Ice skating at night

Since the holidays are over (and yes, I realize it was the end of January, but things around here are finally settling down lol) our weekends are pretty much open to do whatever we want and last weekend we took full advantage of that!

First we stopped by Miller's for lunch...

\

and I kid you not, the burgers were basically the same size are M's head. I couldn't get a picture because she tore into before I even got a chance. Girl was hungry!

After that, we stopped by some friends house to catch up a little bit and ended up playing some Just Dance.

I got my butt kicked lol

A few weeks ago, we found M a pair of basically brand new ice skates for less than $5 and she has been begging to use them ever since. So, we went to a skating rink the next town over for open skate.

It started off like this...

But eventually, she got the hang of it and had a blast! I hadn't been skating in years and I definitely forgot how fun it was. I also forgot how much my thighs and ankles hurt the next day lol

Aren't they cute?

I remember the first day

It's true.

And now, we are off to go celebrate that moment!

Got me doin' the dishes

Have you guys heard of Influenster? Basically, you sign up, fill out a few questions and then they send you stuff to review and try out! It's super simple and I've gotten some really great stuff to try out.

The last shipment I received was full of Palmolive Fresh Infusions dish soap. I was super excited about it because I get really tired of the same old scents of dish soap - they really don't smell that good and considering I feel like I'm always doing dishes, the scent gets real old, real quick.

I use Palmolive usually anyway, so I'm pretty familiar with the brand, but have yet to see this line of products. The three I was sent were Lemon Thyme, Lime Basil and White Tea Ginger. I gave the Lemon Thyme to my mother to let her try and kept the others - they all smelled so good, it was hard to part with them! There was also a few coupons so I gave a a couple to my mom, as well. I kept the others in case I want to rebuy after I run out.

I've been using the White Tea Ginger for a few days and so far, so good! I'm going to keep testing them out and see how they work on my toughest dishes!

*The products mentioned in this post were provided for review by Influenster, but the opinions are my own

Electric blue for me

Me untangling about 5 ft of wire and wrapping it around a spool while Jimmy reads the directions and puts parts together for her electricity science kit. His daughter? She was coloring haha

Why do the parents always end up with the hard fun parts? haha

I'm linking up with Mrs. Three in Three for Wordless-ish Wednesday!

To greet every new day that may come, like the first of spring

Kind of amazing that just a few weeks ago, we were sledding...

And this weekend, we hit almost 60. In January. In Michigan.

But we're definitely not complaining!

It's supposed to snow again soon, so while we had the chance, we took advantage of the warmer temperatures and enjoyed the playground by our place.

It was nice to get out of the house for a while and take in some spring weather!

Now, it has me excited for *actual* spring!

Man, that girl sure loves to fish

Jimmy's daughter has been asking for a pet for a while and since we're not allowed to have dogs, and we're not really cat people, we decided a fish would be a good starting point for the time being. For Christmas, I cleaned up my fish tanks that I had in high school and we told her we would go to pick some fish out.

The bigger tank is taking a little more set up than anticipated (apparently, there's a lot more that goes into these things than I realized...Jimmy doesn't believe that my fish lasted multiple years lol) but I had a smaller bowl that held my beta so while we are working on the bigger one, we filled the smaller one.

So, without further ado, I introduce to you...

Brian the Beta.

She seems pretty in to him so far...hopefully that lasts! haha

We going coast to coast

Have you all seen this yet?  Shane at Whispering Sweet Nothings has a Bloggers Coast to Coast map up so you can find other bloggers in your area! Isn't that awesome!?!?!
Go add yourself to the map and link up!

You're my favorite mistake

Source: pinkserendipity.tumblr.com via Amanda on Pinterest

A funny kind of way, A funny kind of day

 As per usual, there's been lots of great things coming out of Jimmy's daughter lately...

• Can you make me dessert, cause I used my legs a lot?
• If you go too fast, you'll pass the law!
• I didn't want to do a yawn. I just had to do a yawn for my brain!
• I'm getting sea sick of rain.
• Before you get old, and I'm only nine, will you teach me how to cook so that when you're old, you don't have to cook and I can cook for you?

We've also been treated to a never ending stream of jokes lately - some of them make sense like...

What do you get when you step on banana peels?

Slippers!

or

What did one glue say to the other glue?

We've got to stick together!

But some of them... not so much (they're still funny though!)

What do you get when there is a dog that's hot?

A hot dog!

or

What do you get when there is a tree on Christmas?

A Christmas tree!

One thing is for sure, life is never dull when she's around!

(This was on Halloween, she doesn't usually walk around with 15 pounds of yarn on her head haha)

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

The best part of growing up on a hill was by far the sledding. We lived on a quiet side street, so for most of the winter we would be outside, sliding down, often ending up in the middle of the road, before trudging back up the hill and starting the whole process over again. We'd usually break for some hot chocolate and then be out again until dark.

We used to get feet of snow...It wasn't that uncommon to wake up one morning and see 12-24 inches outside your window. We rarely had Snow Days though, because in Michigan, snow is just part of the deal.

It's been a few years since it's snowed like that, though. In fact, last year, it only snowed once and by noon the next day, it had all melted. It made for a nice winter to drive in, but I was starting to miss a Michigan Winter - complete with snow, ice, hot chocolate and some sledding.

Since Jimmy's daughter is only 5, she's never really been able to experience a winter like he and I remember them. In fact, she'd never been sledding! So when we had a few feet come down last week, we took the opportunity to take her out.

I just love the photo of them carrying the sled together

She had such a blast - and we did, too! We sledded for about two hours and she was not happy about having to go haha

Jimmy tried to be cool and go down on the sled standing up...

... it didn't really work out too well

I also just happened to catch this on camera when I was filming her - it gets little shaky at the end because I was literally doubled over laughing... you'll see why!

It was pretty much just like I remember is being... lots of fun and a little cold! But I think this picture pretty much sums up the day...

Love those rosy cheeks!

Camping next to water...

We had pretty decent weather while we were up north - it got a little chilly at nights, but that just made for lots of snuggling with lots of blankets. We thought we were going to be able escape without any rain, but we got hit one day - Jimmy jinxed us by saying he had never been up north when it didn't rain at least once haha

I will admit, that it was nice sleeping "outside" in the rain. I don't think I've ever slept that well! Unfortunately, even I can only sleep so much so once we were up and about we had to find something to do since the fire was out and the chairs were all wet.

The nearest town was about 30 minutes away, so we got dressed, grabbed some breakfast at a coney island (so Michigan haha) and headed even farther west.

We were actually planning on going to the beach that day anyway, so we went...and looked at it. haha Still pretty, even though it was rainy and foggy.

You can only look at an empty beach for so long, so after that we walked around the town a little bit - we explored some antique shops, a few pawn shops and stopped to have lunch at the Jamesport Brewery. We also stopped by the farmers market but there wasn't really much going on because of the weather.

We went back to the town we were staying in and found the bowling alley so we decided to play a few games. They also had a pool table to we occupied ourselves with that for a little while as well, before decided to go get some dinner (we had been making most of our meals over the fire, but since it was raining and wet, we couldn't really do that)

We found a restaurant right on a little lake so we stopped in and ate before heading back to our camper for the night.

Can't really complain about a view like that...

Today's the day I'm going camping

When I first scheduled my vacation, I was honestly a little worried about how I would feel when the time came to have over a week off. To that point, the longest I'd ever really been away from work was a four day weekend.

But, I think we scheduled our vacation perfectly. We started off with Chicago and ended with...

camping.

That was our campsite - our camper, firepit and some trees. (there was also a port-a-potty, but I was pretty sure ya'll didn't need a picture lol)

 We spend the first couple days exploring the town we were staying in - we made lots of trips to the grocery store and to get firewood!

This was pretty much my view for the first few days - to be honest, I didn't really need anything else!

First day of school and I'm prepared

We were only able to spend the weekend in Chicago because we had to be back in town for the first day of school!

I found a printable and had a little photo shoot with her before we left for the morning

she sure loves her silly faces lol

Her good friend is in the same class so we met up with her and her sister to walk into the school. We had a few minutes to wait and then we had to wait some more while the teacher checked in all of the kids - I forgot how hectic the first day of school is! But by the time we left, she was all situated and ready to go!

She is loving her new school so far and I'm so glad I was able to go with her on her first day. It was so fun to see all the kids!

Go to Mr. Jelly Bean

My one request while we were in Chicago, was a Chicago-style hot dog, so on Sunday morning we got up and went to get lunch...

before heading off on our next adventure...

 to the Jelly Belly Factory! 

None of knew what to expect, but we got to learn all about the history of Jelly Bellys, how they are made, saw art made of Jelly Bellys and even learned all about Regan's love of them. And of course, we got free samples and all sorts of treats to take home with us (we still have a bunch in our pantry, actually!)

While we were driving to the factory, we saw a sign for a cheese shop near by so after we finished up, we went to check it out - it ended up being an antique/cheese shop so we looked around for a while before buying some stuff to bring home with us - including honey sticks, which I had searched every where for to get Jimmy for his birthday. I guess I should've just gone to Wisconsin to begin with haha

We made one more stop before heading home for the night - to see a elk preserve right outside of the town Jimmy's dad lives in. It was a nice relaxing, way to end the day and our time in Chicagoland!

Through winter snow, the scarf's a flyin.

A few weeks ago, I signed up for a Scarf Swap organized by Meredith at The Tichnor Family. She's done it for a few years , and this is the second year I've participated (though only the first time I've gotten a scarf lol)

I was matched up with a sweet heart named Camila and was so excited when I came home last week and saw a package waiting for me!

It was all wrapped up so I took my time undoing all of it...

And I was so excited for what I found inside!

I've been on the hunt for the perfect grey infinity scarf since sometime last year and apparently, I shouldn't have just gone to Atlanta to find it haha


I am in love with it! It's the perfect color and I can tell it's going to keep me nice and warm when the weather here starts to turn!

Thanks so much Camila - I hope you like your scarf even half as much as I like mine ;-)

I do it for Chicago.

The birthday girl only had one request for her birthday dinner so of course, we indulged while we were in Chicago...

and she wanted crab.

And not only did she want to eat, she wanted to break it apart all by herself - we were dodging errant pieces of crab shell all dinner long! It was too funny to watch!

Apparently, Jimmy hadn't gotten his fill of the Billy Goat because after dinner we went to the original Billy Goat to grab a drink and look around at the rest of the stuff hanging on the wall. Jimmy has already said that the next time we're in Chicago, he wants to go back so he can look around some more - there was so much and no way we could see it all!

 

Soon, it was time to head back so we hopped on the train again while she dressed up Max in his Tiger gear (don't worry, he got a Cubby uniform as well - but absolutely no ChiSox ;-)

 

 Meanwhile, Jimmy decided he was hungry and couldn't resist the leftovers he had been carrying around all evening...

 

 I'm really not sure why I found this so funny...but I couldn't stop laughing!

Drove to Chicago, all things know, all things know

Once we got to Navy Pier, we stopped at the Billy Goat to get some food - Jimmy was so excited! He's been talking about going to the Bill Goat for months!

After we got a cheezborger and some cheeps, we made a bee-line to the place the birthday girl had been looking forward to the whole trip...

Build-A-Bear!

She picked out a sweet puppy named Max and had a blast building him - the best part was the stuffing and picking out the heart. If any of you have ever been to Build-A-Bear, you know they have a special thing they do with the heart - Rub it on your nose so it smells good, give it a kiss so it's loved, rub it on the top of your head so it grows big and tall, etc - and the guy helping us was so great during this part, he included each of us into his little spiel. She got to rub it on grandpa's heart so he loved his family, on dad's legs so he was strong and - my favorite part - on stepmom's (ie me) hair so he had style! hahaha I about died laughing!

After that, we took a stroll through Harry Carey's restaurant to look at some of the memorabilia - Jimmy and I probably could have spent hours there, it was packed with stuff!

But we couldn't take too long, because we were on our way to a special birthday dinner....

But there's a light on in Chicago, and I know I should be home

Jimmy's dad lives right outside of Chicago, so we decided to take his daughter down there for her birthday and to visit with his dad. She was so excited - she talked about it non-stop pretty much all summer!

We left after he got home from work that night and got in really early on Saturday morning. After catching some sleep, we got on the train and headed downtown.

It started off a little grey and cloudy, but luckily it never really rained! We got pretty lucky with the weather - a little cold, but nothing we couldn't handle :-)

After we got into the city, we got on a boat to travel down to Navy Pier. Even though I'd been to Chicago quite a few times, I'd never actually done this so I was really excited to see a different view of the city.

Next up....

Navy Pier!

Baby, oh, you're a birthday girl tonight

Our first day of vacation started with Jimmy's daughter birthday which was a pretty great way to start!

Him and I stayed up the night before wrapping gifts, decorating and getting balloons for the next morning and she was so surprised when she came downstairs! I even got her a birthday cupcake that she got eat for breakfast - lucky girl ;-)

 Please excuse the bed head - I she was so excited we just dove right in!

After we got ready for the day, we ran some errands and got ready for the rest of our vacation.

 She made out pretty well, but the best part was yet to come...

Guess who's back, back again?

Well, I'm back from my first official vacation.

11 days off in a row.

It was not easy to get up for work after that, believe you me.

But, it had to be done, so I'm doing it. And soon, I'll recap our vacation, along with the rest of the summer.

In between going back to school and finishing up my moving.

But even with the work and the school and the moving and the getting only about 1/4 of the sleep I got on vacation, it's good to be home.

Now, I just with the temps would remember it's September and drop a little bit!