Reblogged June 7, 2019
I know, it’s been ages since I posted a blog and you’re shocked to be hearing from me now. Why don’t you make a cup of coffee or your favorite tea and come sit with me so we can catch up?
I could make up a bunch of excuses about how busy I’ve been (I fel like I’ve been living on fast forward for the past 8 months), but I think the main reason I haven’t written is because I’ve been emotionally drained and writing, even a blog post, comes from a place deep inside my being.
You’re probably sitting there thinking, “So, what changed?”
I wish I knew. It wasn’t anything specific and it didn’t happen overnight. Gradually, over the past couple of months, I have begun to feel a bit lighter in my spirit and the desire to sit at the keyboard has been tickling at my brain.
Since I haven’t had time to peruse any of the creative endeavors I have my eye on (making soap and bath bombs), it has been way too hot to do much in the garden, and I haven’t made many new recipes (although that is changing in the next few of weeks, stay tuned), I thought I would share with you about the trip I took to Ireland.
I’ve wanted to go to the lovely Emerald Isle for so long I don’t remember when the desire first filled my heart. I love history and I read all of Morgan Llywelyn’s historical fiction which I highly recommend. After I read 1916 I started reading Irish mythology and all kinds of other books by Irish authors or set on the island. My recent favorite is the Irish Country Doctor series by Patrick Taylor. More on that in a later post.
My best friend and I have talked about traveling together since we met in college. She had kids and general life stuff got in the way so that never happened. Last year the travel bug grabbed onto me and I started checking flights on Kayak every couple of weeks. Around late August I found a round trip flight for $340. I couldn’t believe it! I texted Tricia (whose youngest child graduated from college this past Mother’s Day) to see if she would be interested in going.
She was in, but something held me back from booking it right then. October rolled around and we still hadn’t made a reservation. I stopped to visit her on the way to Edisto Island, and we went online to check the flights again. They had dropped to $312 per person, round trip! We looked at each other, then at her husband, and said, “Should we?”
Craig, being the amazing husband he is told us to go ahead. He’s in the Navy and was going to be deployed at the time the flights were available for. I was still a tiny bit hesitant because the dates were in March and Tricia gets cold easy. That is probably what held me back in the first place. We looked at the tickets again, looked at each other and hit the purchase button.
We now had four and a half months to plan the trip. There were countless things each of us wanted to see and we only had 10 nights. Tricia lives in Georgia and I’m in Florida so we shared links over Facebook and had several video chats as we pinned down our final plans.
All this planning is part of the reason I’ve felt so rushed, but I was also planning a Christmas festival at my church at the same time and trying to launch my latest novel. I should have known I had bitten off more than I could chew, but in the end, most things worked out well.
The more we researched, the more we found we wanted to do, so I expect we will make another trip once my finances have recovered from this whirlwind. I’m glad we were able to take this journey and get a basic overview of the island. I wouldn’t have traded the experience for the world and I look forward to sharing it with you.
Please stop back by next week to learn all about the painful start to the trip. I’m thankful to a wonderful man we met before we even left Florida and a sweet couple who shared the trials with us from Reykjavik to Dublin.