Traveling the East Coast

On Thursday morning I woke up in my favorite city on the east coast (New York).

I then took a train to my least favorite city on the east coast (Philadelphia).

It was freezing and pouring rain. The kind of rain and wind where your umbrella turns inside out as you are walking.

I was in Philly to meet my friend, Kimberly. (Maggie's mom) She was up from North Carolina for a conference with her husband. I was also supposed to be at this conference with my husband, but life got in the way. The rain didn't stop us from going to Kimberly's favorite store, LUSH. We find a LUSH store in every city we visit together!

We had a wonderful lunch at Good Dog. Macaroni and cheese (a gourmet blend of gruyere, aged gouda and aged white cheddar cheeses mixed with a bechamel sauce and elbow macaroni then topped with cornflakes and backed to perfection.) and warm blueberry cornbread. The perfect meal for a rainy day.

Then it was back on a train and home to reality.

Outta Here

I'm outta here...it's Girls' Weekend time!

(photo courtesy of Kellen)

Hey did anyone catch Nie Nie on Oprah yesterday? Check out this video on page 3 of the article. It will make you appreciate the little things in life.

My Fifteen Minutes of Fame

Here's the story

What To Do With 683 Solo Cups

The beloved librarian at Kellen and Ammy's school, Mr. Hallett, has leukemia. Things have not been looking good and he was in a coma for two weeks. To help raise money for the family, the PTA has been selling wristbands with the message "TEAM HALLETT" on them with all of the proceeds going directly to his family. In addition, a group of kids and parents have been meeting before school to hold prayer services twice a week. The day after the first prayer service, he opened his eyes. He is still critically ill, but he has been alert and recognizing people this past week.

Tonight was our back to school picnic and we decided to put a message on the fence at the school. When someone asked how to do it, I suggested that we use solo cups to write the message. I spent hours trying to figure out how to design the sign. I cut out letters and traced them on graph paper. Only problem is that graph paper doesn't match chain link fence. I found axonometric graph paper online and was able to have something that resembled the fence at school.

I tried cutting and tracing letters again, but was left with the issue of what to do with a square that was half full. I then went to a site that sells fence cups for the purpose of fence displays (very, very cool). They had the alphabet online that they use to design what you want to say and I printed it out. Then I copied it onto my axonometic graph paper.

Then we started putting the cups into the fence.

We had to stop at this point because The Baltimore Sun paper was coming to take pictures of us working on the fence. They are working on a story about Mr. Hallett.

The fence with all 683 solo cups and Chico, "the flat mannequin" dressed as a Team Hallett member. Chico just happened to be in my car from an event two weeks ago, so we dressed him up and attached him to the fence.

At each of the prayer services, the kids have been writing their prayers onto popsicle sticks. The sticks were then decorated and a hole was drilled into the top of each of them.

One of the PTA members threaded all the sticks with ribbon and we tied the kids' prayer sticks to the fence around Team Hallett.

Tonight at the picninc, people had the opportunity to write a prayer on a stick and hang it up on the fence.

The kids' messages were so cute!

Some of the kids around the Team Hallett fence.

Go here to check on Mr. Hallett. The article should be in the paper tomorrow or Sunday. I will post the link as soon as I receive it.

Proof That I Have Lost My Mind

Like you needed any...

Details will be posted later today.

31 Years of Friendship

I met Andie when we were in the 7th grade. We became best friends and did everything together. We went to the beach and even bought matching shirts and sweatshirt jackets. Andie is responsible for teaching me how to french braid--she had long, long hair and she always wore it in a french braid down the back of her head. When she spent the night at my house, it was my job to braid her hair.

She threw a surprise party for me on my 16th birthday. She got an upper classman (that I had a major crush on) to ask me out. We were supposedly double dating and when we got to her house to pick her up, there were a bunch of people there. He of course left me at the party and I was crushed! Andie is the one that I drove around Reston with on the day I got my license...60 miles in one afternoon!

We went our separate ways after our sophomore year and then we reconnected during the summer after my sophomore year in college. She helped me through a really difficult time and was there to talk and eat ice cream with. Then we didn't see each other again until our 10 year reunion. We were both married with children..I was living in Baltimore and she was living in Connecticut. She moved back to the area in 1999 and in 2003 we started planning our 20th reunion. We both love to plan a good party and we ended up talking almost every day during the year that we planned the reunion.

We've kept in touch over the past five years and this summer, we, along with our committee, planned our 25th reunion. She has kept me sane through the entire process and I value her friendship...no other friend I have has known me for as long as she has...31 years to be exact. Yikes, that is a LONG time! I still feel like that girl in the blue sweatshirt from 1978--just wish I was as thin!



Thanks for a great weekend. Love you girl and I look forward to many more years of memories.

25 Years

It's hard to believe I graduated from high school 25 years ago! Last night, the twins and I went to a football game at my old school. Tomorrow night is the "big event"...let the festivities begin.

I Need One of These!

I need a cricut! It is my dream tool to own for all of my scrapbooking and crafting projects--it is a personal electronic cutter that uses cartridges (that you purchase separately, of course) to cut beautiful designs and alphabets. Just imagine what I could come up with if I owned one of these!

I just had to enter this contest!

This is contest entry for those crazy folks at TodaysMama and Cricut. Be sure to check out Cricut's cool new cartridges and the chance at $30,000 in travel for you and your friends at the Great Gypsy Escape site! http://bit.ly/FWcud

Great Escape Meme

1. If you could escape to anywhere in the world where would it be?
I would go to Tuscany. Hawaii would be a close second.

2. What song do you play when you are by yourself in the car?
Anything by Daughtry and "Permanent" by David Cook.

3. If you had a night to yourself, and money was no object, what would you do?
I would curl up with a good book, mexican take-out and a bottle of Shafer Chardonnay. Boring, I know, but I run so much that this would be my idea of heaven.

4. What is your guilty pleasure?
Massages and pedicures.

5. What is the farthest place you have traveled away from your home?
Japan as a child, Hawaii as an adult.

6. Last book that you couldn't put down?
"The Siege" by Stephen White.

7. When you want to escape into another time, what movie do you watch?
Top Gun (back when Tom Cruise wasn't so strange!) I saw it for the first time when I was in college...and at least 20 times since then.

8. What is your favorite local escape?
Bethany or Rehobeth Beach.

9. How do you escape on a budget?
Take a "family bike ride" to PA with lunch at Paesano's (Best Pizza ever!)

10. Best food you've ever had while on vacation.
That's a hard one. We've had so many great meals on vacation, but I'd have to say it was at Longhis's in Lahaina on our trip to Maui in 1990. We had a large group so we tried a little bit of everything...can't even remember what we had, just that it was fabulous!

Want to try to win a Cricut too? Go forth and meme!

I Got An Award!

I am so honored to have received this award from Sheri. It seems there are rules that accompany this award. You have to share five addictions. and you have to pass the award on to five other fabulous bloggers.

Here goes...

1. I am addicted to Diet Pepsi. I used to be addicted to Tab when I was in high school, diet coke in college and then when I graduated, I switched to Diet Pepsi. It makes me crazy when I cannot get a Diet Pepsi in a hotel gift shop. I've thought about trying to give it up, but have not actually gone that far.

2. I am addicted to scrapbooking supplies. I love, love, love to purchase paper. My paper collection is out of control.

3. I am addicted to the computer. I spend WAY TOO MUCH time on the computer. I love learning new software programs (I know, kinda geeky), reading blogs and visiting websites. I am now addicted to having a blog. It's so much fun to chronicle the daily happenings in my household!

4. I am addicted to Chardonnay. I don't like any other white wines. I am slowly venturing out and trying red wines. I leave for Napa on Friday and it is my goal to branch out and try different wines with an open mind! I don't like liquor and I only like Corona with a lime when I am eating mexican food.

5. I am addicted to Mexican food. I love it all...the spicier the better!

Now five blogs that I think are fabulous...

I obviously think that all of the blogs on my sidebar are fabulous!

I follow a lot of cancer blogs (people whose kids have cancer, people who have cancer, etc) and some other blogs of people whose circumstances have been less than ideal. While you might think that following these blogs would be depressing, it is not. It is inspiring to see how people are living through their circumstances and coming out on the other end.

http://www.midgetsandmoonpies.blogspot.com/ I followed Catie's journey with cancer back when I was involved with the Baltimore Ronald McDonald House. She passed away one week before her sister was born. Her parents have since added a third child to their brood.

http://canicontrolmylifeificantcontrolmyhair.blogspot.com/ I started following Finn's battle with cancer several years ago. Natalie is very funny and writes about her life with 2 kids in Colorado.

http://half12.blogspot.com/ I just found this blog recently. Tuesday Fiona Whitt passed away on 1/30/2009.

http://www.mycharmingkids.net/ MckMama blogs about her many small children and the life threatening illness that her son was diagnosed with when he was in utero. He was born perfectly healthy!

http://www.kellyskornerblog.com/ Kelly just had a baby girl and unexpectedly had to spend 3 weeks in the NICU.

Some other fun blogs (and websites) that I think are great are...

http://iamjessicarter.blogspot.com/ Jessi is very creative, plans

awesome parties and is a photoshop goddess! Plus, she is a friend of Mo's from MoJoy.

http://www.artformymom.com/site/tribute/ This is a really neat site where a woman creates a work of art everyday in memory of her mother. All proceeds go to cancer research. I have ordered from her and my friend has ordered 6 pieces.

http://www.dailygrommet.com/ I just heard about this site last week. Very fun stuff that you can purchase. Every day at noon a new product is presented.

http://www.graciousmay.com/booties.html It's a good thing I don't have a baby girl. These booties make me want to have another child!

http://www.creativeruminations.blogspot.com/ Bethany is an artist/scrapbooker and also has 5 children. I love her scrapbooking stuff.

See I am an overachiever. Instead of giving you 5 new sites to visit, I gave you 10!