Fun day at the Park

Molly and her Gingerbread House

Just a couple of Gummy Bears enjoying a campfire!

The front of the Gingerbread House

The backside of the Gingerbread House

We, Molly & I had a fun day at the park. My friend Katy gets a bunch a kids together to make gingerbread houses. Just small milk cartons, graham crackers, fondant icing and candy. The kids all had fun, beautiful day (just a tad windy), hot chocolate and snacks. Molly had fun making her house, think it will go to Grandma's as our dog would eat it in one bite. Forgot my camera but there was someone there with a digital going to send me a copy, hope she follows through. The kids then had fun playing on the playground at the park. After that Katy, I and the kids went to McDonald's to eat and they played again for a few minutes. Molly hasn't done that in ages so I was glad we could do that today. Now tonight Molly will go to grandma's to stay overnight, they have something they have been working on for Christmas so they were going to finish it up tonight. Grandma will then bring her to Church tomorrow where we will meet up.
It was nice having the whole week off, even if it meant getting sick and staying home.

Stuffed

Yes, I'm stuffed from Thanksgiving Lunch/Dinner. Everything was delicious! As promised here is the recipe for Scalloped Pineapple, sorry about no picture, we were in a hurry to get out the door and I didn't want to take a picture of a dish half gone so...take my word for it, it's great. Bill says it tastes like the best part of a pineapple upside down cake (with out the cake!)

Scalloped Pineapple
3/4 C Butter (softened)
2 C Sugar
3 Eggs (Beaten)
4 C Bread Crumbs (about 8 slices of bread)
2 Tbs Milk
1 20 oz. Can Crushed Pineapple

1. Cream Sugar and Butter until fluffy
2. Add beaten Eggs
3. Sprinkle Milk over Breadcrumbs
4. Fold in Breadcrumbs and Pineapple
5. Pour into casserole dish and bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour.
6. Edges should be brown and center a light golden brown.
   

Refrigerator Madness

Ok, when is it the best time to have your refrigerator break down? NEVER! Anyway, Monday night Bill noticed that the stuff in the freezer section was not as frozen as it should be. WTF? We cleaned out the freezer, luckily we have a large freezer out in the garage. The refrigerator side seemed to be cold, but maybe not as cold as it should be. Bill called the repairman, Wednesday morning was the earliest they could make it. Of course I was planning on doing some errands that day, now I was stuck at home. The repairman didn't make it until 1:45 pm when they said it would be between 8:00 and 12:00, ya that's the story of my life. He didn't spend a lot of time looking at it when he stated that it would be cheaper to buy a new one than fix this one. WHAT? it's only 7 years old!!! "Well", he explained "you really should vacuum under the appliance frequently." Who vacuumes under the refrigerator? HMMM, I guess I should. So we are getting one almost exactly like the one we have except for Bill's favorite feature...THE MILK DOOR. Yes, our fridge had a covering over the milk shelf in the door with a hole connecting it to the freezer. So it would blow extra cold air on the milk. It was an extra $500 just for that feature. Needless to say we didn't get it, I may regret that one since I will hear about it for the rest of my life or until we get a fridge with that feature again.

Guess I'm luckey that my Mother-In-Law is having Thanksgiving this year. The stuff I'm bringing doesn't require the refrigerator so that's good. Bill requested we bring Scalloped Pineapple, an awsome recipe which I will post with a picture after Thanksgiving. Hope you all have a great Holiday!

"The Sickness"

The sickness has invaded our house, we haven't had the "throw-ups" in years. So we've been up since 4:30 when it started. She had just gone into the bathroom to use the toilet when I heard the retching. Luckily I was sleeping in the spare room with her last night since she had a stomach ache. So we only had the mess in the bathroom to clean up. Since then she has been back to her own bed with the bucket beside her. Just was talking to some other Moms at dance about how it had been years since Molly had been that sick. Now look, I jinxed myself. It's been going around at school and at dance. I guess we were due, just hope I don't get it. I've been washing my hands like a maniac since she started "using the bucket". So about 7:00 am I thought Bill could handle it and I laid down and just had drifted off to sleep when Molly came into our bed. Of course she thought she was done being sick and Bill didn't stop her, I told her she couldn't be in there unless she had the bucket with her. No sooner that she put that bucket on the floor and got into bed, she puked again, on my sheets, on the comforter and a little in the bucket. AHHH, I can't stand that smell, it's bad enough to rinse out the bucket but to then have it in my bedroom.
I know she couldn't help it but Bill let her get out of her bed and into mine. Didn't he see what would happen, men... So hopefully we don't give it to too many people, hope we aren't sick next week either. That would be a bummer, I remember being sick during Thanksgiving one year, took forever to even think about eating pumpkin pie again!

Here are a few pictures from the performance that I promised you.

Candy Cane Dance
March of the toy Solders

This picture was taken shortly after I poked Molly in the shoulder with the safety pin
that held up her strap.

Raggedy Dolls

The kids had fun (I think) and I know a lot of people stopped to watch the them dance. We had Toy Solders, Raggedy Ann dolls, Reindeer, Elves, Rocketts, Clowns and the Nutcracker performing. The Christmas Spectacular is on December 10th if you would like to see a great Christmas show.

They had fun but my back hurts, my head hurts and my feet hurt. All from standing at Publix 3 hours and changing costumes!

Christmas Spectacular

My daughter Molly is in dance (as if you didn't know that already) and her dance studio is putting on a Christmas Spectacular on December 10th. They have been practicing and practicing and practicing, every week-end. Tonight they are performing at outside one of the local Publix grocery stores. I guess all the Publix in the area are having some sort of Christmas performance, not sure if it is just to get everyone into the spirit or if they are celebrating something. Have not seen anything about it in the papers or their ads. So they perform tonight from 4-7 doing their dances and singing their songs. They are excited, me not so much since I will be there from 4-7 keeping an eye out for my daughter and her little friend that I will be in charge of.
Will take pictures and post some tomorrow.

Bucs vs. Vikings

Bill & I were lucky enough to go to the Buc's vs. Vikings game yesterday. Bill had a vendor that gave us tickets in a suite, and was it sweet!!! Lots of good food, the weather was coo,l great for an outdoor football game. The suite's glass windows rolled back to give it the feel of outdoors. Too bad the Vikings lost, we were the only Vikings fans in the suite so there was a lot of cheering from our fellow suitemates. It did make for some great people watching (which I love to do). Raymond James was giving out free Bucs visors so we picked one up for Molly and her friend Hailey whom she was with all day while we had fun at the game. I wish I had taken some pictures to upload here but I forgot, this blogging thing is still new to me. I will have to remember next time!

Busy, Busy, Busy

Busy, Busy, Busy, reminds me of the magician in Frosty. The uptight gay magician who wanted his hat back, ya know the one that made Frosty come to life! What a jerk.

Anyway we had a busy week-end with dance on Friday night, dance on Saturday morning and afternoon, Molly going to Grandma's to stay overnight, Church on Sunday morning and dance again after Church. When we finally had a free moment on Sunday afternoon, Molly & Dad had to work on the science fair project. She only had about a half an hour to play with her next door neighbor friend Kerstin. She hardly has time to be a kid anymore. The dance on the week-ends will end soon, it's for the "Christmas Spectacular" show the studio is putting on. Molly originally didn't want to do it, which was fine by me but then she saw the tin solders that they bought for the show. She then got excited about it. I think she is having fun with it and it is just till Dec 10th when they have the show. We then headed out to the spaghetti supper the youth of the church was putting on to raise money for their trip to the National Youth Gathering in New Orleans in 2010. We drove by the church and the parking lot was FULL. Needless to say we drove on past thinking we could just give them some money and not make matters worse by trying to eat some spaghetti in an already full fellowship hall. There is always next Sunday when they do it again at the north campus.

As for this week, Molly has off on Tuesday, ya that's right a day off of school in the middle of the week. Genus! Go to school for 1 day and then off and then go back for 3 days, why didn't they choose a different day to take off? Veterans day??? Don't remember having off that day before. Oh well, we might go shopping or something, we have to get an outfit for one of the scenes for the show, an all white, off-white or cream outfit. You hear me correctly, in the winter. I think I found one at Macy's, an off-white velour sweatsuit, that will have to work. Also a colorful sweater or fleece shirt with a scarf and hat. I found the scarf and hat at Old Navy on Saturday for a $1 each! What a find!!! Granted down in Florida we don't have much use for the hat and scarf, maybe one or two days during December or January. We aren't going to make it up north this year so I'm glad they were only a buck.

Next Sunday Bill and I have tickets to the Bucs vs. Vikings game. A vendor of his gave us the tickets and they are in one of the suites. Origianlly Bill asked if I wanted to go or if he should take Molly. I said Molly could go, she would love it. Then I found out it was in a suite, man that stuff would be wasted on her so I'm going. Besides she has dance practice again anyway. I'm not that big of a fan of either teams, can't stand to watch football on TV, but being at a game is different. It will be fun.

Phantom Was Great

We had an awesome time at Phantom of the Opera. The cast was great (although I have to say no one is as good as Michael Crawford!). Molly & her friend Lexxus enjoyed the show, Molly knew what was going on because she had seen the movie, Lexxus not so much. We didn't get to go backstage because the girl who had done the master class wasn't there that night. The girls were bummed but as we were leaving, the usher told us that some of the cast was doing a Q&A for the kids down in front of the stage. So we went down there and there were about 7 or 8 cast members that came out. Lexxus had one of her questions answered, so she was happy. Both girls got shirts that said Prima Donna on the front and Phantom of the Opera on the back. (That cost a small fortune!) The drive down to Tampa was a little hairy when whe reached 275, bumper to bumper the last 4 miles, I think that took 20 minutes of our 45 minute drive, what do you expect from rush hour. It was worth it though we had a fun girls night out. When we got home Lexxus was staying overnight and they spent an hour winding down before going to sleep. They were troupers getting up in the morning for school though. Since they go to different schools, I took Lexxus and my MIL (who went to the show with us and also stayed overnight) took Molly, since both of their schools started at the same time. I took the camera but wasn't allowed to take any pictures of the stage, forgot about taking one of the girls infront of the theater. Oh well, next time!

Phantom Phever

Yipee, we get to go to Phantom of the Opera tonight! It's playing at the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Theater for the next couple of weeks. For some of the shows you can purchase an adult ticket and get a child's ticket for free. So that's what we did for this evening, Molly gets to take along a friend since we had the extra ticket. The girls are very excited since Elaine Matthews (who is currently in the Phantom of the Opera) came to their dance studio last week-end to teach a master class. She said she would take the girls backstage to meet some of the cast to take pictures & get autographs. I am also excited since it was the Phantom that got me "hooked" on musicals and theater. I was a Phantom Phan way back when it first came to Broadway. My roommate at the time and I traveled out to L.A. to see Michael Crawford in Phantom. I have never forgotten the feeling that first moment when the chandelier rises to the ceiling. The music, the drama and the songs. Molly has love of the theater and I hope she "gets that feeling" as well.

CHANGE

Wow, I was overwhelmed by the amount of people who got out to vote, guess that says something about the current condition of our country. I'm proud that our country elected our first African/American as our president. When I talked to my friend Chris, we discussed how we want to believe in him and what he says he will do. DON'T LET US DOWN! I know that it isn't just the president who runs the country but it is the president who sets the pace, I hope with the House and Senate, both now with the Democrat majority, that he can get some things done. I know it will be a rough row to hoe, but we have hope.

Vote!

This cartoon about sums it up, but it is important to vote. Prayerfully consider the candidates and choose the one that feels right for you. BTW, that's a worm who is voting!

Halloween Night

We had a great time Halloween night. We trick or treated and had a bonfire in the yard. It was a chilly night so the fire was greatly appreciated by most of the parents who walked by. Molly dressed as the Genie and trick or treated with her next door neighbor and best friend Kerstin. Then when they had enough candy they went over to Kerstin's house to hand out candy.
Here are a couple of pictures of the girls.Molly doing her I dream of Jennie impression.Should have taken the camera along and gotten snaps of the neighborhood. Many go all out and have the yard all decorated. None were too scary for the girls and they ran from house to house. There were a lot of houses dark that night though. Not sure what the reason, maybe because it was a Friday night and there were more parties. Kerstin's Mom said maybe because it cost a small fortune to buy candy. She's right there, we didn't have as many kids come around this year so I have a lot of candy left. Maybe I'll just stick it in the freezer and use it for Christmas baking!