What a nice day to have off....

Today was my Monday off and the weather was beautiful. Since I was up until 2:30am this morning (don't ask, but it had to do with me somehow corrupting my Microsoft Money backup file) {{rolling eyes}}, I slept in today and didn't get up until 9:00am. My plans included making homemade potato salad for Gunner's birthday celebration tonight and meeting my husband for lunch and so I can see his new place of employment.

Picked my hubby up at work and we went to Francie's on Fleur Drive for lunch. Afterwards, he gave me a tour of his new workplace and I met his boss. Since it was such a nice day and my Aunt and Uncle live really close to Fred's job, I called to see if my Aunt wanted to walk Gray's Lake with me and she said yes.

Gray's Lake is a beautiful place to get some exercise and when the weather is nice, I've been known to drive over there on my lunch hour and do the 2 mile walk.

You can just see the top of the gold dome of the state capital in this photo




The water is still pretty high and there were spots where the water was still over the trail, so you had to detour around


The bridge that is lighted at night.


The tree aren't in bloom yet and everything still has a bit of a blah cast to it, but it felt great to be out in the fresh air!

Random Things

Been neglecting the blog lately as it's been a busy week at work and at home. I still have lots of projects both home and scrapbooking to share with you.

Last weekend we finished the upgrade of our downstairs guest bathroom and I still haven't taken picture of it yet. Maybe later tonight.

A few weeks ago on a sunny Sunday, I went to a arts and craft fair at the Iowa State Fairgrounds. I had my eyes looking for something that I had seen before at arts and craft shows but didn't know if I would find what I was looking for....I've also disliked having our waste basket out in the open in our kitchen. I can't go under the sink, there isn't enough room and I didn't have a pull out cabinet like we did in our old house. Currently it just sit next to one end of the kitchen island.

Well, I struck gold at the arts & crafts show..







I love it, it matches our cabinetry and it hides that damn waste basket.

I also re-purposed a lamp a couple of weeks ago for my scrapbook room. I've had the white base forever, so I just added a $8 lampshade from Target and then bought $1.50 worth of pink trim, got the handy dandy hot glue gun out and ta-da.....a lamp for my scrapbook room!



Had a pretty good day today. I got up way too early for a Saturday....around 7:30am...BOO! THAT'S not going to happen tomorrow. Finally went to the gym around lunch time and did 40 minutes on the elliptical. Fourth gym visit this week....feels good!

On the iPod playlist today (shuffle songs):

Got No Shame - Brother Cane
On My Sleeve - Creed
Don't Change - INXS
You Get What You Give - New Radicals
My Kinda Girl - Chickenfoot
It's About You - Train
Sweet Caroline - Neil Diamond
Don't Think I Don't Know About It - Darius Rucker
Cold Hearted Bitch - Jett
Stranded - Heart

This evening Fred and I went out to eat at a restaurant we have been wanting to try FOREVER. We've tried a couple of times, but it's so popular that there was a wait and both time we didn't feel like waiting. Today we made a point of going EARLY. The restaurant is over by the fairgrounds and it's called "Now or Later" on University. The owner was a chef at The Latin King before opening this place.

IT WAS FABULOUS! Fred ordered the Steak DeBurgo and I had Shrimp Scampi with spaghetti marinara. The red sauce was by far the best I've ever had and next time I'm going to order the Cavatelli. Fred's steak was excellent and even his baked potato was perfection. They have a wonderful creamy Parmesan dressing that is their house special and the 1/2 order of onion rings we had as an appetizer were some of the best we've had also. SO glad we decided to eat there and we will definitely be back!

Hope you're all having a nice weekend!

Another Mini Album Project Completed!

While working on our Disney pages, I was also putting aside some fun photos to include in this mini album that I made in 2007 at a scrapbook convention that I attended.

The pages I had mostly finished and just needed to add photos and some journaling. It think it turned out cute.













Another project done!

Projects

I've been really jazzed about getting a bunch of half finished projects finally completed over the last few weeks.

Some of these things have been on my project table for over a year. Bad scrapbooker, bad, bad, bad scrapbooker....lol

This mini album was of our awesome visit to Matchstick Marvels in Gladbrook, IA. We specifically went when we did to see the replica of Hogwarts Castle before it was shipped off to a museum in Spain. I've completed the album but had never done the journaling, so I finally took the time to do that and it now resides in a basket in our family room with other mini albums.




Another mini album that I had almost done was one I had done of our new house. Well, it's not so new anymore, it will be 6 years on April 1st that we have been here, but we had taken pictures of the place prior to moving in and then I took some after photos, but again, never did do the journaling in the album, but now I have. YEA!





Another project that I finally finished was a CD cover for Fred that holds a CD that his sister gave him when we were with his family last October. His sister put together a compilation of photos of Fred and his family growing up and set it to music. It's very cool!



I'll share more later.

Home

Got back from Washington DC on Friday and brought a lovely chest cold home with me. :( I'm not feeling horrible but I just don't have any energy. I had big plans this weekend to paint the downstairs bathroom, but I don't think that's going to happen now. I think it's going to be a "get caught up on the movies and books I've been meaning to watch/start reading".

Did some reading while in DC this time. I bought and read two books in the last 5 days. The first one was Push, the novel the movie Precious is based on. One of the hardest books I've ever read. Hard in the subject matter is tough to imagine. The language is pretty raw and it's just such a horrific story. Brought tears to my eyes several times.

The second book was a recommend from one of people who was in Washington with me. We were at a bookstore and she said I had to read this book. The Glass Castle was one of those "can't put down" books and I read it until I was finished. What an interesting and unbelievable book. I think my mouth and jaw were hanging for most of the story. To think that a family could live the way the Walls did was hard to imagine. I highly recommend it to all of you.

I finally took the time to watch Slumdog Millionaire also. Very good movie!

I've got some projects that I've finished in the last couple of weeks that I'm going to share as soon as I'm feeling better. A couple of them have been in my "To-Do" pile for quite a while and I'm happy that they are finally finished.

March goals and another travel week

Leave again on Monday for Washington DC. I'll be back Thursday night. This should be my last business travel week until July.

It was a busy week this week. Coming back from Phoenix (which I will share with you later in the post) and having to play catch up at work made the week go by very fast. I did get a bit of good news on Friday that after 14 years in the same desk location, I'm moving into a new space. It's not a cube, but not a full fledged office with a door..it kinda in between, but it's more private than what I've had. I'm going to start looking for a reasonable piece of art for one of the walls since I will be looking at it for the next 7 years.

My goals for March are as follows:

1. Lose 4 pounds
2. Start to organize the stuff I want to put on Craigslist
3. Paint the downstairs guest bathroom and update the faucet & hardware.

#1 and #2 are carryovers from February. I didn't lose 4 pounds in February, but I did lose 2 pounds, so each month I'm going to shoot for 4 pounds until I hit my goal. I did do quite well in getting to the gym. Now if I could get tape my mouth shut...LOL!


Had a really good time in Phoenix the week before last. The weather was super great, but it was nice to get out of the Iowa weather. I was there with a really fun group of people and we made a point of getting together after work a couple of times.

Our first night after a day of testing was spent at Alice's Cooperstown, a restaurant owned by the rock artist Alice Cooper. It's right across the street from the US Airways Center and the place ROCKS! The menu was wild and I decided I MUST order THE BIG UNIT. What can I say?



It's buns were toasted and I had sides of sauerkraut and baked beans and it also came with fries. It was actually a pretty good deal for $12.99. There was no way I could have eaten the whole thing. I *think* I may have finished a fourth of it without the bun and shared the rest with my friends.

I couldn't leave without purchasing a t-shirt for Fred and would have got myself one, but the one I liked they didn't have in my size.

Fred had a great first week at his new job. He thinks he's really going to like it and can't believe his good fortune. Connor attended a middle school dance Friday night but said he didn't dance with any of the girls, just "moshed" with his buddies...we're going to try and get to Shutter Island tomorrow. I've been wanting to see it since it came out, but I also have to get back to the gym, get some grocery shopping done and get ready to watch the Oscar's. I'm rooting for both Avatar and Up and I sure hope Jeff Bridges wins Best Actor. Best Actress is tough because I'd like to see both Meryl Streep and Sandra Bullock win.

March

March...the month of spring breaks, St. Paddy's Day and family birthdays. My mother would have been 71 on March 26th and my nephew Gunner will be 8 on March 24.

Here's the kitchen tree in honor of the month March -



Enjoy your week! Sun is in the forecast for ME!