Dreamers prepare for the holidays

Sam is stressing over being able to buy me anything for the holidays.  I don't care.  Really I don't.  I don't know how many times I've tried to explain to him that I have everything I want and need.

Does he not see that having a loving husband and a loving son are enough?  Does he not see that our life together is enough?  Does he not see how happy I am...most of the time?

There are days that the pregnancy hormones kick my butt.  It's true.  There are days that I get tired and worn down.  Who doesn't?  At the same time, I'm thrilled with my life.  I love the possibility.  I have hope that things will improve.  I don't put a deadline on this.

How could I?

Instead, I just keep plugging along.  Even as we struggle, I like this life so much.  Sure, we don't go away all the time like I did with the ex.  It doesn't matter.  I even love staying in with him.  It's nice being happy at home...even as we dream of one day having a beach home.  That's on our list.

So, once again we are looking at a Christmas light on stuff, but heavy on love.  I'm baking with love.  (Yes, I keep baking supplies on hand at all time.)  And I'm cleaning under duress.  (There are way better uses of my time.)  And I'm making this holiday bright with love and laughter and cookies.

We have a family gathering Christmas Eve at Mawmaw's.  I'm looking forward to seeing the family.  And eating.  Family gatherings involve food!  I'm looking forward to coming home Christmas Eve and snuggling into bed.  (He's been super good at that lately.)  And then on Sunday, Keenan will be home for Christmas and the rest of the vacation.

Nothing can ruin this holiday.  Nothing.  It's never been about stuff for me.  It's about being with those I love.  And in that department, I couldn't be more blessed.

Meet the anti-zilla

Behold the UFOs...

Oh, and that would be me.

Know what makes me the anti-Bridezilla?

Just this.  For starters.

This is what Sam wants to wear to get married.  And I don't mind.  Oh, sure, when I was younger I would have.

But now I'm older and wiser.

I know that the ceremony should be special for us.  I don't care if no one else likes it.  I don't care if everyone thinks it strange or crazy.  We are marrying for us.  And I care so much less about the ceremony than I do the marriage.

So, the outfit is a nod to his rave days.  And my outfit is a nod to my love of our beach bound future plans coupled with my nod to hos Irish heritage.  We'll be rocking the black and white.

Most importantly of all, however, is that we will be comfortable.  We will be relaxed and happy.  We will be ourselves.

This isn't a show.  We aren't dressing to impress.  We're committing to forever together in our own special unconventional way.  And I'm good with that.

I'm so good with that...it surprises me.  Age and experience have put all of this in perspective for me.  And nothing is going to dampen this experience.  Nothing.

Life is good.

Plan Sea...still

I'm not giving up. I've listened to your comments. I've listened to my heart. Plan Sea is still a go.

So, I'm making arrangements with the owner. I need to secure the boat. Nothing has changed as far as I'm concerned. I'm going ahead.

There will be more sailing lessons. I'm really excited about them. The next one was supposed to be a trip to Georgia. I'm really looking forward to it. Why wouldn't I?

I need adventure. I need new experiences. And I can still do that, with or without Sam.

It's funny, but just like I learned with my ex, I'm the one making things happen. I'm the one that has propelled our life in the direction I want to go. I don't need someone else to hold me back or affirm by decisions. I can do this.

And so Plan Sea will proceed. I've spoken to Matt, the dock master, and he assures me that I can spend long weekends on the boat without any problems. And I have been applying for Charleston jobs. And I know that with summer fast upon us, it is imperative that I get moving on learning to sail. I'll be able to sail over to the kids in Myrtle and spend the weekends with them. I can't wait.

Life is going on, just as it should. I'm getting on with my life, just as I should. I don't need a new dream. I just needed to rework my existing dream. And I have. Dream on.

It's coming together

Our passports arrived. We've started sailing lessons. The boat looks like it is actually going to work out. Amazing how a weekend can change so many things.

And because I was feeling so good about it, I contacted the marina. Cooper River Marina is actually perfect for us. We have showers and wi-fi, a mini store, power, and they will sign for packages...which is really great coming from someone who gets A LOT of packages.

So, I contacted the dock master yesterday to find out about the packages. That's when he said that there's a five year waiting list on liveaboard spaces.

I am confused. The boat is already in a liveaboard space. And I pretty much figured that the space conveyed. Now I don't know.

More waiting. I asked him to call me back. Prior discussions were via email. We'll see.

Yet another snafoo. I've come to expect them. Trying to roll with the punches.

On the bright side, we're selling more stuff from the house. We'll be using it to pay for the boat until my money arrives.

Hear ye! Hear ye!

*tooting horns*

By Sam's decree, we will be buying the boat we agreed to buy. *whew*

I talked to a friend last night...

me: It doesn't work to fight with him.

Carrie: Well, what can you do?

me: Normally, I just let him come the right conclusion on his own. He always does. It just takes time.

Our plan isn't as on course as I'd like. We're probably going to be here longer than I'd like, but his reasoning is relatively sound. He wants us to save more money. And he hopes that we will have the money to buy a better boat before we sail off too far.

Fingers crossed, we'll have that better boat.

Personally, I think that will be harder to save the money we need given the high overhead of living in the house. At the same time, we're not ready to sail off. We don't even know how to sail yet. Our passports haven't arrived yet.

And then there's the body...my body. It's not sailing ready either.

I'm hoping that once I'm out of work, I'll have the time to work out more. I'll have time to eat right. It's worked before.

So, we're working on learning to sail. And I'm still building the company. And with some luck, and time, and patience, we'll be setting sail before winter.

I'm not so sad as I thought I'd be, I know that he's my anchor. I'm his compass. Together, we have stability and foresight. We'll be just fine.

One if by land. Two if by sea.

It's two.

Brace yourselves. This is the plan.

We're buying a sailboat.

Nope. I don't know how to sail. Nope. Sam doesn't, either.

But we're about to learn. We aren't complete idiots. We have some free lessons in the works. And we have been doing tons of research.

We're going to sail the Caribbean. Seriously.

Blue water has been our dream forever. And you can't get more blue water than you can by sailing on a boat. Makes sense, right?

And adventurers that we are, we're going to visit every place that our heart desires. We'll start with a small boat and eventually upgrade as we have more money.

Here's the beauty of the plan. I can earn all the money we need with the new company. We've checked the budget. And it looks like the average cruisers spend around $1000 per month to survive.

Imagine how much money we can put away with that cost of living. Yeah, we should be doing really well really soon.

We're downsizing our life, in some ways. We're selling off everything. It will be the first time I haven't owned a car in 20 years. Strange, huh. And yet really exciting. We're going to try new things...like diving and underwater photography. We're going to simplify. No time schedule...for the most part. No excess. Enjoying the bounty of the ocean.

Sam is going to learn to eat fish. I am going to have to remember how to clean it. And he has promised me lobsters. Yes, plural.

It's going to be a whole new way of life. And we're really excited about it. This is why I named the blog what I did. This is the kind of life I have always dreamed of.

Don't bother trying to kill this dream. Don't even think of trying to talk us out of it.

We're contacting potential sponsors while we prepare the boat for the journey. And we're working on lining up advertisers for the new site. This...all while we work on unloading our stuff and tying up loose ends here.

I'm exhausted and I've never been so happy.

So, go ahead, let the questions begin...

So much for lazy Sundays while pursuing dreams

We used to have wonderfully lazy Sundays. I'm sure we will once more, but for now...it's more nose to the grindstone Sundays. It's our last hours of productivity together Sundays. Its gotta get it done Sundays.

*sigh*

And that's okay. I can look at the big picture. It's more like a huge picture.

We have an entire house of furniture and stuff to unload. It's not easy. We're selling a bit here and a bit there. The spare vanity we had in the shed sold last Sunday. The patio set and umbrella sold on Wednesday. And we sold some odds and ends...not even a drop in the bucket...yesterday.

Still, the money gets put away as we prepare for the next leg of our adventure. Soon enough this plan is going to be put on steroids. In the mean time, I have to spend every waking minute working.

I have a web designer creating a site for my new career. We are meeting again tonight because I have changed up the design. Right now, as up in the air as my life is, working with me is a bit of a nightmare.

It took Sam telling me not to cut costs on this project to get me to accept the price tag a good website comes with. It's about three times what I wanted to spend. Dammit.

And I'm buddying up to Craig again. I'm all...Hey, Craig...can I stick my prime junk on your list? Will you find me a buyer with deep pockets who isn't going to try to beat me down too much on price? Pretty please!

So far, Craig needs to work a little harder at filtering out the riffraff. Seriously.

Still, I can't complain. The excitement of what we have going on still has not worn thin. Our patience with each other and the situation has held remarkably well. And we still both like and love each other. Yay!

This is only the tip of the iceberg. I have no doubt that life will get much harder before it gets easier. There's going to be a lot of give and take, a lot of negotiating, a ton of hard work.

We're play big or go home people. We'll do the work. We'll put in the time. The payoff is huge.

A moment of quiet...

Last night I could hardly haul myself to bed, I had so many ideas just running through my head. I was still considering our travel plans. We have discussed so many options. This morning, I can barely get focused. I have to get centered and fast!

And I've just realized that we're about to get a lot more interesting. That's for sure. As much as I want to spill my guts and just share all about our plans, I know that if I do...someone is going to pop up and just ruin it.

There will be some well-meaning soul who will make us doubt or second-guess our choices. While I am really impulsive, I have Sam to help me through it. Sam is the voice of reason. He's the Ying to my Yang. And I'm the light to his dark. It works.

Every time I make a suggestion about our plans, he reels me in, hauls me back. (I keep wanting to call it a trip when in fact it is actually an entire change of life and scenery, a departure from everything and everyone we know.)

Sam is the money guy. It's good. It's better that it isn't me. We know how I roll. I somehow believe that life and hope and a healthy dose of optimism will provide. And the problem is that I have so many years of dumb luck and support to prove it that it is hard to truly refute my belief.

I am resourceful. I am resilient. I am...clearly trying to convince myself that I can handle anything. Only...mostly I can.

And so I have to go back to work. It's Happy Yard Sale Day! We are selling it all. Bit by bit. It won't take long for the neighbors to figure it out. It won't take long for the world to know.

We have a big life ahead of us. We'll be leaving soon. It could be anywhere from two to six months. Sam is getting antsy. Now that we're selling stuff, he wants to go right now.

I find that to be very encouraging. Even more, he's trying to learn how to do what I do. It's the business end of our life that we're working so hard on. We can't have the dream without some money to make it happen.

Hoping the winds of change continue to blow some luck our way.

The preparations are well under way...

Yesterday we waited in line for an hour outside of the passport office. We were the first in line. When we set our minds to something, we don't play.

Once inside, as prepared as we were, everything fell apart. Yup. The passport papers we filled out after downloading from online were out of date. We had to start over. I filled the information out as quickly and neatly as possible. I didn't want to lose our place.

Then we discovered there were fees that we didn't anticipate. Luckily, Sam had money on his debit card to cover us. Yes, money has been thistight lately.

Still, we walked away after a mere twenty-five minutes with the comfort that our passports would be arriving in 4-6 weeks. Yay! And then...we would be so much closer to being on our way.

In the mean time...we are getting ready for the big yard sale tomorrow morning. Here's hoping that goes well. We're selling...pretty much everything.

It won't go in one foul swoop. We know this. And we are anticipating at least one more yard sale and maybe two more estate sales, in addition to the sales on Craigslist.

It's so exciting.

It's like the ultimate in exfoliating experiences. Only, instead of sloughing off dead skin, we're sloughing off our old life, getting ready to expose a brand spanking new one.

Sam has been musing about this plan of ours lately.

Sam: I'm tired of this place. I'm ready for something new. Why would anyone stay the same place their entire lives?

Tons of people do it. Before me, he probably would have been among them. Most of my family has lived in the same town FOREVER.

Oh, but I like our new ten year plan. And after I reveal what we have in the works, I'm thinking you'll like our new ten year plan, too.

Just give me a few days...maybe a week. Then, I'll divulge just about everything.

And in the meantime, fingers crossed that we have a kick ass yard sale.

Happy Passport Day!

Yup. That's what today is all about.

We're going to be heading out shortly to work on getting our much needed passports. It's something that we have been discussing for some time, but now with our future on steroids...we must go NOW.

See, our life is getting busier and busier. Our time schedule for departure is up in the air based on so many factors out of our control. The only thing we can do is prepare.

So, every day we prepare a little more. We plan a little more. We are doing loads of research.

And I have to tell you...I'm dying to tell you. I really want to Tweet and Facebook and just share our plans all over the web.

But I can't yet.

I'm afraid.

Silly, huh?

These words seem ridiculous coming from a woman who moved 1000 miles in the dark of night with two children depending on her and a pittance to support them. It isn't that I'm afraid of what we're planning. No, that part is wholly exciting.

I'm afraid to speak the words aloud and somehow jinx the plan. I'm afraid that if I speak about it, somehow, it will all blow up in my face and never come to fruition.

Soon. Really soon.

I will gladly reveal all because that's the purpose of this blog. This is the spot I haven't told my friends and family about. This is where I can openly discuss without fear of my dream killers.

But for now...passports.