europe

Written mostly on September 19, 2018--

Oh hey, remember when I went on an amazing cruise through Europe more than 3 years ago? No? Yeah, probably because I NEVER WROTE ABOUT IT. The issue was that I wanted to have all of the pics from everyone before posting, but here we are, years later, and I FINALLY got all the pics, so I'm finally posting about it (only to decide to put like 10 pics in the post). Unfortunately, my memory is not as clear :( Lesson learned -- always blog or at least take notes about a trip before it's so far in the past! (Luckily I did start this post only a year after the trip, so I did jot down a few notes about things I wanted to remember. Each paragraph will be a different point I remembered to jot down!)

While the trip was amazing and the sights were beautiful, my favorite memories from the trip are easily the nights spent talking with my family. This was the first adults-only trip, and it was soooo nice to just have that time to bond with each other uninterrupted by kids. Before the trip, my dad asked us all to read a book called, "How will you Measure your Life?" by Clayton Christensen. Most of us were still reading on the airplane ride (and some of us 🙈 didn't finish the book until after the trip), but we all read at least some of the book before/during the trip, and then each night, one couple was in charge of leading the discussion of one chapter. As much as we all grumbled about having an assignment to read a book for the trip, we all agree that this was the best part of the trip. It was so interesting and fun to hear from each other about what kind of lives we want to build and what kind of culture we want to create in our families. I wish I remembered specific details about our discussions, but I only remember that the discussions went very long every night, and it was hilarious because Dad was always the one to say that we better wrap things up (hilarious since when we were young, we always had to nag Dad about wrapping things up -- he can be quite long-winded!). It's really special to grow up with a wonderful family, and then to all be adults who have had our own experiences, and to bring spouses into the equation, and just to all learn and bond together. I'll be forever grateful for my family. I know I am absolutely privileged to have come from such perfect family circumstances (which isn't to say my family is perfect, but they are pretty great :) ).

One thing I really loved was watching Russ get to know some of my siblings better. Russ is an introvert and he's quiet. He has great things to say, but my family is always talking so they don't get to hear him much. It was rewarding for me to see the similarities between Russ and Tyler. I look up to all my siblings, and Tyler is no exception. There was just something special about Tyler and Russ getting to know each other better and connecting over their similarities :)

Before going on the trip, I got a spray tan. It took a few showers to calm the tan down, so for our travel day, I looked RIDICULOUSLY tan, and my family could hardly take me seriously. I even used a black and white filter for my Instagram post on our travel day because it looked so bad 😂 But after showering in Spain (our first country), the tan calmed down enough that I just looked a good amount of tan haha :)

We got to Spain a day early to make sure we made it in time to catch our cruise. We planned to go to church, but somehow everyone left the hotel without me. I couldn't find anyone, and I didn't know where we were going to church. At first I was scared because they ALL started heading to the subway/train without me -- I didn't know where that was at, and no one (not even Russ!) stayed behind for me (but Russ is the one that came back for me). When I finally did meet back up with everyone, I was actually pretty livid. Their reasoning for leaving was that we were going to be late for church. My reason for being livid was that obviously being late for church was a better option than stranding a 23-year-old (may as well have been 12) in a foreign country. So yeah, it was a tearful breakdown followed by a train ride of scowling. 💁

I actually exercised while on the trip! I can't remember how much, but at least a few times. The only reason it didn't continue was because our late-night book chats made for a tired Ashley, so I couldn't wake up early to continue!

There was a deck on the cruise ship where there was like a track. It was a narrow loop, but it was open to the air and ocean (obviously fenced off, but you could see and hear the ocean). One night, Russ and I (and maybe some others) were walking on the track and Russ had me look over the edge into the dark water. If you don't know this, I have a somewhat irrational fear of sharks and the open ocean. It toooootally creeped me out to look over the edge! I felt like a shark was going to jump out of the abyss with a wide open mouth. Geez. I've got the heebie jeebies just thinking about it.

It was my first cruise, and one aspect that I truly loved was the all-included food aspect. I liked the normal buffet area plenty, but my favorite was the nicer restaurants. It was so cool to be able to order whatever I wanted without thinking at all about price. Most nights, many of us ordered two or three entrees because we wanted to try so many things. And of course we got dessert every night. My mouth is watering just thinking about it haha. Kind of ridiculous, but seriously so fun. It just felt so fancy :)

Our cruise had many stops, including Naples, Rome, and Florence, Italy; Cannes, Nice, and Ez, France; and Palma, Majorca (and island near Spain). My favorite places were Florence, Italy and Nice, France. They were so beautiful, and the weather was more mild on those days. The rest of Italy was CRAZY hot, plus we did a lot of walking and museums, so the combination of factors made Rome my least favorite part of the trip.

Since we were all going to be together, we made sure to coordinate colors (in advance) for a family picture. The picture never made it onto my parents' wall, but I actually really loved some of the pictures we got, and used them in my Petersen family picture frame for a few years (because the one before that didn't have Russ, and I wanted Russ in the picture!).

One night, Tyler, Anya, Brooke, Ryan, Russ, and I all stayed up later hanging out on a main deck. I have no idea what we talked about, but there was a lottttt of laughing, a lot of bonding, and an incident of putting whipped cream all over Brooke's face. Good times :)

It was an amazing trip, and I hope we have another opportunity to do an adults-only trip with everyone. It was truly magical!