Wordless Wednesday **

Irene Damage in Our Town

I took a drive to check out the damage (while being continuously detoured en route to my Mom;s house)... the water level has gone down a ton but there is still a lot left to dry up. Most roads are closed/detoured. The 15-20 min drive to my mom's ended up taking me 1 hour and 15 mins... insane. oh, and my lovely sunflower field I love driving past was destroyed... kinda bummed. :(










haha this farm has a sense of humor... if you don't laugh... you cry I suppose...


Happy Tuesday! My only night off from work. I am trying a new recipe I found on Pinterest... buffalo chicken rolls... like egg rolls :) mmm hope they are good!

Our House During/After Hurricane Irene

Kids are LOVING the new fish tank. The morning of the flood, the fish tank sprung a leak and we had to siphon all of the water out to find where the water was coming out and transfer the fish to a smaller tank. Lots of water to deal with and THEN a flood to deal with. A busy weekend of being trapped at home that's for sure. The poor fish are still in a 10 gal tank with no filter until we get our replacement tank shipped to us. I miss seeing it all lit up in the living room. It is set up right next to my desk and I find myself watching those fish more than I do the television... =) I do love fish.
Once the rains stopped and the winds calmed down I took the kids for a walk to the end of the road to see how bad the flooding was. We took pics so they have a record of where they were when Irene came through =) A lot of dress up and games were played. Maris beat me in Mario Party! (only once! haha) and we colored and cleaned the house. Jim took a full on attack of the kitchen and wiped down the walls and cleaned out the cabinets... left a bunch of stuff out for me to deal with... but beggars cant be choosers haha...

I've missed 2 nights of work and got barely anything done... haha I wish and wish for the time to get things done... I get trapped at home with no distractions really and I still just played with the kids, set time aside to doodle and draw, cleaned a bit - but the house still isn't clean... I guess the family time was time well spent. John Lennon said something to that effect... time you enjoy wasting was not wasted... =) back to busy life!

Maris Had Her Beatles Birthday Bash!

Made Twinkie Submarines =)





Photo Booth...

Giant Submarine...

l






It was a great time =) A lot of work... a lot of detail... all worth it. At the end of the day, she sat with me and said thank you and that it was the best day ever =) Everyone kept saying I did the party for myself... kind of annoying... but seeing her have so much fun made it better. Of course I LOVED planning a Beatles birthday and thoroughly enjoyed it. I did just as much for the Toy Story party but no one said it was for me... grr. My love for the Beatles is passed onto her and I had so many ideas due to my vast knowledge of Beatle things. so WHATEVER...
we ended up passing on a bunch of party games since so many kids cancelled or couldn't come. the kids that DID come got a tie dye shirt and played with the outdoor toys in the yard and had a blast. They loved the photo booth props (as did some of the adults haha) they got to go home with a Beatles loot bag and a chocolate mustache pop.
well, epic party. thanks to all who shared the day with us =)

Happy 4th Birthday!!!

4 years ago today I had my beautiful spunky baby girl Maris Violet. She came into the world dramatically and has made every day interesting since =) Here is a quick glance back at her birth, 1st, 2nds and 3rd birthdays...



Happy Birthday Sweet Girl! Our plan is to go to Toys R Us to get her birthday balloon and crown, then maybe to Chuck E Cheese and maybe a few other places (she received a few birthday coupons for free stuff so we will be going around redeeming them!) and eventually end up at "Gramma Black Hair's" house for dinner and cake. That is where she will get her gift. This morning, we told her she will get her gift tonight and that we need the truck to bring it back home. She said "Is it big?! Am I getting a giraffe??!" haha weirdo. Well, off to get the birthday girl some breakfast. Little dude just decided to wake up as well =)

Last Day of Three... onto FOUR!

good morning! Today will be a day of birthday prep. It is Maris' last day of being three. WHERE DID THAT TIME GO....We are going to finish up her slideshow so all I have to do is add today and tomorrow's picture and upload it =) I started decorating the house hehe who cares if its a little less than a week until the party! I keep saying no sneak peeks but I am so excited! haha Hint we all live in a ....




<3





too cool for three =)

Family Fun Fest & Happy Birthday to Jim

Our day started out with the family waking me up early to go to the diner for breakfast... (I worked the night before so I was sleepy) and then headed back home... we gave him his gift - a LEGO board game that he has wanted - and hung around for a little while and did our own thing. I did some more party prep and he watched a kitchen show on netflix while the kids played. We DID end up playing the board game we got him LAST year for the first time.. haha R2D2 Trouble. Maris caught on how to play really quickly and was ruthless. She taunts and goes after people... its funny. We have a little competitor on our hands. :)
After we ate lunch, we headed out to the FunFest. It almost immediately started raining... but we had fun. The annual Family Fun Fest in our town is a free street festival with rides and a clown and music. Great local food too! It rained most of the time but it didn't stop us from going! Usually you can barely get around due to crowds but the rain kept the mobs down. The kids went on the rides (I went on a few with them :)) I don't know why Jim was so distracted but he didn't want to take them on any rides and he was in his own world. He seemed to have a good time... he tracked down a balloon for Jackson... we were walking and I said hey, there's the clown... and stopped so Maris could get a balloon animal. Jim just kept walking. I understand that this happens... but usually you NOTICE you are walking alone after a while... he got all the way to the end of the street before seeing we weren't with him... lol
It is actually scarily almost a metaphor for our relationship lately... not really in sync anymore. Guess its hard to be when you barely see each other...
but ANYWAY... we took them to the rides section first in case it started storming so bad that they closed down. They went on a few then wanted me to take them on the big potato sack slide... in the rain. I went with Jackson on my lap and my butt was SOAKED.. haha it didnt really bother me bc soon after, I was soaked anyway. We ended up watching the live band Whiskey Sinners (I think..?) play some awesome covers and the kids ran around and danced in front of the stage :) even I danced a little =) Jim stood on the side, but thats normal for him. He's def not the dancing type. Macaroni the clown came over to make him smile... lol It started pouring so we tore the kids away from the music and went back home. Changed our clothes and headed off to dinner. I was going to make something but he wanted to try out the Fratellos place in Warwick. We got this enormous family style platter of chicken pasta in garlic sauce. It was soo good. I ate 2 plates of it and so did he. the kids ate a good helping and we STILL have a ton left. my only complaint about the place was the iced tea was off-tasting. (big issue for me as its what I drink) but overall really impressed. tempted to tell them it was Jim's bday but we didn't... haha
I baked some brownies for him with Maris and JAckson while he waited for his baseball game to come on (it never did... rain delays) and she served him his birthday brownie. I didn't make a cake bc he prefers brownies and bc we will be having cake in 2 days and then another for her birthday party. Now we are winding down and the kids are overstimulated... maybe it was the brownies right before bed.... lol but they WONT STAY IN BED! I'm going to go in the kitchen and see if they go to bed. Maybe its bc I'm home for a change (they tend to fight bedtime when I'm home from work) check out the extended amount of photos on facebook. I only added a few on here since its a pain =) goodnight!