Kristen's 1st Formal Dance

Kristen had her first formal dance on Friday. She looked so pretty, so of course I had to take pictures. :) Karen wanted to dress like her big sister for the pictures, even though she did not go to the dance. lol. They both had their formals from the cruise we took a few years ago. Karen's formal still fits her, because it was too big when I bought it for her. Kristen isn't wearing the one she wore on the cruise. I actually bought this one first, and it was too big. So I bought her the next size down in blue. She wore the blue one on the cruise, and I just saved this one figuring it would eventually get some use. Good thing I did, because she just told me on Saturday, May 2nd, that she was having a formal dance the following Friday. I didn't have the money then to go out and get her a new dress since we had just forked out several hundred for her birthday party. It all worked out though. :)

This is Kristen and Karen out in front of our house. So pretty:)

Kristen, my big girl!

Karen, pretty in pink :)

Billy went inside to take some pictures for me before the dance began. I don't know who was in charge of the decorating, but they shouldn't have been. lol:)

If you look really hard, you can see a strand of lights above the bleachers. I mean really, they think that looks good?

The lights go all the way down, and they aren't even put up well.

I'm not real sure what the plan here was. I did see someone carrying in some balloons, so I guess they did add a little more to the decor. And what is up with the grass skirt hanging on the door? lol. Like I said, I don't know who was in charge of this, but they shouldn't have been. :)

This is the school mascot mural. It's kinda cool.

Kristen getting out of the van.

Karen, just after getting out of the van.

My two Princesses posing out in front of the gym.

Kristen with her friend Ashley

Kristen, Ashley, and Karen

Kristen with her friends, Brittney, on the left, and Ashley, on the right. I may be a bit biased in my opinion, but I do believe my daughter is the prettiest. ;)

The girls walking up to the gym

Billy took this picture of Kristen when we went to pick her up. Apparently she did not want her picture to be taken. :)

She had a lot of fun, so I'm glad she got to go. So this pretty much sums up Friday's events. I may or may not wait til tomorrow to post what we did on Saturday and Sunday. We shall see. ;)

Lots of posts to come

We had a busy weekend. I have a ton of pictures I'll post this week from our weekend. Friday night, Kristen had her 1st formal dance, so I took some pictures of her all dressed up. Then Saturday we went to the Mall of America for the day. It was a lot of fun, but it was also a really long day. Then Sunday, we didn't make it to church, cuz I was just too dang tired. So, I slept in then we just spent some time in the hot tub. So, of course, I took some pictures of that too. I'll get started on that tomorrow.

Later guys:)

15th Anniversary Trip to Vegas

15th Anniversary trip to Vegas

Billy and I had a great trip to Las Vegas for our anniversary. We didn't rent a car this time, so we just stayed downtown. We've done all the Vegas Strip stuff we care to do for now and just wanted this time to be simple. We walked around a lot and went to see some movies. We ate at some nice restaurants with really good food. We just had a really pleasant time there. We spent good, quality time together. I love going to Vegas. It kind of funny too, because I don't really drink much, I don't gamble, and I'm not into partying or the strip club thing. So, you might wonder why the heck I like it there so much. I don't really know why. I guess I just like the busyness of it all. I like to just look around and watch the people. I like to see the sites normally even though this time we didn't really go anywhere. I kinda like all of the chaos. I do enjoy going to the shows too. The relatively clean ones that is. :) It was definitely a shoe string budget trip. We should have planned better knowing that it was our 15th anniversary, but no matter, we still had a great time. I can't wait to go back.

We did see 3 movies while we were there. My favorite by far was the Last House on the Left. I love violent, get the bad guys kind of movies though. So if you're into that kind of movie, this is the one for you. I will probably buy that one when it comes out. We also saw Watchmen. I hated it. It was slightly pornographic if you ask me. I don't recommend it at all. It was one of those that you just keep watching and waiting for it to get better, but it never does. Although, I probably would have enjoyed it much more if the blue man wasn't walking around with his junk flopping everywhere. Keep your pants ON blue man. It was just disturbing to me. I mean really, people take their kids to see movies like this thinking it is based on comics. Just disturbing I tell you. I can't even remember the other one we saw, so it must not have made that big of an impression.

The restaurant we ate at for our anniversary dinner was absolutely delicious. It cost a pretty penny. Dinner for 2, $175. But it was totally worth it. The atmosphere was great, the service was great, and the food was exquisite. Yum, yum. I will totally go there again for a special occasion.

We found a cheap little diner in Binions. That is where they started the whole 'on t.v.' poker tournaments. Anyway, the food there was really good too. And they have a dessert called the banana royal. It was huge. One time Billy and I got our own, but always shared after that. It had a big brownie on the bottom surrounded by banana slices, covered in vanilla ice cream, whip cream, nuts and 2 cherries. For only $5 it was a great afternoon snack or after dinner dessert to share. I am a total ice cream junkie, plus I am quite fond of all the other ingredients as well, so it was right up my ally. I'm not the size I am for no reason. lol. I do like the food a little bit too much y'all.

We also saw a show. We saw the Rat Pack. It was a pretty good show, and since we showed our room key, we got tickets for only $8 each. The show wasn't at the hotel where we stayed, but at the casino/hotel across the street which owns both properties. The show lasted about an hour and a half, so it was totally worth the price. We both really enjoyed it.

One day while we were there, there was a Knight Rider convention or something going on. There were Kit cars all up and down Freemont street. It was kinda cool to see them. There were a few other kinds of cars there as well, like the DeLorian from Back to the Future. Billy took all kinds of pictures of the inside of that car. He loves that movie, the first one anyway.

We didn't really take a whole ton of pictures this time. I guess that's because we've been there so many times and have a ton of Vegas pictures already. But we had a fabulous time, and I look forward to going back again as I always do. :)

And in case you don't know, click on the picture at the top to see all of the pictures we took. Enjoy:)

Easter

I am finally getting around to posting the things I've been putting off. Easter was the day after we got home from our trip to Mississippi. But, the "bunny" managed to get the baskets done even though that bunny was very tired. lol.

The kids Easter baskets

Karen and Hunter holding up their webkinz. Karen got an elephant and Hunter got an eagle.

Hunter is digging into a flip top cup that had candy inside.

Kristen with her webkinz. It's a cockerspaniel. She wouldn't let me get a picture of her face. That's not the norm for her, but she was only that way because it was early in the morning.

The kids digging through their candy

Doesn't Billy look just dandy in his robe? :) But I did manage to get some of Kristen's face in this picture.

Karen with her webkinz clothes. That little elephant looked cute all dress up.

Kristen's stash: She got 2 small chocolate bunnies, a bag of kisses, a bag of peanut butter cups, a flip top cup full of candy, a webkinz and an outfit for her webkinz. All of the kids got the same thing. Gotta be fair, ya know? :) I forgot, she also got some toy thing with candy in it. Hers and Hunter's was the same toy thing. Karen got a different one.

This is Karen with her little toy thing.

Trying to get a good famil Easter picture. Hunter was making a funny face in this one, so we tried again.

Except the camera went off before it was supposed to. That was Billy's fault. :)

This was the best we were gonna get. Hunter did change his clothes though. I told him he was not going to wear that for Easter Sunday. So he matched Billy with black slacks and a blue dress shirt. I just didn't have time before church to take another picture, and by the time we got home, I had forgotten all about it. Oh well, there's always next year.

Kristen's Birthday Party

Kristen had her birthday party at Pump it Up, which is an inflatable jumping place. She had a ball. I didn't get very good pictures, but hey, I tried. My camera is just not a cooperative one, or maybe it's just the user. lol. I guess that's why when you buy a camera, they always come with a users manual. I never read that though. I don't think I should have to. It should just be that easy to use, right? Anyway, she did have a great time. The party even continued at home. Several kids, I don't even know how many, came over to the house after the party. So, she had some friends spend the night on Friday night, then on Saturday we had a few hours at the party place, then there were probably 10 kids, at least, partying it up downstairs afterward. They had the music going and were dancing in the dark. She just had a good ole time. That's always my objective, for my kids to have a great birthday each year. I'm glad she had a good one.

I don't want them to have the kind of childhood I did. I want them to enjoy every second possible. It goes by so fast, so it is really important for it to be just an absolutely wonderful time before it's all over. That girl of mine drives me nuts, but I love her more than she will ever know. She means so very much to me, and I just can't even imagine my life without her and her craziness. lol. Of course, I feel that way about all of my kids. They truly are a blessing to my life.

Cool visitor :)

Billy had a visitor at work today. Hey look, it's Ponch. How cool for a cop to be visited by the coolest t.v. cop ever! I loved watching CHiPs when I was growing up. And he was my favorite!!

Something less depressing :)

I decided I would like to post something not so depressing as the last post. :) So, I will just talk about what I've been up to lately and what I plan on doing in the near future.

I never did get around to talking about how spring break with the kids went, so I guess I will start with that. We drove to Mississippi, because I wanted to have my van for the week. I did miss how much shorter it is to fly though. And I know I could have rented a car, but it was cheaper to drive.

We got there Friday afternoon, April 3rd. We went to W.C.'s house first. He is my brother that is my age. We just hung out that evening. The next morning we got up early and headed to New Orleans. I had never really been there except to get on a cruise ship. We met a friend of mine from high school at the zoo there. I was a little nervous, because I hadn't seen him since I was 18, in 1992. So it's been a few years, and boy do I look different. And not in a good way. lol. We all spent the day at the zoo and the aquarium there. Before we headed back to his place, he took us down Bourbon Street. We didn't spend much time there at all though. It was interesting. Interesting enough for me to want to go back. I'm just a curious person. I like to see interesting people and their odd ways of life. I'm weird that way. lol.

We left New Orleans and went to his house, which is closer to Baton Rouge. On the way, just before getting to his house, we stopped so he could pick up some crawfish. I'd never had that before. He also picked up a small bag of something unidentifiable for W.C. and me to try. It was called cracklins. And if you ever have the opportunity to eat this, don't. He wouldn't tell us what it was until we tried one. I was feeling adventurous, so I ate one. At first it tasted good. It had good flavor. Then I bit into it. YUCK!!! It squirted into my mouth this nasty gush of stuff. It turns my stomach just thinking about it. It think this was just about as nasty as escargot. He then told us that it is the fat just under the pigs skin. They cut it into squares, deep fry it in grease and toss it in the flavoring. So the gush of nastiness was the oil. And it was chewy because it was just a square of fat. GROSS!!! I may be fat, but I don't like to eat fat. :)

We got to his house and unloaded the van. Then people started to arrive. He had invited some of his friends over. When I walked out to the back yard, he had begun to dump the crawfish on some newspaper on the table. I would have taken pictures, but I had a little too much to drink and didn't really think about it. (I don't drink often people.) I looked at those crawfish and thought "Yuck". They looked like big bugs. My friend showed me how to eat them, but ripping their tails away from the rest of their bodies just didn't appeal to me. I love lobster, but even though these kind of looked like mini lobsters, they had eye balls and stuff. It was just, well, different. I only ate 2. I just wasn't willing to do the work you had to do to eat them. They tasted pretty good though. Not as good as lobster however. Oh, and watching the people there rip the tails off, eat the meat and suck on the head was kinda nasty. I'm just sayin.

The next day, we went to the Strawberry Festival in Ponchatoula, LA. It was like any other little town festival I've ever been too. There were just stands of crafts and food everywhere, rides and lots of strawberries. We had a nice time. We just walked around and talked mostly and the kids rode some rides. I did drink a daiquiri called a kick in the butt daiquiri. And like the cracklins I mentioned earlier, don't ever drink one of those unless you really do want a kick in the butt. And that's all I'll say about that. lol.

Once we were ok to drive, we headed back to W.C.'s house. This was Sunday night. We just talked a lot. He is going through a difficult time with his divorce. That is the main reason I took him to New Orleans. I thought it would be nice for him to just get away from his worries for a little bit. It always works for me. I guess that's one reason I love to travel.

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday I spent with Terra. We took the kids to see Monsters vs Aliens. I thought it was kind of stupid. But that's just me. Well, actually, Terra and I took the younger ones to see that. Kristen and Hunter went to see the Haunting in Connecticut. They like scary movies. We shopped and ate out and did the usual kind of stuff I suppose most people do. Billy flew in Tuesday late afternoon to spend the night with me. That was really sweet. He flew home early, early Wednesday morning so he could go back to work. I spent pretty much all day in the bed on Wednesday because I wasn't feeling well. Hey, it wouldn't be a normal trip if someone didn't have a day like that. Doesn't someone have to get sick while on vacation for at least one day? Well, this time it was me. I think it was my medicine I'm on though. I just felt super dizzy and that made me nauseous. So, I wasn't really that kind of sick. Ya know, not sick sick.

Thursday I was back with W.C. He had court and I went with him. We were there all freakin' day. It was boring, but interesting, if that even makes any sense. I won't go into details on that though, since it's his business to tell, not mine.

Friday I took the kids to see the Hannah Montana movie. It was actually kind of cute. I liked it anyway. It was much better than the other one, to me. I took them to the park and out to eat. Then that night we just hung out with W.C. and some of his friends. So that was pretty much it with the trip.

We all had a pretty good time. I spent way too much money, again. I always do. It's hard to go on a trip with 3 kids and not spend too much though. At least for me, because I like to go out and do things. I did do my best to keep it at a minimum though. I think it was roughly $500 just while we were in Louisiana for 2 days though. Luckily I did much better the rest of the week. Otherwise, Billy would have killed me. lol.

Saturday, Billy flew in to the Jackson airport so he could ride home with us. That was super sweet. I have really needed him more so than ever here lately. I am just wanting to spend as much time as possible with him. So we got to spend the day together instead of him being at home waiting on me and the kids to arrive. It is just so sweet to be able to fly whenever. I love that.

As if I haven't rambled on enough. I will finish by mentioning what our near future plans hold. This weekend we are taking Kristen to the Mall of America in Minneapolis, MN to go shopping for her birthday. We had her birthday party last Saturday and she got some money. I'll post about the birthday a little later and post pics too. So, she is really excited about that. I am too. I don't really have any money to shop with but it looks like a totally cool mall. The largest in America. And of course, Sunday is Mother's Day, so there's church, which I am trying to get back into even though I'm not too keen on being around a bunch of people at the moment, and we will try to go out to eat I suppose.

Then the weekend of the 16th is the Delta block party. That is where all Delta employees have basically an appreciation day. Last year Billy took Kristen and they won all kinds of stuff, tickets to the Braves game, tickets to an event at the Atlanta Motor Speedway, and best of all, ticket to Cirque du Soleil. We used the last tickets in Vegas last year for my bday. So that is an all day thing. I am looking forward to it. And again, Sunday is church.

The weekend after that is Memorial Day weekend. We are planning on spending it up at Matt's house. Hopefully that pans out, because I am looking forward to that as well. We haven't seen each other in a few months. So, Matt, don't cop out on me now. lol.

The end of the month, Billy and I are going to New Orleans to see my friend again. We will spend Saturday and Sunday there. That should be exciting. I've always begged him to take me, and now he finally is. :)

We will get home on Sunday, the 31st. I will go get the kids from Matt's house on Monday and hang out there for a few hours before heading home. Then on Wednesday, the 3rd, we will head to Petra's in Washington, and stay there til Sunday, the 7th. My birthday is on the 5th, so Petra, ya gonna make me a cake. lol. Just kidding. (or am I?)

So, as you can probably tell, I don't do a whole lot during the week, but I do try to keep my weekends busy with the family. Hopefully I'll get out of my funk I'm in and start being more productive with my weekdays as well. I'm sure the kid will keep me busy during the summer though.

I'll get busy with the pictures later today hopefully. I'll try not to procrastinate too long. :)