A year of fun...

Sarah and I recently celebrated our one year anniversary!  Sarah has been sick pretty frequently this past year and has been to the ER a number of times.  I decided to go big for this celebration because she has been faithful and strong through all of the medical problems and she just deserved a break.  We went on a cruise to Grand Turk, Half Moon Cay island, and Nassau in the Bahamas.  We left from Miami and this first picture is the view of Miami from our departure.  Amazingly, we didn't have any trouble with our flight from Boston to Miami.  That, I believe, is a first for Sarah. 


After a lengthy boarding process...we finally made it to our room.  On advice from friends we did go for a room with some type of windows.  This is the "lowest" level room you can get with port-hole windows.  Ultimately, we spent very little time in our room but it was great to be able to have natural light in the mornings.  We decided that we would have felt a bit crazy without and light for five days!

Day 1 - Miami
Here I am in the room.  We had a king size bed, tv, love seat, and plenty of closet space.  I guess it would have been nice to have windows that you could open, but our room served us well.

Every night, when we got back to our cabin, we got a little surprise from our housekeeper.  Carnival apparently makes these little animals out of towels and uses them to welcome you back after a long day of fun!

Day 2 - Fun Day at Sea 

On one night of the cruise, we had to dress formally.  We had a good time at dinner but it took a few rounds of asking people to take our picture before we got a good one.  Sarah is very photogenic, but my face kept being obscured by shadows, and people kept taking blurry pictures.  It was nice of them to try though.  

Day 3 - Grand Turk, Turks and Caicos



Our first stop was Grand Turk, Turks and Caicos.  The beaches here were beautiful and the weather was perfect.  We decided to go power snorkeling here because there is a 7000 foot drop off in the ocean floor that we could swim out and see.  For those of you that know me, I am ridiculously afraid of the ocean and all that could be in it...so going to the edge of the abyss was a big step for me. 

This is the beach that we left from to snorkel.  Our guides were really nice and showed us quite a bit.  The lead guide was giving us the lecture about how this is a natural coral reef and not Sea World and we might not see anything.  He said "you'll definitely see fish and if we're lucky we might see turtles, sea stars and possibly barracudas.  He made sure to say that barracudas are not aggressive, but are naturally curious and may get right up in your face. 

Us in the boat, getting ready for adventure. 

 Here's Sarah underwater.   

 And here's my best friend.  Immediately after I jumped in the water, this barracuda was in my face.  I have a bit of a fear of sharks, but this guy was just as bad.  I put my flippers toward him to try and scare him off, but he just followed our group the whole time.   I kept an eye on him.

This is me (Dan) trying to dive to the bottom.  We were in about 35 feet of water and I got close.  The problem, however, was that I had to equalize the pressure in my ears about 3 times on the way down and that slowed my momentum...oh well.

After our snorkeling adventure we hit up Margaritaville.  This place was pretty cool.  They had a huge pool with a swim up bar.  The drinks were obviously over-priced, but you go there for the ambience. 

Sarah with her Pina Colada.

Me with a banana-something-or-other.

 Face of fun!!! Sarah didn't want hers on the blog.

Day 4 - Half Moon Cay, The Bahamas

We woke up at Half Moon Cay (Little San Salvador Island) which is owned by the cruise line.  As a result, it was like being on an extension of the ship.  We used our cruise cards to get food, which did make things easier.

While we were here we went on another scuba adventure, but we got to hold a few different types of sea creatures: Stingray, Sea Star, Conch and Sea Cucumber...hope you're ready for the first one.  A sea cucumber is about as close as I believe I will ever come to holding poop.  It was warm and a mix of squishy and firm.  Very weird.

Sarah's face says it all.

Sea Star - one of Sarah's favorites.

After our sea creature adventure we ate lunch and then went to the beach.  Unfortunately, a storm starting rolling in....but it was cool to watch.  After a few minutes of watching we decided to just go back to the ship, since it was obviously going to be storming for a while.  When we got to the transport boat the waters were very rough and the boat took a while to get docked up with the ship.  We moved across the walkway while it was shifting up and down by a good two feet. 

Amazingly, about ten minutes after we got back on the ship, the island needed to be evacuated.  For the next two hours the ferry back to the ship was completely packed and traveling in the rain.  We missed that...and I can't tell you how happy we were to be in our cabin, showering, and happy:)

Day 5: Nassau, The Bahamas

The final destination on the cruse was Nassau.  Sarah had actually been here about a year and  a half earlier with Liz Z!  She knew that she wanted to show me the Atlantis resort, so we headed straight there.

Those of you who know me, probably know that I don't do well with stressful situations and will just walk away to calm down.  The taxi system at the terminal cause me to go into stressed-Dan world.  We had 3 cabbies trying to get us in their respective cars...so I just walked away.  About ten minutes later I calmed down and found a good guy to take us to the resort.  We only lost 10 minutes, but my mind was at ease...which meant I didn't annoy Sarah, so it was a plus for all:) 

We walked through part of the resort, which was immaculate, and then headed straight to the beach.  We spent a few hours there, getting some sun, and then headed to a local place for lunch.  We tried to get things that wouldn't make Sarah sick, as well as some local beers.  Bahamian beer - good taste, but not much body.  We made sure to buy some rum cakes to bring back.  

We spent some time walking through the marina near the resort and saw the most ridiculous yachts, ever.  The yachts were so big that they had smaller boats and cranes on the deck.  The biggest one we saw had two jet skiis, a small boat, and a life raft on the deck...with plenty of room to spare.  The giant Chicago Blackhawks emblem on the side of the "bridge" made me think it could have been an owner of the hockey team.  Who knows.

I'm not the best with words, but we had a great time.  It was wonderful to celebrate our anniversary together and in such a memorable way.  We loved it.  Thank you all for your friendship, support, and prayers over the past year.  In the words of my best friend Kara: "One down, one hundred to go!"

The Big Move

Well...we are about two months behind in blogging...so get ready for a Draeger rush over the coming days!  We finally said "good bye" to the east coast in late July.  It was extremely difficult to leave all the people we have called family for so long, but it was a needed change for us.  The move didn't start well at all.  When I went to pick up the truck, I was told that I wouldn't be able to get it until 1pm, but the movers were coming at 11am.  A lady at Pep Boys haphazardly rented me the truck and I ended up getting a car trailer instead of a car dolly - which is quite a bit longer.  Overall, I got the truck an hour late and the total length of the beast ended up around 37 feet...Wowsa!

 Here I am, proud man with the truck!

 Our last DD stop before we hit the road:(

 What's that you say?  There's a thunder/lighting storm in the middle of no where in New York?  Oh, and a tornado warning?!?!  Well then....I think its about time that your trailer tire explodes.  So here's what happened.  We're driving along and Sarah notices that a semi truck is pacing us.  We look over and he's motioning to the back of the truck mouthing "You have a flat tire!"  Obviously we pull over and here's what we see...

 As you can imagine...that sucks.  A few minutes later, we find out from Sarah's mom that there is a tornado warning in the area.  We are literally in the middle of no where.  Meanwhile, I'm on the phone with Budget.  They are going to contact the closest tire repair place and have them meet us to fix the flat.  They hang up and tell me that they will notify me when they find someone who can come.  THEN, the floodgates opened up.  It was ZERO visibility around us and we are parked on the side of I-69.  I decided that I needed to go get the flares and light them so that no one plows into us while we're sitting there.  I jumped out and was drenched by a ridiculous wall of rain.  I got the flares out of the trunk and spent about five minutes trying to light them.  No go.  I was complete soaked through and just got back in the truck.  We just had to wait for the repair man to show up.

 Eating some chips.

 Here he is.  This guy came out in the middle of the storm and with two pry-bars he removed the old tire and put a new one on.  It only took him about 20 minutes to get us on the road again and he was very nice.  We got back on the road and found out that a tornado touched down and ripped some roofs off of buildings about five miles behind where we were stuck.  We ended up getting to Elyria OH about three hours late.  We slept for 7 hours and got right back on the road.  The trip from OH to MI went smoothly, but we got round two of the storm literally as we exited the interstate into Grand Rapids, MI.  We had to check-in to our apartment and unload the car from the trailer in another ridiculous downpour.  

In the end, we are happy with our apartment, despite a few quirks.  I have a good commute to work and it's nice to be Sarah's family.  We have taken on the yard work and odd jobs for one set of grand parents, but Sarah's been pretty sick so we haven't spent a lot of quality time with people yet.  That'll change soon though:)

The Draegers Invade NYC

Before we leave Boston, we are trying to visit as many people as we can.  This past weekend we went to visit Carrina (Sarah's former roommate from Boston) and her her boyfriend Adam.  They live in Astoria, just 9 short subway stops from Times Square in Manhattan.  Carrina lives right on Astoria Blvd, which is a pretty busy street, but it wasn't very loud inside.

We left Boston at 5pm on Friday, which was taking a pretty big chance of getting caught in traffic.  It did end up taking us almost an hour to get to the Worcester area - about 40 miles.  After that it was pretty smooth sailing, except for the torrential rains and the ridiculous drivers going 40 mph on the interstate.  We crossed the Triboro Bridge (RFK Bridge) about 9:35 and spent about 10 minutes looking for a parking space.  Carrina eventually came out to stand in a spot in front of her apartment while we circled back around to park.  We hung out for a while that night and Sarah and I made plans to visit an old friend from Boston while Carrina was at work.

Little Sarah in the Big Apple

My friend, Kara is a manager with Starbucks near Times Square, so Sarah and I went down early to do some shopping and get a drink before we met her.  Sarah ended up finding an orange dress at GAP on super-sale.  That made both of us happy:)  You'll see her wearing said dress in later pictures.

After hanging out with Kara, Adam and Carrina met us downtown and took us to the High Line.  This place was awesome!  It is a park created on an old elevated train line running mostly parallel to 10th ave.  There is a decently wide walking trail and many varieties of plants and flowers.  It was pretty cool to see.

Sarah enjoyed seeing all of the water towers on most of the buildings.

Adam and Carrina. 

Bench.

 On Sunday morning we all went back into Manhattan to meet up with Kara, her boyfriend Brendan and Karl Vanderwoude (VW for short).  We went to a place called Southern Hospitality for brunch...co-owned by....Justin Timberlake.  It was amazing...pulled pork for brunch, check.  After that we all went to another restaurant where almost everyone indulged in a Bulldog.  This is a crazy concoction of a margarita, a shot of tequila, and a corona.  If you reacted the same way to that as I did, I ask you to hold your judgement.  The beer and margarita actually blended quite well.

After that, there was nothing to do but say our good-byes.  It was a short trip but we saw quite a bit and hung out with a lot of good friends.  We're are very glad that we got to go back to NYC before we left.

We made sure to get a shot of the Triboro Bridge from the subway platform on Astoria Blvd.  Nice sunset surrounded by tons of concrete and steel.  We liked NYC for a few days but being there always reminds us that we do not want to live in big city!  

Memorial Day Barbecue

For Memorial Day we had a bunch of our friends over for a BBQ and Just Dance Party.  It was a ton of fun and we had a lot of laughs. Thanks to the DeMuths, Puetzs, and Englehart/Passenos for coming over!

Many of the ladies spent time outside.

Not to be outdone (by anyone), Asher was rockin' the sweet fishing hat.

Of course, Buddy got in on that action.  He wouldn't sit still so the hat flipped up "Gilligan style".

Pete and Deb - oh yes, they got into it.

Having Tyson there was like having "Wedding Tyson" in your house for five hours.  He definitely danced almost non-stop and did rack up the highest score of the day. 

The ladies showing the guys how it's done, Brittany Spears style.

Deb, Monica and Ty doin' it Beyonce style.

This might be the only time Tyson sat down.

Sarah and I doing our favorite dance.  "Promiscuous Girl"

Toward the end of the night, they guys challenged the ladies to a dance off.  The guys won in decisive fashion.  As you play the game, you earn 'stars' for how well you mimic the dance...we routinely beat the ladies by two or three stars.  As an added incentive, we were trying to make it to 1000 cumulative stars since buying the game seven months or so ago.  I kept pushing people to keep playing because I wanted to see what would happen at 1000 stars.  Well, no one else was as dedicated as I was and they all left at 955 stars or so.  Sarah, being the amazing wife that she is, kept dancing with me.  We made it to 1002 stars AND nothing happened.  No extra song or new dance, not even a "Way to go!".  It was deflating.  I tried to post a video of one of the dances...but it didn't work.  I'll try again later.