Mitt

Did you ever have that once in a lifetime experience?  I'm sure we've all had lots of them...attending Mardi Gras in New Orleans, New Year's Eve in NYC, Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany...what? You've never had any of these experiences?  Well, me neither!  But I did get to see Mitt Romney!  In person! What?  You don't think that's exciting?  He could be the next president!  And the tickets sold out in one day!  And I probably won't ever get that close to him again...making it a once in a lifetime experience!

A few weeks ago, our friends Dale and Sue mentioned that they just saw that Mitt Romney was going to be coming to our town.  We all said we should go and then joked that the tickets were probably $500 each and that it was probably already sold out.  But then we kept talking about it...what if????  So we looked up the press release and found out that the tickets were $50 each!  They put me in charge of trying to get us tickets, but no one got their hopes up.  SO the next morning I got up early and called to get tickets.  They told me they were short staffed and extremely busy.  If I could get there in 30 minutes they would hold my tickets.

Say What???  Hold my tickets?  That means I had tickets!  Yay ME!  So I booked it to the next town over to pick up my tickets.  We needed 7 tickets, costing $350.  But I could buy a table of 8 for the same price.  So that's what I did.  My sister, Kerry bought the extra one.

We were all so excited about being able to see Mitt Romney!

There were secret service guys everywhere!  It was so COOL!  Rodney was sure I was going to get thrown in jail, because I was stalking them looking for Mitt.  I just wanted to know what door he was coming in! I mean really...

They checked everything thoroughly before Mitt came on the stage...

And then...he was introduced as the next President of the United States!

I am pretty sure this is when he was looking right at me...I think he wanted to ask me to dance.  What?  A girl can dream, can't she?!?

They had to postpone eating until after Mitt spoke (and yes we are on a first name basis!) to accommodate his schedule.  We were sad that he had to leave. But I am convinced that he would have asked me to dance if he had time to stay.

Dinner was delicious...

And we finished it all of with an All-American dessert...

Here's to my once in a lifetime experience...which would have been better with just one dance with Mitt - not that I'm bitter!

Get out and vote!

I did it!

I love finding that perfect Christmas gift.  Sometimes I have to go out in the wee hours of the morning on Black Friday.  Sometimes I have to look and look (and look).  Sometimes I'm not even looking for it and just stumble across it.  And sometimes I have to make it.

This year my favorite gift to give was homemade...sort of.

My sister, Kerry, was remodeling her living room/dining room area and she wanted a new table.  She wanted one that was smaller than the mammoth antique cherry table they were currently letting reside in the middle of the dining room.  He got an eviction notice and had to be out by Christmas Eve.  I wasn't sure exactly what she was looking for, but I mentioned that I bought a table at a yard sale over the summer that I could refinish (remember this make over) for her if that's what she wanted. I had already sanded the top and started to prime the base.  Here's what it looked like at that moment.

Kerry said she would love to buy that table from me.  So we talked about stain colors and base colors.  She decided she wanted the base white and the stain a little lighter than the stain on my first table.

**Let me insert here that this conversation took place on Thanksgiving, giving me a month to get it done because she wanted it for her annual Christmas Eve party**

So I painted the base and resanded the top.

Notice that it was dark outside.  Hope my neighbors didn't mind the noise after 9:00 :)

The first coat of stain is always my favorite.  It's at that point that the table really starts to take shape for me.  So I lovingly added that coat of stain around 10:00 one night.  It was quite a sight, I'm sure.  It was cold (we even had a few snow flurries earlier that evening) so I was bundled up with sweatshirts, a coat and gloves.  Sorry I don't have a picture of that babe for you!  But I do have pictures of my table after one coat of stain...

Lovely isn't it???  I almost had a heart attack!  You know how aliens create crop circles...I think they create stain madness as well.  Seriously...I didn't have time for this.  After some research, I think I figured it out.  Remember those few snow flurries I mentioned?  Well, I think the moisture caused the strange blotchy outcome.

So...

I sanded it AGAIN (two rounds with 60 grit, 2 rounds with 100 grit and 2 rounds with 150 grit).

I was very nervous about putting stain on it again.  I didn't know what I would do if those "hidden" marks were still there.

Not bad, huh?  Then I stressed about how many coats of stain to put on.  I put three on my first table so I was originally thinking two for this one.  But I really liked the color after one coat.  I decided to leave it with just one.  It was time for polycrylic and polyurethane. I wanted the table to be durable so I added three coats of each.

I kept Kerry informed on all of the problems that I was having.  We had several days of rain.  Rodney and I moved the table in and out of the house about three times in the last week.  I knew she wanted it for Saturday night, so I told her I would try to have it done.  I also knew she had to work Saturday morning.  I made arrangements to take it to her house while she was at work, so that she would be surprised when she got home.

She was!

I love the little glass knobs on the drawers.  I found them at an antique store and thought they would be perfect.

Merry Christmas Sis!

Fire Hazard!

Have you ever wondered what you would do if there was a fire?  Well, you know from this post that I have thought about it a time or two!  Some people like to sit facing an exit door. Some people like to know exactly where they are in case they need to call for help.  Some people would never go into certain situations for fear of the unknown.  Would you ever lock yourself in the far corner of a large room filled with tables, chairs and tons of paper?  For 3 days?  Who does that???

Scrapbookers...that's who.  Are we crazy?  Never mind...don't answer that.  If you have never been to a scrapbooking retreat, you don't know what you are missing.  Not only are we preserving memories - we are making more memories!

We sit with our friends and family...this year I was lucky enough to have Kerry and Tammy with me.  And Becky and her sister, Rachel, sat across from us.

We work hard...

We share tools, ideas and snacks!

Most of all we have fun!  This year a monkey showed up to visit Kerry.  He was cute and made funny noises, so we kept him around.

We didn't realize that he would attract trouble...

This little guy showed up one evening while we were at dinner.  He was WILD!  Sure, he made us laugh.  But he was a bad influence on our quiet, shy little fella.  So we had to find his original home (the end of the table behind us).  And do you know that after this wild monkey was gone, our little man started mocking us?  I told you he was a bad influence!

I LOVE getting away for the weekend.  I LOVE creating memories.  I LOVE scrapping them!

 Rachel - Thanks for letting your creative juices flow across the table!
Becky - I am sorry I am not the friend you thought I was...By the way - do you know where your punches are? Of course I don't have them.  What would make you say that?

Kerry - Thanks for skipping a poker game to be with us (nice shirt).  You definitely have your priorities in order!
Tammy - How many pages did you get done?  Aww heck!  It doesn't matter.  I am glad you came all the way here to spend the weekend with us!

Can't wait to do it all over again!

Bushel (or two) of Fun

A is for apple - at least that's what they teach in Preschool.  And it's apple season.  Gala apples are my favorite, but for this particular job, Granny Smith was our gal.  My friend, Sara, makes and cans apple pie filling every year.  This year I decided to give it a try.  And if you remember from my corny post I don't usually do these things alone.  My sister and my parents are forced love helping out! 

We used mostly Granny Smith, but mixed in a few Courtlands, or were they Fuji, or maybe they were Jonagolds.  Heck, I can't remember what they were! 

First we washed and peeled all the apples.

 Look how cute these naked little apples are...

Kerry sliced, diced and chopped.  Doesn't she look a little too happy to have a knife in her hand?  And the one that's she's holding is not even the big one!

Then we shoved as many apples as we could into the quart sized jars.

I didn't get a picture of the "filling" mixture, but here we are (and by we I mean everyone but me) pouring the filling over the apples.

I think we might have overstuffed our jars...but we're learning! We then processed the jars in a water bath canner and voila  -  the APPLE OF MY PIE EYE

Sara also gave my a delicious recipe for "Apple Pie Crumb."  I am feeling generous today and I think I will share it with my readers (all two of you!):

Pour apple pie filling into a 9x13 pan.  Sprinkle a dry yellow cake mix over filling mixture.  Drizzle 1 stick of melted butter over cake mix.  Bake at 350 degrees for 50 minutes.  Best to eat warm and with vanilla ice cream.  YUM-O!!!

World Series

Have I told you that we are baseball fans?  As I sit here and think about it, it's strange how much I enjoy baseball.  I didn't grow up in a baseball family.  My brother didn't play baseball, we didn't watch it on TV, and I don't remember going to any baseball games (maybe I did and I just don't remember).  However, baseball has become my own family's niche.  That's who we are...as a family.  It's funny how that works.  Does your family have a niche...something that helps define who you are? 

Anyways...guess what we were doing this weekend? How'd you guess?  Watching baseball!  Every year we make the trek to the Little League World Series.  It's AMAZING! Watching 12 year old boys from around the world play together.  Of course they are playing against each other, while they are on the field.  But when they are not in uniform, they are running around the park.  It's really cool.  And as always, we had a super time! We couldn't decide if we were cheering for the Southeast team (Georgia) or the Mid Atlantic team (Pennsylvania).  We decided on Mid Atlantic...go Keystone!

We went with our friends: Becky, Gary, Cory, and Jack (Gary's dad).

My sister, Kerry, and her family met us there as well.  We all enjoyed several games, including a record attendance game Friday night.   This is what 42,000 people look like...

 

With this many people, there was an awesome "wave"

And we met "friends"...the people beside us were locals, and very interesting.  They had about a four foot square space and about 12 not-so-small people.  They oozed onto my blanket and treated me like family.  One of them had a teddy bear tattoo, one just bought a van that needed to be towed to their house, they all had potty mouths and an Uncle Bubba!  When I heard them talking about Uncle Bubba I.lost.it.  For all of you with an Uncle Bubba, I apologize, I just couldn't help myself!

Two things you should notice in this picture.  First...do you see that man's leg on my red blanket? Yeah...that was just part of the oozong.  Second...do you see that brown stuff on the back of my shorts?  Hmmm - that's a whole other story!  The short version is that there was a storm earlier in the day, the hill was wet and muddy, I was wearing flip flops - do you see where I'm going with this?  Yes, I fell.  How embarrassing!  There were people everywhere.  I was on the phone with Kerry trying to tell her what we were doing.  My phone went flying, my sunglasses flew off my head and my whole right side was covered in mud.  Go ahead...laugh...I'll wait.............are you done yet? I was not laughing at the time, but it is quite funny when I think about it now.  Glad I could make you smile today!
Moving on...At the local bakery we bought cookies for the boys. YUM-O!

We are blessed to be able to have opportunities like this.  Making memories is one of my favorite things to do!

 

Thanks for the memories!