to get off the ship, completely through customs, and out to the shuttle pick up area. It was amazing. I’d never gotten off a cruise ship that quickly before. And then, as luck would have it, our ride to the airport showed up within a couple of minutes and then we were at the airport by quarter till nine. The crazy part is that our flight wasn’t even until later that afternoon.
Anyway, they’re a lot stricter at the Fort Lauderdale airport than in Wichita. They had this Delta attendant there who did nothing but point people to the security line and/or make them check the size of their carry-on against the metal carry-on measurement stand. Brian’s duffel was just a tad too long. We tried to explain to the lady that we carried both of our bags on during our arrival flights and they fit with no problems but she was not having it. She wanted Brian to take items out of his duffel until the bag would fit. There was no amount of stuff we could take out that would make it work because it was the shape of the bag that was the problem and we didn’t want to hassle with trying. Since we were early, we decided to just go to the desk and pay to check our bags. We figured that while we were doing that we could see if we could get on earlier flights home.
The lady at the Delta desk was a lot more helpful and pleasant than the first woman we encountered. She punched some keys on her computer and broke the news to us.
“If I type fast enough,” she told us, “I can get you on the 9:45 AM flight.” It would cost $50 each to change our flights, plus $25 for each of the bags, so we’d have to play $150 total; and we only had a split second to think about it.
Brian and I looked at each other and were like, “Let’s do it!”
She quickly took our payment, printed our new boarding passes, tagged our bags, and placed them on the conveyor belt behind her. I was a little worried that our bags wouldn’t make it on our new flights since we were cutting it so close but she reassured us that our bags would make it.
At the end of our transaction she was like, “It’s 9:08 now so you better hurry because your flight is boarding.” With that, we quickly said our thanks and skedaddled to security.
Security was long and cumbersome per usual but, lucky for us, our gate was close by. When we got to the gate, they were boarding Zone 2, which just happened to be our zone so we fell in line with everyone and got on the plane. We didn’t have to wait around at the gate, which is just the way I like it.
This plane wasn’t as nice as the plane that we flew in going to Florida. There were no free inflight games but the flight seemed to go fairly quick and we were in Atlanta in no time. I think we were 10 minutes early actually. We had a decent layover length before getting on our flight to Wichita. That flight went smoothly as well. We were either early or right on time. We landed shortly after 2 PM. Our bags safely made it and were one of the first few to hit the baggage claim carousel. Our ride home was already waiting for us so we got in the van and were home by 2:30 PM or so.
Brian and I were completely amazed because our original flights wouldn’t have put us back in Wichita until after 9 PM. We got on the flights that, just the night before, Brian told Missy and Todd they wouldn’t be able to make. Crazy!
Things seemed to be going perfectly our way until we got home and found Molly had been badly hurt. She and Saki got in a fight the day before that resulted in Molly getting staples on her head. I guess the reason why things worked out for us and we were able to get home early is that the universe wanted us to quickly get back so we could take care of our poor baby.
It wasn’t fun coming home to a $175 vet bill but we were grateful to be back early to be with our beloved dogs.
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Cram Post Cont’d
Posted on January 23, 2016 by Ching under Babies, Life.
I finally got Nickira’s Christmas present to her after hanging on to it for a couple of months. Ironically, it was the first Christmas present we purchased and it was the last one we had left at home. Nickira asked for the Barbie shopping mall
The package arrived back in November and we just hid it in the office. I wanted to give it to Nickira before Christmas but she ended up going to Texas and didn’t return until after the holidays. Instead we just hung on to it until she got back and I gave it to her on our first meeting of the year.
Nickira set it up in her room the same night she got it and texted me a picture of the completed mall really late. I think it was well after midnight. I didn’t see it until the morning. She said it’s right next to her dollhouse.
In other news, my boss just celebrated her 60th birthday. Brian and I were fortunate to be there for the surprise party. Carmen and Nick were there too, which is a good thing because besides Ginger’s kids we didn’t know anyone else there.
Speaking of kids, we’re seeing some progress with Molly and Saki. It’s slow but I think they’re starting to get along bit by bit. They still fight at least a couple of times a day but I’m optimistic that the fights will eventually become less frequent.
Saki is growing exponentially quick. She doubled in size in her first month. When we got her she was only 4.5 lbs, about half the size of Molly. When we took her to the vet for her pre-spaying assessment and treatments she was 7.5 lbs. I left for Topeka that Monday and when I returned a couple of days later she was 9.5 lbs. That was about two weeks ago. This morning Brian took her to the vet to get weighed and she’s now 10.5 lbs. She is officially way bigger than Molly who tops out at about 8 lbs on a good day.
We mailed out our “Happy New Year” cards a few weeks ago to make up for not sending out Christmas cards this year.
I love Mixbook because they have really cool templates that you can easily customize. I was able to design the card with just a few clicks. I rushed the text a little bit and later found I omitted a few things. Oh, well. That’s what I get for rushing. Overall I was really pleased with how the cards turned out, though.
That’s it. That pretty much catches us up, which is good because Brian and I are leaving town tomorrow and we will not have access to internet.
Come back next week to hear about our adventures on the first ever Zumba cruise!
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Life With Our New Puppy
Posted on December 23, 2015 by Ching under Babies.
Our life got turned upside down recently when we met the cutest Shiba Inu puppy at the Light Your Heart benefit a few weeks ago. She was part of the live auction that night to raise money for Heartspring. We named her Saki which loosely translates to “blossom of hope” fitting considering the circumstances.
We were initially looking for a rescue but couldn’t find one we could agree on. The stars aligned perfectly that fateful night and Brian won me a puppy in the auction. An impulsive move, yes, but the money goes toward a great cause so we were fine with it. We also got a heck of a deal. The puppy came with a crate, crate bed, food, and a bunch of goodies. We did have to buy her a collar, food bowls, and a few other things.
We’ve also bought some additional things since for both her and Molly. First was the Snuggle Puppy
We also got them both new dog beds for the living room. When we were there last week for obedience training, PetSmart was having a huge sale on dog beds. We couldn’t pass it up. It’s a large one so we initially only bought one thinking they would share. It hasn’t worked out that way and they both liked the bed so we went back for a second one the next day. Now our two tiny dogs both have these enormous dog beds. LOL.
Speaking of puppy training, it’s going well. Saki is learning some things but she’s also picking up some bad habits like barking. She didn’t bark as much until after the first day of class. The other two dogs in class were loud and wouldn’t stop barking. Now Saki is barking a lot more too.
The other down side is you’re in the store so you can’t help but shop. Specially when you end up spotting some good sales. That’s how we ended up with the dog beds. We’re getting great use out of them, though.
Last night Saki learned to go down the deck stairs. She learned how to climb up right away but she’s always been afraid of climbing down. Jay taught her how to do it yesterday. I was so afraid when he was doing it too. I worried that she would tumble all the way down. Anyway, it worked and now she knows how to go down the steps herself. No more having to carry her down. Hurrah! She’s getting faster at it every time too.
Molly is still adjusting. I hope that they eventually become best friends because we really wanted a friend and companion for Molly. We’ll keep you all posted as things progress.
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Light Your Heart 2015
Posted on December 13, 2015 by Ching under Babies, Events.
Brian and I had a blast at the Light Your Heart last weekend. This fundraising event for Heartspring used to be the Lights on the Lake launch party but they discontinued Lights on the Lake last year so naturally the benefit had to be renamed.
They had a different band this year, but they were very good.
Here’s a picture of how the venue was decorated.
Here are some pictures of our great-looking group.
The Bowmans always look happy and fabulous.
Looking back at my pics from the evening, I realized that I missed taking a photo of Michael and Rachel. Yikes! I think it’s because they kept wandering off. LOL.
We wandered away from the table a few times ourselves. A couple of times to bid and rebid on silent auction items and once to take some photos at the photo booth.
The photo booth was cool but it wasn’t as cool as the photo booth last year. The photo booth last year could accommodate more people. And, I don’t know what it was with this photo booth but we could not get the timing just right. We would pose and then the camera would snap a picture just as we would move. It was fun, though.
There were lots of great silent auction items this year, but it seemed like there were fewer than last year. I bid on the WSU items but didn’t win any of them.
It’s a good thing too because we ended up winning one of the live auction items.
Attendance seemed low this year compared to last year. Last year they filled a much larger venue. I’m wondering if Garth Brooks had a lot do with it.
People weren’t bidding as much in the live auction either so we thought we’d help out. LOL. Last year the puppy fetched $3500. This year we were able to take it down at $1400. Granted Goldendoodles look like teddy bears and probably go for a lot more in general, but our little Shiba is the cutest little puppy ever. That said, even though we would have donated even more for the privilege of adopting her, I’m glad the bidding ended when it did.
We were disappointed to find out that you don’t get to take the puppy home with you that night. You actually have to go to the store and sign a bunch of papers and they give you a bunch of extra stuff too like a crate, bed, toys, food, etc. Makes sense. We’d never won a puppy from a live auction before so we didn’t know.
Here’s a picture of all the stuff we got with our puppy adoption. The Snuggle Puppy
Anyway, I’m glad we lost all of the silent auction items that we bid on because that would have made for a very expensive evening otherwise. Heartspring is a great organization though so we are happy help. We named our new puppy Saki, which in Japanese can be translated as “blossom of hope” — fitting considering the circumstances.
Here’s to Saki, the newest member of our happy family!
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Brian and Molly
Posted on September 9, 2015 by Ching under Babies.
Came home to an empty house last week after a work dinner. Brian and Molly were nowhere to be found. Figured out they were next door, hanging out with our favorite neighbors. Ended up going over there to hang out also and snapped these photos.
Jim and Karen are the ones who have watched Molly for us the times we’ve been out of town. They have two cute dogs, Nikki and Ellie, who are Molly’s bestest friends.
Nikki and Ellie are two sisters that Jim and Karen rescued. They are super sweet (except for when we’re walking in the neighborhood and they bark at strangers — then they act like a couple of heathens) and Molly absolutely loves playing with them.
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