THE WEDDING TRIP

After the excitement of Thanksgiving, Christmas and the fireworks of New Years here in Cuenca, we were all loaded up to travel back to the COLD NorthWest to celebrate the marriage of our daughter.

We had pleaded with her to hold off till summer.. we could come and stay a month and visit more.. not to be done. (insert smiley) I guess parents coming to visit for a month is not really up there with getting married when you want to get married.

We chose to fly out of Quito, as we are comfortable with the accommodations and airport. Once they begin to use the new airport we will probably start using Guayaquil. Quito has moved their airport to the outer edges of town, and supposedly to get back into town will cost $35. ouch. Hopefully they will get the hotel infrastructure going so those of us who just overnight will be able to avoid those long taxi rides.

Knowing that the weather was going to bad in most of the airports, and that we did not like flying through Miami, we chose to fly COPA which also routes through Panama and Las Vegas. After that got on Alaska Air to go to Portland, so we could visit with my mom for a few days.

We loved the trip on COPA. The airline was on time, courteous, accommodating and helpful. The inside of the plane was comfortable, there were free movies, earphones, food and even free alcohol.

Randy does not have and issue anymore with flying but believes he should enjoy the flight as much as possible.. lets just say.. he got his wish with the COPA free alcohol policy.

Alaska air was very nice, but a typical airline that only serves you food or alcohol if you pay. There was a little screen on the back of each seat with pre programed movies in it that you could watch. These were free.

We visited with my mom for about 3 days, ran around and hit all the Goodwill's, shoe stores and yarn shops. (of course) My favorite was Tangled Purls in Salem, Oregon.http://tangledpurls.blogspot.com/

What a wonderful little store. Also they had the good sense to ooh and awww over my hand woven pinwheel scarf.

We left my moms and traveled to Eastern Washington (Tri-Cities) on the Empire Builder Amtrak. It was a wonderfully comfortable trip, with reclining seats and lots of leg room. On this train they have sleeper compartments as well as a nice dining car with swivel seats, hookups for charging your electrical devices, and huge windows that went over head so our view would be wonderful... if we were traveling during the day..

Oh and did I tell you that we left Cuenca and it was about 72 degrees? When we got to the Tri-Cities they were having a very cold spell (of course), it was 25 degrees. Oh burrrr. I was told that the weather warmed up right after we left!

When we left the Tri-Cities in 2010, we knew we would miss our friends. Even though we all were busy with work and our lives we always seemed to make time to get together at least once a week.

It was great to go back (first trip for Randy in almost 3 years) and find that they were still as wonderful as we remembered! They put us up and  even gave us a car to use. (with a full tank of gas!) then they wined and dined us pretty much the whole time we were in town.

Thank you guys, you know who you are. We love you so much and appreciate the warm hospitality.

OK, "The Wedding". Kelsey and Daniel have dated since they were 16, so this wedding was really not a surprise. We were just a bit aghast to have to come in the WINTER... ok.. 2 times is the limit of whining..

Kelsey is known for her indecisiveness..she is always teased about it, and takes it real well. I was so proud of her, she made a decision to have the wedding in 3 months .. and she did it. Working full time and living on the other side of the state from where the wedding was going to be held.

Fortunately for her, she has a wonderful support base in her new in-laws and extended friends through church and her years of school in this area.

I was so impressed at how they all came together to make this THE WEDDING.

 

 

 

 

We were so happy to have been able to be there to celebrate with Kelsey and Daniel. It was such a wonderful day and evening.

 

I was so impressed with Kelsey's photographer, I am putting a blurb here for her. The photos with the watermark are her photos. The rest are personal photos.

 

Check out her Facebook site, Megan Meyers Photography.  She was the most patient, easygoing and fun person to have taking pictures.

 

We ended our trip with a train ride back to Portland, long wait for the plane, a long layover in Las Vegas and then we slept (I slept) all the way back to Quito.

 

Once we got into our hotel at about 6:30 I crawled into bed and took a hour long nap!

 

We are now home and getting adjusted to our laid back lifestyle.. with what?.. We getting a dog.. Guess what the next blog is going to be about? Pets in Cuenca...



DASHING THROUGH DECEMBER, but its January!

Well once again I have managed to slide though another month without posting...

Lets see.. We had a great time waking my mom early in the morning to sing happy birthday to her (yeah, the same mom who had the 90th birthday last year) Lucky Me!

We had a very full month in the Condo that we manage. Myrna and David, returned to the condo again for almost a month and decided that YEP, Cuena was their new home. So the mad dash ensued with everyone trying to help find them a rental.

We scored a free Christmas dinner at our friend, Nancy Hofmeisters house. I actually have some photos of that, but blogger has changed their settings and I cannot figure out how to add photos directly from my camera card...... hmmm whats up with that?

Oh, and we had some exciting news right before Thanksgiving... our daughter Kelsey is getting married.. in JANUARY! Yep. We are going to brave not only the snow, ice and freezing temps, but the major flu epidemic that is sweeping through Washington state, but...

We got flu shots.. OH, I expect all the disenters to chime in here and scold me on trusting those drugs that can maim or kill me.. but hey, The flu is KILLING people in Washington.. I choose to take my chances and go drugged to the epicenter of pukedom..
(that being my friends houses with reports of small children who are projectile vomiting..yeah fun)

ANYWAY.. Kelsey is getting married. She is my youngest, 21, and has been dating a very nice young man from a very nice family for 6 yrs. So I guess I should give in gracefully and be happy for her, but JANUARY? sheesh..When I talked with her about this she said.. "So I should change my wedding plans to accomodate you?" WELL YEAH!  As you can see that didn't happen.

We are flying out through Quito, into Panama, then Las Vegas on COPA  and then on Alaska to Portland. I chose this route trying to avoid nasty weather and the Miami Airport. Also, on the way back we have a 7 hr layover in Las Vegas! Late at night, so we have been told what off strip casino to go to so we can hang out and have the most fun. Fortunately for us we don't really like to gamble so it will just be a nice place to hang out other than the airport.

Shopping for "the dress" to wear to the wedding has been interesting. I found out that Macys does not like debit cards. I ordered and they waited until I placed the order to tell me it could not go through cause I had a debit card.. did I want to use a credit card or their Macys card? NOOOOOOOOOOO. So now I have this swirling pending charge on my debit card that I have to go and try to get canceled. Thank You Macys...

I did manage with the help of my mom.. again.. Picture this

 She is 91, about 5'2", driving 30 miles in a big old gas hog of a car, through the driving rain to get the dress I want at Macy's.  She is such a sweet heart!  So I got the dress.. now lets just hope I can find shoes!

We will be leaving Portland and taking the Amtrack up to the Tri Cites. We are really excited about this because  A. we dont have to drive up the Ice Rink called the Columbia Gorge and B. We get to see the scenery and enjoy the trip instead of the white knuckle trip in option A.

ECUADOR.. ok, here is whats happened here.
The flu is here too.. we hear its on the coast mainly, but we have the vaccine here..obviously since we got shots today. OH @20 each at the Dr. office. Free at the local clinics.
We are in the middle of upcoming elections. Rafael Correa our president is predicted to win. We hope he does. We are not sure we can vote yet. It was very confusing last year so we didn't . If given the option I will vote this year.

The Tram work will start next month, and hopefully will be finished by 2014. It will make a marvelous difference in the flow of people and traffic. Also one of the stops will be very near our house.

Weater finally got warm and we had a whole string of days of pure sunshine. Then it rained really really hard. Oh our landlord has agreed that the roof is not the problem with our leaks, but its the skylights. We have massive skylights and they both leak. So now the issue is the cost. But I will leave that for the next time...