My Adventures of Cooking

Before I got married, I used to only liked to cook for parties or cookouts.  Now that I am married, I am trying to make more of a conscious effort to cook every day and expand my recipe repertoire.  I am pretty proud of my self.  I have made a pot roast all by myself which was pretty tasty and the Castro side of the family actually liked it!  I also have been using cook books I got for the wedding.  I also made chicken pot pies!  They were also very tasty!  Take a look at the before and after pics!

HONEYMOON!!!

Dave and I went on a 12 day cruise around the Mediterranean. We booked our cruise with Celebrity Cruise Lines on the Summit. Our cruise started in Venice, Italy and ended in Barcelona, Spain.

We flew into Venice and stayed there for 1 day before we boarded onto our ship. The first day in Venice was quite a culture shock. My first lesson was that 2 people with 5 pieces of luggage and a hotel on the other side of the canal is very difficult. After we managed to find our hotel, our next lesson was that in Europe, most hotels do not have elevators, and we counted 59 steps to our hotel room. Dave was a champ and carried all our luggage up all the stairs in 90 degree heat! THANKS BABE! Next lesson was a hard one for me. Public restrooms are very hard to come by. Restaurants and cafes had the only public restrooms, needless to say, Dave drank a lot of coffee in Europe so I had a bathroom to use!

Once we boarded our ship on our second day in Europe, our honeymoon was in full effect! Our ship was HUGE, our room was on the concierge level and was amazing with floor to ceiling sliding glass door to access our private veranda! The food was great, and entertainment was plentiful. We also saw the most beautiful sunsets! Here are some pictures of us and our ship:

We stopped in several ports along the Med. Then we visited the following ports and cities in the designated order:

• Venice, Italy: In Venice we rode a Gondola, had my first Italian Pizza and Gelato (the boat remained docked for the first day and actually left port the 2nd day on the ship)

• Dubrovnik, Croatia: We visited the Old Town of Dubrovnik and a Museum in a home of a local artist. I had my first fig ever and it was love at first bite!  We then had a large lunch in a home of one of the locals.
  

• Athens (Piraeus), Greece: We visited The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, The Acropolis, and Plaka, did some shopping and ate a traditional 5 course Greek meal which was YUMMMMY!

• Santorini, Greece: We first visited Village of Pyrgos where we had a taste of local Mezes and then walked around Fira Town were Dave and I sat on two of the many roof top cafes and admired the AMAZING views. We took a cable car back to the port to catch the tender back to our cruise ship.

• Naples, Italy: We visited Isle of Capri and Amalfi and the Amalfi Coast. We also had the opportunity to tour a Cameo Factory!
  

• Rome (Civitavecchia), Italy: We visited the Trevi Fountain, Pantheon, and The Vatican

• Florence (Livorno), Italy: We visited the Galleria Degli Uffizi, Ponte Vecchio, Il Duomo, Galleria dell' Academia, and we went to Pisa to see the Leaning Tower of Pisa

• Cannes, France: We toured Nice and Cannes)

• Barcelona, Spain: Once we left the ship, Dave and I spent 1 night in Barcelona where we had delish Tapas for dinner.  The picture of us was taken on our balcony of our hotel in the University District.
  

As you can see we were VERY busy. Overall we had a fabulous time but we were ready to head home as our dogs had been in the kennel for 15 days. They were excited to see us!

WE DID IT!

After a long and busy 9 months of planning, we finally tied the knot! The last couple of days or our engagment was very stressful but fun at the same time. We had many of our family and friends in town and tried to enjoy the time together. We had several pre-wedding activities before the big day. We managed a bachlorette/bachelor party, wedding shower, rehersal, rehersal, Ride the Ducks tour and a rehersal dinner within the short 3 days before the wedding. Then once the day of the wedding arrived, everything went off without a hitch. The whole day went as planned and to end the wonderful day, the hotel where we had our wedding (The Edgewater Hotel) hooked us up with the Penthouse suite! Dave and I were too excited about the room we couldn't sleep. We couldn't have asked for a better wedding!

p.s. stay tuned!!! When I get our wedding pictures back I will be posting them ASAP!