Vacation update #2

Well, we've been in Los Angeles for a couple of days now. Yesterday we spent the day exploring Hollywood and the surrounding area. This time we saw the Hollywood sign!! Unfortunately there was no movie stars waiting to greet us during our walk down Rodeo drive. We saw lots of beautiful jewellery and clothing. Try as I might, I couldn't convince Teresa to buy the $25,000 gown that matched her eyes....

We went to the Pier in Santa Monica last night and watched the sunset. We were able to see some dolphins while we were there. It really was quite exciting to see them. For dinner we went to Micro brewery in San Pedro. The food was great and the boys sure enjoyed the beer samplers. We also found a terrific place for breakfast... If you can believe it, they have over 80 items on their breakfast menu!! You'll have to ask us about the "quickie", Pecan and Banana French toast and Quesideas... they were awesome.

Today we were up bright and early to catch the ferry to Catalina Island. Our first impressesion as we approached the island was that they could have filmed Jurassic Park on it. What a beautiful island. The homes make you feel like you are in Greece. They have a huge Hotel resort built into the side of the mountain. We took a trolly car up the mountain and spent an hour exploring the botanical gardens. There was a large variety of cactus there and many of them were in bloom.

We saw Starfish along the Pier and Sea Otters playing in the water. Dolphins swam behind our ferry as we went to the Island. The weather was beautiful. We are all sporting red noses and a healthy glow.

Tonight we're going to enjoy the hot tub. We've walked for miles and are getting our exercise. We even went to the gym yesterday to keep those extra pounds from adding up.

Tomorrow we're heading south to Huntington Beach. We modified our agenda slightly to co-incide are plans with the best weather. We plan to see the surfers at Huntington and then work our way up to Venice Beach. Ralph and Lawrence want to work out at Musclemen Beach for an hour or so....we'll be sure to take pictures...

On Friday, we're heading north for Pacific Grove and the Carmel/Monterrey area. Stay tuned for further updates.

Our vacation - Update #1

Hello everyone, we have access to an Internet Cafe in our hotel so we thought it might be nice to give an update on our holiday. We left at around 4:00 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon. The drive went very well and it didn't take us that long to get to Buffalo. We had a nice dinner on Wednesday evening together.

On Thursday we arrived at the airport around 11:00 and had a "LONG" flight to Nevada. We arrived at around 9:30 Toronto time (6:30 Nevada time). Once settled in our hotel, we set out to find a place for dinner. We walked down the strip to the Paris Hotel and had a nice Italian pizza.... it was very good. We had a fun evening exploring the strip and were back in our hotel around midnight. We were getting pretty tired because of the time change.

Friday morning, we got up early so we could have breakfast and be at the golf course for our 8:00 a.m. tee off. We all played a good game considering it was our first time in 6 months!!! The weather was beautiful..... in the low 80's. They said that we had broken a record for this early in the year. In the afternoon we went to the local Outlet mall and enjoyed a couple of hours of shopping.

In the evening we went to see "O" which is done by Cirque du Soleil.... Words cannot describe how awesome it was... (Karen - you will love it!!). We got back to our hotel at around 11:30 and after our nightcap went to bed to allow us to get up for 5:00 a.m.

We had a nice bus drive to the Grand Canyon... The view was spectacular!! We were all pretty tired on the the bus trip, so we slept for part of the trip... It was alot of fun. We had dinner at night close to the hotel, because we were getting a bit jet lagged and tired.

Sunday we were up early for church. We took a taxi to the church only to discover that they changed the time from 8:30 to 6:30 a.m. So we went back to the hotel...and explored the city before leaving for the airport again for our trip to Los Angeles.

We flew via Salt Lake City and saw the most amazing sunset over the mountains. We'll post pictures when we return from vacation. We are now in LA and spent the time in Santa Monica at the Pier and exploring 3rd St. Promenade. The weather was great - again in the mid 80"s. They are having a heatwave here as well. We certainly timed our trip well!!

Stay tuned for further updates.

Love, Grace, Teresa, Ralph and Lawrence...

No more sleeps!!

Well today is it!! It's finally here.... The day we've been waiting and planning for, for 2 years. Hip, Hip, Hooray!! Ralph woke me up at 5:00 a.m. to get ready to drive him to work. Funny how it doesn't seem early when you're planning on going away today!! I'm sure I heard the birds singing as we were getting in the car.

All of Oakley's stuff is packed in the back of the truck and he's ready for his visit with Henry, Yolande and their children. He can tell that somethings going on, but he isn't sure... He keeps following me around the house, looking for missing toys and of course his missing bed.... hmmmm he must be wondering...

We took him yesterday for his shots. I think he's a little off today because of them. Ralph said he didn't really want to run the whole distance this morning. They usually run anywhere from 5-8k three times a week. I'm sure that his hind legs must be a little sore because they put the needles right into the muscles. It will be a day of adjustments for Oakley. I'm sure he'll do fine and it will be great to go and play with Holly, Megan, Ryan and Amber...Oakley will be in his glory...

Sandra and I are going for breakfast this morning. Then we'll pick up Oakley and head north to drop him off. Sandra is staying with Ed and Janice for the next couple of weeks so I'll drop her off there.

Then, once everyone else is home from work - we're off. We plan to drive to Buffalo and have dinner there. We'll get a good sleep tonight to help prepare us for the busy weekend! The weather is suppose to be nice and warm (in the mid 70's) so it will be a refreshing change from what we've been experiencing.

Check the blog periodically and if I'm able, I'll update it from an Internet cafe in one of the hotels...

Talk to you all in a couple of weeks.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TERESA!!

Today is a special day!! Teresa is celebrating her 48th birthday!! Happy birthday Teresa. I hope that you don't have to work to hard today and that the boys at Telus bring you coffee and treats!!

I thank God every day that we are sisters... I'm looking forward to our vacation together!!

Weight loss journey

For those of you watching my weight loss journey, I'm happy to report that things have been steadily decreasing.... Yesterday I bought a new pair of pants and I'm soooo happy that I was able to go down 2 sizes. I'm not convinced that this would be for every label, but it sure makes you feel good. I've lost 14 lbs. I went for a few weeks where I held steady at 12 lbs, but I perservered. I knew that the inches were continueing to come off. I'm now at 1/3 of my goal. I'll try to go the gym today and tomorrow and Teresa and I hope to get in a few workouts while we're gone... I'm sure with the golf and all the walking that we'll be doing, that we should be ok as long as we don't over indulge at the restaurants. That will be the challenge!!

Only 1 more sleep

Can you believe it! The time is almost here. I have packed and repacked at least 2 times and I think I'll do it again today. I don't want to bring to much, yet with the weather being so different at each of the cities we are going to, I just don't know exactly what will work. I wish I could look at it as easily as Ralph. He just shrugs his shoulders and says "oh well", if we don't have the right clothes, we'll just buy what we need... No big deal. I just don't want to freeze at the Grand Canyon....oh well...

Today I will spend the time doing my housework and making sure that everything is in order. The fridge is clean, the floors are vacummed already, but I think they'll need one more go over. Oakley is really shedding right now. I'll clean the bathrooms and air out the bedrooms and then I'm done.

Tonight Teresa and Lawrence will come by with their suitcases. We'll pack the car tomorrow and be ready to leave once everyone finishes work. It sure is going to be alot of fun... I can't wait!!

A day out with my sisters!

I never thought I'd do it, but Teresa and Marian convinced me to go and have a pedicure. Now I won't say that I enjoyed the chair like everyone else raves about, but having my feet cleaned up was quite an experience. I couldn't believe the amount of skin that comes off your feet when they take the "cheese grater" to them. Unbelieveable!! My nails look very beautiful and they really do a nice job trimming and filing. My feet haven't looked this good since I was 10 years old. I think Marian got a kick out of watching me. Everytime they massaged my feet I would burst out laughing, because those of you that know me well will know that I am very ticklish....the poor girl who was assigned to me. I gave her a slightly bigger tip to thank her for her patience with me...

It was really nice to have Sandra with us as well. She got the full treatment. While her feet were being done, they gave her a manicure as well.Will I do it again?? I think so! It was fun. Wouldn't it be great to have Laura, Karen, Liz and Kristen along as well. Now that would be a real girls day out!!