Carnival Breeze 2022 – Time to make the lists.

With 4 weeks to go, I have decided it is time to make the lists for this cruise. I will primarily be focusing on clothes and maybe shoes. But I will also include my excessive first aid kit. So lets get started.

Since my first aid kit seems to have more on it than the clothes I will be taking, lets start with it.

I know the list is long but in these times, I want to be prepared for anything and everything including taking a lot of face masks!

I do have a small first aid kit I keep in my purse, but it is very basic.

Now for the clothes. For every cruise I go on, I will make a chart of the days on the cruise and what will be going on those days. This year, I decided to use my handy dandy Plum Planner.

First, I wrote on each day what would be going on. This gives me an idea of what I will wear on that day.

On the opposite page, I wrote in pencil what I plan on wearing that day and evening.

Since I have written everything in pencil, it will be easy to change in my planner should I change my mind about something. And believe me, I already have.

For some reason, when I was putting the clothes together, it appears that I will be taking a lot less clothes than I normally do. This makes my husband so excited. But since it is still early, there may or may not be any changes made to the list. I guess the only way to find out will be to come back for the packing blog which will be up closer to cruise time.

Thanks for reading!!!

Carnival Breeze 2022 – Essentials packing list

When we travel, there are some items that we make sure we take on each and every trip. I would like to share with you what are essentials are for this cruise.

First and foremost are the fans. Yes, more than one. The large black one is for the room while the other two are for outside use. Well, mostly outside use any way. I say that because when we were on the Carnival Vista in August/September, our embarkation was at terminal 2. It was our first time embarking from that terminal so we did not know what to expect. What we found was that it was very hot. We used the necklace fans a lot while we were standing in line. I thought it was probably cooler outside!!!!

We bring an over-the-door shoe hanger on each trip. This time, I purchased a new one that is slender and came in a a package of 2. We do not use the hangers that come with it. Instead, we use Command Strips. They have never failed us!

Our first aid kit has everything we could possibly need and then some. Better safe than sorry.

Do NOT forget to bring some antacids. It is definitely a necessity. Any brand will do. These were purchased at Dollar Tree but the container has since been refilled with whatever we have on hand at the time.

We also bring plenty of hand sanitizer, both liquid and wipes. I keep wipes in my purse, beach bag, and back pack because you never know when you will need them.

Let’s not forget our beverage cups. Hubby brings a Bubba Mug he has had for years and years. I bring my trusty Tervis tumbler that I found a Bed Bath and Beyond many years ago.

Typically, we bring two bottles of wine on board with us at embarkation. So, we bring plastic, reusable wine and champagne classes to use. A corkscrew is kept with the wine and glasses so we do not forget it like we have done before. We also bring metal straws with us since plastic straws are no longer available and I do not like the straws they are now using.

We also bring a travel power strip that stays in camera bag when not in use. It has been awesome to have.

Also in the camera bag is spare batteries.

Do not forget face masks. We bring disposable ones as well as reusable ones. I am fully aware that I’m bringing more than I will probably use.

A battery operated night light works well when your room gets dark. Even the balcony rooms tend to get dark at night.

Water shoes and rain ponchos come in handy as well. I purchased these water shoes on Amazon several years ago and the rain poncho was purchased at Dollar Tree.

So that is it for now. I know there are some things I have left off. Anything not included here will be in a packing blog.

2018 Vista Project – installment 8: Paper selection part three, the shopping list that didn’t happen.

I had every intention of making a precise list of solid color papers I would need to complete the scrapbook pages. I was really going to do that. But then I saw Hobby Lobby was having a sale! So instead, I went to Hobby Lobby.

The first pack I found was the BRIGHTS one. I love the colors in the pack and I sure they will all be used if not for this project, for others I will be working on real soon. Here are some of the colors that really caught my eye.

I also purchased the pack UNICORN as I love the lighter, more pastel shades. These will definitely not go to waste.

And finally, I purchased some red glitter paper and some light blue glitter paper that I have a specific use for in this project.

Now all that is left to do is to start putting pages together. But first, I have some time-sensitive craft projects that I need to get started on and completed. Have no fear, I will be returning to show the scrapbook pages once they are put together.

2018 Vista Project – installment 7: Paper selection part two

Continuing the paper selection from part 1.

Mahogany Bay. I am considering using some of the cut outs for these pages.

Belize. There may be a cut out or two for these pages also!

Cozumel

Sea Day #3

The time when they make us leave…

In all fairness, the paper selection for our excursion to Dolphinaris was purchased at Scrapyourtrip.com. I knew that I needed this paper when I first saw it so I made sure to purchase a large quantity! And I’m glad I did as they no longer have it in stock.

I was not finding anything I thought would be appropriate for the Cat in the Hat breakfast until I started searching the internet. This came up in scrapbook.com so I bought all they had!!!! I may be making a paper change on the Seuss parade!!!!

Now that all of the paper has been selected, all that is left is for me to find the correct color paper for matting some photos. The final part of the paper selection will be my shopping list. Hopefully it will not be a very long list. At least that is my hope at the moment.

Thanks for reading this blog. I hope you will return for the next installment.

2018 Vista Project – installment 6: Paper selection part one.

This is truly a labor of love. Unfortunately this labor of love will be broken down into two parts.

Before we even left for this cruise, I started buying paper pads from Michaels that I knew would be used for this adventure. After all, it’s now often that you can take a 4-generation family cruise. These are the paper pads I purchased. All are 12 x 12 and the quality of the paper is awesome.

And now for the selections by day:

Travel day

Embarkation day.

Sea Day #1

Sea Day #2

These are the selections for the first few days. The next installment will have the remainder of the days of this cruise. So please come back to see what I have selected for the remainder of the cruise.

Carnival Breeze 2022 – Embarkation attire and it is diet time.

Embarkation day is always an exciting day. One that I am always looking forward to. Until this day arrives, I always always always worry about what I will be packing for this cruise. I have yet to overcome my over-packing habit. Only time will tell if I succeed this time.

I purchased our shirts while we were on our last cruise with the intention of wearing it on our next cruise. At that time, I did not realize our next cruise would be this soon. This shirt will likely be in the regular rotation for our embarkation shirts.

Since I am uncertain to what the weather will be like, I am planning on wearing jeans while boarding. But I will also be taking a pair of denim capri’s just in case. The jeans are KUT from the Kloth that was in a StitchFix box a few years ago. The capri’s were purchased at SteinMart several years ago as well.

Embarkation day is definitely the day to wear comfy shoes. I learned this the hard way when I decided to wear a brand new, never worn pair of Sperry’s. Luckily, I was able to switch into comfy shoes before we boarded the ship. For this cruise, I will be wearing my Reeboks. They are the best shoes for me as they offer a lot of arch support and are very comfortable.

Let’s not forget the socks!!! I found these at Target. Of course the socks must be a Valentine theme!!!!

I love jewelry and I really enjoyted finding the perfect pieces for my embarkation outfit. All of which were found by accident!!!!!

Also from Target are the red heart earrings an the gold heart necklace. Both are by the brand SugarFix by BaubleBar. I love their stuff!!

I found a red heart necklace on Oriental Trading online while I was searching for things for a Disney themed project. I love this one.

While shopping for Valentine decorations for my moms apartment, I found these heart bead necklaces at Dollar Tree. Might as well add them to the embarkation day outfit as well.

Unfortunately, I have waited until the last possible time to start my pre-cruise diet. I’m hoping to drop at least a few pounds. I want to make sure I have room to grow into the clothes I will be taking on this cruise. I’m sure the HydroxyCut I started taking on Monday will help. I will include a weekly diet update every Thursday.

2018 Vista project – Installment 5: Final photo elimination and the beginning of paper selection.

It feels good to know I have managed to make decision on the final photos that will go in the scrapbooks. I have managed to go from 2500 photos to 645. That means that 129 photos will be making their way into 5 mostly identical scrapbooks.

How will the 129 photos be broken down into scrapbook pages? Well, please allow me to tell you. There will be a total of 31 single page layout, 10 of which will only contain 1 photo. There will be 7 two page layouts. The largest majority of single page layouts will contain 3 photos. Most of those are from our excursion to Dolphinaris in Cozumel.

Now the fun part begins. Time to do some paper selection. This is just as time consuming as photo selection. But this is what I have so far.

Of course, like everything else, it is subject to change. In fact, now that I’m looking at the initial paper selection on here, I will likely change it. But I guess this will be the preliminary round of paper selection.

So, I will be spending some time over the next few days selecting paper for the photos I have. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I will not have to go shopping for paper and can match photo and activity with all the paper I have on hand. Wish me luck.

Please continue to follow my blog as I continue the scrapbook journey that is 2018 Vista Project.

2018 Vista Project – installment 2: Organizing, cataloging, and temporary storing

I do not know how I ended up with 2500 photos!!!! Some of the photos have 5 copies of it as those are ones my daughter has selected for herself. So, I figured if she wanted one, maybe the others would want one too!!!! There are a handful that have 2 copies. I’m not sure what I’m going to do with those extras but I’m sure I will figure it out.

When I started this project, the photos were in the boxes we received them in from Shutterfly. I had already gone through all the photos to determine which area they should be in. And by area, I mean pre-cruise, travel day, embarkation day, and so on. This was a good start, but, obviously, still had a long way to go.

To begin the next part of my project, I would need index cards, a columnar pad, and photo boxes. Unfortunately, I did not have any photo boxes on hand, at least none that I could find. So I suppose shoe boxes will have to work, at least temporarily.

I knew I would need to divide the photos by section, so I made some dividers to use to separate the photos I would be storing in old shoe boxes. Apparently I did not plan well enough to have photo boxes on hand. Either that or I’m just blind and they are right in front of my face! So, I first made dividers to use in the photo albums for each section with the sections being: Precruise Follies, Travel Day, Embarkation, Sea Day #1, Sea Day #2, Mahogany Bay, Belize, Cozumel, Sea Day #3, and The End. I also made some dividers to divide the photos into sections. And then I made some divider cards to use within each section. One for photos chosen for possible scrapbook page and one for the photos that will go in the photo album.

The next thing I did was to sort the photos by the date, if printed on the back of the photo, and image number found on the back of the photo. The image number from the cell phones are different from the ones we took from our camera. Cell phone photos start with IMG_ while our camera photos start with P. Once they were all sorted, a made 3 separate image lists: one for cell phone photos, one for camera photos, and one for the photos we purchased from our excursion to Dolphinaris in Cozumel.

The only think left to do was to put the photos in the shoe boxes and start to decide which ones belong in which sub-category. But that will be in the next installment… maybe.

This has been a very time consuming process, but one that I think will be beneficial. Why? Since dementia runs in the family, I will have written documentation of who was on the trip with us. I know this will be very beneficial for my mom!

2018 Vista Project – installment 1: all the photos, so many photos.

Everyone loves a good project, right. Well I will be starting a project that is long overdue.

In 2018, we went on a 4-generation family cruise. For some time, I have been sitting on all of the photo’s I have ordered. Some are to be shared, some are for scrapbook pages, and some are just for the heck of it. I have even purchased scrapbook albums to put the photos and scrapbook pages in. And yet, they sit here, taking up room in my very cramped craffice.

Now this is a lot of boxes with nothing but photo’s in them. I love Shutterfly and would recommend to anyone and everyone.

Two LARGE boxes with Scrapbook Albums in them were purchased at hobbylobby.com when there was a 50% off sale. I love Hobby Lobby and I love a great sale!!!! Unfortunately I do not remember who wants which album. Oh well, they will get what they get!!!!

The time has come to something done with the chaos created by these photos. My plan is to go though all of the photos and decide if they are scrapbook page material or photo album material. the ones for scrapbook pages will go in one stack while the others will be in a box of the person they should go to.

Some photos have 5 copies of it. Why 5? One for my mom, one for my daughter, one for each of my granddaughters (2), and one for myself. Obviously, with that many photos, this could take a while, but I hope not.

Somehow I stumbled across 4 envelopes of photos from Shutterfly that I apparently have not gone thru. Most likely, these photos were taken by other family members. In any case, I guess that means I will be reviewing them and putting them with the section they should be in. This is going to be fun.

My plan at the moment is to work on it daily until I receive the photos and scrapbook for a special project for my mom. Once that special project is finished, I will return to the 2018 Vista Project.

Wish me luck and please follow along with this project.

Carnival Breeze 2022 – Reservations made

We currently have seven weeks to go!!! I fully aware that these weeks will fly by!!! But at least there are a few things I do not need to worry about!!!

Parking reservation was made on September 11th. We will be using Port of Galveston SMP Parking Garage located at 150 Rosenberg Street. It is conveniently located across the street from the pier. Of course, our return trip could have us at the terminal 2. It is still within walking distance. We used this facility the first time in August when we sailed on the Carnival Vista. The only drawback was the elevator not working. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the elevator will be fixed by February.

I did have an issue with hotel reservations. Let me start of by saying, I use Hotels.com for my hotel bookings. I have never had a problem and the issues were all mine, not theirs in any way, shape for form.

On September 11, I booked a one-night stay at Hotel Galvez, located at 2024 Seawall Boulevard. This is a hotel that is on my bucket list, mainly because it is haunted. I was looking forward to staying there, but then I started doing some research. Although the reviews are great, I just did not feel comfortable with having to pay extra for parking. And some of the reviews said the rooms are rather small.

So on September 17th, I cancelled my reservation for Hotel Galvez and booked Inn at the Waterpark located at 2525 Jones Drive. They had a great rate and I thought I would be okay with not having an ocean/gulf view. And any other time, especially if we had our grandkids, it would probably suit our needs better. So, I kept thinking about staying at the Inn at the Waterpark while still checking rates on Hotels.com.

Finally, on October 1st, the hotel/inn that we have stayed at before had a rate I was happy with. So, I cancelled the Inn at the Waterpark and booked our stay at Quality Inn located at 5924 Seawall Boulevard. It is a very basic place but it definitely fits our needs for a comfortable place to sleep.

Now I feel much better about our pre-cruise accommodations and have no plans to make any changes.

I have made reservations for Jim and I to have dinner at Fahrenheit 555 Steakhouse on embarkation day! I am definitely excited about this. I have already decided that the clothes we will be wearing to dinner that night will be in our carry-on, just in case our checked bag(s) do not arrive in time for our 6:30 dinner reservation.

I have also made reservations for a beach club in Cozumel. This is a new place for us and for the price, it is definitely worth checking out. Bonus: It is within walking distance for Puerta Maya cruise terminal. I do not know if the rates in the photo are still available.

Please come back next Monday to read about my pre-cruise Amazon purchases so far.