The Museum of Broken Relationships

Over a year ago, I was listening to NPR and heard a story about the Museum of Broken Relationships. The first Museum of Broken Relationships opened in Croatia and the second location opened in Los Angeles, on Hollywood Blvd, just a block from the Hollywood and Highland mall.

Last week, I found myself in Hollywood with a few hours to kill, so I headed over to check it out.

I visited on a Thursday afternoon in late October and the museum was busy. It was so busy, that it was almost difficult to navigate the exhibits. The Museum of Broken Relationships is a popular place! I paid my eighteen dollar admission fee and spent nearly two hours exploring. If it had been less crowded, I think I would have finished in an hour or so. It's not a big space.

The museum is comprised of artifacts sent in by anonymous donors from around the world, the donated objects are displayed with a story regarding the significance of the object. As one might expect, many of the objects involve broken romantic relationships, things like wedding dresses and love letters. However, many of the exhibits are not about romantic love, they include damaged parental relationships and friendships that have crumbled. There is even a nicotine patch symbolizing a broken relationship with addiction. Names are not included on any of the objects, apart from what you might see written on a letter or other note.

The exception is a piece from The Bachelorette, the dried final rose that Nick Viall presented to Kaitlyn Bristowe, when she rejected his proposal. Non-fans of the show, might not understand the rose, as it is simply labeled Nick, without reference to The Bachelorette. I'm a fan of the series, so I got a kick of of this. When Viall was The Bachelor in his own season, he planned a date at the Museum of Broken Relationships and showed off his displayed rose.

Some of the stories are still full of emotion: anger, sadness, regret...but many symbolize a catharsis, as the storyteller has now let the physical baggage of their relationship go, set free their story into the universe. As a writer, I can appreciate the importance of sharing a difficult and emotional story. I found a huge sense of relief when I participated in sharing a true story about my aunt and uncle for The Ricochet: A Storyteller Show, last month.

The Museum of Broken Relationships is an incredible journey into the human experience and well-worth a visit. I found the whole concept fascinating. I loved seeing the objects and getting a little snippet into a life-altering moment of a strangers life. I would not recommend it as a place for people to take young children, as some of the exhibits include adult content and the museum is heavy on reading. The stories are vital to understanding the artifacts, but know that a large chunk of your visit will be spent reading the stories. The Museum of Broken Relationships will certainly put you in an introspective, falling down the rabbit of memories, type of mood. You may even be inspired to make your own donation to the collection. Everyone has their own stories to tell.

Summer 2016- Holiday Inn Orange Lake Resort

In 2016, before realizing that I prefer to go on vacations and write about my trips, I tried my hand at running my own travel agency. As I was learning the business, I was able to discover fantastic deals for our family vacation. One of our discoveries was the Holiday Inn Orange Lake Resort in Orlando, Florida.

We contemplated staying on Disney World property, as I have done on many previous trips. However, the high prices and lack of availability for our trip in late July/early August, made us look elsewhere. I don't think that the Holiday Inn has a great brand image, but we read reviews of the property and our price couldn't be beat.

We got a two-bedroom condo for two weeks and a mid-size rental car for about 1600.00. No parking fees or other costly surprises. The resort is just a fifteen minute drive from Disney property and located very close ( practically walking distance) to restaurants, grocery stores, and a Target. We ate at several of the local restaurants, including a Bahama Breeze ( twice), a waffle house (twice), and the biggest hit with our family, Logan's Roadhouse. As a Disney fan I'm shocking myself by writing this, but I think I enjoyed our time off-property, as much as in the parks.

There were a few catches to the incredible deal. The main one being that the Holiday Inn Orange Lake Resort is a time-share. We are not time-share owners nor was our deal contingent on taking a tour or sitting through a sales pitch. We simply booked an available room through my travel agency ( any agency can help you, I didn't have special access) and bundled it with our car rental. We knew it was a time share or "vacation club" going in and we had read advice on handling the time share employees from Trip Advisor.

When we checked-in, we were directed to a separate desk to get our parking pass. This is the time-share ploy. We knew it was coming. We responded to the rather intense offers of checking out their vacation club, with a polite and firm, "No Thank You." We were offered the usual time share gifts, like park tickets and coupons for free inner tubes for the lazy river on property. They charge nine dollars a day per tube, so we just skipped it and honestly, the kids didn't mind. We read on trip advisor that we should unplug the phones in our room, because the time share people would try calling and sure enough, they did. However, with enough polite and firm "No's" they will leave you alone and we did not have this impact our vacation.

Our family time is too precious to waste sitting through a presentation for something we are not going to buy in efforts to get a "free gift."

Our room was located on the front entrance boarder of the property, on the top floor in a three story building.

Some of the rooms are single-story bungalows. We had a large back balcony that faced a golf course that circled Orange Lake Resort. We don't golf, so this was another amenity that didn't matter to us. It looked nice if you are a golfer. I often sat on the patio to read and it was always peaceful with lots of local birds landing on our deck. I loved the patio. It was a good place for me to have a break, when everyone else wanted to watch television.

The condo was perfect for the four of us. We had our own little kitchen that was fully stocked with everything that we needed to make meals at home. Although we often ate in the parks or out locally, we did have a couple of dinners in and we found that it was really helpful for breakfast. With little kids (6 and 9 at time travel), it was easier and cheaper for everyone to eat breakfast in the condo. We mostly used the breakfast bar for these quick meals, but the condo also had a beautiful dining room table.

My Swedish stepkids wilted in the Florida heat, so we discovered that it was best to either go to the parks in the morning or late at night for just a few hours. This meant that we had plenty of time to enjoy the condo. The living room was perfect for watching movies and cooling off in the air-conditioning. This was the summer that we all discovered the show "The Impractical Jokers," which pretty much always seemed to be running in a marathon on TruTV.

The kids had their own room and their own bathroom. They surprised us by unpacking their suitcases and putting their clothes neatly away in their bedroom drawers!

Our master suite was down the hall and it had a large bathroom with a spa tub. The entire condo was spacious and comfortable.

I actually enjoy doing laundry, even on vacation, so I was thrilled that our condo included a washer and dryer. It just made things a lot easier, especially when our clothes were gross from sweating and getting dirty at the theme parks. Lots of stains from dripping Mickey ice cream bars!

One downside is unlike a traditional hotel, we did not have regular cleaning service. We could have had it for a per-day fee, but instead we just kept with the two cleanings that were included in our stay. We had to call to book the cleanings, but we found that they did a very good job. The lack of daily cleaning didn't bother me much, because we had the washer and dryer to clean towels and linens. We purchased an all-purpose spray cleaner and paper towels to keep sticky surfaces from getting mucky. It wasn't hard or a hassle to keep the room relatively clean ourselves.

As I mentioned, the Holiday Inn Orange Lake Resort has a pool complex with slides and a massive lazy river. This was not near our room. The entire resort is enormous and it even has an internal bus system. We drove over to the pool complex and found to be over-crowded. On a slow day, it might be nice, but for our needs, the kids were more happy at the small, basic pool/hot tub that was located within walking distance from our condo. The pool close to our room was rarely crowded and it was just easier than having to haul ourselves over to the bigger pool area. As much as our family loves lazy rivers, no one was fussed about skipping this one and for a family of four, it saved us thirty-six dollars a day in ring rentals! We never went back and since none of us had a camera with us, we didn't take pictures of the big pool area. The resort website has great pictures if you're interested.

Here is a shot of the pool near our condo. We used this every single day of the trip. A little Florida rain didn't stop the fun!

The Holiday Inn Orange Lake Resort has many features we didn't visit, such as restaurants, arcades, kids activities, a gym...it has a lot to offer.

Besides the initial pushiness of the time share people and the crowds in the main pool complex, we really had a fabulous time at the Holiday Inn Orange Lake Resort. The price simply cannot be beat and we loved our condo. It was convenient to the Disney parks and area shops/restaurants. It was the ideal fit for our family. We would definitely return to this property and seek out other Holiday Inn Vacation Resorts.

Oklahoma City Trip 2017- Myriad Gardens

With less than two hours left of being a tourist in Oklahoma City, I headed over to the Myriad Gardens. The Myriad Gardens is an amazing seventeen acre garden that opened in 1988. It's right in downtown, very close to the convention center, which was right across the street from the hotel where I was staying.

I entered the Myriad Gardens through a section called Meinders Garden.

I thought that I would encounter a ticket booth, but it turned out that most of the garden is free to the public. Bonus! I'm not really sure what the boundaries of Meinders Garden were in relation to the overall Myriad Gardens, but the first things that I encountered were pretty waterfalls and streams. There were several people enjoying a sunny afternoon in shady alcoves.

Myriad Gardens has a huge man-made lake that reminded me of the Serpentine in London. The lake was full of Canadian geese that were flocking to a family who was feeding them bread. When I walked down, the geese rushed over to me in anticipation of more food and quickly realized that I had nothing.

I love the design of the gardens. The design plays with height and space; for example, the lake is at the lowest level, like a sunken living room, and to reach it you must walk down various sets of stairs or winding paths. Multiple bridges span the water, giving another height at which to view the gardens. It's possible to view the downtown skyscrapers from the garden, but there are also many areas where it is easy to forget that you're in the middle of a big city. It's magical.

I was delighted to discover a theater in the middle of the gardens.

And this colorful sculpture. It made me think of fish or butterfly scales.

The children's garden was another delight, filled with interactive and educational exhibits. Like the other gardens, there were plenty of hidden paths and discovery trails. It's whimsical in theme, perfect for both kids and adults.

My last stop in the Myriad Gardens was the Crystal Bridge. If you look at the pictures of the lake, you'll see a large enclosed bridge over the water. It's impossible to see this and not be curious, so I went inside. The Crystal Bridge houses a tropical conservatory. It was eight dollars for adults and as I was short on time, I asked the ticket attendant how long it would take to tour. She suggested about 30-45 minutes, which was just the amount of time that I had left.

I didn't last more than fifteen minutes.

Outside, it was an unseasonably hot September day. Inside the Crystal Bridge, it was sweltering. I can usually handle both heat and humidity, but the Crystal Bridge was intense. I rushed through the conservatory, trying my best to enjoy it, as I was dripping in sweat and in need of water.

I did enjoy what the Crystal Bridge had to offer. It's quite spectacular and unexpected. I saw waterfalls, tropical plants, animals like parrots and lizards, et.. The exhibit was multilevel with caves and different trails. It's much bigger than it appears.

The Myriad Gardens is a must-do on your Oklahoma City itinerary. Although it was uncomfortably hot, I highly recommend splurging on the Crystal Bridge. I'd also recommend checking the events calendar before your trip, as it looks like they have many cool events throughout the year.