Busy long weekend

Posted on October 13, 2009 by Sherry

Being Canadian, this past weekend was a long one. It was Thanksgiving so Hayley had both Friday and Monday off from school. Friday saw me scurrying around like a bit of a crazy person, preparing for company on Saturday. I worked and cleaned and worked and cleaned, and that’s about it for Friday.

George had to play that night, and I intended to get to bed early but I’m not particularly good at doing that if no one is around to shoo me off towards my pillow. Which is why, I suppose, I found myself – at 12:30 am no less – wiping down my kitchen cabinets, washing the kitchen walls, and cleaning the dust off my ceiling fan blades.

At 1 am I realized I was insane and headed to bed, except I heard a sudden knocking sound. The cat spends most of her time behind the washing machine so at first I thought she was scratching herself and banging her leg against the metal. Then I heard it again and looked out the peephole only to find two people I’ve never seen before banging on the door down the hall from us. One was a tiny little woman and the other was a very tall and burly man, the latter of which POUNDED loudly several times.

In all honestly, I’m sure it was the woman’s family, and maybe her phone wasn’t working and no one had heard from her in awhile so they had come to check on her. Still, I had no idea how they had gotten into the building since you need to be buzzed in, and they were freaking me out. It’s a sad state of the world today that while my first reaction was to want to open the door to inquire if they needed help or a phone or whatever, my second and more logical, safe reaction was to keep the door firmly locked. There are semi-regular home invasions in the Montreal area and while they are usually in houses as opposed to apartment buildings, I was taking no chances – especially with two kids in bed.

Eventually they left but I was pretty rattled (particularly since the woman came right up to my door and cocked her head as though she was listening for someone inside) so I didn’t really sleep until George got home. Whew.

On Saturday we had Hayley’s birthday party. We had wanted to have it the weekend of her birthday but it wasn’t in our post-holiday budget so we waited until now to throw her party; she didn’t mind. Since it fell on Thanksgiving weekend, one of our friends offered to roast a turkey and stuffing. It was delicious and a big hit. We also had George’s roast pork, my potato-onion casserole, rice, and mixed vegetables along with all the usual things (crackers, cheese, etc). There was definitely enough food! Another friend made a ridiculously amazing pumpkin cheesecake complete with Oreo cookie crust, caramel, chocolate ganache, and pecans. Gah!

Hayley was in heaven because most of her gifts were Barbie-related. She’s finally become super interested in playing with them which is kind of nice since I usually had no idea what to tell people when they would ask what she wanted as gifts. She got a Barbie dog grooming center, a beach cruiser, and a kitchen set, all for Barbies. Ecstatic! She also loved her cake. She wanted a beach cake since she had so much fun at the beaches in Halifax and that was pretty easy to do. I even decorated the “beach” part with some of the (boiled and washed) shells that we had picked up and a hand-drawn starfish. I also put a little Orca figurine in the “ocean” part of the cake. She was really happy!

On Sunday we went to George’s parents’ house to have Thanksgiving dinner. It was just the four of us, his parents, and a family friend so it was quiet but very nice. And really it’s never actually QUIET with kids, right? We ate a lot of good food, had some good laughs, and earlier in the afternoon I slipped out and took some pictures of the woods to capture the slowly changing leaves. I’m worried that we won’t have a particularly colorful Fall since the wind has been blowing the leaves off before they get super bright, but I’m still hoping.

It was nice to walk in the woods alone with nothing but my camera for company!

Monday was pretty quiet and one of Hayley’s friends came over to play Barbies, but everyone was tired so it wasn’t as exuberant as it might have been otherwise. I was really happy once 10 pm came around and I was able to put my feet up and watch some prime time television (oh okay, it was “CSI: Miami”) and then go to bed.

This morning was rough since I was tired, had a wicked sore throat, and it was also freezing cold and raining out. Still, it was good to get back to routine again. It’s a short week so it won’t be too bad and it will be the weekend again before we know it.

I hope all my fellow Canadians had an equally wonderful Thanksgiving weekend! You can see all the birthday party photos over here and all the Thanksgiving photos are over here.

What's been up around here

Posted on September 29, 2009 by Sherry

Wow, remember when I used to update here daily or almost daily? With all the other blogging I do for work I often find myself comatose in front of the TV at night instead of being able to concentrate on anything else. Let’s see, what have I missed?

Last week I went to my first PPO meeting. I had a good laugh when it was over because I had told George that this year I was just going to be a member, volunteer for things at the school (stuff like movie night, carnival, etc), and that I was not going to run for any of the executive positions.

So naturally I came home having become the secretary. Of course. It’s not a problem though, all I have to do is take notes, then type up the minutes and email them to everyone else. I tend to take notes for my own purposes anyway so it’s really an easy and natural extension for me to do it for the others too.

Things got pretty busy on Friday straight through the rest of the weekend, but it was all the good kind of busy. On Friday morning George’s dad came by and Breanna and I went with him to the school’s Terry Fox Run. They do it at the high school because they have a seriously beautiful field, and they have a big sound system so they can play music to keep the kids motivated (though they still need occasional rests since the field is HUGE).

On the other hand, we were all pretty motivated to keep moving because it was so chilly that morning! Just like the last two times, Breanna was very eager to take part and she actually ended up running and walking more than Hayley did. As for Hayley, she had a fantastic sleep later that night because between walking to the high school, doing the run, walking back to her school, playing outside at lunch, and then having gym for final period (plus the exhaustion of school in general), she was completely wiped out.

Saturday found me packing up my camera bag with all my lenses and my flash for my very first professional photo session. That was exciting! The gospel singer that George worked with over the past couple of years needed pictures taken for his album cover, the back photo, and the CD face so I went to his church and shot a ton of different pictures. Although there were many to choose from, we immediately found the front and back cover photos and will use a black and white version of the back photo for the CD face.

The album is titled “Dear God” so we went with the concept of him writing a letter to God. He’s ecstatic with the results, which makes ME happy too. I can now officially add “photographer” to my resume… Yay!

On Sunday we went to the Shriner’s Circus which was a lot of fun even though it was completely insane trying to find seats inside the tent. We ended up with George and Hayley sitting on one side of the aisle and I sat on the other side with Breanna on my knee because there was no way we were going to find four seats together. Next time we’ll know to show up at least an hour early!

We had a good time though. I have mixed feelings about the circus because of the animals, but the elephants seem to be very well taken care of. I love watching the acrobatics as well, it’s so exciting to see people do all these wild flips and jumps when they make it look so easy.

(Do you see that guy in the second photo? He’s sitting on a thick rope and he freaked me out so badly that I thought I might throw up just from watching him. He swung around so high, right up to the top of the tent, and even hung by his knees and one time he dangled by one foot which was when I nearly passed out. Seriously, I’m freaking out just thinking about it. It was amazing but I’m glad it didn’t go on too long because I would have needed an EMT.)

Hayley seemed to enjoy it and I know that Breanna was very excited. She loved everything she saw, but I think the cutest moment was when three women were doing an act hanging from circles up near the top of the tent. At the end of their act, they all started spinning and glitter fell to the ground; Breanna looked at me with big eyes and an even bigger smile and shouted, “they’re fairies Mommy! They’re real fairies!”

And now it’s back to the grind. I’m sort of surprised to find out that it’s already Tuesday since it somehow still feels like it’s only Monday. That’s always a good thing, I love when the week goes by faster than normal.

Now if only I could make myself go to bed earlier, then I wouldn’t be so tired, plus the week would zoom by even more. I’ll have to work on that, but I don’t think I’ll hold my breath. It’s hard to win the fight against my night owl self – after all, it’s been winning for 35 years and counting!

Maybe I’ll just have another coffee instead.

Birthday lunch and turning seven

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Sherry

Before we left for Halifax (sigh, Halifax), we had figured that we’d have Hayley’s birthday party on September 19th since it was Saturday and the day before Hayley’s actual birthday. Then we realized that after a three-week trip we might be sort of short on funds for such an event. We ended up postponing the party until October 10th which will work much better. Also, since it’s Thanksgiving weekend one of our friends has offered to roast a turkey and we’re basically going to have a big turkey dinner for the party which should be awesome.

However, I didn’t want to just let the weekend of Hayley’s birthday slip past unnoticed so we decided to invite her two best school friends over for a birthday lunch on the Saturday. These two kids aren’t even in her class this year, but they still all play together at recess and lunch so it made sense to have them over.

We had some lunch and birthday cake and we played a few games like Freeze Dance; it was also Talk Like a Pirate Day so I made them walk the plank, arrrr. That went over so well, they begged to keep playing it long after I expected them to get bored with it.

On Sunday we got up and went to one of those traveling fairs that set up in shopping mall parking lots. The kids went on a few rides and had a lot of fun. Breanna’s a bit of an adrenaline junkie apparently, and she was walking around with that crazed “NOW WHAT?!” look for much of the morning. She was royally pissed that she wasn’t big enough to be allowed on the ferris wheel, let me tell you. She also really wanted to go on the roller coaster by herself but we had run out of tickets by that time and had to go to a birthday party, so she’ll have to try it next year.

That afternoon we had a birthday party for our friend’s daughter. I wondered if Hayley would be upset about going to someone else’s party on her real birthday but she wasn’t bothered at all. As far as she was concerned that just meant more friends, more cake, and more games.

After the party wrapped up we gave Hayley her gifts from us. We’ll still get her an extra gift for her party, but her main gifts were a CD player (she has a stereo but the CD player has become temperamental lately and doesn’t always work so now she can either listen to this one with headphones or hook it up to the stereo) and a microphone. She was especially excited about the microphone. We hooked it up to the kids’ computer which then plays through our sound system. Now she can load up a video on YouTube (especially fun are the ones that have the lyrics on the screen) and she can sing along. Once she gets used to it I can try her on some karaoke videos too.

All in all I think it was a pretty good weekend! Unfortunately Hayley had caught a cold last week (right on schedule, first week back at school for her, happens every year) and while she was over it by Saturday, it hit my like a freight train on Sunday. By now I’m mostly better, thanks to putting vapor rub all over my forehead to ease the pain in my sinuses but I’m still pretty tired. I can’t tell you how thrilled I am to be starting back on the illness cycle that comes with school, yippee!

I can’t believe my first baby is seven years old now – that’s just crazy!

Things we did before we left

Posted on September 15, 2009 by Sherry

I was in Halifax for three weeks. Originally we weren’t sure we could even go and I was considering the fact that I might have to fly out by myself, stay for three or four days so I could attend Amanda’s wedding, and then come back home. I wasn’t looking forward to flying alone and I was sad at the thought of George and the kids not being there with me (not to mention being sad about the whirlwind visit). Then it worked out, I took my work with me, and we got to spend three great weeks in a place that I love tremendously.

It wasn’t long enough but as far as getaways go, you can’t really ask for much more than that.

After the wedding we were very tired and just lazed around with Breanna napping and even I fell asleep beside her for 20 minutes. I was abruptly woken up by George who told me that it was the final day for a ride on Theodore the Tugboat, something we really wanted to do with the kids. After Sunday it was going from daily outings to weekends and we were due to leave on Wednesday so we had to rush to catch one of the last two rides out that day. It was crazy but we made it in time for the 3:30-4:30 outing and it was so worth it.

(That picture cracks me up because only George looks happy, but Hayley was just mid-blink while Breanna was temporarily nervous when we started to move; she was fine once we got going!)

He’s a rather pleasant looking guy isn’t he?

The whole trip takes an hour and a guide gives a history of the harbour and all the boats and whatnot in it. She does it in a way that is interesting for adults but still fun for the kids and they were all laughing. Hell, even I laughed a few times, like the time she warned us all to duck as we approached the MacDonald Bridge because Theodore had “bumped his head on it” last week, and the way she told us all to try to touch the bridge on the way back with the caveat to avoid sticky spots because people like to leave their chewed gum up there.

On Tuesday I had to pack everything up for our Wednesday morning departure but before I did that I asked George if we could go back to Point Pleasant Park one last time. I needed to see the harbour-turned-ocean once more before I could leave. And so we did, and as though we didn’t already have enough shells, we combed the beach for more, then we bought amazing fries and sat to eat them overlooking the water.

I wasn’t happy to be leaving on Wednesday but by 8:45 we were off, stopping quickly in Truro for breakfast at McDonald’s, and then we drove to Grand Falls, New Brunswick where we had decided to spend the night in a nice motel. The drive out had been too much for one person to deal with so stopping was a better idea. It was quite nice there, with comfortable beds, a nice standard of cleanliness, free continental breakfast, and a play area for kids which was nice after seven hours in a car.

We left at roughly the same time on Thursday. I don’t sleep well the first night in a strange place so I got very little sleep (and it was broken to boot) so I was too queasy to hang around for breakfast; George and I downed a coffee, the kids drank juice, and we took our muffins to eat in the car. The drive felt longer than it was, but we actually made excellent time, managing to avoid all traffic and arriving back in town before 3 pm. I hadn’t wanted to leave Halifax but by Thursday I just wanted to get the hell home already and it was good – or as good as it can be – to be home.

I had the best time in Halifax. It was the perfect blend of excursions, relaxing downtime, and fun. I’d say I’m hoping to do it again next year but frankly I’m hoping our next drive out will include a U-Haul trailer hitched to the back of the car as we journey off to our new Halifax home.

Keep your fingers crossed, okay?

East coast girl

Posted on August 21, 2009 by Sherry

It’s been, uh, more than a few days since I’ve updated, hasn’t it?

Sorry about that. See, a few days ago we handed a spare key to a friend who is house-sitting for us, showed him where the dog food and cat food can be found, offered up all the contents of our fridge and pantry, and then the next day we got in a car. At 3:30 am. For roughly 16 hours.

Yes, the driving sucked. And I don’t even drive. I’m so sorry that I don’t have a driver’s license because I felt bad for George who had to drive all 16 of those hours. The kids were really great up until the last three or four hours, and honestly you can’t ask for much more than that. We stopped frequently at rest areas, ate too much junk for one day (alas), and plied the kids with portable DVD players until they passed out.

And we drove. And drove. And stopped at Tim Horton’s for coffee because both of us had droopy eyes. And then we drove some more. And then…

We hit Nova Scotia. And roughly two hours later we arrived in Halifax and let me tell you, I already know it’s going to be hard to come home. I wonder if our house-sitter would like a cat and dog. And all our crap. Because I’d like to stay.

The first real day that we were here was very quiet. The last thing George (or any of us) wanted to do was get back in a car to drive around anywhere. Instead we hung around his cousin’s house and I took the kids to the park. The biggest drive was when George went to the grocery store for steaks to BBQ that night. It was quiet but fun.

Today we headed into downtown Halifax where I surprised my sister by dropping in on her at work. The surprise was almost on us when we found out she had gone for a walk after lunch, but she arrived five minutes later and there were tears from each of us. I miss my sister.

After a tour of the law firm she works in, we took the kids down to the waterfront, ate some insanely delicious burgers, and watched the boats – the kids desperately want to go for a ride on Theodore the Tugboat, so we just might go back and do that while we’re here.

We drove around the Citadel but plan to go back on a day when it’s not so hot. We did drive out to Point Pleasant Park though, and the kids were very excited to see the Atlantic Ocean. Let’s be honest – I was excited too.

We have many more plans in store. I’m updating my photo set over on Flickr regularly. In the meantime, I had to smile the first morning I was here when I pulled out a mug from the cupboard and filled it with coffee only to notice what it said:

Yes. Yes, it certainly is.

Why I'll be steering my kids towards the Jonas Brothers and away from Miley Cyrus

Posted on August 12, 2009 by Sherry

I’ve been trying to wrap my head around something for several days. The 2009 Teen Choice Awards were taped on Sunday night and they aired on Monday. However, this is the Internet world with YouTube and Twitter and Flickr, and so long before the show aired I had heard that Miley Cyrus did a pole dance during her performance.

I was confused when I heard this. Miley has made some mistakes in her short career but overall she’s a pretty good girl, an average teenager, and at least one of her parents (usually both) are at all her shows to keep her head on straight. I thought that certainly someone was exaggerating something innocent. You know, like maybe Miley had grabbed a support pole as she skipped past and lost her balance or… something?

Well, no.

miley

No, Miley wore short-shorts, high heeled boots, and danced on top of an ice cream truck with a POLE.

I need to state for the record that I am not now, nor have I ever been a prude. Not even close. And I will admit that her routine was tame. It wasn’t a re-enactment of Showgirls with Miley twirling upside down on a pole, legs spread in the air or anything. That being said, she is SIXTEEN YEARS OLD. She is an underage teenage girl. On top of that, she’s an underage teenage girl associated with Disney and a role model to very young girls.

If Miley wants to break free from that, I don’t blame her, I get it. But she needs to remove herself from the whole Hannah Montana phenomenon first. When you have fans as young as four or five years old, gyrating – even for a moment – along a pole in an itty bitty outfit and hooker heel boots is inappropriate. I’m so glad my kids were in bed, so I would have to explain that no, they can’t dance like that on the poles that hold up the play structures at the park because it’s (as I said) INAPPROPRIATE.

The thing is, I can’t really blame Miley herself. She’s gotten herself into so much trouble before that you’d think she’d learn by now (hello, stop taking half-naked pictures of yourself and maybe avoid racial slurs that you think are funny) but she’s still 16 years old. She probably thought she was being cool. I remember being 16, and I probably would have thought so too.

But did I mention that her parents are at pretty much every performance she does? Also, her manager is HER MOTHER. Her mother approved that routine? Seriously? Well apparently, because Billy Ray and Tish stood up and applauded their little girl up there, proud as all hell. Makes you think they just really like the money Miley brings in with her massive empire of products. Well, you know who else liked the money her daughter was pulling in? Dinah Lohan. Have you seen what’s happened to Lindsay Lohan over the years?

The truth is I think the Jonas Brothers SUCK. I’ve admittedly never heard any of their recorded albums, I just know that every time I hear them live on some awards show I can’t get past the fact that they’re constantly out of tune. But you know what? I’ll get their albums and some posters and see what Hayley thinks of them because three boys with purity rings are better role models than a pole-dancing teenager.

Dude, just say no.

Getting as much enjoyment out of the weekend as possible

Posted on August 5, 2009 by Sherry

Sunday was a rainy day, so luckily we had big plans for Saturday instead. We were up at a decent hour (especially for a weekend) and we headed up to Saint-Sauveur, a charming area in the Laurentians outside of Montreal which is a tourist haven year-round, but especially in the Winter thanks to its numerous ski hills and chalets.

George is in more than one band, and one of the drummers was having a party at his house up there. He asked the band to come and play – no pay, but lots of food, the use of his (fabulous!) pool, and a good time. He also told George to be sure to bring his family, which was really nice since I had spoken to him on the phone a few times but had never actually met him in person.

We had a great day. It started off a bit rocky because Quebec is an idiotic province that figures it’s a good idea to do construction on every single possible route to a major destination. What should have been a one-hour drive North ended up taking us two and a half hours, complete with cursing and muttering. We grabbed a quick lunch just outside of Sauveur, then made our way to the party.

The upside was that we didn’t have to figure out how to entertain ourselves in town while waiting for the party to start – by the time we made it there, the band simply set up, the kids and I hopped into the pool, and the live music started.

They played several sets, with a few other people joining in on guitar, harmonica, and vocals – the guy playing harmonica found out that Breanna loves that instrument and gave her a spare that he had. She was in heaven. Meanwhile, we swam until our lips turned blue, ate tons of corn on the cob, grilled hot dogs & burgers, salads galore, and had a wonderful time.

At one point when the sun was hitting that magical “golden hour”, I took the girls for a walk and took a few shots along the way. After the sun set I expected to be attacked by mosquitoes, but for some reason they didn’t bother us at all, even without bug spray (chlorine maybe?), and when the band finally called it a night we had even more food when the hostess brought out platters of cheese, crackers, fruit, and pies.

We left a little past 11 and got home (after dropping George’s amp off at his parents’ house) around 12:30 a.m. Breanna had passed out within five minutes of driving. Hayley managed to hang in for about 20 minutes before she fell asleep too. Neither one was impressed to be woken up when we got home but we got them upstairs and into bed fairly easily.

It was a really great way to spend the day. Everyone was so nice, and I spent a lot of time talking to one woman in particular who also had a Canon dSLR camera (the 40D) – that was really nice because usually I’m the only one with a “big-ass camera (TM)” and people sometimes look strangely at me when I’m lying on the ground or climbing up on stuff to take pictures. It was great to spend a lot of time with someone who does the exact same thing.

I can definitely go for more weekends like that. You can see the full photo set over here if you’d like.

An easy way to spruce up your weekend – go see Harry!

Posted on July 19, 2009 by Sherry

Here is something which will not be a surprise to anyone who knows me even a little – this weekend we went to see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. The reason this wouldn’t be a surprise to most people is because I have always gone offline completely whenever a new book came out in the series so that I could read it without fear of spoilers, and the only times I missed the movies in theaters was because one time I was experiencing horrible morning sickness (with Hayley) and another time I had just given birth (to Breanna).

I’m a bit of a Harry Potter fan. You know, just a little. To the point where I know all the spells, characters, debates, and prior to the final book had a great deal of fun indulging in theories all over the Internet. I’ve also been known to enjoy some good Harry Potter fanfic and even wrote some myself.

So yeah. It’s no surprise that I saw Harry Potter this weekend. It made $104 million on its opening night; I don’t know how much it made over the whole weekend but I certainly contributed to it. Also, oh my GOD. It was so ridiculously good. They’ve all been fun but I’ve usually had some gripes after the fact. This time the movie was two and a half hours which helped avoid cutting out too much of the important story parts which was really nice. There was only one thing that they left out that I would have liked to have seen included but the story didn’t suffer for it so it was okay. I really think that this was the best adaptation of any of the books so far.

George made fun of me for crying. It’s okay because I made fun of him for jumping so high that he nearly fell out of his seat. Good movie indeed.

Can you tell I was really happy to have seen it?

(What? What do you mean you don’t take pictures in your in-laws’ bathroom? I thought everyone did!)

*******

The amazingly crappy summer continues with further instances of rain and cloud and temperatures that are way too low to be considered normal July weather. It rained today which ruined my plans of hitting the park – not only were all the swings and slides wet, with the proximity of the woods it also means the park was a total mosquito paradise so that was out.

However, thankfully the sun broke through the clouds after supper – of course! Just when it’s time to start setting! But at least it was there, so I grabbed both the kids and we went out for a nice long walk around the neighborhood. They needed the fresh air and exercise, and the air felt pretty good to me too. It was also nice to actually have some evening light for taking pictures.

I know that by this time I’m usually bitching about the humidity but honestly, it’s getting ridiculous. The kids tried to swim last weekend at the party but the pool was brand new so the water was cold and so was the air – they didn’t last long and I didn’t get in at all, choosing to just hold Breanna up on the side of the pool to splash her feet instead. I haven’t been swimming yet and it’s been almost a full month since summer started. Enough!

I need some pool time. Really desperately. Please?

An outdoor party on one of the few nice days so far

Posted on July 13, 2009 by Sherry

Honestly, so far this has been one hell of a crappy summer. There’s been way too much rain and while it may be great for the grass, we can’t enjoy it since we’re INSIDE all the time. Also, it is killing my flowers. Totally killing them. They can’t handle it and I’ve lost all the flowers on my geranium, an entire box of white pansies, and the yellow ones may be next. It figures that I wait ten years before finally planting flowers, only to do it on one of the most monsoon-like summers.

And it doesn’t help that it rained again today, and when I went to check the forecast I found this:

Well YIPPEE.

Anyway. It wasn’t looking good on Saturday, but Hayley had a birthday party in the early afternoon. This left Breanna very sad since she wasn’t invited (I told her she’d get birthday invites when she starts school but this was of little comfort) so I took her to the park for a picnic. We had to eat really quickly and get to the swings as fast as we could because I could see the clouds coming in, but we got some fun time in together before it started to pour.

When we had to go back out later it was just ridiculous driving. There was so much rain coming down that even though we parked all of 15 feet from the door we were all soaked by the time we got in.

Luckily it didn’t rain on Sunday though because we had an outdoor party that day. The sister of the drummer in George’s band was having a party at her house but it was intended to be outside in the backyard and the band was going to set up beside the back deck. A storm would have been a disaster. It ended up being quite chilly but there was nary a drop of rain so that’s all that mattered.

The house is in a rural area and surrounded by farm land. I LOVE it out there. They have two kids as well, not much older than Hayley, so their yard is like a child’s paradise – pool, treehouse, swing set, slide, trampoline, tons of toys. Hayley and Breanna were NOT bored, let’s put it that way. Also, they’re at an age where it’s so much easier to go out with them because I don’t have to hover and follow all the time like you do with younger kids. I just let them go and they had a blast – the entire day they must have jumped for a total of three or four hours on the trampoline. They slept SUPER well that night.

Meanwhile, I had a great time because I hadn’t heard George play in a really long freakin’ time. I miss that so much. Also, *rawr* and all that.

It was a really good time. The food was delicious (lots of grilled chicken, sausages, plus side dishes of pasta salads, potatoes, and oh my GOD Tabbouleh – I ate so much Tabbouleh), everyone had fun, and it was so nice to be out. Unfortunately, the second that the sun went down, approximately 500 angry mosquitoes came out of nowhere and attacked us so the show came to a stop at about 9 pm and we had cake and coffee in the kitchen, leaving by about 10 pm.

I love that my kids are growing up in a world where it’s totally normal to have parties that involve live bands.

The last day before a new year

Posted on July 6, 2009 by Sherry

Today is my last day to say that I’m 34 years old. I’m not disappointed, 34 is an awkward-sounding number, I think that 35 is much nicer. I’m looking forward to 35 to be honest. I have lots of things in mind to make happen during this next year of my life.

Tomorrow will be spent hanging out with the crazy people who share my home, the one who looks for Heffalumps in the tall grass at the park:

The one who swings way too damn high (without any pushing from anyone anymore, she does it all herself) and scares the crap out of me:

And the crazy guy who helped bring them into the world:

I completed over half the work that I need to do on my actual birthday so that I don’t have to work too much. I’m going to relax, try to pretend the forecast isn’t full of RAIN, make a chocolate cake, and enjoy starting another year of my life.

Sounds pretty good to me!

Chaos Theory

Category Archives: Blablabla