Quick Update...

Today's filter went well.
I arrived at 10am and was escorted to the surgery waiting room around 1020ish.
Then the real waiting began. We were shown to my pre-op cubical. Got into the well ventilated gown and they came in started hooking me up. I had one iv in my hand and things on my legs to help circulate the blood. A small dose of heparin and given a tv remote. :)

I have no idea how many people came in and out.. but it was a bunch.
Everyone was very friendly and super nice.

My surgery was to be at 1130 and they didn't wheel me back until 1215-1230.
However, once they got started it was over very quickly.
The OR staff was great. keep me laughing the whole time, until I fell asleep.
They did intervenious sedation, not a full "but you to sleep" sedation.

I remember the Dr. coming in, saying hi and asking if I was ready.. and that was about it until I was being rolled to recovery.
Chris came and sat with me for a bit there and when all my IV fluid was in me, they tossed me out. Very different experience from Baptist Hospital a few years ago when I had my finger surgery. They acted like I was in their way and they wanted me out as quickly as possible. Here they made sure I was ready to go before they sent me home.

I was home by 230 and slept most of the afternoon. I'm a little sore, but nothing too bad.
Tomorrow I should be able to move around much better :)

Thanks everyone for keeping us in your thoughts and prayers.
Hugs and Love,
Dawn

Cruise Pictures

I forgot to post a link to the pictures from the Cruise
http://carnivalgloryapril1825.shutterfly.com/

Surgery update

I found out yesterday that my surgery date has been moved to May 12th. Apparently the 2nd dr is going to be out and it takes 2 for their certification program.

I'm ok with the change.. gives me a few more days to get over the fact I didn't do the liquid diet on the ship. I wanted to, i planned to, but when I was getting sea sick I needed to keep something on my tummy. However, I can proudly say I only gained 3 lbs according to my home scales. :)

Kym had her surgery on Monday and is doing great. I stopped by yesterday after work and again today. If she's still there when I go to my Dr appt tomorrow, I'll stop by again.
I can only hope I do half as well as she is.

Our Cruise continued... (part 3)

Thursday our port of call was Costa Maya. Today we didn't have anything planned other than enjoy the city, beach and do a little shopping.
As we got off the ship it was doing the rain thing. Thankfully it wasn't too bad. So we walked around the shopping area a little. First stop, Diamonds International to get my next charm. then off to Tquilaria International. Tasted some tequila that was actually very yummy.
They have 3 large pools for the guests to use at no charge. One of them even has a swim up bar.
After 45 min to an hour it had stopped raining and the sun was back out. So we wondered down to the beach and found a few chairs under an umbrella and laid out for a bit. However, that didn't last long, about 30 min into it the rains came again. So we went back shopping. To the "market" in the middle of the center. This was more hand made type things instead of the store stores.
As I looked around at all the pretty dresses Chris disappeared with the shop worker. A bit later he comes back with a chair hammock. I decide to buy a dress too (for after I loose some) and we make a deal with the guy for the price. We have to go 2 stores down to pay (strange set up). The older lady didn't agree to our price and said we have to pay more. I told her no. We'd just get the hammock and that would be all. She decided to take our offer. however, if I calculated pesos to USD correctly, she got her extra 7.00 anyway.
After this we went back to the Tequila store and bought 2 bottles. :)
Back on the ship we had to hand them over until Friday night.

That night in the Amber Palace was The Comedy Hypnosis of PUCK.

This was the night of the midnight buffet. After the show we went back to the room and watched Marley and Me instead of going out and about. What a good but sad movie. Afterwards we were beat, so we just went off to sleep instead of visiting the Mexican Buffet.

Thursday was another Fun Day at Sea and Elegent Evening.
We attended a Debarkation talk that morning and learned how to get off the ship with all our stuff. ;) There were tons of activities going on this day. We went to another game show. This time it was called The Marriage Show. We did pretty good. One of the 3 couples on stage had been married over 50 yrs and they only got 3 or 4 of the 11 questions correct. The guy was too funny. We laughed so hard we cried. The couple that had just gotten married (the day before we left) actually won.
We also did a Galley Tour. This was very interesting to see how the kitchen works. It's amazing that they can plan out food for 3200 guests and another 1200 staff, know what they need and have it ordered, have it waiting on the ship to dock on Saturday morning and load it all in less than 4 hours. We bought 2 cookbooks during the tour... yes you know me and my cookbooks. :)
After the tour we wondered into the Casino and played a few slots and attended a fun little class called Mixology 101. The bar tender shows us how to make 5 different drinks. Too bad we didn't all get to try them. They asked questions and the correct answer got the drink.

Time to get dressed and go do the picture parade again. The photo "booths" were lined along the starbord side of the ship and in the lower lobby piano bar. Dinner tonight was pretty good too. Not as fancy as I expected but still good.
After dinner we went back to our room to change into more comfy clothing and I about cried. There was no Towel Animal on the bed. But before I could pout too long Chris found it.. the cutest one yet.. a monkey hanging in front of our mirror.

Tonight was the big show of the week. "Just Rock" This was a very good production. We set near the sound board for most of the shows this week. HUGE board. And tonight we also went to a midnight adults only Comedy Hypnosis Show. This was too funny, again laughed so hard I was crying. After this we went back to our room and crashed hard.


One more port of call and we head home.
Nassau was on Friday. This was my least favorite place of all. There were cars 3 wide on a 2 lane road. The drivers were impatient and just simply RUDE. I have never heard so many horns blowing in my life. We didn't do any excursions here either. We simply did our finaly shopping and headed back aboard to do some sun bathing. this was much more enjoyable than the city. Next time we'll do an excursion here... we heard some great things about them.

As we left port I went up on top deck and took pictures. There was the neatest little stretch of land that came out from beyond the pier and sort of inclosed the area. This port can hold up to 8 big cruise ships at one time. There were 4 before we left.
We spent quite a bit of the afternoon by the pool.
Dinner tonight was my favorite. Ribs!!! YUM YUM. They were cooked to perfection. The sauce was finger licking good too. It was a tearful goodbye to our tablemates. We looked forward to seeing them every night. We really did have the best table on the ship. We closed down the dinning room every night. I'm sure Joel and Stephon were glad to see us go LOL.

The final show was really good. Through out the week they held "auditions" for certain music personalities and tonight they were dressed like that person and on stage with the Glory Dancers. Being backed up by the live house band. A few of the entertainment staff also joined in the fun. Amy and Dan were Sonny and Cher. And Butch was Dolly Parton. Both were too funny for words. It was one of those "you have to be there" to appreciate it. I laughed so hard I was past crying to I was having trouble breathing.

We had packed our luggage before dinner so after the show we went back and relaxed.

For the most part I was pretty good about taking the stairs instead of the elevator if we were only going a few floors or doing down. I drank water instead of tea, soda or even the harder drinks. ;)

Saturday morning found us back in Port Canaveral at 6:30ish.
Coming back into the USA is a trip in itself. The coast guard actualy "seizes" the boat until they do an inspection. Every floor, every deck, every log book. We were told that sometimes this process takes almost an hour and depending on their mood, can bring on drug sniffing dogs and do a complete search before giving the go ahead. Luckily today was a decent day and they gave the ok after only 30 minutes. now the waiting begins. We went up for breakfast and then back to our room to gather our things and WAIT. They call you to leave the ship by zone numbers. our number was 25 (out of 40). We were called around 9:30. By this time we'd moved to deck 5 to wait so they could reset the room for the next guests. This part is what really seemed to take forever.. we did not make it to the outside of the terminal until 1030 and then had to wait again for our transportation back to the hotel. (but this wait wasn't bad.)

Picked up our car and headed off.
Stopped in GA at an outlet shop and again just past the SC state line. That trip took us about 30 minutes out of our way and didn't find what we were looking for :( But it was a pretty ride, so not complaining at all.

Got into Columbia and stopped at Subway around 9pm. Came home, unloaded the car and ate dinner... then fell into our OWN bed for a very solid nights sleep.

It was so nice to be home. :)

Our Cruise continued... (part 2)

Each night your bed is turned down and your daily 'reading material' is laid out beside a very cute towel animal. :) The daily reading materials are your Carnival Capers (daily activities schedule) and any other materials they think you'll want such as coupons or brochures for the following day's port of call.

Monday was a fun and not so fun day. This was our first port of call and our first excursion.
The sunrise was pretty, its the only one I really watched. I went up on the lido deck around 7:30 and watched us approach Cozumel. When Chris joined me we went and found breakfast. Then continued to watch us dock. It's an interesting process. There are guide or pilot boats and also their version of the Coast Guard boats as well. Those are a little scary looking. BIG guns on little boat.
We arrived in port around 10am and left the ship to find a taxi to take us to our only pre-booked excursion. Mr. Sanchos Resort. We were supposed to do a cooking class and then enjoy an all inclusive day at their beach with all the food and drinks we wanted. Included table and chairs, umbrellas, lounge chairs and all unmotorized water equipment.
The road there was very straight and no very much to see. Everything was set back off the road behind palm trees and shrubs.

Upon arrival we were taken to the main dinning area. Very nice outdoor seating, with covered roof. Oliver greeted us and promptly told us that tourcozumel.net had not sent them their money. Therefore we were not able to do the excursion. HUH??????????
So he called the company we booked thru. Spoke with Ken the owner, he said the money was sent. Oliver said it wasn't but would check with accounting again. He let Chris speak with Ken. Ken said he would reemburs us our payment. (Belive it or not, I really did research this well before booking an excursion outside of the ship and was confident it was a good place to do business with.) Oliver called his accounting folks, they talked for a bit, the cheif talked to them and then Oliver came back and said "no, the money hasn't been transfered". Now I'm MAD. At first I was ok, thinking this is just a mistake, it'll all be ok. We are being told that we can do the excursions but we have to pay again. Ok, lets think about this... we pre-paid. I have a confirmation letter in hand, along with my paypal receipt, why would we take that kind of cash to a place where everything is already paid for????? Now I get on the phone with Carrie. She's didn't really talk to me other than to say "this is a mistake, they have the money, let me talk to Oliver." At this point Oliver is talking to another party of 6 that are in the same position we are.
I take Oliver the phone.. he talks to her again. She assures him that we will all be refunded our funds and its ok to pay again. Again.. with WHAT MONEY? I did have a little cash with us, but not much. I told Oliver this and he agreed to let us do the stuff for about half the original price. At this point its around 11:30 and the chief starts setting up. We begin cooking around noon. The cheif had an assistant who did the translation for us. Chris and I were the only ones cooking that day. We each got to make a margirta, one was Mango and the other Strawberry.
They taught us to make fresh salsa (pico for us Americans) and guacamole'. Neither one of us are too fond of the green stuff but being troopers we didn't say a word. The entree was beef and chicken sopapias. Not the sopapias that we were used to seeing. These were made like a corn tortollia, however smaller around and thicker. After they are cooked on both sides for a few min, they are removed and the edges are squished to make a little "pizza crust" looking disk. The beef and chicken were cooked on what looked like an upside down wok, using garlic butter. After they were done, the meat was cut into tiny pieces. We also learned to make refried black beans. Now the assembly... on each disk place a small amount of refried beans, then meat of choice. Top that with tomato, fresh sour cream and grated white cheese (looked like parmasian). Everything was very good.. even the green stuff we don't usualy like. LOL Oh and we also made the chips... store bought flour tortollias cut in forths and tossed in hot oil.

By the time we finised cooking and sat down to eat it was close to 1:30. So we ate, walked out in the water a little and then did a quick sun bathing to dry off a little. And back to the ship we went. We didn't really get experience the "all inclusive" part beacuse of it taking so long to get everything straightened out at first. however, over all it was a very fun day and I would do it again. Just not thru the booking company.

Monday nights entertainment in the Amber Palace was Comedian Al Ernst. He was good although we didn't get to see the whole show due to our dinner being at 8:15 and his show didn't start until 7:30. Oh and the Amber Palace is at one end of the ship and our dinning room was all the way at the back of the ship. Did I mention that the ship is the length of 3 football fields? yep, it sure is.

Tuesday was an experiance... this "port of call" was Belize.
We didn't actually dock here.. we set down anchor and little boats came to get us. Yep, you walked out a hole in the side of the ship onto another boat, with only water below you.
The first time I was a bit nervous.. but after watching everyone it was a cake walk. They tender boats are right up next to the ship and tied off. You're not going anywhere.
At this destination we had paid for a snorkling excursion. Everyone that was going to excursions or ashore was to meet in the Amber Palace (in certain areas) and you would be called to your boat one group at a time. Well before they called our group they made an announcement. "For you snorklers the water is a bit choppy today. If you would like to not go, then your money will be returned in full. however, if you go you'll be charged even if you get there and don't do the excursion." Chris and I looked at each other and said "what the heck, lets go" So we did.
The island was called Goff Cay. It was really pretty and really little. It runs along the reef, which is the reason the ship is anchored 2.5 miles off shore. This is the largest reef in the world, 138 miles long. Oh, did I mention it was RAINING? yep, not bad though. And heck, we were going to get wet anyway, right? While on the 12 mile boat ride they gave us our snorkling equipment. We pulled up to the pier and the sun had came out and it was so pretty.
We put down our stuff on the benches in the covered area and headed out to the water. After a very breif intro to snorkling we went into deeper water. Some of the folks opted to go out on the boat and snorkle back to the beach. Being our first time, we opted to start and end on land.
We figured we'd get a few min of instruction and get to go get the underwater camera.. nope. So we don't have any pictures of the beautiful reef. It was pretty amazing, however I don't think it was as amazing as it would have been if the weather hadn't been playing dirty. I think most of the fish had gone into hiding. But I would do it again in a second. :) We swam half way around the island and back. As we stepped on dry land the bottom of the sky opened up and the rains came pouring down. I don't mean a little rain either.. this was a full blown, I can't see 10 feet in front of me storm. But no lightning or thunder, just wet stuff. While we waited it out they gave us bags of water. I'm not kidding, it was a bag not a bottle. Pretty cool. :)
After about 20-30 minutes the rain cleared and we went out into the water again. however, by this time they'd taken up our snorkling equipment so we just walked around for a bit. It was like bath water and just as clear.

Back on the ship we changed into dry clothes and went back down to deck 0 to catch a tender into Belize City. Now this was interesting, we were told, no matter what you do DO NOT go outside the gated area without a guide. Apparently its not very safe. Not a problem, we didn't stray too far from the dock. Matter a fact we didn't leave the dock, all the stores are built right there. No need to go anywhere else at all. (unless you are doing an excursion).
The first store we stopped into was Diamonds Internation for my free charm. We all know they give you the free stuff just to get you into the stores, right? Well, lets just say it worked. BIG TIME. We started looking at the Tanzinite. Just looking mind you. The guy that gave us the charm was showing us af ew things and wow the prices were up there. We looked at several pieces from necklaces to earrings and then rings. Chris found a pair of earrings that he really liked for me. They were beautiful too. Small Tanzinite stones in the middle of a heart, with 2 small diamon chips on the heart. I figured we were dreaming so I asked to see a ring. It was pretty, but i'm not too much into solitaires (the round stones). Since I was dreaming anyway, I asked to see another ring that was just screaming at me. Of course it fit perfectly. oh my this ring was so pretty. There was no hiding it on my face either. The saleman, Roby, was very good at his job LOL. After 20-30 min of looking and asking his manager and talking and asking his manager .. we finaly said if you can meet this price, then we'll take both. Holy Hanna!!! they came within 8 dollars of my price. When the Jeff, the shops shopping specialest said they had good prices, he wasn't kidding. We got around 72% off of the retail price. The neat thing about this store, if you get back home and have it apprazied and it isn't worth what you paid, they'll refund you 100%. Their home office is actually in New York City.
After that we did a little more shopping around and headed back to the ship to deposit my new jewlery into our room safe. :) After we set sail we went up to Jeffs desk and ask him to look at the jewlery. He was impressed with the stones and said the stone in the ring alone, was worth about 400 more than we paid. that's not counting the gold, the diamonds (oh, there are 6 on the ring) or the earrings. WOW WOW WOW!!! Chris said he's taking me with him to his next yearly review to negotiate his next raise. hehehe

Back on ship we went to the Battle of the Sexes game and then off to dinner. The big entertainment that night was "Justin Illusion and the Amazing Glory Dancers." This was a pretty good show. I think we both enjoyed it quite a bit.

Back home... (part 1)

We arrived back home on Saturday evening around 9pm.
The ship docked at 7am, however our Zone number wasn't called until around 10am. And it took us another 30 minutes to get thru customs.

We had a wonderful time. I'll try to add a summery of our events here, hopefully I won't miss anything important :)

On Friday we got up at our normal work time and headed to Florida. Stopping my Walmart for a few last minute items. Found both of us sunglasses. Mine clip to the sides of my glasses and have a cool purple mirror reflection to them. For a late lunch we stopped in Daytona at Cracker Barrel and met up with Sherri and Steve, who we met thru ThreadStop. It was great seeing them again.
Afterwards we continued on down to Cocoa where our hotel was. The Econo Lodge at Cocoa is really nice. The rooms were larger than expected and the staff was very nice. This is where our car would stay while we were gone. They allow guest to park for free while they are aboard a cruise ship.

On Saturday we got up nice and early, well sorta it was around 8:30 and got our things ready to depart. The shuttle from Cocoa Beach Shuttles arrived right on time (actually a few minutes early). We left the hotel at 11:00 The driver was very nice also. He gave us some history about the Glory while in route.
Upon arrival at the port we saw 2 ships. One was ours, the Carnival Glory and the other was the Disney Magic. Oh, and we got to a limo pulling a travel trailor. That was a funny site.

It only took around 30 minutes to get thru embarktation. I've read horror stories so it was a nice way to get our cruise started. It was now around 1140 and we couldn't go to our room until 1:30. So we visited the lunch buffet. There was food everywhere!!!!!!!!! Deck 9 is the Lido Deck, pools, Red Sail Resturant, Deli Grill, 3 more grills, Oriental Station and Pizza station is all on this deck.
At 1:30 we went down to our room. At first glance it looked TINY. But after your in and moving around it wasn't that bad. The shower was a little scary looking, but again, after getting in it, it wasn't bad at all. We left port at 4:00.

We took a tour of the ship with Dan and Amy from the Entertainment staff. That was one of the best things about this cruise line, they the best staff. Very friendly and helpful. How on earth they remember everyone's name is way beyond me.
I got a little seasick this day so bought some wristbands for seasickness. Ate dinner, went to see a Game Show and then laid down for a bit. Afterwards was feeling much better and went to the Welcome Aboard Show. That was too funny. They brought 3 guys on stage and even Butch, the Cruise Director, was cracking up so hard he couldn't hardly talk.

On Sunday we had a Day at Sea.
Shopping Ashore talk with Jeff, the onboard Shopping Specailest was very informative. We were able to pick up some maps of each port and he talked about the stores in each. They have partnerships with certain stores and for each they give a 30 day guarentee for the items purchased in those stores. And of course there were coupons given out. The neatest copuon was was a free charm braclet from Diamonds International. In the first port you get the free braclet with a charm and purchase your first port charm for 5.00. Then in each port you stop into their store and pick up an additional charm. you never have to buy another charm. They are all free from then on. Even on future trips. Pretty cool!
We laid in the sun for a bit, caught a few minutes of a show and enjoyed our first Elegent Evening. They have around 12 different places to get your picture taken. There is no fee to have them taken, only when you buy. So we took lots, you never know which ones your going to like best.
Dinner was good. I had the BEST stuffed mushrooms to start with and prime rib for my meal. Chris had Shrimp Cocktail to start and Shrimp and Lobster for his meal. Met our dinner companions and immediately liked everyone. You never know who your going to be sitting with. However, I have to say our table of 8, was the very best table on board!!!
After dinner we changed and went to see the show, an R-rated Comedian. He was pretty good. Then we crashed. It's tiring being at sea ;)

A sailing we will go...

We leave in the morning for a fun filled well at sea.
Thank everyone for your well wishes.

See you in a week :o)

Kym's Jewelry

My friend Kym makes the most beautiful jewelry.
Last weekend we went over to her house and spent the afternoon with her, her wonderful hubby Rob and their 2 kids. We had alot of fun. We went to eat at the Blue Ocean before the race too. It was our last time for there for a while. Kym and I are both having the gastric bypass surgery. Her surgery is April 27th. We met on the forum the doctors office provides for us and have gone thru quite a bit of this process together.

Anyway.. back to the jewelry.... a few weeks before she made me a really neat bracelet. Then we went to AC Moore together and I picked out some beads and she took them home and made them into the coolest set. (See the seahorse picture? That's the set.) Then last weekend while we watched the race she made me another awesome set to wear with my formal dress on the cruise. How cool is that?????

THANK YOU KYM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(Click the pictures to see larger images)

Full but fun day

Been a super busy few days.
yesterday i had my nutrition and info class. Was supposed to last 2 hours.. lasted 3.
Was very helpful. Today I had my session with the diatition, Emily. She's really nice and very helpful with preplanning for our cruise. I go on my liquid diet tomorrow. So made a late evening run to walmart. Bought some protein bars and protein drinks. We'll see how they go tomorrow :)

Today was great, after the session with Emily, I met up with my Sister in Law and 3 of her kids, Father in Law and 2 of his friends grandkids and we all went off to the Riverbanks Zoo. Most of us had a great time, unfortunately JR got sick and his Mom had to come get him. I think we spent 7 hours there. Then went to eat and home for a bit before they all hit the road again.

how many more...

Wow.. how many more appointments can they squeeze into a few weeks?
It seems like every day I'm not working they have something scheduled for me.
But hey.. that's OK. :)

Now I have a nutrition class this coming Tuesday.
And my SIL is coming with 3 of the 4 kids Wednesday and we're going to the zoo.
I love the zoo!!!!!!! This will be fun.

Even more tests scheduled...

Today I got a few calls.. my next tests are on April 15th.... Cardo.
They'll do an ultrasound of my legs and do an EKG.

Lynn also called. I'll call her back tomorrow.

Hopefully I'll get my packet with everything scheduled tomorrow.
Then I'll know for sure what's when. And can rest easy that nothing is scheduled the week of our cruise.