Staycation Time

So our niece, A, came to stay with us for a week - her first-ever flight, her first-ever long week away from family, her first-ever time to stay alone with us.

Good times.

Really - it was good times. We only had one bout of homesickness, no preteen meltdowns and a remarkably sunny attitude from both niece and aunt despite incredibly hot and humid weather.

We did all sorts of things around town, like get photobombed by a giraffe at the Dallas Zoo:

Ordered our own customized-pizzas:

Played around with new hairstyles:

Rode the trolley:

Got a 500-foot view of the city (that one was a little scary):

Got pedicures (and manicures!):

Helped Papa Holiday feed the catfish:

Got a princess-for-a-day makeover:

Had nail art done - twice!

And went swimming - lots and lots of swimming.

But my favorite part of A's trip happened this week - long after she'd returned home.

She sent me an IM, saying:

I hope you will be as fun as you were this time next time.

I hope so too, sweetheart.

Somewhere in Time

We love Jefferson, Texas. If you've not been there, you should go.

Anyway, an old-timey town is even more fun when it's hosting a Civil War reenactment.

 

And on a side note...we saw some really really really old quilts.

I Owe A Full Blog

But until I'm no longer tired and have caught up on laundry...

Cuba:

Weird Things Runners Do

Ever wonder how many laps of a secluded small island equal one mile?

Eleven.

 

Runners are weird.

And speaking of weird, we ran 17 miles at DisneyWorld last weekend. By the way, it takes 20 laps around the Epcot resort area lake to equal 20 miles. Not that I was counting or anything.

How-To: De-Stinkify and Polish Sea Shells

While in Belize, we collected an enormous amount of shells.

Well, maybe not a ton of shells, but plenty of pretty ones. They made me happy - both searching for them and bringing them back to remember our wonderful island experience.

There was just one problem: Some of the shells had a musty odor and all of them needed a bit of clean-up.

Here's how I took my shells from stinky and dingy to fresh and shiny.

One: Soak shells for 2-24 hours in a 3:1 mixture of water and bleach (3 parts water to 1 part bleach). If your shells are very stinky, make the mixture a 1:1 ratio and soak for 24-48 hours.

Two: Use an old toothbrush to thoroughly scrub the shells after soaking.

Three: Allow the shells to completely dry. I let mine sit for 24 hours.

Four: Lightly rub shells with a mineral oil-soaked paper towel.

 Five: Enjoy your lovely mementos!

All Good Things Must Come to An End

Of course, no vacation can last forever. Otherwise it wouldn't be vacation.

Or it might be life in Kenya. But that was 16 years ago for me. I digress...

I would be remiss if I didn't mention the one thing that I talked about nearly non-stop while we were on the island: Dolphins. I wanted to see one in the wild. Badly.

But we never did. We heard stories of how they frequently swam by but they weren't around during the week we were there.

Until the morning we were leaving!

There were actually three dolphin - swimming and
feeding right near the resort.

It was pretty cool to stand outside, watching the dolphins play while drinking our coffee, along with the entire resort staff.

Some final shots...

Yok Ha's great staff.

Saying goodbye as we pull away.

A much smoother ride back.

Stacie and I loved our full-time waiter, Ezekiel.
This was his first job - he was there on a trial basis.
We gave him a glowing review and he whispered to us
as we left, "I got the job!!"

Pastor, our able captain.

Ah, Yok Ha, we're going to miss you...

Our Belizian Inland Excursions

We travelled off Waterfoot Caye two times: Once on an inland outing with the other resort guests and the second to visit the local markets and grocery stores (a must for us on any international trip).

I could go into the disaster that was the former trip, from a too-small vehicle (sitting square and on laps for my Kenya friends!) to drat-it's-not-open encounters, but I promised my family we wouldn't do anything too life threatening on this trip.

Since I've already written about our boat trip in water that was "a bit choppy," I think it best to not go into detail about our "are you prepared to meet Jesus if you fall out of this jeep while riding in the front seat in your husband's lap" experience.

We'd planned to tour Xunantunich, but the ferry to get there was closed due to high water. Our tour guide took us to nearby Cahal Pech instead.

Our tour guide was of Mayan descent.

Archaeologists were at work.

The dig site.

Filtering for fragments.

The main residence.

The main plaza.

It.Was.HOT.

From there we headed to lunch at a local favorite, Benny's Kitchen. Amazing food!

Pilbil - pork roasted underground

Rice and beans (with plantain, of course!)

Cow foot soup. It is what you think it is.

Great outdoor seating.

Then we stopped at St. Herman's Blue Hole - we didn't have long there, but we did (bizarrely) meet a Belizian who had been to our friend's small town in East Texas. It is a small world after all.

And just down the road, we found a great ice cream stand run by a man from Oregon. Seriously.

Finally, those of us who were fortuitous enough to wear pants got to tour Citrus Products of Belize, a large juice factory.

The amount of juice processed here is amazing.

All "waste" - peel and rind - are used to make cattle feed.

Each extractor can process 500 oranges a minute!

This huge box is holding 3000 liters of concentrated orange juice.

 

The warehouse can temporarily (48 hours or less)
store vast amounts of processed juice.

The juice factory was easily our favorite visit. We love factory tours. What interested me the most was that none of the fruit goes to waste. Peel and rind are made into animal food, juice is concentrated, aroma and oils are captured, and pulp is collected. The pulp is kept separate from the concentrated juice, which allows juice manufacturers to reconstitute the juices in whatever form they'd like to sell to the public - heavy pulp, no pulp, etc. And, believe it or not, the most valuable byproduct of the entire process is the oil.

For our shorter excursion, we rode into town with some guests who were leaving. While they headed to the airport, we wandered the grocery store and local markets. We also helped run errands to restock the resort pantry.

The Rainforest Cafe

Creole - "Make My Plate Diner"

Dangriga

The large grocery store we went to - had to buy some
local products to take home. It was very well stocked, primarily
with local, Guatemalan and Mexican products.

The local fruit and vegetable market.

The resort owner's house.

Plus The Boy got to have his first-ever experience of drinking coconut water fresh from the shell.

Good times.