Okay, okay--everyone keeps telling me I need to post more pictures, so I've overcome my laziness for today and actually uploaded one. This is at our church "Trunk or treat" on Friday night. As of Thursday night, I still hadn't put together a costume or even thought of an idea. So we ended up throwing together some stuff at the last minute and going as Tacky Tourists.
Which, as it turns out, is kind of relevant right now, because Kevin and I are leaving for Hawaii in two weeks! (We hope not to be too tacky there, though.)
Why are we going to Hawaii, you may be asking. Well, my sister Heidi's husband is a professor at BYU-Idaho, and he just happens to be doing a sabbatical thingy this semester and is teaching at BYU-Hawaii just for a few months. We also happened to have a bunch of frequent flyer miles, due to Kevin's numerous flights for conferences (most of which are in Europe) for his research, plus an American Express card we have that we can accrue miles with. So, as it turned out, we had enough miles to fly to Hawaii for free! (Well, almost free, we had to buy the last few miles because we didn't have quite enough...And, we have to fly on 2 different airlines, but at least the flights are almost the same times) BTW, it only takes 35,000 miles to fly to Hawaii, which is really not bad considering it takes 50,000 to fly to Europe, yet the airfare to Hawaii is usually just as expensive as to Europe.
So, we decided we couldn't pass up this opportunity and we'd better do it! We decided to go around Thanksgiving time, but since we were using miles, we were limited on our choices of dates...which means we ended up having to spend longer in Hawaii than the 1 week we were originally thinking of. (I know--darn!) So we're leaving in just a couple of weeks! It's crazy, because we planned this all months and months ago, and I've sort of had it way in the back burner for a long time, and now it's suddenly almost upon us!
The downside is that we have sooooo much to do before we leave! Kevin has two paper deadlines, I have a grant renewal deadline, plus some experiments that have to get done asap. Plus lots of church activities, etc. AND, there's an all day Symposium on campus that I am in charge of just a few days before we leave. So, by then we'll really need a vacation!
We're way excited. A year and a half ago, I went with Kevin to Germany (he had a conference there, so his way was paid by Purdue. I paid my own way and just tagged along for fun.) It was SUCH an awesome trip (you can read my blog from it here) , and I discovered that I really like to plan vacations! I'm thinking that I maybe should have been a travel agent for a living. :) I think I enjoy planning the perfect itinerary *almost* as much as actually going there.
I'm sure we'll do a similar vacation blog like we did for our Germany trip, but I won't promise that it will be done until we get back!
5 comments:
I just realized that I haven't seen you in like, what? THREE YEARS?!?! Or something like that? Anyway, you look great! I like your costumes. Very impressive for last minute.
I am SO excited for you to go to Hawaii. I can't wait to see a blog about it. Maybe, just maybe, I'll be able to convince Danny that we need to go. Two of his sisters take their entire family there every other year and we've been invited but...turns out Danny's not a huge traveler. So I may have to live vicariously through you and all your perfect itineraries. And by the way, I am exactly the same way but with parties! Planning is at least half the fun if not MORE!
Well, bon voyage or something like that and good luck with your long to do list. You are BUSY PEOPLE! Wow! You are definitely EARNING that Hawaii trip.
VERY CREATIVE (especially for a Physics lover)! Have fun in Hawaii! I'm super super jealous!!! I love planning vacations and parties-I just HATE paying for them.
Great costumes!!
So so SO cool about Hawaii. I loved reading through your Germany blog so I'm excited for this one, too -- but don't forget to have some nice, relaxing afternoons on the beach in the midst of all the sight-seeing I know you will squeeze in! You know you're gonna need some warm, sunny memories for that Illinois winter!! (Though you'll also have some New Mexico memories, right? For Christmas?? With me???) (Never mind that last time I went to New Mexico it snowed ten times as much as it did in Chicago.)
And GOOD LUCK with your to-do list -- you can do it!
Mindy, you look great! Gorgeous! And that's really exciting about your Hawaii trip. I'm really looking forward to the report (photos included, of course).
How was Hawaii? Did you get everything done? I'm sure you did!! I hope you had a great time. Let us know how it went.
And you have been tagged on my blog. Make sure you only do BORING things, like I've asked.
And I confirm what Amy said: You look sensational.
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