Back from Miami

I had a great time in Miami! I managed to make four new wardrobe pieces (plus my birthday dress from last year) so I felt all styling, though I kind of wished I'd made a short dress. I didn't want to look like the Young Things on their Spring Break (it appears to be a "thing" to wear your booty shorts unbuttoned and the fly peeled back to expose your bathing suit and, in one instance, your underwear), but they reminded me that I used to looooove wearing short skirts when I was younger. Somewhere around age 30 my skirts settled at the knee and have stubbornly refused to budge ever since. Even when I think I'm making something short, it only barely skims above the knee. I need to put a genuinely (but not obscenely) short dress on my Spring/Summer sewing list.

I was there with my sister. We have wanted to travel together since we were teenagers, but she started having my nephews in her early 20s and by the time either of us could afford to travel she couldn't leave the kids. The youngest is now 4 so we had a window and we took it! It wasn't the trip to Italy we planned so long ago, but we both were desperate for warm weather, sunshine, and lots of relaxing.

I used Priceline to get our hotel; we ended up at the Renaissance Eden Roc Resort and Spa. It's right on the beach and has four gorgeous pools. Our room had an ocean view but no balcony, but for what we paid I can't complain! The bar area was gorgeous and the gym had up-to-the-minute equipment.

I loved the boardwalk, though I fear they are replacing it with a ground-level cement path, which is neither as comfortable nor as romantic as a traditional boardwalk. It goes all the way down to the bottom of the spit of land on which Miami Beach is situated and most days I took a long walk down, got ice cream, and walked back up.

The weather was good, which was so nice after predictions of rain for most of the days! It was a little cloudy, but there was always sun (even on my last day, which was mostly cloudy and a little rainy). It was warm in the sun, but cool in the shade. I love the beach but burn like crazy and I usually sit under an umbrella the whole time. It was too cold under an umbrella so I got a little burned, despite my liberal and frequent application of 50 SPF sunscreen with titanium dioxide. The worst place? The back of my hands! When I reach into my purse it scrapes against them and hurts!

I slept late, read books, had nice workouts, ate a lot of dessert, and lounged in the sun to my heart's content. I wasn't quite ready to come home, but I suppose better to leave with a little longing than bored.

You can see all the photos with a concentration on my wardrobe here on my sewing flickr, and a slightly different set with more concentration on the scenery on my travel flickr here; I haven't gotten my sister's pictures yet so there will be more eventually.