MEXICO! (Finally)

Well, it took me a while (almost a month!) but I'm finally blogging about Mexico.  I have been waiting to try out picasa to upload the pictures and make one of those cool collages but I have a Mac and Google hasn't made a picasa version for macs.  So, here are some of the pictures with narrations below.

This is Kari and I on our first night there.  (A little side note: I am really good a taking pictures this way...my arms are the perfect length)  This picture was taken in front of the last picture on this blog.  It's called "The Ridge" and it's the more exclusive part of Playa Grande where we stayed.  You can only get up there if you have a special key (which we did!)

My brother, Kari, and I in a water taxi on our way to "The Office" which is a pretty cool place to eat...yummy food! (I have no idea why this font when blue and underlined...sorry.)

There is a putt putt golf course at Playa Grande and we played in flip flops and Troy played barefoot.  I had a hole in one but I also had a 10 on one of these holes...it was a tough course...can't you tell by the look on my face?
Did I mention the spa at this place was amazing?  The spa itself is two stories and this was on the 2nd story.  The pool I'm sitting in is a saltwater whirlpool.  You can sit in it forever and never get prunie...I tried...trust me.
We had dinner at this place called the Galeon.  Kari was in this picture but somehow I cut her out and haven't been able to put her back (sorry Kari!).  Troy didn't make it to dinner that night...he was having too much fun at the pool bar and never made it...oh well!  Kari and I had a great time eating YUMMY food and awesome coffees!
This is the view of our resort.  Putt putt is at the bottom and right above that is the saltwater whirlpool from before.  This was the nicest vacation I've ever been on and it was so amazing to spend a week with my brother.  He's going back again in November but that's peek time for volleyball (it's the same week as Nationals which we haven't been to in a while but could this year!)  I'll try to post some more pictures sometime soon...

Ooooh 24!

I've officially joined the "24" bandwagon.  My friend Steve, who I blogged about earlier this week with the torn quad tendon, has the whole series (through Season 5) borrowed on dvd and I watched the 1st episode tonight.  I am hooked!  I don't know why I've waited so long to watch this show!  I guess it's better to do it this way so now I can watch the episodes whenever I want (or whenever Steve gets done with a disc!).  I did the same thing with Sex and the City...only that was because I didn't have HBO.  I think I like watching shows like this, no commercials and pausing to figure out what is going on.  I guess I figured out what I'm doing for the rest of my summer!  24 hours is a lot of TV and then multiply that by 5?  Yikes, I'll be busy for a while!

My First Post with a Picture!

When I first starting reading people's blogs I thought "how lame that they didn't post pictures, no one will read them if they don't post pictures to go along with them!"  Well, I have a picture to go along with my blog today, it's when the kittens were younger but you can still see what they look like.  Sugar (brother) is on the left and Honey (sister) is on the right.

So, my funny story for the day...about my kittens.

Honey has a fascination with bags of all sorts...it could be paper, plastic, my laundry bag with freshly washed clothes that she has to dig through...she has no favorite.  So, today I had a Bella Casa bag and let her go to town.  I was in the other room when I hear her start to rustle through the bag...all of a sudden it gets louder and louder until her brother runs through the living room with his tail puffed out wider than I've ever seen it.  Followed close behind is his sister with a bag around her middle (I couldn't see her tail but judging by how fast she was moving she was scared).  I wondered what they were running from but then I come to realize that Sugar is running from his sister who is running from the bag that's attached to her!  I grab the bag but it only rips which scares them again.  I finally got the bag off of Honey (which I had to hold her down and rip the handle apart to get it off of her middle) but Sugar wouldn't come near her.  She tried to coax him but he just flared up and hissed at her like she was a freak.  (Wouldn't you if your sister came at your wrapped in a bag?!  I know I would!)  I think they made up before I had to leave...but it made for quite an eventful evening in the Gradek household!  

A Trip to the ER

I planned to post something about my trip to Mexico last week but that didn't happen because I was in the ER most of the afternoon because my friend and teaching partner, Steve, tore his quadriceps muscle and ripped off part of his kneecap.  You'd think there was some miraculous story about how it happened, like dodging a car or saving one of his boys...nope!  He did it while walking down the stairs...poor Steve!

The worst is over for him, he goes into surgery this afternoon and then it's a 3 month recovery.  Marilyn is the one who needs the positive prayers and thoughts right now since the rest of her summer is going to be spent taking care of her husband.  Poor Marilyn!

Before all the ER craziness I did get to go golfing.  I played the back nine of Michelbook and golfed a 51.  I had a chance to birdie 18 but choked and got par, not bad for me!  It would have been better than a 51 had I not blown up on hole 15 (I hit one into the woods and one into the water).  It was quite an eventful day, hopefully today won't end up as crazy!

The First of Many...I hope!

I am usually not one to jump on the ol' bandwagon but here I am...blogging.  Never thought I would.  I actually thought I would scrapbook before I did this.  Oh well, I guess that's how it goes when you are on summer vacation!  

Today my friend Erica and I played in a tennis tournament (it started yesterday) and we won!  The whole Maryanne!  It was pretty cool.  We went three sets with our opponents and I can honestly say it's because of our mistakes.  Had we not had so many I think we could have won in 2.  Either way, we had a great time...even with all the drama (they thought we had made some bad line calls and then proceeded to make a few nasty comments just loud enough for us to hear).  In the end it just fired Erica and I up more...even if one of our calls was bad (oops!).

Our final score was 7-5, 3-6, 6-3.  Not bad for my first tennis tournament!  I can't believe with all the volleyball I've played in my life that I've never played in a tennis tournament!  It was a lot of fun and a lot of heat (it was over 100 degrees on the courts both days we played!)

I will post pictures when Erica's husband sends them to me!