Friday Funny

Time for a math funny!

It took me a couple seconds to get the last line....say it out loud....   :)

Losing it

I've been scrambling lately because I feel like there are so many things going on that need to be done and taken care of, and there are only so many hours in the day.  Take yesterday for example...the three kids and I had to be out the door by 8:25 am to take Katie to school and to be in the music room by 8:40 to watch the 2nd grade class do their spring "Music Informance".  At this young age, instead of doing 2 concerts a year, they invite the parents to a music class to participate with their child and see what they have been learning.  It was lots of fun....and time well spent.  We were out of there at 9:10, just in time to get to a meeting at 9:30 for a non-profit I help with.  We spent 2 hours going over things there, then at 11:30 it was time to make a run for the grocery store to pick up lunch stuff for Katie's sack lunch today because they are on a field trip to the Mall of America.  We were out of the store by noon, just in time for an hour meeting back at Katie's school to talk fundraising with the PTO.  At 1:00 we finally trekked home to have some lunch and get the 2 year old down for a nap. 

Finally at 2:00 I had time to sit down and attack my to-do list.  I had until 3:25, so that gave me 85 minutes and was only interrupted for bathroom help, snacks, toy fixes, and book reading 8 times.  As you can imagine, I got LOADS done. (eye roll....)  Now usually, I can grab a good hour of solid work time in the afternoon because Will likes to go on the computer if his room is picked up.  On Monday I discovered that the old desktop won't boot up.  The light comes on when you power it up, but no fan, no beeps, no sounds, nothing.  So from taking an hour on Monday (that I shouldn't have spared) to troubleshoot the issue - it seems I may have to replace the motherboard....but I still have to open it up and take a look at it.  If I end up opening it, I may throw in some extra RAM too and see if we can't really re-vamp the whole system. 

So I think our of 85 minutes, I got about 15 minutes of work done.  That brings Katie home at 3:25, and the 2 year old up from her nap.  Now it's snack time and time to discuss the school day and before you know it, it's 4:00....and time to attempt to get Katie to sit and focus on her undone homework that is due the next day.  We had 6 pages of math and a spelling test to do because she had refused to do any of the homework since Friday. 

We finally got done around 5:30, the 2 year old got picked up, and now it was time to get supper going I was making a new casserole and the prep time said 20 minutes...with 15 minutes of baking.  Ok - should be done by 6:05.  After 3 doorbell rings (2 of which were people other than Will.....) and other random interruptions we were eating at 6:45.....talk about throwing the night off. 

The kids hadn't bathed in....oh, I don't know.....let's just be kind and say 8 days. (Actually I think that's close.....may have been 9.)  So I had earmarked Tuesday night for a bath, which meant bedtime didn't happen til after 8.  Finally at 8:30 I was able to sit down at the computer and get 45 minutes of more work in. 

So in 24 hours.....I got a whopping 60 minutes of time to get my own work done.  Let's see how today goes....for now, I'm going to take some time and make a list of stuff to get done.  (Bear with me)

- Finish Federal tax return
- Start/Finish state return
- Pay all March bills
- Get monthly #'s done for non-profit
- Finish monthly report for non-profit
- Finish correspondence for Area job for non-profit
- Finish said "training" for Area job for non-profit
- Complete 45 minute concussion training online for Will's soccer team
- Since there's no coach and I signed up to be "manager" for said team....I now have to do all coaching duties as well.  This includes contacting all parents to introduce myself and remind them about practice.
- Pick up team uniforms and get names put on the back for whole team
- Create a "treat schedule" as well as a "phone tree" for team
- Find Katie pink ballet flats for recital and pictures in May
- Call dance coach about pictures
- Pick up dance recital tickets at rec center
- Register for Easter party at Nature Center
- Troubleshoot whole computer problem and research the availability of a new motherboard.
- Mail in 2,200 Kemps milk caps for Katie's school
- Mail in 2,000 Kwik Trip caps for Katie's school
- Mail package of assorted baby stuff to pregnant friend


This is just stuff in addition to the normal daily stuff that has to get done too - I have 3 loads of laundry, a stack of dishes, and a kitchen floor so sticky I think the cat refuses to walk on it.  Not to mention that I still have hours and hours of episodes of Glee to get to. :)  I think I might treat myself to an episode today since it's been about a week since I've gotten to watch any....we'll see.  Enough complaining for now - it's a sunny day and time to tackle that list!

Oh crap, I can't - it's time to take Will to school.  Try again later, I guess.

All Right....Fess up.

Ever since that last post with the Bible Verse I've been getting a daily e-mail from "Your Bible Verse of the Day.....Your Daily Dose of Holiness"

Now which one of you signed me up for that.

I may just keep it to see if there's any little nuggets from Deuteronomy that pop up.   Or Leviticus - that seems to have some whoppers too.  I'm not going to get into a discussion of faith or religion here.  That's something I will never delve too deeply into on here for many, many reasons.  And it's probably reasons you wouldn't expect - not your normal, run of the mill "I don't want to start a disagreement" thing.  So if you're really interested in why I veer away from that on here - ask me in person.

I will say however, that the Bible can be a good tool, and is a good book.  If nothing else, it can be read with an interesting historical interpretation.  And if people are throwing quotes out there from the Bible trying to support a viewpoint that disagrees with yours, wouldn't it be nice to disarm their argument with a little verse of your own? 

Ok enough of that....it's Friday Funny time....

Good one for a Sunday

Katie was presented with her 2nd Grade Bible today at church.  Will got his preschool one last fall, so Katie was happy it was her turn.  I remembered getting my Bibles when I was younger, and it was always a pretty big deal.  Then afterwards, Pastor Kristi came down to Sunday School and taught the kids how to look verses up in it. 

Katie got home and was excited to show John that she knew how a Bible "worked".  Of course John was excited to just jump right in and start reading it to.  After 10 seconds of him flipping through, he discovered his favorite verse and I thought I would share that with you.  After all, it IS Sunday.

Deuteronomy 25:11-12
Moses said to Isreal "If two men are fighting, and the wife of one man tires to rescue her husband by grabbing the other man's private parts, you must cut off her hand.  Don't have any mercy."

Don't you think that would look nice stitched and hung above the couch?

This is totally worth the time it took to upload.  Will's interpretation of Henry The Hermit Crab....an idea that came up out of the blue (like most of what comes out of Will's mouth).

Are you sick of them yet?

More pictures.....

Katie and I with the director.

Katie getting a pep talk from her friend, Kenzie.

Did I mention that women at the church FED us cast members between shows on Saturday too? 

Oh man, they made us turkey, mashed potatoes, cheesy potatoes, corn, grapes, strawberries, cookies, brownies....you name it, we ate it.

Katie and some of her orphans.

More Annie Pictures

Poor "Molly" getting her hair picked out by "Ms. Hannigan."

Katie singing her solo during the last scene.

 

My "other" on-stage personality, "The Producer"....no lines, no singing, no dancing, just improv.

Perfect for someone who lost their voice.

Katie during "Never Fully Dressed without a Smile."

More dancing!

Ok - get ready....here come the pictures

I just got access to all the pictures that had been taking of Annie over the last week of dress rehearsals and performances.  Geez, there were almost 1,000 pictures and ALL totally wonderful.  I've taken the last 2 hours and gone through all of them and now am going to try to only post 500 or so.....

just kidding.  (Katie and I were only in about 160 of them.)  But bear with me, there may be a lot.

Katie doing her best impression of Ms. Hannigan

Katie getting tossed into the laundry basket.

Ms. Hannigan yanking Katie out by the ears.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN THERE?"

"Nothin'!"

Katie doing her yelling solo at the end of Hard Knock Life.

And, oh yeah......here's me and my crew of servants with "Annie", "Grace" and "Daddy Warbucks".



Katie and I

I'll type this.....if I don't fall asleep first.

4 shows in 3 days DONE!!

And....for the first time in all 5 years of our church putting on these musicals, they had a sold out show!  AAAAANNNNNDDDD....not only did they sell out 1....they sold out 3.  I'm telling you - it was the most packed I've ever seen it.  I will have some great pictures coming my way later that I'll share, but don't have any right now.

So Friday night and Saturday afternoon Katie was a "non-speaking" orphan.  She did a wonderful job of singing and dancing and hitting all her marks.  I was also in the show as Mrs. Greer, Daddy Warbucks' house servant.  At the end of Friday night's performance my voice felt like it was cracking.  So I went home, had some tea and went to bed.  I woke up Saturday morning with barely a whisper coming out.  I tell you I drank everything that I thought would help, and anything that people told me to try.  Tea, honey, aloe vera juice, grain alcohol throat spray, drops, lozenges, etc.  Nothing helped.  I had a few lines that I barely squeaked out and I lip synced the songs that I sang with others on stage.  My other part that I was assigned last minute was as the "producer" in the radio show.  Luckily, it was a non-speaking, non-singing role and I basically could do anything I wanted.  The other cast members and I came up with some ideas to make it pretty funny and it kept growing and changing as the shows went on.  Today my voice still isn't back, but I can manage more than just a whisper....but it still isn't pretty.

Last night and this afternoon Katie got to be "Molly" - the youngest orphan.  I'm telling you - she was amazing.  It was absolutely the cutest thing, and even John admitted he was on the verge of tears as he watched her do her thing up on stage.  Everyone thought it was just so funny how she is so quiet and sweet off stage, but can get really loud and let it out up on stage.  She did say that she was a little nervous before the show, but holy cow - you wouldn't have guessed it.  To all of our IA family...I've been promised a CD of last night's show and will hopefully have that in the coming weeks to share with all of you.

I also wanted to take time to send GIANT hugs to all of our friends that took time out of their weekend to come see the show.  We love you all so much and are so thankful to have been able to share this with you.  You really made it so much more special for Katie because she got so excited when she knew there were friends out in the audience.   

Stay tuned for pictures!   Good night!

In costume

Wouldn't you know it that when I have something I actually WANT to take pictures of, my camera dies.  Thankfully it made it through our vacation without a hitch, but when we got back, it froze.  So I'm thinking that the lithium ion battery pack in it has gone bad and just needs a new one.  However, I hate those battery packs.  When we bought the camera down in Austin 2 1/2 years ago I didn't realize that it had a pack instead of AA's.  So to replace the battery pack costs anywhere from $30-$50.  When I went to the store they had brand new camera's (that take AA's) right there for $80-$90.  I like using the AA batteries instead because I can have extra on hand.  And we use rechargeable batteries for the cameras anyway. So these Annie pictures were all take with my new Canon Power Shot.  I think the video quality is much better than the other camera as well.

Katie, the orphans and Miss Hannigan.  (It's so cute because the woman who plays her is one of the sweetest people you'll ever meet, and she felt horrible for having to treat Katie like dirt.)

Seems Will has to do things like this to get attention these days....

Yes.  That's a pickle in his nose.

Hard Knock Life sneak peek

So here's a little video I took yesterday at dress rehearsal.  It was the first real run through with props and music.  You'll notice Katie and a few other orphans have microphones, but they were still working on getting them so the sound isn't as clear as it will be come showtime. 

Oh....and pardon the really shaky part in the middle....I was trying to signal Katie to remember her cue to go upstairs.  Thankfully Kenzie (Annie) is on top of it.  (Side note - Kenzie is also Will and Katie's babysitter sometimes!)  When they run up on the stairs, Katie sings "Santa Claus, we never see."  Then Kenzie says back "Santa Claus?  What's that?  Who's he?"

**If you want to make the video bigger, click the button in the lower right hand corner of the video (the square thing.)

Friday Funny

Tomorrow begins a week of dress rehearsals for "Annie".  I hope to get some cute pictures of Katie all dressed up in her costume.



Molly's friend

We have a neighbor cat that visits us often named Dustball. (Fixed female)  She comes over looking for Molly in the afternoons.  I only have to yell "Molly, it's Dustball!" and she comes running to the back door.

For the most part, they get along....through the glass.

Sometimes they meet at the front door....

Most of the time they chat through the back patio door.

Sometimes they get upset with each other.

They both like their space.

One more night - then time to go home.

Friday night we went out to eat for our final night in Florida.  We ate at a place called The Old Salty Dog.  Very yummy food - again, the kids got theirs on frisbees.  I guess if we lived down there, we'd have frisbees coming out our wahzoo.  Ended up coming home with 5!

Will being.....Will.

Katie displaying her most recent frisbee.

Picture of us, thanks to Katie

Time to go home....Will looks sad, but he actually couldn't wait to go home.  He'd been asking for the last 2 days of vacation when we were going to go home.  I once said "Well, maybe we should just live here." 

The terrified look on his face told me that wasn't an option for him.



At the Atlanta airport we had better luck on the return trip.  When we were there on Monday, we had to take a tram to another terminal where we were leaving from.  So, the 4 of us were on the (very crowded) tram to go to Terminal T.  When the doors opened and it was time to get off, John was trying to squeeze through a bunch of travelers who were NOT moving out of the way.  This resulted in him and Will getting off the tram at the right stop, but Katie and I were stuck on the tram as it continued to zoom down the track.  Once the people on board realized that they had separated us....they really weren't that apologetic.  No Minnesota Nice there.

Anyway - at the next stop a bunch of people on the tram pointed to another train across the walkway and said "Just take that one back to the previous terminal, you'll be fine."  One guy even said - just walk down this hallway (as he pointed) it'll get you back to the other terminal.  Ok - Katie and get off and head over to that tram....which is blocked with yellow caution tape with a big red sign saying "Out of order" and "Under construction."  Great. 

The tram we had gotten off of, was still there - doors wide open and wasn't going anywhere.  The hallway the guy pointed to?  A dead end. 

The only way out - was an escalator at each end of the room - going up.  And each had a big sign at the top saying "Exit only....no re-entry.  Alarm will sound."  Ok - so if I went up there, I'd have to re-enter through security.  No big deal, except John had all of our boarding passes....and we had to be ready to board our second flight in about 45 minutes. 

All of a sudden, after sitting for about 4-5 minutes the tram all of a sudden shut it's doors and we watched it shoot down the tracks going the way we wanted.  I figured the tram would take us back down, but when it was just sitting there....with nothing on the screen about where the next stop would be I was hesitant to get back on it.  After about 45 seconds, another tram showed up and the screen said that IT was leaving for Terminal T in 30 seconds.  Katie and I got on - and we magically appeared in front of John and Will about 45 seconds later....on the opposite side where they had originally gotten off. 

This whole thing freaked Katie out - and she was not happy about getting back on the tram on the way home - but we stood right by the doors and were willing to push people out of the way if necessary.  Then we realized that over the course of the week, we had been in a car, a bus, a train, an airplane, a boat, an elevator and an escalator.  A real journey. :)

Day Five - Continued.....Friday Afternoon

After eating lunch at the park, we headed back to Siesta Key for more beach time.  It was still clear and warm. 

Katie and John were able to head pretty far out, and still only be waist deep.

Will opted to be more of a beach bum than a water guy.

We had a buddy that hung around us most of the day because we were eating chips....and apparently he thought he'd get some. 

John and Katie went for a walk and found sea grass, sea weed, and a certain kind of

sponge that smells like garlic.  (We had learned this on the boat ride!)



Day Five - Friday

Again, you may have to scroll back to find the previous days....

Friday we woke up, had breakfast and decided it would be a good day to head to Myakka State Park (about 30 minutes away).  It was going to be a warm, sunny day.....until later afternoon/evening when there was a chance for showers. 

The brochure for Myakka Park said that alligators were "abundant" and gave instructions not to feed them or approach them.  Here was a sign just in case you forgot....



Our first stop was the canopy walk.  It's a walkway suspended 25 feet above the ground and extends 100 feet through the hammock canopy.  Completed in 2000, it's the first public treetop trail in North America.  The world's longest walkway is in Peru. 

When you get to the end, you can climb a wooden tower that soars 74 feet in the air to get a good view of the Florida wetlands/prairie.  

Pretty big alligator sunning himself.

The kids got really good at spotting these little geckos.  In fact, they are so common in buildings in Florida that they are called "house lizards."  Luckily, we only saw them outside.  I think from what I've read, this is a brown anole lizard.

Day Four - Thursday

We didn't want to have too much planned the next few days because we wanted to spend as much time at the beach as possible.  It was going to be 2 beautiful days and we wanted to take advantage of it.  Katie was upset because we didn't think we'd have time to get to G-Wiz (a children's science museum)....her #1 activity on her list.  It was just hard to think about spending a whole day inside.  So I made her a promise that we'd make a special trip to The Works back in MN which is an older kid's museum concentrated around "how things work".

We went down to the beach after breakfast.  Since we weren't staying in a hotel - we were on our own for breakfast.  We had picked up a box of cereal, milk, bread, jelly, and coffee the night before so we figured that'd get us by.  It was so nice down in the sand we stayed there til about 1:00, and then headed to a little shopping village to grab lunch and do some shopping.  The sand was insanely soft.  It had such a nice feel to it, it was hard to keep your hands out of it.  And the crazy thing was that after you rub your hands around in it....your hands actually felt cleaner - not dirtier.  And you didn't have the yucky "I have sand all over me" feeling.  It brushed right off. 

We ate lunch at a place called Gilligan's....and it was happy hour. :)  After lunch we found some t-shirts, a Christmas ornament for our tree, a necklace for Katie, and a space ship for Will.  After shopping, we hit the beach again and stayed there til after sunset.  It was just beautiful.  I took the opportunity to run along the beach - which is a very popular thing to do.  The sand is so packed down in some places from high tide that it's very easy to walk/run on.  So I ran about 1.25 miles upbeach and then ran back.  It was so wonderful and something that I wish I could do every day - what a treat!

I'm not sure what "cracked" in Will, but he got SUPER excited to be on the beach today.....he said he was being the "Red Tornado"....

When I got back, John went for a swim out in the gulf....he said it was a little cold at first, but pretty nice. 

I got a bunch of beautiful sunset pictures and I'm hoping one will look nice blown up bigger.

Day Three Continued......Wednesday afternoon

After the aquarium, we grabbed a bite to eat in their diner and then waited to get on the boat that would take us out in the bay.  We were doing an "explorer cruise" through the aquarium that would take us on a little nature walk on a small man-made island, and allow us opportunity to spot dolphins and other sea life out in the bay. 

We did get to see some dolphins diving around in the water, and some pretty awesome houses that we were told are only occupied a few weeks to a few months a year. 

It's hard to tell the difference between sea sickness and boredom....luckily, this turned out to be boredom.

On the way back to the docks, the naturalists on board threw out a net to see what they could scoop up.  We were lucky enough to get to see a big sea horse, a puffer fish (which they made "puff up" and was quite funny), a bunch of different types of crabs, a sea urchin, and a handful of different kinds of fish. 

After the boat ride, we headed south a bit to check into our condo/resort.  We stayed at a place called The Palm Bay Club.  We got a condo in their "Tower" which was right on the beach, and plenty of room to spread out for a few days. 

Our home for 3 nights.

The first night on Siesta Key we went to eat at a seafood place just down the road from where we were staying called Captain Curt's Crab Shack.  The kids got their food served on a cool frisbee they could take home.  We all split a dozen raw oysters too - well, John and I split it.  Katie did have a few bites. 

Will had some fish sticks....and found that he rather liked tarter sauce sucked through the straw.

Ick.  So would you rather eat raw oysters....or tarter sauce via straw?





Day Three.....Wednesday

If you haven't read Day 1 or Day 2.....scroll back and start there.

So we woke up early Wednesday, had breakfast at the hotel as we had done the previous morning.  Thanks to the complimentary waffles, eggs and cereal we hadn't had to spend $ on breakfast yet.  We had gone swimming at the hotel pool each of the 2 nights we'd been there.  It was chilly, but not terrible.  Plus, soaking in the hot tub afterwards always made it worthwhile.  We had the entire pool area to ourselves each night which was also very nice. 

Wednesday we had to pack up though and move to a new resort/condo on Siesta Key Beach.  We figured we'd save money by staying at a $100 a night hotel for a few nights, and then splurging and staying on the beach for 3 nights. 

We had plans to go to Mote Aquarium today with a 1:30 pm boat ride out into Sarasota Bay to see animals, fish, etc.   Then we'd go check out our new place at the beach.  The aquarium was a lot of fun.  I think the best part was the building with the loggerhead turtles, manatees and dolphins.  The dolphin area was under construction so we weren't able to see them, but the turtles and manatees were amazing!  There were 2 huge manatees that swam around and when Katie and Will stood along the tank, one would come up and give them kisses through the glass.  He did this every 90 seconds or so...it was way too darn cute. 

Here comes the smooch!!!!

The manatees only eat Romaine leettuce and are really, really stinking adorable.  I think they are one of my new favorite animals.  Unfortunately we didn't see any out on the boat because they don't like the colder water.  So they actually head north in the Gulf of Mexico during the winter months and spend it along the northern coast were all the power plants are.  But usually in the Sarasota area they said there are between 60-100 manatees in their waters. 

Katie as a green sea turtle.