Don’t hate me, but while the US is starting the long cold winter, I’m still wearing shorts and flip flops. The weather has been incredible lately, and we’ve taken advantage by traveling and seeing more of Nicaragua.

A few weeks ago, we traveled to the beautiful island of Ometepe, located in the middle of Lake Cocibolca. This lake is the largest lake in Central America and the 21st largest in the world. The island of Ometepe is large enough to take several hours to travel around via car or boat. It is made up of two volcanoes, one of which is still moderately active. I wish I had pictures of all the modes of transportation, but we were so rushed there and back that we couldn’t stop to breathe let alone take pictures. We took the bus from Granada to Rivas, a taxi from Rivas to San Jorge, and a ferry from San Jorge to Ometepe. From the ferry port, we took a taxi to the hotel. Two days later, we took the same trip in reverse. Travel time took about 5 hours in total. We left on Friday afternoon, and came back on Sunday afternoon. The ferry ride was my favorite part, as we were able to get a lot of pictures of the island from the distance. Mid way to port, a rainbow appeared in between the two volcanoes. It was so incredibly beautiful. As the hubby put it, “When in your life are you guaranteed to see this again?” I can’t describe how amazing it was to slowly chug through the water watching the rainbow shimmer and shift through the clouds.

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For those of you who don’t read ABCD Design on a daily basis, I thought I’d give you a little {Lemons to Lemonade} update. As you know, Mr. D lost his job with a London based financial firm at the end of May. Since nothing was exactly keeping us in the City during the month of August, we gave up our furnished rental apartment on July 31 and have been spending our time visiting our families in Knoxville and Detroit. Thank heavens, the job market is picking up and he has been getting interest from potential employers. One week ago last Saturday, we flew back to NYC after nearly 50 days away from the City. We packed our agenda with important work meetings and dinners out with our friends.

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It is a crazy feeling to be a “guest” in the town you consider your home. Over the weekend, we stayed at 60 Thompson. Great location and the common areas were beautiful! But I have to say … for such a nice hotel, our actual room was remarkably un-remarkable. We then moved up to Midtown and stayed at the Sheraton. For this portion of the trip we cashed in on our American Express points. When Mr. D and I got engaged, we enrolled with a Starwood American Express Card and paid for almost our entire apartment renovation with it. Since then, we have had endless amounts of “free” hotel nights which have come in handy when we want to get away for a long weekend, or in this instance visit NYC while he is interviewing! Seriously, it is one of the smartest things we’ve done as a couple. By the time our wedding anniversary rolls around each year we have at least 5 “free” nights - and we plan a “free” trip. Year one was a stay at the St. Regis Hotel in Rome and year two was ski-in, ski-out at the Westin on Whistler Mountain. Nice, no?

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Hi ya’ll!  Gosh, I feel like I haven’t talked to you guys in forever.  If you follow me on Twitter, you know that I just returned from a two-week tour of the Baltic sea.  Here was our itinerary:

Sept 1-3 - Copenhagen
Sept 4 - At Sea
Sept 5 - Stockholm
Sept 6 - Helsinki
Sept 7-8 - St. Petersburg
Sept 9 - Tallin Estonia
Sept 10 - Gdynia Poland
Sept 11 - At Sea
Sept 12 - Oslo

I’m going to do a few recaps shortly, but here’s a few photo teasers until you get the real thing:

{Catherine’s Palace, St Petersburg}

{Stockholm}

{Peterhof fountains in St Petersburg}

{Overlooking Tallin, Estonia}

{Fredericksborg Castle, Copenhagen}

{Copenhagen}

Lots more to come!

xo,
E.

PS - In other news, who else is over the moon that it’s fall TV time?  I bawled (naturally) during The Biggest Loser and am absolutely in love with The Vampire Diaries, Melrose Place, and Glee.

I apologize for my lack of posting over the past month.  I got laid off, so I’ve been focusing on my job search and some other goals and activities.  {Just in case you’re wondering or know someone who might want to hire me, I’m an intellectual property attorney with five years experience.  Ideally, I’d like to remain here in the Triangle, but I’m willing to move for the right position - elsewhere in North Carolina or somewhere else fun (i.e., Chicago, DC, Atlanta).  Read more about what’s going on with me here.}

Now, on to the main point of this post!

Last week, Jet Blue announced an All You Can Jet Pass for $599.  The deal is that the pass allows you to, with certain restrictions, fly all you can stand on their planes between September 8 and October 8.  Sounds pretty cool, eh?  Well, there are some catches to it.

1. All flights must be booked at least 3 days in advance.
2. The passholder must show up for each booked flight, or all other booked flights will be cancelled and no new flights may be scheduled until a $100 no-show fee is paid.
3. Only one flight per city per day may be booked.
4. Flights can be cancelled/changed for free, but this has to happen at least 3 days in advance of the flight or you’ll pay the regular change fees.
5. You can fly to JetBlue’s international destinations and Puerto Rico, but you’ll have to pay the taxes and fees.

So… it’s really only a good deal if you’re able to fly a fair amount within the time period, definitely won’t miss your flights, and plan to stay in the US.  As it turns out, it seems as though I have the time to really utilize this deal, so I booked it on Saturday.

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Dottie tries to stowaway {from Author’s Personal Collection}

We are the owners of a large dog. Dottie is 70lbs to be exact. There are many restrictions for flying with large dogs, such as they are only flown when the outside temperatures are between 45 degrees and 85 degrees. When they are flown, they are placed in the cargo hold with the luggage. It’s a special section of the cargo hold, but it’s the cargo hold nonetheless. The thought of her being handled like luggage doesn’t sit well with us. So, we have been kenneling her or leaving her with friends while we are away.  It’s not our favorite solution. Whenever I see people toting their little dogs in carriers at airport terminals, I am envious.

We are in the midst of planning a trip to visit family on the East Coast and are entertaining the idea of bringing Dottie with us. She’s a member of our family and we really hate leaving for long periods of time. Since we prefer not to fly with her in cargo, our only option would be to drive to our destination. Driving cross-country is not always as fun nor as exciting as it sounds. The biggest downside to driving cross-country is the amount of time it requires. We would spend most of our vacation on the road and have limited time to spend with our family.

Recently, I was told about Pet Airways. I’m looking into it as a possible solution to our dilemma.

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We’re moving not once but twice in the next 30 days.

The first time will be this weekend to a friend’s house. She moved to the beach and is letting us stay (rent free!) in her house for the next month. Which includes access to her pool and extensive land with a lake (daily swims for the dogs!). This move requires separating everything we own into three categories:

• Things we will take to Nicaragua
• Things we will sell or donate - anything that doesn’t have real meaning to us
• Things we will store - one dresser, one side table, four chairs, one table, keepsakes, office supplies (paper, envelopes, printers, cutters, etc.), kitchen supplies.

The second time will be our move in late August to Nicaragua. Everything we need will be brought on the flight as cargo. We are taking the following:

• 4 lockers, measuring 32″ x 17″ by 12″
• 2 suitcases, carry on size
• 2 laptop bags

That is the sum total of all our necessary belongings for the next year. We ran into a problem when we realized the lockers (small enough to meet airline requirements) are too small to contain our printer. Which isn’t a true necessity (like, for instance, high thread count linens), but we really need access to a good scanner to transfer documents back and forth from the States.  Shipping is incredibly expensive (about $500 for the printer, not including customs). So we are trying to decide whether to buy a smaller model (really do not have the funds right now considering our vaccinations alone are $750, tickets are $1500, shipping the dogs is another $1000, emergency flights are $2000, medical flights are $1000…you get the picture), find a way to package it and pay for the extra luggage, or just leave it and take the risk that we can eventually pick up a suitable printer/scanner in Managua.

Oh, and I quit my job so our sole income is my husband’s graphic design business. Yay!

At the same time, we are meeting with a friend who is designing our future studio. Are we crazy? Yes! However, it’s really helping to have a short term goal (moving to Nicaragua) and a long term goal (building a studio and eventually a house). It’s allowed us to part with items that have no potential future use, and to truly appreciate the items we are keeping and/or able to take with us.

All I can say is that I am very happy to have read this book before the move, rather than after.

I may have mentioned this once or twice (or approximately one hundred billion times, but who’s counting?), but I live 500 miles from my parents. This equates a painfully boring 8 hour car ride or a really expensive and inconvenient flight to a major city 2 hours away from my parents’ home. Which explains why we just returned home from our first trip back home since Christmas…..and yes, it’s the end of July. I swear I’m not a horrible daughter. I blame it on the insane speed of time these days which of course, makes me an old hag who complains about how everything moves too fast, blah blah blah. I accept it because I am SO that girl right now.

Now, I am fully aware that 500 miles is not an impossible distance and our hellish eight hour car ride through the most boring of all landscapes does not win me any sort of award. Plus, having Nate’s parents live underneath us might negate some of the extreme distance from our other set of parent. But living this far away from my family has definitely posed a few special challenges in our newlywed lives that would not occur if both of our parents lived in the same state as us (ahem– hint, hint, Mom). I’m quite certain that some of you readers encounter some of these same challenges and I’m writing today to get your feedback and advice, from one displaced newlywed to another.

For those of you who live far away from one set of parents: how to you manage holidays? What about regular trips back home? Do you plan those out in advance or just wait until you can’t stand it anymore?

For those of you who have my ideal set up, with both sets of parents in the same exact city as yours (lucky ducks!): what are some of the hidden challenges with this situation? I’m sure it’s hard to manage holidays for different reasons, if both sets want you to stop by in the same day. Do you feel pressured to spend a lot of time at each house? I can see how that might be less than perfect at times. I suppose no situation is perfect with this one and it definitely depends on the parents, too.

For me, I’ve relied heavily upon blogging (duh!), email, and the almighty cell phone plan to stay connected to my parents. It works for us beautifully but one long weekend with face-to-face contact always trumps a few long phone calls, for sure. And Mom’s homecooked meals win out over a heart felt email anyday.

Thanks for input, fellow travelers. And now, unpacking calls.

I like to think that I don’t have a laundry list of pet peeves, but I do have a few: the sound of knuckles popping, false teachers, shredded iceberg lettuce, and pajamas in airports.  Let’s chat about that last one.

As a frequent business traveler, I am generally in 2-3 airports per week, sometimes more.  I am always surprised when I see people checking in or walking through security in their pajamas.  I can understand packing up your toddler-aged kids into cute jammies so they make the mental connection that planes are for nap time and not screaming their demands to the rest of the passengers.  I can even see why a teenager would wear pajamas and how their mother could have simply decided that particular battle was not one she was going to fight.  But grown adults?  Do people who wear their pjs to airports not understand that the rest of us can, oh I don’t know, SEE THEM?

In my experience, dressing in a well put-together manner (not necessarily wearing expensive clothes or dressing up), helps other people take you more seriously.  While they should respect you regardless, that is simply not the way it works. If it were, the entire marketing and design worlds would be obsolete.  Plus, you never know who you are going to sit next to on a plane.  It just may be someone who could be a good career connection. In fact, I met my current insurance agent while waiting for a flight at the Houston airport last year.  She was able to help me with my insurance needs and I was able to give her my business.  We were able to strike up a conversation and take each other’s professional claims seriously because we weren’t dressed like we were headed to a seventh grade slumber party.

Some insist that if they are going to be seated for a five hour flight across the country, then they want to be comfortable. To this I say: you most likely sit in a chair at an office for eight hours every day in business-appropriate outfits. What is it about sitting on the plane where normal clothing becomes absolutely unbearable?  One friend also smartly pointed out that wearing a negligee on the plane may be the only way to get extra peanuts in coach these days.

While I love free salty snacks as much as the next person, it seems to me that this issue of how to dress in public really boils down to a matter of respect (or rather a lack of it), both for others and for ourselves.  While I am not advocating everyone traipse through security dressed for the opera or even in full three piece suits, it seems that people who care about themselves tend to at least run a comb through their hair and put on a pair of jeans before heading into the outside world.  Also, if someone walked into your office to negotiate a deal wearing their pjs, wouldn’t you be a bit insulted that they hadn’t tried a little harder?  Why shouldn’t the flight attendants or desk agents be insulted as well when someone wearing flannel pants with pink hearts all over them demands that their flights or seats be switched around?

It seems to me that all social graces and any semblance of etiquette get thrown out the window when people fly.  If we want to be taken seriously as a generation, maybe it should start by being respectful in our interactions with the seemingly non-important things in life.

What are your thoughts on wearing pajamas in airports?

Sunday’s the day!   As my mom would say, “I’m off like a prom dress!” and I couldn’t be more fired up about it!   I board a flight at 5:29 and for nine days, I’m livin’ in The Motherland of Ireland.  I’ve got all my outfits laid out (like I’m in 6th grade) and toiletries packed,  so now all I need is a plane to take me there.  Oh, and thanks to you all, I have these AWESOME shoes to wear (see below)…so European.  Bear with me, they aren’t 100% practical, but 70% is good enough for me.

I’m going to try to post on my blog (Ok, that sounds too official.  I’ve never had my own blog, but registered one to post for this trip.  May be a total bust.)  Any who, if you’re interested, check it out here.  I am going to try and document some Irish fashion for us.  Should be interesting….I asked a woman that I spoke with at the Dublin hotel what she would wear if she were going out to eat or to a oub.  Response: “Just some nice fitting jeans and I nice top.”  I followed up with “What would you wear to church?”  Answer: “Ugh!  You could wear your bathing suit top and shorts to church!”   Exsqueeze me?  If I heard her correctly, there are either some major cultural differences, or she just goes to a really cool church!

While I’m gone, I would love to hear from you all what you want to hear about from me.  Does that make sense?  I could write about the perfect lip balm and be totally interested, but what in my posts do you all want to know?  Send me your thoughts and I will talk to you all when I get back.

Cheers!

The Feisty Tourist is making me nostalgic for travel photos. So I thought I’d share with all of you details from a trip to Hong Kong in February 2007.

Getting There: From Chicago there are two flight options to get to Hong Kong. First option: O’Hare to Tokyo (overnight) and Tokyo to Hong Kong (arrive morning). Second option (and my preferred): O’Hare to LAX (morning) and then to Hong Kong direct (arrive evening). I generally prefer arriving at destinations in the evening, and sleeping through the night so that I’m ready to go the next day - it also tends to reduce my jet lag. Upon arrival at the airport, there is an easy high-speed train into the city, which connects to the subway (the MTR).

Hotel: We stayed at the Four Seasons in Central, which was a great location. Kowloon is the tourist mecca in HK but Central is the business district and it’s also by all the ports so to ferry anywhere you want to go from Central. Plus, it’s a major MTR station for a couple of good lines. Hong Kong is crazy. You seriously have to go through 3 malls, down 16 escalators, up four ramps, and through 2 footbridges to get anywhere! It’s all connected above or below ground. We were right by one of the big malls, the IFC Mall.

Must Sees in Hong Kong

The Big Buddha: An aerial tram takes you on a glorious trip up to the Big Buddha, Nyong Ping Village, and Pin Lo Monastery. This was such a fun day trip and something I consider a can’t-miss for any trip to Hong Kong!

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