Good morning and welcome to the Sunday Salon! It’s been a while since I’ve done a chatty post and I don’t feel like writing a review right now, so here we are.
I don’t think I updated you guys on my cruise! We had a GREAT time. I would absolutely, one hundred percent, visit the same places again (Barbados, St. Maarten, St. Thomas, St. Kitts, St. Lucia). I ended up not zip-lining – I know, I’m such a chicken. But I got a really bad cold the day before we were scheduled to go, and I knew I would be miserable and panic attack-y anyway, so I asked my lovely husband if he would just go by himself. Which, of course, he did. So we saved $100 and I didn’t have to do it. 🙂
And we snorkeled with sea turtles in Barbados – that was a super cool experience. We also did a catamaran cruise around St. Lucia, which has some of the prettiest scenery I’ve ever seen. But I think my favorite two places have to be St. Thomas and St. Maarten – the combination of bright blue water and mountains right there, it just can’t be beat. I think next year we’re going to fly to St. Thomas and actually spend a few days staying on the island. There’s so much to do and when we stop there on a cruise, we only ever go to Magan’s Bay. It is beautiful, for sure, but there’s a lot more to St. Thomas than that!
Since returning a few weeks ago, work has been pretty busy. This past week was exhausting and today couldn’t have come soon enough. I didn’t do anything for Halloween as I worked a twelve hour day then visited one of my employees in the hospital after she had surgery – by the time I got home, at almost 9 pm, I was ready for food, wine, and bed, and of course had to get up Saturday morning for work.
October and November are fun for my husband and I as we love the Epcot Food and Wine Festival – we had let our Disney passes expire for about six months, but started up again at the end of September. We’ve been going almost every weekend, and while the food and wine part is awesome, we also love to park-hop – spend a few hours at one of the four parks, then move on to the next, and so on. So our weekends have been filled with lots of Disney fun. 🙂
I’m not sure what is happening with my blog. I lately have been going through another one of those slumps where I just don’t feel like writing about books. I read a few great books on the cruise, and a couple since then, but don’t have the energy or excitement to talk about them. And my reading feels stagnant right now, too, but that’s probably because I’m dragging myself through a 580 page book that I’m not loving (The Valley of Amazement, and it’s for book club, otherwise I’d give up). I am sort of in limbo with this blog – like I’m kind of committed, kind of like I could quit and be perfectly happy. I am just not sure what to do at this point.
Actually, I’m feeling like that about a lot of things at the moment. I want to get back into exercise – taking long walks, using the elliptical at the gym, and yoga are a few things I keep telling myself I’ll go back to – yet I keep not doing it. I want to cook more often and more healthy foods – I have all these cookbooks sitting around, and I even took out one from the library yesterday, but I keep making the same things over and over, every night. Hubby and I want to get back into church after taking almost the whole summer off (I know, bad us) but we went last weekend and were underwhelmed by the service. We’ll go again today and decide if we want to keep up at this church or move on to try somewhere else. We’ve been without a church family for over a year now (we keep trying different ones but nothing seems to click with us) and it’s not a great feeling.
Also, I haven’t been to Chicago since June and I miss my nieces and nephew SO MUCH! I remember last year at this time I trick-or-treated with my nieces and while it was freezing cold and raining and the kids were SO freaking muddy by the time it was over, I still have fond memories. I miss them and can’t wait to go “home” for Christmas this year.
Anyway, I don’t want this to be a depressing post! I’m happy to have the entire day today to just do whatever – we’re going to church in a little bit, then probably grab some lunch and veg out in front of the TV for a few hours. It’s cold for Florida standards – about 50 degrees right now – so a long walk tonight is out of the question, but maybe an afternoon walk with the dog? We’ll see. And maybe I can sit down and finish this loooong book that’s been dragging me down for what feels like forever.
What are you up to this Sunday?
Book Addiction 
There is no way I could zip line so I totally understand. Your cruise sounds like it was wonderful!
I can understand the transition you are in where it is hard to commit to routines for self care. You will surely get back to the rhythm of this new season. When looking for a new church, you could try researching a Willow Creek Association church in Florida, or the WCA. They have a similar philosophy and maybe would be a match for you. If you wax and wane on the blog that’s ok, but don’t stop the Sunday Salon, I love to hear about your life with hubby, Bob.
Life happens like this – at least in my experience. I’m also in the middle of this “want to do it” vs. “doing it” dilemma…and with many of the same things – blogging, cooking, exercising.
I can’ definitely relate to your blog-limbo – I’ve been experiencing it myself. I finally decided to just give up on trying to be a book blog. I’ll still write about books, of course, but I’m not going to accept review copies anymore or feel pressured to review everything I read. Making that decision has brought new excitement to my reading, so I think I’m headed in the right direction. Now if I can just get my hubby to do a new blog design to go with the new focus…
I can also relate to being without a church family – we’ve been there, and it is so hard. I hope and pray you find one soon.
Your cruise sounds absolutely amazing! It’s been far too long since we’ve cruised but I’m not sure when is a good age to take the kiddos on a family cruise. Just sounds like a lot of work. 😉
I hear you on the blog. Maybe take some of those interest that you mention and spin them into posts? Beth Fish Reads hosts a great weekly event for Weekend Cooking that would be great for your cookbooks–and I host a once a month link-up for cooking from your cookbooks. There are book bloggers who do exercise posts and of course travel and personal and everything else under the sun. Have fun with it! (I know, MUCH easier said than done)
Glad to have you joining in on the HP readalong!
I have no idea why this post just now showed up on my reader. But I’m not ignoring you! So glad the cruise was wonderful and certainly what you needed. I hate heights but I do love to zipline. Ryan and I did it on the top of a mountain in Hawaii, which I think was the best ziplining experience I had. Theme park passes are really wonderful things…you can just “get away”. Feels like you are on vacation for the day, which is the beauty of living down here. If you want to talk about slumps, then I’m here for you. I’m in a huge one.