Million Dollar Quartet

Sorry for the lapse in posting! I had a 3 day conference in Chicago--the Chicago MidWinter Dental Meeting, it was a great time and I learned a lot =)
It wasn't always classes and exhibit floor though (30,000 attendees and over 600 exhibition booths!). We had a couple of very nice meals out, the Hyatt Regency is a lovely place to lay your head at night and one of my co-workers picked a show for us to see at the Apollo Theater on Friday night. She wanted to see Million Dollar Quartet, a show based on the recordings of Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins and Johnny Cash one day at the Sun Records recording studio.
The show was just wonderful and they told us on the way out that the show was essentially "born" at the Apollo and the original cast took it to Broadway where the actor portraying Jerry Lee won a Tony award. Of course, we told my co-worker that she set the bar pretty high if we try to repeat an experience next year!!!!

Our in-house IT

aka: Arielle. And actually, that's kind of misleading, since she came over here so I could help her download a book onto her Nook. But THEN she worked on getting Microsoft Office installed on my laptop, so that part fits the title =) Actually, we're just glad to see her whenever she comes by for whatever reason!

Menu Planning Monday!!

Well, last week I was lame and didn't post a menu plan. BIG mistake--turns out, things run so much smoother when I KNOW what's happening at 5:30 and Kurt will be home in an hour to gobble down dinner on his too short supper break! The only thing I KNEW we were having was BBQ ribs and all the fixin's for FIL's B-day dinner (a week late, but not totally my fault, HA!) This week isn't TOO much better, as I have to go to Chicago for work for a few days, but the boys won't starve, even if the blog posting looks pretty slim this week =)
Monday: I had class!
Tuesday: Crispy, Creamy Chicken, rice, green beans
Wednesday: Papa Special ("beef tips and gravy over noodles") peas
Thursday: Momma's gone
Friday: Momma's gone
Saturday: Momma's coming home, but may not cook, LOL
Sunday: TBD

I know, lame, right?

TRAINS

Today we took the boys to Madison (no, not to the protests at the Capitol--HA!) to see the 44th annual train expo (it was written on the program, we haven't been routine attendees) and boy did they get their fill of everything train-related. All sorts of elaborate displays with trains of every size, complete with buildings, cars and little people. Thomas was well-represented too =) They took a ride on a miniature train and each got a new Thomas board game. There was even something for Daddy---nearly every setup that we saw had a fire scene!!
Even better was that the boys were angels and hung onto hands and stayed close to us in the crowds!

I am Paxton, hear me ROAR!

In 2nd grade, the kids do a report on a wild animal (Arielle did hers on a Boa Constrictor--and brought a REAL snake in, huge hit!) He chose a lion and today was his presentation. He did GREAT! Kurt and I were able to both be there and Momma got pictures =)
I would have been nervous as heck, but he didn't seem to be at all and was pretty excited this morning before he left for school! Mrs. Jones miked him up and he went to town! He was pretty cute doing his presentation too--HA! Paxton got to pick dinner out and he went with "chips and salsa" which is code for Mexican--and Arielle came with us, so score for the boys =)

And Leading Off Your News Tonight....

Chances are, if you tuned into your local newscast tonight, MY local news was the lead (or close to it) story. I live in Wisconsin (no secret). Ours was the first state in the US to grant union rights to employees more than 50 years ago. And now we are in the news again with union-related headlines.
In the November elections, I'm told the majority of voters decided that Scott Walker was the man to lead us Wisconsinites (although I've yet to meet anyone who admits casting a vote for him). All along his campaign "promises" were about cutting big government and keeping "big brother" out of your business. Well, his first order of business is to take away the collective bargaining rights that are currently afforded to all State employees. My husband is a State employee--this affects us. The teachers that educate my children are State employees--this affects us. Prison Guards? Nurses? Firefighters? Yes, yes, yes. It is the topic of conversation everywhere you go. Entire school districts are having to cancel classes because the teachers are calling in sick.
For the moment, the final vote is stalled because all elected Democrats (and a couple of Republicans) are refusing to attend the session, which leaves them without a quorum. Juvenile? Maybe, but this whole announcement came less than a week ago---there needs to be time to process what it is this ONE man has decided is right for all of Wisconsin.
Sorry to get all political--not usually my style, I know! It's kind of big news though folks =) I promise that I'll be back to my "regular" blogging tomorrow. In the meantime, I've attached a couple of pictures from the Capitol building---25,000 protesters were there today....

Gift Card Score

So, as part of my continuing decluttering project, I was downsizing a purse or two. As part of the process, I of course was doing a sweep through pockets for important or long lost items (but mostly just found change, receipts or expired coupons!) There was a WOO HOO moment when I came across 2 gift cards--one to Macy's and one to Coldwater Creek. I called the 800 numbers on the back and there was even a little bit of unused balance on each of them =) Not much, but something is something, right?

Happy Valentine's Day!

to my hubby and all the people I love =)
Kurt and I had an early V-day date night. We had tickets to see Rodney Carrington in the Dells with some friends we hadn't seen in FAR too long!!! This sucky blogger didn't get any pictures though--can you believe it?! It was a very funny show and we spent the night (no waterpark this time and boy, was it an odd feeling!) Arielle stayed the night with the boys, they LOVE when she's over =)

Fun in the Sun, errrr......

Maybe not the sun so much. When given lemons, you make lemonade, right? If you're 5 and 7, yes. If you're their Momma, you stand inside and snap pictures through the french doors!!!
Notice Paxton working his little tookus off to pull that wagon through 3 feet of snow on the deck. Notice Beckett, sitting on one of the little adirondack chairs, eating snow. Glad they enjoy it out there!!!

Wike my Wadybug Hat?

Asks Beckett...

Mystery Solved...

Right after I posted the picture of Beckett hanging out on the kitchen counter playing LeapFrog, lamenting about where in the world he'd get such an idea, I got an email. With a picture attachment. From my FIL. It's shown above. Just call me Nancy Drew...

Menu Planning Monday!!

It's Monday!!! You know the drill--HA! I'll be linking up with Laura at I'm an Organizing Junkie, as always. And I don't just link, I click, and click, and click... There are almost 400 bloggers hooked up already--that's a lot of meal ideas! I'm trying a couple of new ones this week, hopefully they'll be hits! One recipe I got by blog-hopping---give it a try, really =)
Monday: Class for me, little boys mooch! I pack my supper and I made Parker fried egg sammies and a banana/blueberry smoothie
Tuesday: Sausage Gravy over biscuits, hash browns, fresh fruit
Wednesday: Tacos, spanish rice, corn muffins
Thursday: Chicken gyros, coleslaw, chips
Friday: Hamburgers, turkey hot dogs, fries, baked beans
Saturday: Kurt and I will be gone, Arielle is in charge--can probably count on pizza!
Sunday: FIL's B-day--we're invited to lunch and we'll do leftovers for dinner

In case this whole nursing thing doesn't work out...

The boys think I'd make a great engineer (not the whoo-whoo, all aboard kind), no they think I could make a go of it as the kind that lays railroad track, HA! It's harder than you think, peeps! Beckett tries to hand you track that you don't need and Paxton will drive trains right up to where you've built, waiting for you to lay the next section. LOTS of obstacles. Maybe I'd just better plan on graduation...

Flashback Friday

Can it really be that THREE years have gone by since we were on the hunt for the perfect prom dress? How did that happen so fast?! I've noticed that the dresses are on display, so that time of the year approaches!!
A little backstory on her dress: she came home one day and told me she found the perfect dress and it was ONLY $400 and she was going to order it, OK? Um, NOT OK! I told her no way bay-bay and she promptly told me that was the one she loved, she'd never find another one like it. She and her friends had all already "claimed" their colors and she was lime green. She wanted VERY full, sparkly, strapless and wanted it to lace up the back. Well, Momma went a-hunting on eBay and found a dress with 4 out of 5 requests and Arielle decided that maybe Momma knew what she was doing after all! We won it for a little over $100 and my girlfriend did the minor alterations for us. It was a beautiful dress worn by my beautiful baby girl =)
One of my favorite pictures from that night was the one of the masses of tulle in all the colors that the girls chose---you can pick her out of the crowd even without her face, HA!