What Ana Does

Alice is our huge Swiftie. And we tried but failed to get Taylor Swift Eras Tour tickets when she rolled through the USA last summer. And the secondary market ticket prices were absolutely ridiculous. $5,000 a ticket? Even the $2,000 was out of the question. So when she released dates for her European tour, it made sense to try for tickets. We had planned to go to Europe this summer for Leah's graduation trip and we knew we would spend less than $2000/ticket, even with the flights and hotel.  It was a very stressful experience, but I got GREAT tickets in Milan for the three of us to last summer for less than $500/ticket. We just had to wait 12 months before the big night.  We watched the Eras Tour movie on Disney, watched all the videos on social media from other fans at the concert. I studied the lyrics all year and ran on the treadmill so I was in fit for the 3.5 hour show. We picked out outfits and made 60 friendship bracelets to exchange at the show. We needed those 12 months t

What a trip! As it was Leah's graduation trip (in leu of a big party), she choose to go to Ireland years ago, inspired by the show "Derry Girls" but also by recommendations from some close friends. Then, we got into the lottery to buy tickets to Taylor Swift's Eras Tour in Milan a year ago. So we joined the two destinations and created the itinerary for our Family Summer 2024 Vacation! Here's the breakdown and some helpful links.  Milan, Italy Hotel: Hotel Tocq   (Our Rating: 9/10)!   We started our trip with three hot and humid days in Milan, thanks to Taylor Swift tickets we were lucky enough to buy last year. Putting aside the life-changing, extraordinary concert experience that is the Eras Tour (future post), our time in Milan was super. I booked and rebooked three hotels and finally settled on this hotel on the north side of the city. Let me tell you ... I can't talk enough about how awesome the location of this hotel was. First, it's next to the Metr

 After years of homework, tests, presentations, reports and bus rides ... Leah is a high school graduate!!Wohoo!!  I remember, all those years ago when Leah started kindergarten, she was put into the "Class of 2024" and thinking how far away that is. So far into the future it was crazy. I might have even turned to Dave and said "can you imagine? I wonder where we'll be?"  And here we are. Just a blink later.  At first, I thought of it as an ENDING. It's ending. No more first day of school, waiting for the bus, buying school supplies, picking up backpacks, packing lunches, going to teacher conferences (not that I really ever went), checking on homework -- 12 years of being in this schedule and it's over. I'll never hear that door open and shut at 3pm and hear whatever crazy thing happened at school today. And that made me really sad. I really liked that chapter of our lives and it's closed.   So I mourned that for a while.  Then I started thinkin

This Spring, I got a chance to tag along with David back to Europe. May is an excellent time to be in Europe, the weather is Spring-like and the crowds are manageable. The itinerary was based on Dave's meeting schedule, so it was: Copenhagen, Skordsborg, Amsterdam and Utrecht.  Copenhagen and Skordsborg We started in Copenhagen , our favorite city. We arrived on a holiday Monday where a big "Royal Run" was taking place, so the streets in central part of the city were packed and roads were closed. We had the afternoon free, so we rented bikes, which we've never done, and explored a bit. Biking along the canal was such a "goal achieving" moment. Just awesome fun. Impossible to take a photo, though. After the first day, we headed to Skordsborg, a seaside town north of Copenhagen where Dave's three-day training was taking place. I spent a day enjoying the spa but otherwise, there wasn't much of a town to explore. So the second day, I took the train back

Maybe end of April is the ideal time of year to visit Alaska, or we just got super lucky, but the weather was not cold. 50s and sunny in the day. With daylight lasting well into 9pm.  But wait, let me back up.  In the last week of April, my brother-in-law invited us all to Wasilla, Alaska to surprise my older sister on her 50th birthday. It was a huge surprise and she was SUPER shocked to see me, my younger sister and Mom at her doorstep. Epic. Just epic. Once the shock wore off (it took hours), we had an absolute spectacular weekend.   First day, we drove along the Seward Highway toward Seward. We stopped at a glacial lake and Whittier , a harbor town with shrimp boats and small cruise ships that go around looking at glaciers. The town is tiny, only reachable through a one-lane road that goes under a mountain (or by boat) and ALL its residents live in one high-rise apartment building with a school/market across the street accessible by tunnel because of all the crazy amount of snow

 Dave works two days a week at home, so we've been trying to find the best spot for him. This house doesn't have a dedicated office like our last one did, therefore he's moved around the house, looking for that perfect spot.  Once I sold this pool table we inherited with the house ... ... this corner of the basement made the most sense for him to really set up a comfortable space just for him.  My first step was to paint over the starburst mural I did almost as soon as we moved in. I was never a big mural fan to begin with, but I thought this spot out be a cool place to put it. I should have picked brighter colors in a better spectrum. Luckily, I had just a little of the original of the wall paint left to cover it up.  We found this soft indoor/outdoor rug (he hates the flooring but it doesn't make sense to do this corner of the basement; we'll wait to do the whole thing) that's grey and checked to ground the area.  And we've got a clean slate! Tasks to do: