Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Birthday Wishes

Happy birthday to my father-in-law, Ed and my niece, Rachel! Hope it's a good one!!

Monday, September 29, 2008

Another SNL...

Tina Fey has Sarah Palin down!!! This just kills me!

Sunday, September 28, 2008

Well, There You Go...

I will love it when I don't have to start a post with an apology for being gone for a while. Anyway...

Friday night, I got to go to the Maroon 5 concert with my friend, Roxanne. We got all dolled up and even rented a limo so that we wouldn't worry about how much we had to drink. The concert was awesome. Counting Crows and Augustana opened the show. After, Roxanne and I headed to Steak 'n' Shake and had a lovely dinner of steakburgers and chili. I still think that's really funny.

Saturday morning, I woke up and thought my leg felt sore. I pulled back the blankets and saw this... I have no idea where they came from. And they hurt so bad!!! So strange! But I'd take them all over again if it meant that I got to go to another Maroon 5 concert!!!

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Sarah Palin

Now, you know how much I love Sarah Palin, but this is really funny (in case you missed it on Saturday)...

Saturday, September 13, 2008

Well, We Didn't Blow Away...

It's been raining and dreary for the past couple of days now. I picked the kids up from school yesterday and about 10 minutes after we got home, the weather radio went off for a Tornado Watch. Hannah begins her little freak out but calms down a little after I remind her of what a watch means. Mike calls to tell me that he's going to work out and then head home. That's fine. Just before 5pm, Jacob starts screaming that there's a Tornado Warning (we were watching the Weather Channel). A second later, the weather radio goes off again for the Warning. Ugh. We listen and find out that it's for NW Johnson County. Not for us. Okay. I still step outside to get a look...no sirens or anything...we should be okay. Jacob turns on Gary Lezak and he sees a cell heading out of Miami County (just to our south) and into Johnson County that will probably hit us. Great.

The weather radio goes off again. Another Tornado Warning for that cell entering Johnson County. I look at the kids and they've got their valuables (blankets, Nintendo DS games, Jacob's violin) and Jacob's seriously looking for the pets. That's when the sirens start. It really starts raining hard and, after looking at the radar, I'm not convinced it's quite basement time yet.

Mike calls to tell me that they closed the Fitness Center and he's heading home. I told him to hang out until the storm's passed...I'd give him a call. The radar shows that the storm is almost to us so, the kids and I head to the basement.

I'm still not sure about this tornado thing, so I head back upstairs to take another look. Sirens are still going off (they went off about 4-5 times) but everything looks to be east of us. Mike calls to ask if he can come home yet and I tell him that Gary says there's a possible tornado around 143rd and Nall, headed to where Mike works. He says that he'll wait for the all-clear and I tell the kids they can come back up.

Not five minutes later, the weather radio goes off again for another Tornado Warning. Hannah's crying at this point and I have to assure her that this one is also not for us. I call Mike to tell him it's okay for him to leave and we try to go on with our evening.

Ultimately, there were a couple of touchdowns but nothing in our immediate area. I completely forgot about the second tornado season. Hopefully, the rest of fall won't be this active. Now, we get ready for Ike, which won't be fun after the 5 inches we've had in the past couple of days.

Friday, September 05, 2008

What Day Is This?!?

Bobbi and Ed came in last weekend for a visit. It was nice to see them since it's been a while. It was also nice to have a stretch of days where we didn't have to do anything. That's not to say it was light on drama, because there was certainly a ton, but it had nothing to do with Bobbi and Ed. Of course, that drama continued throughout the week but that's neither here nor there. It's just what happens when you have friends you care about a lot. Anyway, we had a very nice visit and, as always, it was too short. They flew back to Chicago on Monday and we went back to reality on Tuesday.

I started feeling sick on Monday evening. I've been dealing with this whole allergy/cold thing that's really beginning to make me mad. I was really hoping I wouldn't have to deal with this again this year. Ugh.

Hannah thinks it's way cool that a tropical storm shares her name. She's been running around saying, "I'm a hurricane!" It's been driving Daniel nuts. He got so jealous that he finally yelled, "well hurricanes aren't the most powerful thing in the world. Tornadoes are worse!" They were totally cracking me up.

I didn't workout on Tuesday because I just didn't feel well enough, but I've been in for the rest of the week. I have yet to lose any weight but I've lost a couple of inches here and there. I guess that's more important anyway. I'm also losing my back rolls which is always a good thing. I just can't believe that I'm up to an hour on the elliptical. That's crazy!!! I also discovered the steam room at the center this week. It's my new favorite thing. A nice steam is so nice and I can actually breathe through my nose for about an hour after! LOL!

Last week we found about 10 monarch caterpillars in the milkweed. We decided to bring them in as well. We got a better container for them and most have turned into a chrysalis. What was really cute was as we were collecting them, a couple of neighbor girls came by to see what we were doing and asked if they could take one home. I talked to their moms and they said it was fine so I sent them home with a caterpillar and a big bunch of milkweed. They've been asking me a lot of questions about how long it takes and whatnot. I was so impressed with Jacob who helped answer some of Beth's questions. She told me today that he told her to look for when the caterpillar turns into a J shape on the top of the container and she said that he was right. He's been paying attention. I'm just loving this!

Jacob's had two weeks of Wednesday Keshet classes. He fought me hard the first week but didn't give me a hard time at all this week. Thankfully, he's looking forward to Sunday School starting up this weekend.

All three are doing really well in school so far. I have yet to hear anything from Daniel's teacher and I've seen her quite a bit. She's not one that holds anything back on that sort of thing either. They all seem to be doing pretty well, which is a huge relief. Poor Hannah's just exhausted but she's still getting used to the whole full day thing. Starting next week I'll be helping for an hour once a week in the school's library. The second graders have never done Accelerated Reader before and they need help learning how to choose the right books. I'll be helping out with that. I'm looking forward to it. The kids love running into me at the school. I'm excited that I can help out more with stuff like this. Full day kindergarten is a wonderful thing.

Jacob starts orchestra next week. Only they don't call it orchestra, they call it strings. Either way, he chose the violin and was sized for one last week. He'll get his violin on Monday and his first class is on Tuesday. He had to sign a contract for the teacher that said he's committed to practice 10 minutes a day. I liked that. Anyway, he's excited. Daniel told me that he'd like to learn the trumpet. He's got a few years until he can start (5th grade) but trumpet's perfectly fine with me. I don't care what you play, just that you play something. Except for drums. I just don't think I could handle the drums.

We start jiu jitsu reflex classes tomorrow. I'm about 6 classes away from my second stripe. Master Dave said that he'd like for me to test for my blue belt before the end of the year. I just don't see how that's going to happen but we'll see. And Daniel has his first football game tomorrow. He just loves football and is so excited about the game. I can't wait to see it all.

So, I guess that's about it from here for now. I'll try to do a better job posting!