Signs Of Life

There are signs of garden life at the 'ski residence. Here's some photos to show what's going on in the yard, and what's happening with the seeds.

These are some type of perennial ground cover that came with the house. I'm not sure what they are, but they sure are pretty.

These are shots of my daffodils and tulips which are coming in nicely.

I started my Impatiens seeds on March 16, and they are off to a great start. These are the first of my seeds to start sprouting. My little babies.

Onto The Next

Now that one wedding is down, I've moved onto the next ones we have coming up. I have two weddings for sure in July (Jason & Pharrah) and August (Nicki & Tim). Very likely another last minute one before the fall. And I'm wondering if a friend that is overseas who just got married will have a reception while home in July as well? So up to four wedding events this summer. Busy, busy!

My next purchase is...

I'm getting to like that little place called Davids Bridal. I'm loving this dress. It's got that vintage-like feel to it. Pair it up with some nice black shoes, and I'm good to go. I'm taking my measurements this week, and putting the order in. I can't wait!

Ryan & Jess Wedding Photos

Some photos from Ryan and Jessica's wedding on March 8. I wish I would've gotten some photos of the Husband and I with our camera. I didn't. So I'm left to rely on friends, and most of them didn't turn out. Oh well, the wedding was fun nonetheless. The wedding and reception were both at Egypt Valley Country Club.

***Update***

Here is the only full body shot I have of the dress and shoes. The pic is horrendous. It is virtually unfixable to an ameteur like me in PS Elements. This is the last time we get dressed up and don't have any photos taken with our own camera.

Bahamas Bound

Happy Anniversary to us! We're heading to Grand Bahamas Island for a quick 5-day/4-night get away. A few days on the beach with nothing but sun and relaxation sounds like heaven right about now. I can hear the waves of the ocean crashing on the beach already. That soothing sound....

Planning a list minute trip has been kind of hard. The last two trips we have taken have been through my parents' timeshare, extra weeks they have and what not, so the options are a little more limited with the dates of travel we were looking to do. I called my mom, and she had a couple of options, but they weren't that inexpensive, and I wasn't too crazy about visiting places I've already been. While on the phone talking timeshares with mom, the Husband is in the background saying:

Him: Ask your mom if there is a place in Kokomo.
Me: Mom, Brett wants to know if there are any resorts in Kokomo that we can go to.
Mom: Kokomo? Where's that?
Me: You know, the Beach Boys' song. Aruba, Jamaica, oooh I wanna take ya.
Mom: Oh yeah, I know the song. Don't know anything about Kokomo though.
Me: That's because it's made up. By the Beach Boys.
Brett (yelling in the background): Then where'd the Beach Boys shoot the video if it's all made up?
-Sigh.- Someone watches too much Scrubs.

I was really interested in going to Cabo, but we found better deals to either the Bahamas or Jamaica. We also decided not to go the all-inclusive route this time, so we could go out and explore the native culture a little more. The Bahamas is all tourist driven, so culture will be watered down, but it at least forces us to leave the resort and explore. :-) Maybe go on an excursion???

Whatever we end up doing, I'm sure it'll be fun, because we'll be together. A week off work, some time away from home and no worries.

Easter As A Child

I don't have the best memory, but there is one snip-it of Easter that I remember from growing up. It must've been when I was quite young, because my older brother (4-years older) was still participating in the events with my younger sister and I. My Little is 2-years younger than I am.

My mom, ahem, I mean the Easter Bunny, used to put jelly beans and candy ALL over the house for us to find in the morning when we woke up. She went all out. We'd still be finding jelly beans in hiding places a month later that we missed. It was so fun. This really dates me, but this was back in the era of glass half liter pop bottles. The Easter Bunny would even set a jelly bean on the tops of empty pop (I'm from the mid-west, this word is acceptable) bottles. That Easter Bunny sure got creative.

So anyway, we'd arise from bed really early on Sunday morning to find our house all full of candy. We'd each have individual baskets with some candy and trinkets as well. So as tradition goes, all three of us would get our plastic cereal bowls out, we each had our own color, and start going around the house looking for and picking up the candy. Being that my brother was so much older than Little and I; he was better at it. And faster. So we'd essentially follow him around the house, trying to pick up on his leads, and beat him to the punch. He always got so much more candy than we did. But that's just how it always went. He kicked our butt at everything.

We're all in the living room, and the room has been pretty much wiped clean of candy, and we're all spread out looking for anything that might be remaining, when all of a sudden, our older brother trips and loses three-fourths of his candy all over the floor! Little and I haul ass over to the spill and start filling our bowls with all of the candy on the floor. It's like a pinata just exploded, and we're going to town. Of course, our brother is down there with us, trying to get all of his candy back. Little even started taking candy out of his bowl as he was refilling it, because he set it on the floor so he could use two hands to pick candy up! The candy got divided up pretty evenly after that. After all the candy was picked up, we all went on our way looking for more, almost like it didn't happen. It's funny, especially the part about taking candy right out of his bowl as he was refilling it, but I always had this hint of guilt about stealing all his candy. Even now I kind of feel bad. That may have been the last year he participated, I can't remember. It was always kind of a competition to see who could get the most candy, even though we all shared it after, and it really evened out the playing field with that trip happening. I'm cracking myself up thinking about what scavengers Little and I were to go running over there to grab all the candy we could.

I always wondered too, if my parents sat in bed listening to us rummaging through the house looking for candy, snickering to themselves about the awesome job they did putting candy out for a little while before getting up?

I also remember one year my cousin (I'll leave his name out to protect the innocent) telling us that he saw the Easter Bunny in their house on Easter morning. Little and I were soooo jealous. A few years later we figured out he was just a liar.

Ahh, good times.

Mmm Bop, Got My Robot

I ordered a refurbished Roomba from www.woot.com a couple of weeks ago, it shipped, and I tried it out. I must say I was pretty impressed. This thing will not replace vacuuming on a regular basis, but will help keep things a little less cruddy in between. With three cats, and all hard surfaced floors (wood and tile), there was always constant tumbleweeds of cat hair drifting about the place (minus the western whistle theme from The Good, The Bad and The Ugly). Problem solved.

I haven't scheduled my Roomba to run at a certain time. For the time being, I just turn it on and let it do it's thing. It did everything the Husband said it wouldn't (I love being right, hehe). It can go from wood to tile and back again, so it makes it up and down thresholds. It can go from hard surface onto area rugs. It also stops itself from going down the steps. It gets itself unstuck from obstacles. It even goes back to the charging dock when it's done. Oh, and it's got a remote, so you can drive it like one of those remote control cars if you want. Now how cool is that?

I need to work this thing a little bit more, testing its limitations and maybe trying out scheduled runs. The cats seem to like it. They all stay on the edge of the room, watching the thing go. If it gets too close, Nico and Sasha run away, but they always come back. Tayshaun wasn't paying attention one time, had his back to the Roomba (his first mistake, I guess), and got his tail run over a bit. That was pretty funny. So the Roomba provides a cleaning service AND entertainment. Who knew?

So far my review of the Roomba is that it's great. It exceeded all of the Husband's expectations and definitely met mine. Not a bad little investment.

Rehearsal Dinner for Ryan & Jess

We had rehearsal dinner at One Trick Pony the Friday before Ryan & Jessica's wedding. Mmm, love their pizzas. Afterwards we went out for drinks at the Cottage Bar next door.

The Husband and I at One Trick Pony.

Carrie and Zack at One Trick Pony.

The whole gang at Cottage Bar enjoying some cocktails.

It's Aliiiive!

The first signs of life appeared this weekend. It looks like the tulips are starting to take flight. It seems a bit early, but I'm only left to assume that they know what they are doing. I imagine they are in for a few more frosty days, and definitely cold nights. I sure hope they survive.

Last April I lost all of my tulips and daffodils. They sprouted so nicely, and then we got a few inches of snow during the second week of April. Not one of them made it through. Let's hope ol' Mother Nature is a little kinder on the plants this year.

Some Things Are Meant To Be

I bought a dress on New Year's Eve this year, for New Year's Eve and for a wedding I have coming up this Saturday. On NYE, I just wore the dress with some brown, suede Mary Janes, however, for the wedding I wanted something a little more dressier and matchy-match.


So I did what every person who is looking for GREEN shoes would do. Wait until two weeks before the wedding to find some shoes to wear.


My first attempt was to go to Davids Bridal. Yeah, I didn't have the best luck that night (Feb. 19). I couldn't get anyone to help me, so I was sitting in the shoe corner by myself wondering where the heck all of the size 6's or anything in that range were? I was pretty discouraged, and rather than stand in line to hear "all of our stock is out in the shoe area", I just left. The next day I visited my old friend, Zappos. I figured if I was going to order online, I needed enough time for those babies to ship. I ended up ordering a pair of $185 Charles David green, peep-toe pumps. Gulp. Something about that last statement is all wrong. $185 shoes. GREEN shoes. So you know there wouldn't be much if any "I can wear them with this. I can wear them with that." to make up for the cost of designer shoes. I wasn't even sure if the color was right. So I then purchased a pair of patent leather green pumps with two straps. I figured one of them had to be darn close to the dress color. I couldn't go wrong with the free shipping both ways. Whew. At least I knew if one or both of the shoes didn't work, I wasn't out any money. I even got free over-night shipping. Bonus.


So now it's Thursday morning. I'm having buyers remorse on those sickeningly expensive shoes that I ordered. I just know the expensive ones are the ones that are going to match best. That's how it always works. I can't put the Davids Bridal shoes out of my head. They'd save me so much money at $63 dyed. I could buy almost three pair of $63 shoes for the price of those Charles David shoes.


It's Friday at lunch, and I figure I have to give Davids Bridal one more shot. Maybe, just maybe they have some more shoes in since Tuesday. So the woman on the phone goes to look for me. She comes back and says "Nope, no 6's. I even looked for 6.5's for you too, because sometimes people can wear them instead.". That's when I tell her, actually, if I was going to swing sizes, I'd go the 5.5 route. Could she check for me? She had no problem going to look again. After holding for a couple minutes, she came back to let me know that she had one pair of 5.5's. She was going to put them on hold for me to come try on after work. Bless her. But I wasn't out of the woods yet. Who even knows if the 5.5's will work. I kinda have terrible luck when stuff like this happens. It's like fate wants me to feel sooo close to something and then take it away to have a good laugh at my expense. So I wasn't getting too pumped up just yet.


I get there after work, and have to wait in line to get someone to bring me the shoes to try on. Man is that place busy all the stinking time. Unreal. Anyway, I take my box and walk all the way to the back of the store to try them on in the designated "shoe corner". Like I could find a bench or seat anyplace closer. I put them on, and let me tell you, these things fit like a glove! I would've been so, so sorry if I got a size 6. They would've been too big. So I take the shoes to the front, wait in line, and someone tells me the shoes will be ready in a week for me to pick up. Alrighty then!


Last Friday after work I picked up the shoes and took them home. I took them out of the box, held them up to the dress, and they match about as perfect as I can get. The whole thing couldn't have worked out better. So now I have to send back two pairs of shoes from Zappos. I haven't even opened the box yet. I refused to look unless the Davids Bridal shoes were a complete miss, and I was forced to wear a pair from Zappos. Plus I sure didn't want to fall in love with a pair of $185 shoes only to return them. I wasn't going to risk jinxing my Davids Bridal last resort. I figured not looking at the Zappos shoes helped my chances.

So it doesn't look like a total match from the photos, but let me tell you, it is!

Hopefully I can get some pictures of the Husband and I all dressed up at the wedding to share. Then you can see the whole ensemble. That would be fun.