They're back!

My hair is finally long enough to put some fun curls in it again. Oh how I missed being able to have bouncy curls. My hair is finally starting to feel like "my" hair again.

Pay no attention to the over-sized gray sweatshirt. I decided to curl my hair for no particular reason when I was lounging around in my sweats on a Saturday afternoon.

Happy V-day...Love, Mom

My mom made some Valentine's day treats for Aaron and me. She sent us a heart-shaped meatloaf (yes, a meatloaf...it's tradition) and a heart-shaped strawberry cake. Though equally delicious, the cake proved to be more photogenic than the heart-loaf.

A Day in the Life of Taggy

"Excuse me Mom, we're trying to sleep here!"

"Unhand that mouse...it's MINE!"

"Do I need to repeat myself? It's MY turn!"

"Fine! Wake me up when you're ready to share."

February Holidays

February is like another holiday season for me. Valentine's Day is this Wednesday and my birthday is exactly a week after that. Let the festivities begin...

Kitty Pedi

Everyone has heard the expression "curiosity killed the cat." Well, in this instance, "curiosity painted the cat." I was painting my toenails and Tag sat down in front of me and put her little paws out while watching me. Aaron went to get the camera and while taking the first picture Tag reached out and swatted the nail polish brush (above)! Unfortunately, I was using the pink nail polish at the time so Tag got it on her paw and then stepped on the carpet. Ahhhh!!! We got that messed cleaned up, then went for another picture, this time with the clear polish. What a glamorous, pampered feline. Must be a rough life. "Excuse me, I wanted pink, not this clear junk. Clear polish is not a fashion statement. Come on woman!"

Snack Fairy

Sarah and I have a kind of bartering system with snacks at work. When I get a new snack I give her one and visa versa, or if one of us is hungry, but doesn’t like the snacks that we have stocked in our respective snack cabinets then we’ll trade snacks for something more fitting for our particular craving. I told Sarah I was hungry today and she immediately offered up some snacks…no bartering required. She has been keeping a giant box of 100 calorie packs in her car for about a month and she eagerly asked what kinds of packs and how many of each that I wanted. She’s sick of them because she bought the giant box so it was like she was “dealing” them to get rid of them. Too funny. I went for 1 pack of Doritos and 1 pack of Lorne Doones. When she came back in the office from getting my snacks I exclaimed, “You’re like the Snack Fairy” and she laughed and did her best impression of the Nabisco Snack Fairy, prancing a little before returning to her desk. Watch out Collin Mochrie (the Nabisco Snack Fairy), there’s a new Snack Fairy in town!

Idolize This

I have been in love with Edy's ever since they came out with the Slow Churned line of ice cream...then I found out about these amazing new selections and it put me over the top. I think I'll be sending Edy's a Valentine's Day love letter! The new ice cream is special edition American Idol-themed ice cream and America will get to decide what flavor sticks around. I ran right out to Target to buy some as soon as I found out about it, but they were out of one of the flavors that I wanted so I had to make a trip to Kroger. There was a lot of "Hollywood Cheesecake" ice cream, but I wanted the "Take the Cake" flavor too so I dug through the stock and found a containter of the "Take the Cake" flavor in the very back! Happy day. I hurriedly ate my dinner so I could get to my dessert and boy was dessert yummy! I liked both flavors, but the "Hollywood Cheesecake" got my official vote on the Edy's website.

I wonder what Simon, Randy, and Paula would have to say about them. On second thought, who cares! I love the ice cream and that's all that truly matters, right?!

Come one, Come all...

One of my friends tracked me down and took some pictures of my co-workers and me while on display at our weekend gig... at the circus side show.

The Cassinator and Sweaty Speedo Saraman

Mark the Amazing Mulleted Midget
Bradalina the Beautiful Bald Bombshell

I guess our secret is out.

Just how well do you know me?

Find out how well you know me by clicking on the chart below to take the test! Good luck!

*The test website seems to have been messed up when Rebecca took it. Her score is actually 80.


Create your own friendquiz here

Cast of Characters

Michelle said, “I have become a recurring character on your blog,” and that gave me the idea to do a “Cast of Characters” list of my often-mentioned characters.

Aaron- My husband- the amazing, smart man that I fell in love with in high school and married in 2004. Also, one of my best sources of blog material whether he wants to be or not.
TagAlong- Our little furbaby- a somewhat psychotic, but oh SO cute kitty that I just love to pieces. She is probably the best form of entertainment in our household. Also known as Tag or Taggie
Mom- My Mom- one of my very best friends, favorite shopping buddy, and a general “pick me up when I’m down” kind of lady
Dad- My Dad- the silent yet strong type that doesn’t make quite as many appearances as my mom because he is “the silent type”
Nick- My brother- always good for a laugh whether I’m laughing at him or with him
Jen- Nick’s wife- my look-alike and overall sister in every way other than by blood
Carol- My mother-in-law- one of my most avid blog readers, an amazingly strong yet caring woman. Also my “back-up” when Aaron is doing something crazy and I need reinforcements
Jerry- My father-in-law- Aaron in 30-some years
Jennifer- Aaron’s sister- the mom of the most adorable nephew EVER and savior when it comes to all things cell-phone related.
Doug- Jennifer’s husband- the dad of the most adorable nephew EVER and car guru
Derek- Jennifer & Doug’s son and my nephew- the MOST ADORABLE NEPHEW EVER!
Deanna- Aaron’s sister- claims she is Derek’s favorite Aunt, but I know better (j/k Deanna)
Sarah- My co-worker and best friend since I moved to Indy- got me started on blogging and gives me good material daily
Michelle- My co-worker and zany friend- cracks me up on a daily basis with stories of her kids and funny sayings like, “Hi-larious”

Auditions for additional recurring characters are held daily. Say or do something crazy, intriguing, or down-right funny and you could appear on the list too!

Happy Belated New Year!

We didn’t do anything exciting for this New Year’s Eve. I decided to go shopping around 4:30pm so Aaron made dinner for us. What can I say…that timing was well planned, huh? After buying a new coat and some shoes (at GREAT prices) I returned home with dinner cooked and waiting for me. What a great way to start the New Year! Aaron and I opened a bottle of champagne that we got for our wedding (yes, our wedding that was 2.5 years ago) and rang in the New Year with a champagne toast.

Our other happenings since the New Year’s Eve ball dropped in Times Square:

I got a new job! I will start it on January 22nd. I have been frantically shopping for dress pants because my current workplace is so casual that I haven’t had to wear dress pants since before my diet last year. Since I dropped a full size in pants I need to equip myself with a new wardrobe that fits before the 22nd. I had some major luck shopping on my lunch hour though so I’m feeling pretty good about the new wardrobe. I bought 4 pair of pants and 3 shirts for $102 at JCPenny!!!! LOVIN’ Penny’s right now!

Aaron started his internship with the Public Health and Safety Office downtown Indy this week and that seems to be going well so far. Yesterday, his co-workers used him as a lab rat to test some new equipment. The only bad thing about the internship is that he won’t get paid near as much as he would if he continued to work at Carmel Rehab for the semester. Luckily the internship is only 14 weeks long and he can go back to making some moolah at Carmel Rehab again in March or April.

Jennifer and Baby Derek stopped by our house last weekend and Derek is crawling now!!!! I can’t believe my little nephew is growing up so fast! It’s sure a fun stage though, other than the fact that I had to keep pulling him away from TagAlong so that she wouldn’t lose her cool with him and snap. Amazingly, Derek did pet (pet = hit, when you’re 6 months old) Tag a couple times and she just sat there and looked at him. Thank goodness for that! Jennifer said that she has a new workout program now…it’s called “chase the 6 month-old all around the house.” I think I’ll need to borrow Derek every once in a while so I can keep my New Year’s resolutions!

That’s the beginning of our New Year in a nutshell.

On the Eve of Christmas Eve

Mom and Dad started the tradition of lighting an advent candle each day during December for our annual Christmas countdown. This year, Mom gave us an advent candle so that Aaron and I can continue the tradition. Only one more day to go before we've reached the last day of the countdown!

The Christmas Collection

Since we don't have a "real" baby to take Christmas pictures of, I was on a mission to get some cute Christmas pictures of TagAlong this Christmas season. Below are some of my favorite pictures from the collection...

This picture was taken right before Tag crunched down on one of the hanging lights and shattered it with her rice-sized teeth. Who knew, something the size of rice could be so powerful!

After chomping on the light, Tag ran away, then came back to inspect the damage.
Tag then went into hiding under the tree because "Daddy" yelled at her.This picture was taken later in the evening when Tag was inquisitively looking at my shadow. Look at those big eyes! My shadow must be pretty scary!Whenever Tag hears Aaron's car door shut in the driveway she always runs to the door to greet him. As the door opened, I betTag was wondering, "Hmmm, will it be Daddy or SANTA CLAUS???!!!!"
Next, I tried to get Tag to pose with a Christmas bear. I love this picture because Tag looks so un-impressed and really down-right irritated with the creature that is inhabiting her favorite snoozing spot on the couch.Last, but definitely not least...a sweet moment with Tag and the Christmas bear. A kiss. Of course she might just be trying to size up the bears ear for an evening snack. I think I'll choose to believe the "kiss" angle until teddy bear stuffing appears on our living room floor to prove otherwise.

Halleluiah

I got an early Christmas present on my commute…all 5 stop lights, that I encounter on my daily commute, were GREEN as I approached them today. I didn’t have to stop once!!! The heavens were smiling down upon me! It’s a true miracle!

May the Treats be Plenty...

and the pounds that I gain be few. I guess that’s an oxymoron, but that’s what I’m hoping for this holiday season!

Where is Superman when you need him???

Mom was in Indy for a conference a few weeks ago and she was staying at a hotel downtown. I met her downtown for dinner, and then we walked to TJ Max to do some shopping. On the way to The Max we got in one of those little picture booths to have some fun pictures taken of us during our ‘night on the town.’ (The pictures were funny, but they sure weren’t very flattering.) Following our outing, we went back to the hotel, planning on heading to the hot tub and pool.

This is when the real adventure began….we stepped onto the elevator and I pushed the button for the 12th floor. As soon as the doors started to close, the elevator fell about 2 feet and I pushed the “door open” button to try to keep the doors from shutting. Unfortunately, the button proved ineffective on the malfunctioning elevator. After the doors closed completely, I pushed the button a few more times and it still didn’t work. Mom started pushing the “bell” and the bell rang out, but no one came to our aid. It was at that point that I felt like yelling out a famous Louis Lane line…”Help Superman.” If only there was such a superhero at that very moment. Mom opened the door to the emergency phone and we found a phone that was covered in a 2 inch thick layer of dust. When a woman answered, mom told her that we were stuck in an elevator. We were told that a maintenance man would be there in a few minutes. After about 10-15 minutes in the elevator, Superman arrived, only this Superman wasn’t wearing a red cape and blue tights. Our Superman was wearing a blue and white maintenance outfit. He pried the elevator doors open and held them open about 2 ft for mom and me to squeeze out. For our troubles, the hotel manager had a fruit and yogurt tray delivered to our room and mom got free valet parking for the following day.

While in the elevator, I tried to keep the mood light so that I wouldn’t freak out, so I had mom pose for this picture as she hung up the emergency phone…

The fruit and yogurt tray was waiting in the room for us when we returned from the pool.

We got a chilled bottled water and a Caffeine Free Diet Coke too. I'm still not sure that this stuff made up for being trapped in an elevator, but it was better than nothing and it makes for a good story.

BackBlogged

I told Michelle that I was backlogged on my blog entries and she said, “Oh, you’re backblogged.” So, of course, I had to blog about that great new word! Thanks MJ!

The Boys

Aaron and I watched Derek on Sunday while Jennifer was at the Colts game. We had a great time with the little guy and I was able to snap this cute pictures of the boys.

I almost forgot to mention that Aaron helped change a diaper on Sunday! It was his first diaper changing experience, but I know it won't be his last!

'Tis the Season for Glitter

During the holiday season, I look forward to coming home to find Christmas cards in the mailbox. We had a large stack of mail yesterday and I was happy to see three Christmas cards among the sale flyers, coupons, junk mail, and bills. Finding a Christmas card tucked between a stack of bills and junk is always a welcome surprise. As I opened the first card and started to slide it out of the envelope, glitter started sprinkling down from the envelope onto the counter. The card had a glittery cover and the glitter made its way onto my fingers as I slowly pulled it from the envelope. I put the card in our decorative Christmas card holder, brushed off my hands and opened the next card. This card was a glitter-less card, but I still had glitter on my fingers so I unintentionally made it a glitter-smattered card when I put it in our card holder. The third and final card of the day was another glittery card and I laughed this time as the glitter sprinkled out of this envelope and clung to my fingers. By that point, my fingers looked like the fingers of a child who had just come from Arts & Crafts hour at vacation bible school. As I washed the glitter off my hands, I said to Aaron, “”Tis the season for glitter, I guess,” and we both laughed.

Thanks to Adam & Jen, Greg & Andrea, and Judy & Amanda for kicking off the holiday card-giving season for us!

Fudge Nuggets?

Do you know what fudge nuggets are??? Neither do I! All I know is that when I bent my fingernail backwards on my car handle today, those were the words that came flying out of my mouth. I have no idea where they came from, but laughing at my ridiculous phrase helped ease the pain of my fingernail incident. Remember that phrase and yell it the next time you stub your toe or hit your funny bone. Trust me, it will make you feel better.

FUDGE NUGGETS!!!

The Wal-Mart "Experience"

Every time I go to Wal-Mart it turns into a real “experience.” I prefer to shop at Target, but Wal-Mart has better prices on groceries so I usually decide to save money and give myself a headache by going to Wal-Mart. Here are some of my recent Wal-Mart trials and tribulations:

1.) When I was heading to my car to leave, I noticed that a LONG line of carts was behind my car pinning me in. Of course, there was no one in sight to move the carts either. I had to wrestle the carts into the “cart corral” and while doing so, one of them went flying off the front end and I had to chase it across the aisle to stop it from hitting a car. Unfortunately, I didn’t make it in time and the cart careened into a parked car right as I reached for it. Luckily, the car wasn’t damaged. After fighting with the long row of carts for a couple minutes, I noticed a man sitting in an SUV right next to my car, watching the whole thing! I would like to think that if my husband, dad, or brother was witnessing something like that they would have helped the damsel in distress! Oh, and did I mention that it was about 35 degrees outside during this Wal-Mart “experience?”

2.) I got a cart and went to the frozen section to get some frozen lunches and I noticed a used Kleenex in the bottom of the cart. GAG! I made sure to avoid the Kleenex when I was putting items in the cart. Thank goodness I had hand sanitizer in my purse to use after this “experience.”

3.) As I pulled into an aisle to park, I lucked out and got the first spot past the handicap spots. I was excited by my luck and walked the short distance into the store. When I returned to my car to leave I noticed that another car was stalking me to take my spot. As I started to back out, I realized that I wasn’t going to be able to back out because the other car had pulled in too closely behind me. I had to maneuver my car about 5 different ways to get out of the spot because the car behind me wouldn’t back up even though he had room to!!! So irritating!

4.) I was in the self check-out lane and a little (hispanic) boy (probably about 7 or 8 years old) hit the “Espanol” button on the machine, so the machine started barking the commands loudly in Spanish. “Explore por favor el primer artículo” (Please scan first item) or something like that. I wanted to say “Aprenda por favor el ingles.” Anyone know what that means??? The Spanish-English language issue doesn’t usually bother me too much, but Wal-Mart seems to put me on edge. Can’t imagine why…

Oatmeal Fiasco

Every morning when I get to work, I make myself a package of instant oatmeal in a Styrofoam cup. I usually buy the “Fruit & Cream” variety box of oatmeal and eat whatever flavor I happen to pull out each morning. It’s like a gamble, but some mornings I’m in more of a “Strawberries & Cream” mood than a “Peaches & Cream” mood, so on occasion I “exchange” what I have picked for something more appetizing. This morning, I was delighted with my pick of “Blueberries & Cream” because it’s one of my favs. I happily walked off to the break room, oatmeal packet in hand, to make my breakfast. I grabbed a Styrofoam cup and ripped open my oatmeal packet. Apparently I ripped it a little too hard though because some oatmeal bits went flying onto the trash can lid (that was sitting on the floor). I thought “dang it, there goes 1/4th of my breakfast.” I cleaned the oatmeal off the lid, washed my hands, filled my cup with water, and then put the cup in the microwave like I do every morning. I set the time for 15 seconds and when I opened the microwave after the 15 seconds I discovered that my oatmeal had bubbled over the top of the cup. There was oatmeal all down the sides of the cup and around the bottom of the cup on the microwave tray. “Well, there goes another 1/4th of my breakfast.” So, with a half a packet of oatmeal in a sticky oatmeal covered cup, I returned to my desk to eat my meager breakfast. I wish this whole crazy mess would have happened with a packet of something like “Bananas & Cream” instead of my favorite flavor.

An Entry a Day...

NO WAY! My friend Sarah has made a resolution to do a blog entry a day through the month of November. So far, she’s been able to keep up with it, even though she admits that it may kill her in the end. As for me, I admire Sarah for taking on this task, but I know I do not have the creative energy to make such a commitment. However, I am going to try to get back to writing at least one entry a week. So, I'm posting a few entries today to make up for lost time. Here's the first...

Mascara Mayhem

I admit that I’ve been known to put on my lipstick or pull my hair up while sitting at a stoplight on my way to work, but I was behind a lady who gave new life to the “Caution: Driver Applying Make-Up” bumper sticker that this women so obviously needed. I was tooling along on 465 last week in the left lane, when all of the sudden the driver in front of me slowed down by about 5-10mph. After hitting my breaks, I looked into the car and noticed that the lady in front of me was applying mascara as she was trying to drive down the interstate. She was rubbernecking to see her face in the rearview mirror and was getting dangerously close to the traffic in the middle lane. I watched as she finished her right eye, sped up a bit, then slowed back down to lengthen and plump the eyelashes on her left eye. When she was done with the make-up application she moved back into the center of the lane and sped away. All I could do was laugh. Women… risking life and limb to look beautiful.

“Cast” ing Away Keepsakes

My parents are redoing my old bedroom in their house to convert the room into a guestroom. My room had 2 twin beds and was painted in a buttercup yellow color with lattice and ivy wallpaper along the bottom half of the walls. The “new” room is painted a breezy blue color and the new cherry bedroom suit includes a queen size bed, which will be a nice improvement from the twin beds on the occasions that Aaron and I spend the night. The new Cape-Cod style room is going to be really nice, but in order to get it looking nice Mom and Dad had to clean out the whole room, including the 2 walk-in closets, so the woodwork could be painted. In cleaning out the room, Mom found TONS of my old keepsakes. I went to her house to get some of my stuff over the weekend. The keepsakes ranged from diaries from my grade school years, to marching band memorabilia, to formals from high school dances and the most recent addition… my wedding dress and veil. Among the keepsakes were a couple boxes of t-shirts from all of my high school activities, band, drama, cheerleading, etc. There were trinkets from school dances and marching band contests. All the usual keepsake kind of stuff. There was also an unusual keepsake among the piles of items. This was a keepsake that I didn’t even know I had kept…

It was my cast from when I broke my leg the summer before 7th grade!!!! I would have been around 12 at the time, which means that the cast is 11 years old!!!! Amazingly, for being almost half as old as I am, the cast wasn’t toooo terribly disgusting. It was packed in a clear plastic bag and I laughed as I read the signatures that covered it. The signature from my mom, near my toes, that said “WOW” instead of “MOM” to me when I was wearing it. The signatures of two foreign exchange students, Pedro and Liza, that went to the Indianapolis Zoo with mom and me and pushed me in a wheelchair so I didn’t have to walk on crutches the whole time. (Pedro kept acting like he was going to push me into things.) Nick’s signature, signed “Nick, Class of ’95.” (He had just graduated from high school.) A touching signature that read “Fratello” written by my best friend Amanda’s dad, who has since passed away. (Amanda’s dad, Dave, had an Italian restaurant named “Fratellos.”) The list could go on and on. It was amazing that that old, somewhat gross cast sparked memories that otherwise may have been lost. That’s the whole reason behind saving “keepsakes” isn’t it?

Unfortunately, I have way too many keepsakes from my younger years and my house isn’t nearly big enough to store everything that my parents are purging from my old bedroom. So, my mission for the next couple weekends (if I’m lucky enough to have any downtime during them) is to take pictures of my memorabilia and create a whole “Keepsakes” photo CD. All the memories on a little CD that will help keep my house from a state of total clutter. Wish me luck on completing this project : )

I'll post pictures of the cast when I get a chance...

The Return of Closed-Toe Shoes

I’ve been lucky this year; thanks to the warmer than usual weather I’ve been able to stretch my sandal-wearing season for a couple extra weeks. However, there is a chance for snow flurries tonight so my less comfortable, higher heeled, closed-toe shoes will be making an appearance tomorrow. Oh, how I will miss the airy feeling of exposing my French pedicured toes to the world. Oh, how I hate making sure that I have socks clean to wear with my closed-toe shoes. Oh, the misery of living in a climate that forces me to store my sandals during the winter months.

Attention Target Shoppers

The last couple times I’ve been in Target on my lunch hour I’ve made an interesting observation. Apparently the hours between 11:30 and 1:30 are “Pregnant Lady and Lady with Small Children” hours at the retailer. If Target was ever to have a promotional opportunity, like handing out flyers for “healthy nutrition during pregnancy” or “potty training your toddler” (sponsored by yet another company trying to capitalize on women who are in this stage of life) the hours of 11:30 to 1:30 would be the time to hit the right demographic! I would venture to guess that it may be the largest collective group of stay-at-home moms outside of mom's club.

The Yearly Candy Dilemma

I decided that I wanted to make my Halloween candy purchase and get that out of the way for the year. Of course, buying Halloween candy early can pose significant problems for my waistline, so I had to have a Halloween candy shopping strategy. That strategy was 1.) Go to Dollar General to buy the cheapest candy possible 2.) Get generic brand candy that’s not terribly appealing to my taste buds and 3.) Get enough candy so that we don’t run out like we did last year. Last year we had to dig into a bowl of candy that we had left from Easter (yes Easter) to stock the last few trick-or-treaters at our house! It’s amazing how long Hershey kisses stay fresh. At least I hope they still tasted okay. Oh well, if not, we’ll have fewer trick-or-treaters this year.

“Don’t go to that yellow house down the road. That lady gave us stale Hershey kisses last year.” I can hear the neighborhood children whispering.

I don’t think we’ll have to resort to using Easter candy this year. My shopping is complete. I bought 2 large bags of candy for $7. One bag is a “kiddie mix” with gum, sweet-tarts, and caramels. The caramel chunks will be slightly difficult to resist, but I don’t usually overeat caramels like I do other yummy treats like miniature Snickers and Twix bars. The other bag of candy is full of generic peanut butter cups and chocolate crunch rounds all wrapped up in that dorky Halloween print foil. Normal peanut butter cups (of the Reese’s variety) and Crunch bars would be hard to resist, but I can resist the generic kind…I hope.

Enough candy talk. If I keep it up I’ll start craving chocolate and have to resort to eating generic foil-wrapped mummies and witches.

Finally, a picture of Baby D and Me!

I wrote a blog entry a couple weeks ago about the fact that there are very few pictures of me with my nephew, Derek. Since there is a severe lack of Baby D and Aunt Cassie pictures, I took matters into my own hands while watching Derek on Saturday. I tried to get Derek to smile for the picture but when I talked he would turn his head toward me so I decided I would just take the picture anyway. I love that he's looking right at the camera with his big blue eyes. His cuteness is neverending:)

A Three Hour Tour

It wasn’t exactly a tour. It was more like a 3 hour headache! Last Tuesday I left work at my usual time, 4:30 and took my usual route to get onto I-465, which means taking I-65 to 465. As I branched off 65 to meet up with 465 I noticed that the cars in front of me were all stopped. I immediately regretted that I hadn’t stayed on 65 and made my way home through the downtown area. As I came to a stop in the long line of traffic, I was glad that my script for my weekly church drama performance was in the car with me. I picked it up and started rehearsing my lines. Occasionally I would have to stop rehearsing to put my car back in “drive” and move a whopping foot or two down the road. After being at a nearly dead stop for about 35 minutes, a traffic report finally came on the radio. “A semi has tipped over and spilled its load on 465 at Crawfordsville Road. No injuries, but extensive clean-up.” It was then that I realized I wasn’t going to be getting home ANY time soon. After sitting in traffic for nearly an hour on the ramp from 65 to 465, I finally merged (at a snail’s speed) onto 465. By this point I had all of my lines memorized for the drama performance and there was no end in sight to the traffic. Suffering from boredom, I decided to start making phone calls. I couldn’t get a hold of mom, and Aaron was at work so I called Nick. I complained to Nick for a little while and then he had to hang up because he was going out to eat with a friend. Now, I’m an hour and a half into my traffic experience and I wasn’t even to the 38th street exit yet (which is about 2 or 3 miles from my office.) I bet you can guess what happened next…if you guessed that I was well on my way to a near pants-wetting issue then you were right! I was thankful that I had gone to the bathroom before I left work, but unfortunately I had A LOT of water to drink that afternoon! I was praying that I would make it to the 38th street exit soon so that I could run into McDonald’s and use the restroom before I had another disaster on my hands (or rather, on my seat). As I got a little closer to the 38th street exit, some cars started speeding (meaning that they were going about 20mph) by me on the right shoulder. I followed their lead, which I normally wouldn’t have done, but this was an emergency! Halleluiah! I made it to McD’s just in time and only 2.5 hours after leaving work! After the bathroom break, there was no way that I wanted to get back on 465 and sit for another 2.5 hours so I decided to cross over 465 on 38th street and work my way home through downtown roads. You won’t believe what happened next! As I passed over 465 the traffic was completely clear!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! In the 5 minutes it took me to get off at the exit and go to McDonald’s, the traffic completely cleared! Of course, at that point it was too late for me to get back on 465 because I had passed the on-ramp. I continued heading east and decided to cut back south to catch the next road that had a ramp onto 465. I turned onto a road to take me south and went for about .5 miles then I found myself at a dead stop AGAIN! I was furious at this point and called Nick again to complain once more. He said, “Just another reason that I don’t want to live in a big city.” Let me tell you, I was hating city living at that point! FINALLY, (after also making a phone call to Sarah to complain) I made it back to 465 and was on my way home again. At 7:40, after my 3+ hour adventure, I finally arrived home…and went to the bathroom again, just because I could…LOL.

Girl Scouting at its finest...

As I was leaving work one day last week I had a brief conversation with Michelle. It went something like this.

Michelle: “You’re leaving just in time. The rain just started.”
Me: “Oh, great.” (sarcastically)
Michelle: “Don’t you have your umbrella with you?”
Me: “Yes, I do. It’s right here in my purse.” : )
Michelle: “You’re like a freakin’ girl scout…always prepared.”

We both chuckled as I walked out the front doors, and popped my automatic umbrella open for the walk to my car. I was pleased that I had remembered to bring my umbrella in after hearing a weather report on my way to work stating, “Rain and possible thunderstorms expected this afternoon.”

Later that evening, I went tanning. Right as I walked in the door to the tanning place, my left flip-flop flipped its last flop. In other words, it broke and my foot went sliding out the front of my sandal. I scooted my foot back into the broken sandal and shuffled my feet across the floor to the check-in desk. Luckily no one saw my "flip-flop malfunction". After the girl behind the desk checked me in, she walked away and I picked up my shoe and hurried into my tanning bed room. When I lay down in the bed I started thinking, “how am I going to get out of here with a broken shoe?” (Keep in mind that it had been raining so the ground outside was wet and puddley.) Walking out barefoot was not an option in my mind. Then the light bulb went on. “I can use the rubber band from my ponytail to hold my foot and shoe together to make it to the car!” As soon as I was done tanning, I took my hair out of the ponytail to free up the rubber band for a greater purpose…instant shoe repair! Viola! It worked perfectly. Michelle would say that it was another “girl scout” moment : ) If I hit you up to buy cookies from me next spring, now you’ll know why…

Self Portrait Challenge

This month's theme is "your self portrait with someone else." Since I was having trouble accessing blogger earlier in the month I got a little bit behind on my photos. I've got one for this week though! Yippee! It's nothing creative, but it's one of my new favorite pictures of the hubby and me. This picture was taken at the 25th Anniversary party that Aaron, Nick, Jen and I had for my parents in August.

Adorable, as always

I've noticed that almost all of my pictures of baby Derek have Aaron and Derek in them, but I'm hidden behind the camera taking the pictures. I guess that's just a little sample of motherhood because if you look back through the pictures of me as a child you'll notice that most of the pictures were taken by my mom. Moms, or Aunts in my case, seem to be under-represented in pictures. Case in point: Uncle Aaron is feeding Derek a bottle. How cute is it that Derek is trying to "help" Aaron:)

My Bad "Biker" Husband

We had a family Labor Day party at my Grandma and Grandpa Connors' house and at the party Grandpa got the Aero Scooter out to take his younger grandkids (Rachel, Sarah, and Grant) for scooter rides. After the kids had their turn on the scooter, Aaron took the scooter out for a ride... After feeling the wind blow through his hair for a few minutes he came back into the yard and posed for some knarly "biker" pictures. Just look at that studlly man riding the motorscooter...swoon. That basket on the front is so sexy. He could bring groceries home in it...
Then my family, namely my Mom and Uncle Dale, got involved with the photo shoot. They said that no "bad biker" photo shoot is complete without the American flag draped around the "biker" or hanging galantly in the background...

Wow, these pictures are so good. They look like something right off the cover of Redneck Bikers Magazine (if there was such a thing).

Carol and Jerry, the real bikers in the family will be so proud...lol.

Blog problems...

I was having problems with my blogger account so this is the first time I've even been able to get on my account to write since Sept.1st! Enjoy:)

Grandboomers

My mom found the definition below on the www.wordspy.com site that I blogged about a few weeks ago and sent it to me. Good stuff! I have now decided that my future kids will call their grandparents, Grandbooma and Grandboompa Connors, and Grandbooma and Grandboompa Parkins…LOL.

P.S. To the future grandparents of my future children: I don’t like the idea of grandparents being called by their first name (as highlighted below) so I hope you don’t fit that part of the definition : ) AND, you better find time to bake cookies with our future kiddos because I like cookies and they’ll have to share with their mommy : ) (Cakes, breads, or candies would be acceptable items to make also.)


grandboomer (GRAND.boo.mur) n. A grandparent who is a part of the baby boom generation.
Example Citation:
Given the "boom" in baby boom, by the year 2006, there will be 80 million grandparents in the U.S. Nearly half of them will be boomers — the youngest, best educated and most active generation of grandparents in history. Already, the average age of first-time grandparents is a spritely [sic] 47. And these "grandboomers" are giving a whole new look to the role.—Karen von Hahn, "Grandspending," The Globe and Mail, November 30, 2002

Earliest Citation:
First it was grey hair and bifocals. Now baby boomers are adjusting to another sign of middle age: grandchildren.
But these neophyte grandboomers are bringing a new, informal style to grandparenting. Today's grandmother wears jeans and a T-shirt, wants to be called something other than Grandma (first names are getting the nod), probably works outside the home and is short on time to bake cookies.—Dorothy Lipovenko, "Boomers' next hurdle: grandchildren," The Globe and Mail, August 7, 1996

Notes:
The leading edge of the baby boom turns 57 this year, so it's not surprising that a good chunk of them are grandparents. In fact, more than a quarter of the cohort — around 20 million of the 78 million boomers in the U.S. — now have grandkids to dote on. Boomers-as-grandparents stories have been around since at least 1996, the year the oldest boomers turned 50 (and the same year the word grandboomer first appeared). As this first wave of boomers approaches 60, expect to see many more such articles and, since these are baby boomers we're talking about, expect most of these stories to talk about how these boomers are revolutionizing grandparenthood (as, so we've been told, they already revolutionized dating, marriage, and parenthood in previous stages of the boomer era).

Welcome Back! (To myself)

After a much-too-long hiatus in my blogging, I’m back. I have no real good excuse for why I haven’t blogged in weeks other than that life just got in the way : ) So, here’s some rapid-fire reading material about what’s been going on in the last few weeks of my life.

1.) I’ve been working on cleaning out our spare room and making room for Aaron’s clothing in an “actual” closet in our house. Up until about a week ago, my clothing occupied and filled all the closets (3 total) in the house and Aaron had a “porta-closet” set up in the spare room for his clothes. I know I am the Imelda Marcos of clothing and shoes, but luckily I am blessed with an easy going husband that doesn’t give me a hard time about my favorite hobby…shopping…thank goodness for that! In order to make room for Aaron, I had to get rid of some of my clothes, so those items got tagged and sent to Nick and Jen for a garage sale this weekend. I’m still working on boxing up some of my “summer clothes” to put in the attic so that my other clothes aren’t quite as smooshed in my closet. I’m having a hard time boxing up my lightweight tanks and shirts though because I don’t want to admit that fall and cooler weather are quickly approaching.

2.) I auditioned for a part in a church drama program called JumpStart in July and got a lead role. The JumpStart program is every Wednesday night and we have practices on Thursdays. Needless to say, my weeks are quite busy now. In JumpStart I play the role of a high school girl named Samantha, aka Sam, and I’m a “hippy.” We had a JumpStart kick-off yesterday at church. I did not act in the skit yesterday, but we had to be dressed for cast pictures. You can visit this site for some pictures from the day: http://centerjumpstart.blogspot.com/index.html . I don’t like my portrait, but oh well : )

3.) Aaron started classes again last Wednesday. I tried to talk him into letting me take a “first day of school” picture of him wearing his backpack, but he wouldn’t go for it. Maybe next year : ) Other Aaron news…Aaron quit Kroger!!!! After 6 years of imprisonment, he finally broke free of Kroger’s hold on his weekends! With his class schedule this semester, Aaron would have only been able to work at Kroger one day a week so he decided to quit Kroger and step-up his hours at the Rehab center. We’re both happy about it.

4.) I’ve been able to spend some quality time with my hubby lately. As mentioned above, Aaron quit Kroger and it has allowed us to actually go and do things together on the weekends! That’s a luxury we’ve never had in our 6 years together so it’s been really nice! I don’t have to say, “Aaron we have a family reunion on Saturday in 2 weeks, make sure you get the day off.” It’s a nice change. Of course, I’m used to having “me” time on the weekends when Aaron’s at work, so that’s been an adjustment. I still have a need for “me” time (because I go nuts if I don’t have some time to myself) but Aaron has been good about recognizing when I need “me” time and getting the heck out of dodge : ) What a good husband I have…he lets me have all 3 closets in the house and he knows when I need to be left alone and takes heed.

5.) The State Fair! Aaron and I had never been to the State Fair, so when Aaron’s sister, Jennifer, called to see if we wanted to go to the fair we were excited. Jennifer, Derek, Aaron, and I spent about 3 hours at the hot fairgrounds. We spent most of our time outside on the main drag, which I was happy about because the smell of the animals in the animal barns made me want to gag. We did have to spend some time in the pig barn though because Aaron wanted to see the “World’s Largest Boar.” The boar was one of the most disgusting things I’ve seen. I took pictures to share the grossness with all of you. (I will post pictures later, I'm having trouble uploading them)



Of course, there were many non-gag inducing things at the fair too, like Orange Shakeups (similar to lemon shakeups, but make with oranges), nachos, hot dogs, elephant ears, strawberry shortcakes, fudge sundaes, etc. etc. Amazingly, the only thing I munched on was a strawberry shortcake in the produce/agriculture barn. (I liked that barn because it was air conditioned, clean, and non-smelly.) There were some down-right cute things at the fair too. The down-right cute things I’m referring to were my nephew and husband : ) Uncle Aaron carried baby Derek in a baby carrier for part of our fair trip. Derek looked so tiny next to Aaron, with his little legs dangling out of the baby carrier. A couple of my favorite pictures from the day are below. (Again, will post when the upload feature is working on my blog profile.)

I think that about sums it up for now. I’ll try not to let so much time lapse between this entry and my next. I make no guarantees though : )

What was your favorite age?

We celebrated my dad’s birthday on Sunday and at the party I asked a few family members this question, “What was your favorite age?” Here are the responses:

Mom- Age 17 (Here's her reason, in her own words) My 17th year was special because that is when I started feeling good about myself (not conceded but confident). I had a wonderful group of friends, a boyfriend and classes that I was doing well in. I could drive and my parents were very trusting (ha). Life was good, I had no real problems—probably thought I did but didn’t really. Music was good, my friends and I danced, laughed and dreamed together. Most of our dreams came true as we grew. Good times were had!

Dad- Age 21 because that’s when he got his pilot’s license

Grandma Thomas- The years that she had her children, which would be around 18-21 (If I’m wrong on the years, someone correct me.)

Me- Age 17 because I started dating my future hubby at that age, it was my senior year of high school, and I was drum major of the Northview Marching Knights : )

Your turn…everyone leave me a comment telling me about your favorite age! I look forward to getting some comments on this entry!

My Sister (In Law) and Me!

At Mom and Dad's 25th anniversary party I’m not sure how many times I heard comments like this (but it was a lot), “Wow, you and Jen look so much alike,” or “You’d think you and Jen were sisters by blood, not marriage” or “Oh, I thought you were Jen walking up to me, but you’re Cassie.” Good thing that Jen and I are both so darn cute since people say we look so much alike : ) By the way, I have to agree with all of you that think we look like sisters…there is definitely a resemblance. I guess my brother thought I was so cute that he wanted to marry someone who looked like me, LOL. Of course, some people say that Aaron and Nick resemble each other too, so I guess I did the same thing with my brother and hubby : ) We’re just four good-looking individuals I guess…ha, ha.

Vocab List

I found a website today that I fell in love with because it made me laugh for a good, solid, ½ hour (possibly longer.) The website is www.wordspy.com . The site specializes in defining newly coined words and phrases. I found it very amusing that many every-day events now have coined phrases. I kept thinking to myself, “oh, that’s what you call that.” : ) This website has expanded my vocabulary by leaps and bounds…ha, ha. Here are some of my favorites (in no particular order) :

Brokeback marriage- n.- A current or former marriage in which one partner is gay or has had a gay affair.


Manilow method- n.- The discouragement of loitering in public places by broadcasting music that is offensive to young people, particularly the songs of singer Barry Manilow.

godcasting -pp.- Podcasting an audio feed with a religious message


mucus trooper (MYOO.kus troo.pur) n.- An employee with a cold or the flu who insists on showing up for work.

butt call- n.- An unintended phone call placed by sitting on one's cell phone.


seagul manager (SEE.gul MAN.uh.jur) n. -A manager who only interacts with employees to criticize their work or when a problem arises. (swoops in, makes a lot of noise, poops on things, then leaves)

bozo explosion -n.- The large number of inept employees that a company ends up with when it hires an incompetent executive, who in turn hires incompetent managers, who then hire incompetent workers.

freegan- n.- A person, usually a vegan, who consumes only food that is obtained by foraging, most often in the garbages of restaurants, grocery stores, and other retailers.

Hopefully that’s enough to get you interested in looking at the website. Let the good words (and laughter) roll…

Self Portrait Challenge

This month's theme is "enclosed spaces." For my first portrait for the month (since I missed last week) I enclosed my eyes in the frames of my glasses.

25th Anniversary Bash!

Nick, Jen, Aaron, and I threw a big 25th anniversary celebration for Mom and Dad yesterday. We had the party at a banquet hall in Brazil, IN and we had about 115 guests! It was lots of fun and started with a vow renewal ceremony then there was cake, punch, and dancing until early evening. Mom and Dad were so cute together. Here are a couple pics from the day.

I can’t wait to see the pictures the photographer took! The photographer is going to post them on-line in a couple weeks so I’ll post the link on by blog as soon as I get it.

Oops

I bought a large bag of plastic cups for my parent’s 25th anniversary party at Sam’s Club on my lunch hour last week. Unfortunately, I didn’t think about how hot my car was going to get as it sat in the parking lot at work for the rest of the afternoon. I got home that evening, grabbed the bag of cups out of the backseat and headed into the house. When I got in the house, I put the bag on the floor and noticed that the stacks of cups looked shorter than it had before. At first I thought, “No, I must be imagining it.” Then I picked up the bag and took a closer look. Staring back at me were about 150 cups that looked like this:
I think they look like little lopsided witch hats. The little hats would look adorable on Taggie, but there is no way that she would wear one long enough to take a picture, so just visualize how funny it would be : ) Fortunately, I was able to save about 50 cups out of the bag of 200. “Duh Cassie, plastic does melt!”

Self Portrait Challenge

"My self portrait as astonished, disturbed...and cracking up about it." I know this is not one of my most creative self portraits, but I couldn't resist using this picture as my weekly image. One of my co-workers found this HUGE fruit on a table in the breakroom at work and told me I had to check it out. Of course, we had to take the camera with us to take a picture of this "oversized banana" that was invading our space. We did some research after the picture and found out that the "banana" was in fact a "plantain." Regardless, we think it is very unnatural and quite freakish looking. I mean, check it out, it takes two hands to hold it...how bizarre is that??? (Okay, if your mind went into the gutter, come back and join me in the non-gutter world because this entry was completely innocent and was not supposed to be suggestive.) :)

...and yes, our office does have neon green walls.

Sweet Baby

Yes, yet another entry about my nephew. I just had to post this oh-so-sweet picture of little Derek. He could be in Ann Geddes calendars!

Self Portrait Challenge

"My self portrait as a hollywood starlet." This picture was inspired by a story I read today about how celebrity photo shoots are arranged and how the "right" picture is selected for use on magazine covers, movie posters, etc. I thought, "I can do that. I can use a fan to simulate a mega-movie-star photo shoot and go from there." I added the big sunglasses for the modern celeb touch. I like the results!

If it contains fruit it must be good for you, right?

This dessert, made of a sugar cookie crust and a cream cheese and sugar topping, sure isn't good for you, but it is OH SO YUMMY! Amanda and I made this fruit pizza for a cookout on Saturday. We hadn't made fruit pizza since high school "foods" class, but we both had a hankering (yes, i just said "hankering," i'm from a small town after all) for it. Amazingly it turned out great, despite the fact that we made it:) It was so pretty that I had to take a picture!

Yummmmm, this picture makes me hungry!

Consider him initiated

Aaron was officially initiated into “uncle-hood” last night. We went to Jennifer and Doug’s to see Derek, and Aaron got hit with almost the whole gamut of baby-ness. While Aaron was holding him, Derek got the hiccups, sneezed 3 times (towards Aarons face), spit up on Aaron’s arm and (the best part)… left a puddle of pee-pee on Aaron’s lap. Derek had a diaper on, but Aaron was holding him at an angle that apparently allowed the pee-pee to trickle out of the diaper and onto Uncle Aaron’s lap. Aaron didn’t even notice that he had been leaked on until he passed Derek off to Jennifer and saw the large darkened area on his pants and shirt. The situation was made even funnier by the fact that Aaron had asked Jennifer, “Now, I’m not going to get pooped on while I’m holding him am I,” and Jennifer had replied, “No, but you might get peed on”…and he did about 5 minutes later : ) Aaron was a good sport about the whole thing though. After all, “You only pee on the ones you love (as the Parkins’ family saying goes).”

By the way, I just love calling Aaron, “Uncle Aaron.” It’s got a nice ring to it : ) It will be really cute to hear Derek call him that in the future too.

Self Portrait Challenge

"My self portrait as an aunt." My beautiful baby nephew, Derek Michael was born on July 5th. I am thrilled to be an aunt...he is our first nephew and Aaron and I are completely in love with him:)

Introducing....

...my ADORABLE new nephew, Derek Michael. Aaron's sister, Jennifer, and her husband, Doug, brought this amazing bundle of joy into the world on Wednesday July 5th at 3:35pm. I am thrilled to have a little nephew to spoil! Like I told Jennifer the day after Derek was born..."I can't spoil him to much or get him loud toys though because payback will be hell in a few years if I do." Eh, I'll probably do it anyway:) How could I not spoil something so precious???

Self Portrait Challenge

This month's "Self Portrait Challenge" theme is "My self portrait as..." The theme this month is very open to interpretation so I decided to interpret it in this way. My portrait this week is "My self portrait as a Shirly Temple Wanna Be." I was in a wedding on Saturday and at the end of the day, when I took my hair out of the updo I had created, my curls still looked quite Shirley Temple-like and since I loved Shirley Temple as a child I decided to capture my look on camera. It was after that that I found out the theme for Self Portrait Challenge and realized that I could make the picture work for it and show off my curly locks.

Superman Returns

As you all know by now, I’m a big fan of Superman (so is Aaron). So, we made sure that we got to see Superman Returns on opening night, last Wednesday. However, we were both a bit disappointed with the movie. It wasn’t horrible, but it wasn’t anything near as amazing as it could have been. The actors that played Superman/Clark Kent (Brandon Routh) and Lex Luthor (Kevin Spacey) were great, but I thought the character of Lois Lane (Kate Bosworth) left a lot to be desired. The plot of the movie was a bit lame and I thought the action sequences and special effects were a bit lacking. I think part of the problem is that the directors were using the first two Superman movies as a benchmark for improvement on this movie. When you compare this movie to the first two Superman movies “Superman Returns” looks AMAZING. However, with the great special effects and exciting story lines in the current “Smallville” series (which the most recent generations identify with as the "Superman story"), I expected more from the movie. If the writers of "Smallville" can come up with a new, exciting story line and impressive special effects each week for the “Smallville” series on the small screen, I thought they could do even more incredible, Superman-like things for the big screen version of “Superman Returns.” I was also very bothered by the lack of interaction between Clark and Lois in “Superman Returns.” In the movie, Clark returns from being gone for 5 years and Lois barely even says “hello” to him. It was a strange dynamic that seemed very unfitting for the age-old Superman story.

(Another point of irritation…what’s the deal with the latex Superman costume??? I’m not a fan of the updated latex-looking dark red cape.)

As we were leaving the movie and were both complaining about it, Aaron said, “They should have asked us for our input.” Because we’re cinematographers in our spare time, you know : )