Last week I booked our winter vacation and now I have travel on the brain. Unfortunately, we have more than month to wait before we go anywhere. In the meantime, I thought I would reflect on some vacations past.

So my friends, join me, as I take you back to November 1979. Disco was dying and the attention of the world was focused on the Iranian hostage crisis, leaving the Bahamas vulnerable to a Todd family invasion. When I say the family, I mean ALL of us. Three generations of Todds climbed aboard a 747 en route to Nassau. It was perfect timing for a vacation because Kindergarten was getting to me, and I really needed to unwind.

This was our hotel. I love those umbrellas. You sure don’t see patio furniture like this anymore.

I shared a room with my uncle’s girlfriend (a few years later she became my aunt). Looking back, I can’t help but think about how disappointing that must have been for her. When you’re 19, as she was then, a trip to the Caribbean with your beau should be a romantic getaway, or at the very least, a booze soaked shag-fest. Instead, she was stuck bunking with a socially awkward 5 year old.

I remember how amazingly warm and clear the ocean water was. It was such a contrast to the cold, murky water of Lake Erie I was accustomed to. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like it since. I spent a lot of time there picking up shells at the beach. I think shells were the only things on the island I was actually allowed to touch (I don’t recall the Bahamas being very kid friendly).

Here I am with my Mom. I love the dress she is wearing here. Also, I’ve never noticed this before, but the woman wandering into this shot has pink spongy curlers in her hair (incidentally, those curlers have never worked for me). By looking at our accessories in this picture, I can assume it was taken after our trip to the straw market.

I have fond memories of the market. I think we bought every straw accessory they had to offer. Along with the hat and purse seen here, I also had a wallet, slippers, a doll and a necklace made of some kind of bean that made a fun clickity, clackity sound when I walked. I know that sounds like and excessive amount of souvenirs, but it’s not like we took trips like this often. In fact, I didn’t travel more than a few hundred kilometers from home again until I was in my late teens and I was 26 before found myself on an airplane again. My parents have never really shared my wanderlust.

Speaking of airplanes, here we are heading home while the locals breathed a sigh of relief.

Nordair – how adorably vintage! Apparently they were swallowed by Air Canada in the 80s.

Thanks for joining me for this trip down memory lane. Stay tuned for the next installment of my travels.

I’m still on a crochet kick. I took a break from making wool scarves and switched over to cotton to make some baby afghans (not for me, in case your imagination was headed in that direction).

While I’ve been crocheting I’ve been catching up with the world of television. Have you seen the show Hoarders? If you haven’t, it’s a reality show by A&E that takes you inside houses of people who hoard. Jeremy introduced me to it yesterday. The show totally freaked me out. About 15 minutes into the first episode, I dropped what I was doing and drove over to the charity drop box with a bag of random things I’d been meaning to get rid of (Jeremy found this quite amusing).

Deep down, I know I’m not in much danger of becoming a pack rat, but I’m sure it’s a slippery slope. First, it’s bag of old clothes in the guest room closet and the next thing you know you’re buried alive by a stack of decade old newspapers.

Ok, I know I’m exaggerating a little. However, if you need some inspiration to clean and organize, this show is a fantastic motivator.

I bought this dress in the fall of 1996. It’s a shirtdress that leans more toward shirt than dress. When I bought it in my early 20s, I was ok with that. These days, I’m a little more modest. For years this dress was my favourite. It was warm and comfortable and I wore it everywhere from work to parties.

I’ve now had this dress for well over a decade. I also have many other dresses – other brown shirtdresses even. Despite this, I can’t seem to part with this particular dress, although I never actually wear it. In fact, once a year I throw this dress in the charity bag en route to the thrift store and every time I pull it out at the last second. Then the dress comes home and I hang it back up in the closet only to be purged again the next time around.

I needed to either make this dress wearable again or get rid of it once and for all.

First, the elbow patches had to go. I thought they were adorable before but not so much anymore. They came off easily so I removed the pockets as well. Next, I needed to address the biggest problem – the length. I found a hunk of brown corduroy and sewed it along the bottom giving the dress a few extra inches. At first it looked a little mismatched so I removed the original buttons and replaced them with buttons covered with the brown corduroy. The finished product looked a little plain so I made a co-coordinating flower pin and called it done.

I’m really pleased with the way this dress turned out. I think I’ll finally start wearing it again.