First Place!!!

This morning was the Cub Scout Pinewood Derby. Connor was soooo looking forward to it, he loves making the car with his dad and has a lot of fun the day of the derby. And for the second year in a row he won first place in his den and first place in the pack overall!! He was so psyched!! Here is a picture of him with his car and his trophy after he got home.

Congrats Connor!!

P.S. Connor wants me to add that he thinks he won because he was wearing his lucky pants!!

P.S.S. And a special message for Miss Kim--Connor says you will never ever beat him!! And boys rule and girls drool!! He'll see you next year at the track....you're going down!

A post about nothing...

I am going to make a valiant attempt to update our blog on a regular basis. So I thought that if I make it a point to post every few days even if I don't have some event to post about it would keep me in the habit. So, here is my post about nothing...

Connor just joined the Computer Club at school. Today was the first meeting and he LOVED it! My little computer dork! Ok, so I'm just jealous of the opportunities that kids have today. I am amazed at how easily both of the boys pick up on anything that has to do with computers. The computer club will be meeting Wednesday and Fridays after school for a few weeks so he is happy about that. I, on the other hand, now have more running around to do...

We bought a Wii today!! Yes, this is exciting news. The boys are THRILLED! However, they are both currently grounded from video games until further notice. Their behavior hasn't been the best lately so we took away their 4 wheeler and video games. Sucks to have a Wii finally in stock at Walmart during your grounding, doesn't it boys?? I'm sure that eventually they'll be able to play it. Until then maybe Keith and I will enjoy it after the boys go to bed!!

And on a sad note we woke up to find one of Evan's recently aquired pets deceased. A month or two ago he got two gerbils that he named Kirby and Ricki (both females). Well (and this is gross!) it appears that Kirby didn't enjoy having company in her little part of the world and she took steps to send Ricki to gerbil heaven. Not a fun thing to wake up to first thing in the morning. And now Evan wants to get Kirby another friend.... Ummm, probably not our best move! I told him that Kirby likes her space. Apparently this isn't that uncommon, especially among female gerbils, but it still is rather disturbing. I guess it's a gerbil eat gerbil world...

That's all for now....Off to help Connor with his homework and get the boys to bed. Keith is in Philadelphia for a couple of days so Kirby isn't the only solo act in our house tonight...

The Mighty Hunter Strikes Again!

It's time for another dead animal photo. Please don't send me any anti-hunting emails, ok?? I didn't kill it. I didn't even take the photos. Feel free to email Keith though. And don't forget to mention what a HUGE turkey that is... If you're not convinced you can stop by and see the dead turkey parts in my garage drying so they can go on a plaque or something. GROSS!! (Thanks Glenn for that suggestion!)

Apparently hunting ettiquette says that after you kill something you have to pose for a photo with it. Then pose for another with your hunting buddy and the dead animal. And then you must go find your children and have them pose with it too....even if it traumatizes them for life. Phew, I am just glad that I was busy that day and not available for photos...

I know it's not Thanksgiving but... Happy Turkey Day!!

The Big 4-0!!

Yep, it happened. As much as I tried to ignore it....and deny it...it happened anyway. My birthday was a couple weeks ago and I am....gulp...40! Seriously, how did that happen? I don't feel 40....well, not mentally. Physically I feel 90 some days. I'm having a bit of a difficult time with this. Ok, it sucks! 40???

On a positive note, I have some of the best friends in the entire world. My hubby, along with a couple of my friends, organized a 40th birthday party for it. It helped to make the whole 40 thing a little bit more tolerable. We had a fun night with lots of food, drinks, and laughs. Oh and vibrating bananas... I guess if you have to be 40 at least you can do it with some great friends along for the ride!!

So, here's to the next 40...

Great Wolf Lodge

In April we were able to escape for a few days to Great Wolf Lodge. If you haven't been there, I highly recommend it! We all had such a great time and it was so nice to spend a few days as a family without all of the interruptions of our everyday lives. The waterpark at Great Wolf Lodge is amazing and the kids LOVED it!! Mom and Dad quite enjoyed ourselves as well and we're already talking about planning to go again over Christmas break. The waterpark has a ton of different things to do--water slides, raft rides, pools, water slides, a wave pool....TONS of fun!! The whole place is decorated like a lodge and there are interactive animals in the lobby that talk and sing. Each morning and evening they have a storytime for the kids. There are restaurants right in the lodge so you don't even have to go out. There's an arcade, a miniature golf course, a craft place for kids. My kids wanted to sell our house and just live there!! Each night they were so exhausted they just fell into bed and right to sleep. It was expensive but soooo worth it!!

Here are just a few of the 500 pics I took!! LOL

Moms Gone Wild!! (aka The Boston Trip!)

In March I had a wonderful opportunity to go on a trip to Boston to attend a PTO Expo. The expo was only one day but since it was such a long drive and the expo filled an entire day we were actually in Boston for 3 days. No complaints though as it actually gave us a chance to do some of the touristy stuff! I had never gone to Boston before so it was great. I went with two other moms from the boys school who fortunately I am good friends with so that made the trip a LOT of fun!! (Hi Brenda and Wendy!!)

The first night there we just chilled out and went to a restaurant near our hotel for dinner. We were all exhausted from driving all day. After dinner we went back to the hotel to watch chick flicks and have a few "mommy drinks." Oh and we cried a lot cause we were missing our children SOOO much....yeah, that's it. It was great to watch a movie without a G rating for a change.

The next day was the PTO expo. We saw a lot of vendors and picked up some cool free stuff! We got quite a few good ideas to take back to our group. Definitely worth the trip!

That night we decided to check out Cheers. We knew it wasn't going to look like the bar in the show but it was REALLY different. Still a lot of fun though. The only real part of the bar that was used for the show was the exterior. And there was no Sam...or Diane...or Frasier...or Norm...sigh. And NOBODY knew our names! But hey, there was cold beer and yummy food so we got over it quickly!

We also went to Faneuil Hall which was a meeting place during the days of Samuel Adams and the Revolutionary War. Now it is a neat marketplace with lots of food vendors and little shops. Excellent for finding things to take home to the little munchkins!

On the last day we did a really neat trolley tour of Boston. Saw some really cool stuff--the USS Constitution ("Old Ironsides"), the Bunker Hill monument, the Old State House, Fenway Park, the harbor, and a bunch of other historical sites. We could get on and off at whatever stops we wanted and a trolley would come by every 20 minutes so we could reboard. We got to see a lot of things that we never would have made it to if we were driving. And the driving in Boston?? Absolutely horrible!! There is a reason they have trolleys. If you're ever in Boston, DON'T DRIVE ANYWHERE!! I can't tell you how many times we got lost and tried to find our way to a particular place only to be sabotaged by construction and one-way streets. Worse than NYC, I swear!

It was a great trip. Lots of fun to get away for a few days and explore a new city. I hope to go back one day with Keith and the boys!

Cub Scout Cake Bake

Connor has been a Cub Scout for 3 years now. Each year they do a cake bake. Each year I have lucked out and been able to get out of baking a cake. The first year Connor came down with a stomach bug. The second year Keith and I were in Vegas. This year I came THISCLOSE to escaping again when Connor started vomiting less than 48 hours before the cake bake judging. But, thanks to a speedy recovery, I finally had to supervise my son's baking of a cake. Unfortunately he didn't recover THAT quickly so we ended up doing it at 10 pm the night before. He enjoyed it so that was good....but I am glad it's only a once a year thing. And the sick part is that after the cake judging and awards they auction off the cakes and almost all of the parents end up buying back their own cake. So, on top of the $20 I had into making this cake, it cost me another $40 to get it back!!

Anyway, it had to have a Cub Scout theme so Connor wanted to do a Pinewood Derby Cake. Below is what we came up with. He got 2nd place in the most creative category. He actually did do a lot of the work on it and despite everything we had fun making it.