Matrimonio, Pura Vida style

Woohoo! All that is left are a few more days of kwanzaa, new years, a niece’s birthday, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s birthday, another niece’s birthday… and then our wedding!!

I hope everyone had a great holiday, whatever you celebrated.

I got to see my first live Portugese Man-O-War over the weekend. I have seen them preserved in jars before but the chemical fixatives bleach out the gorgeous color. I took the largest one washed up on the beach back out to the water. It isn’t an individual organism but rather a colony of organisms. It moved like one unit on the sand struggling for water and that is deceptive. I got a couple of small nematocyst strikes but nothing major, they tickled more than anything else. However you need to be careful of these guys.

Here are two pics of the Man-O-War from the weekend… remember them for Costa Rica. You most likely will not encounter one… but those long tentacles on the underside are a sure give-away! If you get any sort of jellyfish sting down there we will have vinegar to put on it to help neutralize the effects.

Besides the critter we found something else pretty cool that day. Terry decided to pose with a Red Ryder BB Gun (a la A Christmas Story) while ducking in from the rain at an outdoor store.

Christmas itself was awesome. We planned to sleep out on the grass Christmas Eve but a steady rain sent us inside about an hour after we fell asleep. We went for a workout in the park on Christmas morning. Afterwards we were hungry and stopped at a Dunkin’ Donuts for bagel sandwiches then came home for mimosas and clementine cake. Here is Terry still in workout gear sitting with our X-mas morning feast spread around him.

After food and a bottle of champagne it was present time. My stocking is the one fashioned from a Target bag. His is the one I put together in a few minutes with hemming tape. They are both goofy hanging out with the Christmas orchids. All right, there are no Christmas orchids. We simply didn’t care enough to want a Christmas tree this year.

We both got some sweet loot this holiday. Terry had some surprises in his stocking as did I. He got us a nice sized sample of some Fresh Cannabis Santal for the wedding (our gender neutral wedding fragrance). He also gave me a Michael Michaud Sage necklace. This was really surprising because this is what I wanted to wear with the first wedding dress I picked out. We are both fans of Michael Michaud’s work.

Have a great New Year everyone. Be safe and make merry.