JoyOfStamping

Have you ever had one of those PERFECT vacations?  Well, I sure did one month ago today…. and I am still on a high…..  this isn’t one of my normal “crafty” blog posts… just life… so hopefully you’ll stick around to this long blog post! 🙂

So, I have been an NKOTB fan since Jr. High…. like the kind with posters all over the bedroom wall from BOP or Teen Beat…. I thought I would marry Jordan Knight one day.  LOL!  Well, since they have gotten back together, sis and I have been going to concerts here in Southern California and we also went to one in Las Vegas.  We even saw them one year ago today in Anaheim.  After all these years, these guys still have “the right stuff”.  LOL!

Last summer, when NKOTB joined with BSB (backstreet boys), we brought 2 cousins with us to the concert.  I brought Krystl (we call her pop) to her first BSB concert when she was a young teenager since I knew what it was like to be in love with a boyband.  Well, my cousins ended up loving NKOTB, too.  We joked about going on the NKOTB cruise… but when it came down to it, we started getting serious about it…. really?  after all these years?  it would be like a once in a lifetime opportunity….  so, the day that the tickets went on sale, it was a stressful day….  every cabin package we were trying to get kept selling out in a matter of minutes.  panic took over…. but after a few stressful minutes and a few choice words, we got confirmation that we were going on the boat…. we had no idea what we booked… we just knew that we were going to be there.  That was back in August… so of course, as time went on, we sort of forgot that we were going on this cruise.  Not until 3 weeks before cruise did one of my cousins remind us that we still needed to book our flights to Miami… and “what???? we need to pack for ‘theme nights’?”

Us cousins hopped on a red eye to miami… we were so excited that we could barely sleep….

And how after such a long red eye flight did my cousin continue to look adorable?

We couldn’t wait to get on the boat…. we checked out our cabin and tried to figure out how 4 girls were gonna fit all of their stuff in one tiny cabin…. and we checked out our little balcony right away.

And first things first as soon as we left our cabin…. ice cream…. i don’t know what it is about me and carnival ice cream…. I have to have it all of the time.  definitely after every meal.  With the miami weather, we had to have it like 5 times a day.

after we got our ice cream, we were ready for the sail away party. we didn’t really know what to expect.  So, us 4 girls were looking for the girls we were gonna meet up on the lido deck…

holy cow…. 2800 all on the lido deck…. probably 2700 females and 100 guys.  us girls decided to just find a place where we could fit all 4 of us without “touching” anyone else… the hot sticky weather was definitely not something us SoCal girls were use to…. but when the guys came out, it didn’t matter how hot we were. we were SCREAMING like we were 12 year old girls again.  LOL!  one big party on that lido deck.  And the “love of my life” for 25 year ready to party with 2800 of us. 🙂

within 30 minutes of the party, donnie wahlberg decides to go into the crowd… and we were shocked that he was coming into our section…. out of the rows of people, he turned on our row.  as he was walking by, one of my cousins stops him to take a pic with him, then he drinks out of my other cousins drink and then takes a pic with us.  he was talking in this picture… but its all good… look how happy sis and i are.  LOL!  25 years of love for these guys!

The party ended since it was time for dinner and NKOTB squares where the guys and some of the crew played a game like “hollywood squares”.  totally funny and we were laughing through whole thing.

 

FIRST NIGHT‘s theme was “red carpet affair”.  everyone got dressed up so fancy.  look at my beautiful roommates looking all gorgeous!  It sure was windy that night, but we danced our @$$es off.  LOL!  The parties at night didn’t start until midnight and would go on until 3-4 in the morning.

The next day, it was time for Half Moon Cay.  NKOTB was going to be performing a concert on the stage in front of the ship.  It was such a beautiful island.  The water was absolutely gorgeous and so warm.

They guys were putting on a great show… sis gets hot and tells me “hey, I’m gonna take a dip in the water and I’ll be right back.”  She comes back after a couple of minutes and taps me on the shoulder… “let’s go watch the concert from the water!” so, us 4 girls head to the water and watch our favorite boy band perform while we enjoy the beautiful ocean blue.

 

Had a great time with the girls just hanging out on the beach and in the water… watching the beach games, talking, laughing, just being together.  We even ran into Danny Wood and got to take a photo with him. (I looked like a beach whale in the pic… 🙁 so i opted to omit it from this blog post. lol)

 

SECOND NIGHT‘s theme for the party was “up close and cuddly”, which pretty much meant PJ night.  There was also a fundraising event “dance for the cure”  for Danny Wood’s charity (Remember Betty). we were encouraged to wear pink since it was a breast cancer research fundraiser.

But before the party, Danny Wood performed by himself… just him and his guitar, singing and telling us stories of his life experiences… what he went through when his mother died from breast cancer.  He sang a song dedicated to her and there was not a dry eye in the house.

After Danny finished, they reset the stage, and it was time for Joe MacIntyre…. he performed for almost 2 hours.  More of his life story and his life experiences.  Talked about growing up in Boston.  Talked about his parents… he got a little emotional and again… not a dry eye in the house.  It was so awesome to hear what these guys have gone through and to hear their personal stories.

 

Saturday…. the most stressful day… the day of the group photos.  When you take your group photos, you have to be in a group of 10…. 2 for each guy…. you have to decide which 2 girls go with which 2 guys…. well, there were 6 of us in our group, which meant we needed to find 4 random girls… 1 danny girl, 1 jordan girl, 1 jon girl, and 1 joe girl… guess who had to look for these girls… me.  really?  they shyest one of the bunch?  so, I walked around asking people if they were already in a group and who they wanted to take pix with…. it took like an hour to find these girls… but it seemed like 10 hours.  so, needless to say, I was already sweaty by the time it was time for our group photo…. not only that… but I was actually going to get to TOUCH Jordan Knight….  LOL! really?  after 25 years? oh my!….  and like a dork… i tripped over his foot when I was going to take my place next to him for the picture.  lol.

All 5 guys were super sweet when we met them.  I didn’t have anything “clever” to say, so I just thanked each one of them for putting together this amazing event.  How could they party every night until 4 am and then be beautiful for the group photos that started at 10 am or concert that started at noon in the heat.

 

After our “high”, we had lunch with our new friends that we made taking our group photos. 🙂  We just walked around the ship and took silly pictures with cut outs of the guys…. and then… of course got more ice cream and just chatted on the lido deck.  Girl time… bonding… it was AWESOME!

 

NIGHT THREE‘s theme was “into the 90’s”.  I wasnt’ really sure what to wear for this night.  But, as I saw other girls… duh, flannel shirts with combat boots or 90210 or Britney Spears. Naughy by Nature was also on the ship with us as guest for 90’s night.  They did their thing and the crowd really enjoyed them, too!

But, of course, before the party, it was time for more individual performances by the guys.  Donnie did his thing, but we weren’t allowed to bring cameras for his event.  The next event was my absolute FAVORITE.  Jordan did a concert from his latest tour from his “Unfinished” album.  It was so awesome and he did an amazing job. (can you tell who I adore?  LOL!)  His dance moves are still amazing and he did not look like a 42 year old man out there…. he’s still got it.  How can he perform better now than when he was 19?

The next day, we docked in Key West.  It was tough going through immigration between 8 am-9 am after going to bed around 5 am…. and because we went through immigration so early, my government id wasn’t in my purse because I forgot to put it back… when everyone was getting off the boat to check out key west, the carnival employee announces that we needed government id to get back on the boat.  our sail and sign card was not enough….  It was a good thing that we had to go back up to our rooms to get my id… because when we walked out of our cabin, Danny Wood was in our hallway autographing doors. (girls had decorated their doors with posters, pictures… looked like how our bedrooms looked back in the day.)  He is just so super sweet and so funny!

Then, we hit the town…. did a little shopping and little sight seeing.

THE LAST NIGHT‘s theme was “GPS Lovefest”… so you are suppose to show love from where you are from…. of course us girls had to represent our Lakers! 🙂

This party went until we docked into Miami…. the sun started to come up and we just had such a blast….. hanging out and spending time together!

We spent an extra night in Miami…. but instead of going out, we decided to catch up on a little sleep in our gorgeous hotel room with a beautiful view.

Words cannot explain how much I loved this trip… how much I loved my girls.  4 girls sharing a little cabin… with very little sleep… yet, there was no drama, no fighting over the shower, the hair dryer, etc.  no fighting about what we were going to do next…. everyone down to do what the others wanted to do….  I just have the utmost love and respect for these girls.  I hope we can do it again next year… provided we can get on the boat before its sold out….. lol

Until next time… goodbye miami…..