Sorry, I am away from my Keyboard, try again Later

Well, here I am again.  Summer vacation.  That much-anticipated two-week break I book for mid-August every year.  Not to say I haven't been enjoying my summer up to this point.  I am having a fantastic summer.  One of the best in years.  I have more free time, I have a new car that's less of a risk of breaking down that my old one and I have some extra money to work with which is usually not the case these past few years. And because I am enjoying my summer so much, I have been avoiding anything that even remotely seems like work (outside of my regular job, of course) and enjoying life. 

I'll have plenty to write about in the fall, but for the next month or so, you won't find me at my keyboard.  I hope you are all enjoying some nice weather and getting outdoors and having fun and making memories.  Because that's what life should be about!  See you in the fall!

 

 

 

Sure I'll Take a two-day Stay at a Resort in Italy...Now I just have to get Myself there!

I enter a lot of contests. Some of them are simple and only require a form to be filled out with my contact information; others are more challenging and require me to actually do something for my entry. I prefer these more challenging contests. Sometimes the challenge is to submit a photo and other times, the challenge is to submit something in writing. Recently I entered a travel blogging contest that offered a two-night stay at a resort in Italy as the prize. I composed my entry and hit submit and forgot all about until a few weeks later when I opened my inbox to see the headline “you won” on one my incoming emails.

“You won” is something I often see in my email and 99% percent of the time, it is one of those scam emails. But I always open them up just to be sure and scan them to make sure they are in fact scams. As always, I opened this one, scanned it and went back to the top to reread again slowly because something caught my eye. I recognized some things in the email and it all came back to me; this was about that contest I had entered a few weeks ago. I was being informed that I had won two free nights at a resort called La Francesca in Bonassola, Italy.

I’ve been thinking about doing a multi-country trip in Europe for some time now but never got around to it. After confirming my information and getting in contact with the resort owners, I really started putting a plan in motion. I even went as far as choosing the dates that I would be in Italy and corresponded with the owners of La Francesa to inform them of my plans. It wasn’t until I received an email back with a pile of information about the resort including the fact that many of their facilities were now closed because it was the off-season. Those two words “off-season” caused my plans to crumble. I had forgotten that it was almost winter in Europe. I emailed them back and informed them that I would not be going in December but rather next spring or summer when the weather was warmer and there was more to do….and proceeded to book a week-long vacation in Barbados instead! 

It's Been a While but Rest Assured, I am Still Here...with lots of Posts to come in the Near Future

Yes, for anyone wondering, I did return from my solo trip to Central America, bruised and sunburned, but in one piece.. I just haven't had the chance to blog about it yet. I had some very hard life events to deal with upon my return. Three days after I arrived back in Cape Breton, My mother passed away suddenly and unexpectedly. Devastation, shock, exhaustion and sadness settled in and my life was literally turned upside down. I am still feeling pretty down but I think I am ready to jump right back into the blogging and writing because its what Mom would have wanted since she was my biggest fan and supporter and was so proud of my work. I've started working on a few posts already but they are not ready to show to the world just yet but in another week or so, I should be back to my normal pace and posting shall continue as it always did!

Another Day of Grace - The Humble Beginning......

For the first time since I started this blog, someone recently asked me how I came up with the name "Another Day of Grace". Well, I have to admit, I can't really take full credit for the name because the idea for the title was actually pitched to me by a friend. I can, however, take credit for my middle name, which happens to be Grace. The suggestion really jumped out at me and, although I prefer to take credit for my own work and come up with these type of things myself, I was unable to come up with a more suitable name for my first blog. And so Another Day of Grace was born....

I started this blog back in November of 2008. I didn't know a thing about blogging and frankly, I wasn't all that interested in blogging. But at the suggestion of a friend who thought it might be good to at least start one so I have a place to showcase my writing and photography skills, I began the process of setting it up and trying to find loyal readers. When I go back to those first posts, even I can see that this blog has come a long way from that personal diary peppered with random posts about anything and everything that, at best, occurred every few weeks. It was only recently that I decided to take it a step further and try to specialize a bit more and since my main interests are writing, photography and travel and my life pretty much revolves around those three things, I have decided to try and focus my blog around those interests. After all, they are all intertwined. I travel, I take pictures of my travels and I write about my travels so it seems to be working out quite well!

Anyone who has been following me for some time has probably noticed that I've made a lot of changes in the last few months and my posts have taken on a different direction and feel. I am still making some changes here and there and probably will be for the next little while.

That being said, I am thrilled to see that I will soon be reaching the milestone of 60,000 visits to my page. Not a whole lot considering the period of time we are talking about but a large amount of those visits have been in the last year so I guess that is a sign that people are finding me and seeing my work! With that milestone approaching soon, I would like to thank anyone who has taken the time to visit this page, to comment on my posts and for sharing it with others. I take pride in my work and thoroughly enjoy it and I am only glad to share it with the world!

Enough with the Excuses....time to get back at this!

I realize that I have not been posting nearly enough over the last few months and I keep coming up with excuses for reasons why I am not posting! While it is true that I am quite busy, in reality, it only takes a little bit of time each day to post something interesting on here so I came up with a technique to help me make at least one post a day providing I have a readily available internet connection. My plan is simple. Do something new and different every day and write about it! Not only will this get me into the habit of posting as much as possible and to stop coming up with excuses, it will also encourage me to get out more and try new things and see new places! Coincidentally, I happen to be going somewhere new tomorrow so you should see another post from me before the end of the day Friday!