Sunday, July 5, 2009

Stars, Stripes and Sunburns!

Yes, I realize the Fourth of July was yesterday and that my birthday wishes for the good 'ol US of A are a bit belated. Whatever. We were too wiped out when we got home last night at about 11:30 to do anything other than rinse the lake grunge off and crawl into bed. My husband's family is very proud of me; I not only climbed in the lake willingly, but I did it twice.

I am glad I convinced Michael to go out on Saturday and not Sunday because a) Billa and I definitely needed today to recuperate and b) Billa got to see her first fireworks show last night and what a show! Being on the lake meant that just about every lakeside village/community had their own show going and we got to see about 6 or 7 of them in great detail from the widow's watch on top of the house. They were very spectactular and Billa was a trooper for staying up so late. We also did sparklers and the younger kids got some fountains and whizzmagigs and those were tons of fun too. Below is a slide show of our day. Michael went back out to the lake today as some friends of ours were headed that way today and Billa and I hung around at home and then headed to my folks house to visit to make the round of grandparent visits complete for the week :o) All in all, what a weekend! And despite the title of this entry, we actually made it through the weekend without nary a burn! We were a little pink, but not that bad.



Happy Birthday America! And speaking of birthdays, my pal Tori from high school (I am fairy godmother to her son Nicholas) turned 28 today. Happy Birthday Victoria!

I hope the rest of you all had a wonderful and safe Fourth of July!

Nighty night,
Kelly

Friday, July 3, 2009

Notice Anything?

Anyone who knows my husband well knows of his love for Arthurian legends. He got an Amazon gift card from his grandparents for his birthday and decided to spend it on some books and DVDs he's been wanting. He finally received the book yesterday, having received the DVDs last week. As you can see from the picture the publisher, Overlook Press, just happened to overlook something:


Yep, that is education and attention to detail at it's best!

And speaking of noticing anything, I have changed the blog layout again. I really really really like this one a lot, so it will be staying for awhile. I have my friend Anna to thank for it! She uses a background from the same website and I am so pumped about the goodies I found there. I hope you like it too! Someday I will finally Photoshop Elements for my Mac and actually do some really cool stuff, but until then, you can just appreciate my awesome Word/PowerPoint/iPhoto skills.

Toodles,
Kelly

Baking Bonanza!

Whoo, what a day! My good friend Julia came over this morning and brought her two children and we had ourselves a baking bonanza! Julia had bought a really cool cake pan from William Sonoma (happy sigh) that makes train cars and she wanted to test it out. So we made a pink and purple butter cake and then Mathilda decorated it to take to her family's Fourth of July party tomorrow. Afterwards we feasted on mac n cheese, watched some 'toons, and then played for a bit before it was time to give the little ones naps.

Mathilda dishes batter into the cake pan whilst Billa watches intently. I thought she'd play with Alexander, but if there's food involved, forget it! She did so well that I let her "help" me make cookies later.

Mathilda and I "glue" the train cars to their cake board to prevent them from moving around during transit.

Mathilda shows off her masterpiece! It was very colorful and she had so much fun!

The kids have one last hurrah in the ball pit. Alexander definitely had a blast!

Today reminded me of when I used to work at the Boy Scout and Girl Scout camps with the kids, so I told her mom that if they needed someone to provide for that kind of activity for their Girl Scout troop to give me a call. I miss working with kids sometimes in a teaching environment, but I couldn't do it full time like my friend Kellie. It's one thing to do a small group of kids like 10 to 12 versus 20+. (Hey, I can acknowledge my limits!) All in all, it was a good day. I now have some cookies to decorate for Fourth of July, so I bid you adieu!

Adieu!
Kelly

Thursday, July 2, 2009

It's Too Darn Hot, 110 in the Shade, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof...

Can you tell my background is in theatre?

You know it's ridiculously hot when you wear clinical strength deodorant and it fails. Yikes! With the holiday weekend here, we are planning on spending some of it at the lake house with Michael's dad and stepmom and some good family friends. Well, ok, Billa and I will spend only one day because going to the lake really wears me out and I need a day to recover from the sun and the stress.

Truth be told, I am not a fan of natural water, especially water in which you cannot see or touch the bottom. Not only that, but I get stuck with baby watching duty the whole time since everybody inevtiably does one of two things: 1) ride jet skis or 2) lay out. Being redheaded, I can't lay out if I want to live to see 50 (my goal is 105 folks, so skincare is important!) and I absolutlely hate jet skis (they're disgusting abominations for the environment). Soooo...given that there isn't really anything else to do, well, being so near a large body of water and the mother of a small toddler who runs faster than Speedy Gonzalez makes for a nightmare scenario in my book. Billa and I will most likely be inside the lake house staying out of the sun and the heat anyway, and I don't see the point in spending a whole weekend doing that somewhere else when I could be doing it in the comfort of my own home, which I would be doing anyway. Plus, I don't want to burn anyone's retinas with my awesome blindingly white legs or pudgy fat ass and waistline. Ugh. THAT is a whole 'nother can of worms we just won't open tonight!

I will enjoy seeing everyone though and since there are only two jet skis, perhaps I might enjoy myself a bit more since there will be more hands to take, er...ENJOY the baby :o) And who knows, maybe it will be cool enough to sit on the porch instead of in the house. Lake breezes do wonders, I hear.

My holiday weekend actually started this afternoon; my office is closed tomorrow and they let us all out early today, so Michael and I went and saw Transformers, which was freaking awesome. I know a lot of people are tearing it up in the press, but seriously, folks, if I'm going to drop $20 on a pair of movie tickets, I want to be ENTERTAINED. I'd prefer to watch an Oscar worthy movie in the comfort of my own home with a glass of wine and thankful that I don't have to the share the viewing experience with some bloody idiot who is too dumb to appreciate a fine cinematic performance. Because inevitably, there is always THAT GUY in the theatre who is loud, obnoxious, and just doesn't get it. I'd rather spend the $20 on a nice bottle of red and the rental and have a far better time of it.

Tomorrow my friend Julia is bringing her kids over for a playdate of sorts. Her son Alexander is about the same age as Billa and Mathilda is 6. Mathilda (who happens to be my godsister since my folks are her godparents) and I are going to be baking while the little ones play together. And Julia and I will be catching up on everything all the while. Julia is a dear friend from high school who was one of the advisors for my Explorer Post and we have been on many a camping trip together. She's seen me at my worst (crouching bootless on a rock in the middle of a freezing river in Colorado panicking over having lost one of my boots in the aforementioned river...that's also a story for another time!) and at my weirdest (being on the same said camping trip wearing teeny little buns all over my head...or sitting on top of my backpack with banana chips over my eyes singing I'm a Little Teapot during one particularly grueling trip). Yes, a friend that witnesses that and hasn't run screaming for the hills is definitely a friend for life.

We've got a busy weekend and I hope that all of you will have ann equally funfilled weekend too. Happy (safe) Fourth of July, y'all!

Patriotically yours,
Kelly & the Gang

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Random Fun

One of my favorite websites to visit is Cake Wrecks. If you haven't clicked on the link in my sidebar over there to the right and visited it, you should so now. Go ahead! I'll wait. [humming] Ok, so you've finally picked yourself up off the floor from having fallen there after laughing so hard? Well, you might just want to stay down there. I have some more fun for you! Granted, this one will be most fun for the gals who've reached puberty, but guys, I think you'll get a good laugh out of it too. If anything, at least you'll know NOT what to tell the gals in your life!

So enjoy a laugh...because in this economy, we're gonna need it!

Toodles,
Kelly

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