Alaska

Well, we made it to Alaska and back.

Apparently the weather last week was around 80 and sunny. During our trip, however, it was cold (like 55), rainy, foggy, and occassionally "sleety". Despite the less than perfect weather, it ended up being a really great trip. I will give you a brief summary of our days...

Wednesday: Jon and I drove to Baltimore for our flight at 8. It was a 5 hour flight with no problems, and though in our time we got there around midnight or so, on their time it was only 9:30. We probably got to the actual hotel around 11 and went to bed!

Thursday: Jon and I walked over to the Space Needle and took a look, then went into the Science Fiction Museum where they actually had a Jim Henson exhibit that ended two days afterwards! Lucky us! It was really awesome. We met up with Jon's parents and walked to Pike Place Market (in the rain) where we got dinner and gaped at the sights in the market itself. My parents arrived around 11 pm to the hotel room, but I was pretty much already asleep.

Friday: We took the fam to the Space Needle and all went up in it, then dropped our bags off at the ship. We then walked the Market a bit more and picked up some souvenirs. We got on the ship around 2:30. Jon and I quickly walked the whole ship, then at night we met up with everyone for dinner at 8:30.

Sat: At Sea. I spent a good two hours laying in the sun under two wool blankets soaking up the warmth. It was beautiful but around 63 and windy... still, very enjoyable. It was our formal night so we got all dressed up and went to specialty dining. It was delicious. I will post a pic of dessert at the end. MMmmmm.

Sunday: Ketchikan, AK and now 4 hours behind Philly. I sleep wonderfully on the ship, so it was great from that perspective. We zip lined through part of Tongass National Forest - a temperate rainforest. Beautiful. We did not see any bears or moose or anything unfortunately. Zip lining was a BLAST.

....

I think I will have to finish this later... there is a lot of packing and cleaning to do!

three weeks

And now, quite literally, there are 3 weeks left to summer. Why does time pass so quickly when you get older? When I was young, summer felt endless. And trust me, I loved going back to school. I anxiously awaited it. It always felt so far away. And now.... ugh. Back to work.

This summer has been the quickest in memory. I am not sure what exactly I did every day, but all of a sudden it was time for rehearsal again or time for working at the hospital again.

Our concert for project philly was last night. It went swimmingly. :) I am pretty sure it was the largest audience we have had in our 4 years. We also had a lot more going on than we have in years past. A guy from the Walnut Street Theatre came out and spoke to the audience about the scholarship fund we raise money for. Our lighting was cool. We webcasted it on our website. We sold ringer t shirts to the crowd. It was just neat to see how our organization is becoming... organized. Since I am on the board as membership manager (I screen interest calls, interview potentials, and send/track invites), its neat to feel like our dreadful once-a-month 3 hour board meetings are actually doing something. I am excited to hear how much money we raised. It is very cool that something which started out of our love for singing has turned into a sustainable group which will live on after we retire and is raising money for an awesome cause. Its great to be a part of that and a founding member, even if it makes me feel old. :)

The concert itself was great. I felt really good about Pink's sets. I had a solo... a song called Gravity by Sara Berellis (like I can spell her name!) and I felt so good and relaxed about it. That is the best - when you are confident that you can carry something off. I mean, I was nervously excited, but I was not worried about forgetting the lyrics or whether I could hit the high note. I was mostly concerned with making sure that I was showing emotion in my face and drawing the audience in to the lyrics. The song itself is about a girl who keeps going back to this guy that she knows is bad for her, but she thinks she is in love and in need, and she just cannot break away even though she knows he hurts her and is wrong for her. Yeah... you could say I empathized with the feeling. I was really lucky to get the solo because the girls in Pink are really talented. It was neat too because we had a lot of friends and family come out who have not heard me really sing before... let along something I felt comfortable singing. :) It felt really good. I was glad to be able to do it.

Music is a very wonderful gift. I can honestly say that my life has been shaped by it, and without it, absolutely everything would be different. I would be a completely different person.

In other news, I have been watching the interest rates fluxuate daily in the hope that it miraculously goes down again. Last week it was 5.375, but this week it jumped up to 5.625. Sigh. Its a gambling game, and if everyone could say a short prayer that it goes back down, I would appreciate it. ;)

We leave for Alaska on Wednesday. Technically, to Seattle, and our cruise leaves Friday. We are very excited and very happy to bring our parents along with us for the journey. For both sets, this is their first vacation in a very long time, and we think they will enjoy it. We were glad we could convince them to go. :) I am looking forward to the brisk weather and the ecology. I know that sounds totally nerdy... but I like seeing different biomes. Shrug.

Speaking of weather... its been beautiful the past two days and my brother says that this summer is in the top 5 for coolest PA summers ever. I do not mind. Yesterday I felt the spark of autumn, and that got me energized because I LOVE the fall. I mean, yes, going back to school is not fantastic, though it will be great to be with my work buddies again... but I just LOVE fall weather. I love the crispness and how blue the sky is and how the leaves turn and pumpkins and sweaters and mums and hay bales and apple pies and oooooh I just love it. :)

So anyway, thats kinda what has been going on. Now that Project is over, it feels like summer is kind of here... for three days at least, until we leave for vacation. :) Last week did not help the feeling that summer was missing - I worked every day. Boo.

And for today...... working at the hospital. Sigh. I guess summer will have to wait until Monday.