The Best Gift Ever!

Our trip to Traverse City was really awesome. Who doesn't love family, beach and fresh produce? A day spent drinking beer on the beach with good friends then a night around a campfire is my idea of vacation. While we were mooching off our super cool up north family (thanks for the washing machine and dryer service Dennis), I further crossed over to major needy, when I was offered the best garage sale gift ever. My amazingly talented (yes, I'm still sucking up) sister-in-law Tracey gave me this amazing pot for my motor home. It is the perfect 70's retro shade to match our rollin' turd.

The best thing is it has a strainer liner, a steamer level and stand alone colander that nestles all inside the creamy daisy outer pot. Perfect for packing away in a kitchen with few cupboards. The very cool picture that shows the transformation powers of this kitchen gadget doesn't seem to want to load, so you're gonna have to trust me when I say it all fits inside. In closing I have to say a big, big THANKS to Tracey for her generosity and mad garage sale shopping skills. You rock!

My Day

There is a very special reason my homepage is set at babyblues.com: because it is sooo my life. I swear there is a video camera with a direct feed to the authors' homes. If I had any concrete evidence I would sue Jerry and Rick for some royalties because it's like they're singing my life in their comic. You want proof? In the short time it took to type this post/rant I broke up 2 fights, filled 1 cup of juice, wiped a nose and helped Brendan log on to Pirate's of the Caribbean all while thinking "I should be packing for the trip we are leaving for in 5 hours." 

From the sounds of it the entire town is heading out for vacation. I hope everyone has safe and happy travels!

If I just owned more paper....

I'm sure I could get caught up on my albums if I had about 4 straight days of scrapbook time. In my mind that is totally logical but in the real world it ain't happening. Great strides were made last night at Creative Passions with Laura, Roz, Lori, Meredith and Melinda. Ok, some of us got more real work done than others, but just to be together and be able to finish a sentence without kids to interrupt every few minutes was amazing. Not that it's easy to get a word in on a conversation when we're all together. You'd think we never get to see each other or that at some point, we would run out of things to say. But the longer we hang out the more things we share and over scrapbooks is a great place to share them. As multi-taskers it seems more satisfying to catch up with each other as we are catching up on our favorite hobby and enjoying a glass of very nice wine, (thanks Melinda).

So if I don't want to fall too far behind (and 6 months is too far behind) I need to spend more time with my friends at Creative Passions. Everyone has sacrifices to make. :)

3 is the magic number

The 3rd piece of equipment in our house finally died and now I can stop waiting for the last shoe to drop. Around the fourth of July our refridgerator in the garage stopped working or more accurately stopped cooling, it was running all the time. (thanks for the reminder Consumer's Energy). So Joe made a trip to Home Depot on the Fourth to find a low cost model to keep his beer cold.

On Showboat Saturday, the window AC unit in our bedroom quit. DRAT. Thank goodness he could buy local and replace it with a new, way more efficient model from a local hardware store. It's quieter and smaller and has a remote! I think we've already lost said remote.

The final tri-fecta was when the lawn mower hit the wall and sputtered to a stop last night. Once again a trip to the hardware store saved the night when Joe came home with a new self propelled bagger. Wow, that takes a little getting used to. My trees, edging and all poles have been tagged by my inability to steer that little black monster.

All these new upgrades are totally better than their shoddy predecessors, now we just need to pay that dang Ace Hardware bill.

Thank God Showboat is Over!

Yes, its been a while since I've posted. So you can image it took a pretty big event to make me type, upload pics and email my pals. SHOWBOAT WEEK IS OVER. More importantly, the beer tent is done. Anyone reading this would get the mistaken impression I didn't have fun. No, on the contrary, there was no lacking in the fun department. The shows were great, the volunteering went smoothly and the beer was cold. But the sleep deprevation and draft beer headaches linger on. Everyone worked so hard for 7 days and I really want to say thank you to everyone who helped out.
Monday night HAD to be the best! Three of the members of Finger 11 stopped by the "hospitality" tent to just have a few drinks. It wasn't long before I spotted one and their quite night of drinking ended and the autograph and photo taking began. This picture is of Scott Anderson, Lead Singer and my fan crazed face. (thanks Kelly Keys for the picture!) His brother Sean and the guitarist Rick Jackett were also chatting with some very happy Chesaning people. They were super nice guys from Toronto that were talking about family and music and well, beer. I'm not sure what I was expecting... I totally yelled, "you are the first guy I ever met that lives in my I-pod." What's a guy suppose to say to that? He took a small step back, smiled and made sure his manager was close by.

Wednesday was a let down at first, the weather was crazy. But when we were told that Sugarland would re-schedule everyone was ready to just enjoy the fun atmosphere of the tent. I remember thinking "we should go home early". That would have been great advice.

All the volunteers were amazing! Everyone just wanted the nights to be a big success.

Now that we've been home for a day, the kids even recognized Joe when he came home from work, hopefully our rutine can get back to the happy little rut we have come to know and love.

Until we decide to buy a sheep farm......