Bruce's Birthday

Bruce's birthday was over a month ago but it seems like the celebrating has been nonstop.  Like I said when we both turned 70, the older we get the more we get to celebrate, right?  And it goes on and on...besides a lovely day here with Lauren in town on his actual birthday where we had dinner at a family favorite at La Rustica 

we also went on another cruise per Bruce's birthday request.  Our anniversary cruise was so fun in May that he wanted to go again only this time we took a cruise to Hawaii.  We booked it on the same ship because we really love the Celebrity Edge, a relatively new-ish ship that has a lot of nice features we like such as spacious cabins with lots of storage area, a French bistro with top notch coffee, and four different dinning rooms to choose to eat in each evening (as well as the "speciality" ones, of course).  This time, the Edge was repositioning to Australia instead of going to Alaska.  Now that the Alaska cruise season is over, the ships all reposition to other parts of the world for winter cruises.  We cruised as far as Hawaii and then we flew home from Honolulu for a total of 10 days on the ship.  We love "sea days" so on repositioning cruises, you get a lot of sea days with a lot more activities on the ship. We developed a pretty good routine on board with all the activities they offered.  We would attend an exercise class each morning which was very invirgorating outside on the deck of the ship. 

I would take advantage of their outdoor track to get my daily 5 miles in either before or after the exercise class.

Then I would grab a quick breakfast, go take my shower, head to our ukulele lessons which was offered since we were cruising to Hawaii.   I brought my ukulele on the trip, of course, so I could play everyday on the ship and having a group lesson with lots of people was even more fun.  Bruce was thrilled, too, to learn ukulele with a lot of beginners and I had fun practicing my "noodling" with the beginning songs.  Then we got to participate in the ship's talent show in the theater.  

We made a lot of friends in this ukulele group and looked forward to seeing everyone each day and even had dinner together with some of them.  There were three Polynesian embassadors onboard who taught our lessons plus various other activities so they really got everyone into the Hawaiian mood heading to Hawaii. 

Since it was Bruce's birthday cruise, the dinning room personnel gave him a special birthday cake after dinner the first evening and sang happy birthday to him. It was a nice way to start our 10 day cruise. 

They even gave Bruce his favorite carrot cake, too.  Of course, he also got one at home on his actual birthday. 

We had a minor hiccup in our itinerary on this cruise since there was a hurricane near Hawaii, Hurricane Nolo.  Instead of stopping at a couple of the ports, the coast guard had closed them so we had to add two more sea days instead which was fine with us.  We've been to Hawaii multiple times so it was okay for us to skip that part.  But it was a little windy, nonetheless.  We weren't going to let a little hurricane dampen our fun. 

Despite a hurricane, we never saw remnants of it except for one very windy day. Everyday was gorgeous and we enjoyed every minute.

We never get tired of cruises, it's the ultimate relaxation vacation.  And we were certainly in relaxation-mode after this one.  

We returned home with one day of rest before three of my siblings started arriving in town to stay with us for another big birthday celebration; my sister, Barbara's, 80th birthday.  It turned out to be a family reunion of sorts with my siblings coming for a big "celebration of friendship" party that Barbara hosted at a local restaurant with around 50 people.  I gave a toast to my sister telling many stories growing up with her as her little sister. It was a very heartfelt moment.

So much for our relaxing vacation!  It was nonstop activites with my siblings here.  

We don't get together very often since everyone lives in various other cities so it's a big deal to see each other.  We had lots of good catching-up time together especially since three were staying with us.  We had to do a tourist favorite of riding the water taxi into town and doing some Seattle sightseeing on a beautifully, foggy day. 

We had several wonderful family meals together and celebrated my nephew's son's birthday, too. 

We also had to include a few dinners at our favorite restuarants including Anthony's on the waterfront

and the 74th St. Ale House that is in Barbara's neighborhood and another family favorite since we all love it. 

Now, I'm just wondering about these birthday celebrations.  Each year we celebrate more and more until by the time we turn 80, it's a super big deal.   When I was young, did I ever think I'd live this long?  Probably not. It's hard to imagine yourself not young when you're young.  But somehow, all of us (my siblings) are all retired now with Barbara the first to turn 80 and it's just a little hard to believe. But after putting together my toast about my sister and growing up in our family and everything she and I have done together and been through together, it's not your age that matters.  What the celebration is really about is the quality of the life you lived during those years.  And Barbara lives a high quality life and that alone is worth all the celebrating.  So, who cares about age?  It's just a number.  I just want to keep living a high quality life like my sister.  That's what really matters.  And that is something we need to cheer to and to celebrate.   Cheers to all our birthdays and to future ones, too.