I'm It

Ashley tagged me. Who knew this was a giant game of tag?

Well I'm supposed to answer some questions. So, here we go.

1. Where I was ten years ago.

Not too interesting. I was here, in Plano. I had four kids and Will was just a tiny baby. Lucy was about to turn four and was singing the entire score of The Sound of Music.  Drew was eleven and I was homeschooling.  Ashley was in tenth grade and learning to drive!

2. Five things on my to-do list today.

Haha - five out of five million.

1. Pack the kids rooms.

2. Choose appliances.

3. Figure out an April Fools joke to play on my family.

4. Choose light fixtures for the house.

5. Call a handy man to do repairs to current house.

3.  Things I would do if I became a billionaire.

Make Jon quit working.  (This wouldn't be hard)  Send our parents on a trip around the world ending at their new home in some really cool place.  Buy homes in all the greatest places - Hawaii, Newport Beach, CA (just for old times sake), Tuscany, South of France, New York City, some mountain retreat with a river for fly fishing, a grass strip for landing airplanes, and a huge porch with a hammock and a swing.  That's a good start.  I'd travel to all the places I haven't been and take someone new with me (besides Jon, he's going, too) on each trip.  I'd hire someone to do my laundry.  Get a massage twice a week.  Hire one of those Hollywood personal trainers to follow me everywhere.  Hire a chef, but I'd want to cook right along side him/her.  I could eat all the food, cause the trainer would help me work it off!  The chef would do all the clean up.  Throw a really huge party, in a really cool place for all my friends and family and have some amazing party planner do it up right.  Play out that shopping scene from Pretty Woman - every other day.  Hire a tutor to teach me other languages.  Take painting classes from the best.  Have tickets for opening night of every Broadway musical ever performed (well, maybe not the trashy ones).  It's a billion dollars - I could go on forever, but I won't bore you further.

4.  Three of my bad habits

1. Staying up too late (and then getting up really early).

2. Procrastination

3. Clenching my teeth

5.  Five places I've lived

1. Kenosha, Wisconsin

2. Worthington, Ohio

3. Honolulu, Hawaii

4. Idaho Falls, Idaho

5. Groton, Connecticut

6. Five jobs I've had

1. Ice cream scooper/cake decorator at Baskin Robbins

2. Aerobics instructor

3. Curriculum Rep

4. Front Desk Manager, Fitness Center

5. Business owner, Food service

7. Something most people don't know about me

I'm adopted.

OK, that's a joke, but I spent my childhood believing I was.  

That's it.  Wasn't that fun?  I tag Aubrianne,  and Kristi Clinger.

It's Raining Gifts!

My friends Sally and Rosemary helped throw a really great baby shower for Ashley during her visit last week. It was magazine worthy! Here's the invitation:

And the hostesses:

Everything was really great!  Especially the food.  

The Menu

California Salad

Fruit Salad

Two variations of Mini Quiche

Assorted Scones with Clotted Cream and Raspberry Jam

Mini Chocolate Bundt Cakes with Vanilla Ice Cream

The table looked really great, too!

Brown and Blue worked great together. I found this great ribbon at Wal-mart! We tied each napkin with a candy pacifier (made by Lucy) and a brown and blue polka dot ribbon.

Vases from Ikea tied with the striped ribbon and a big stem of Hydrangea made the table look super sweet.  The chip board letters were whimsical and fun and the solid and dotted paper circles filled in the spaces perfectly.  See the little pacifiers scattered here and there?  So cute.

My favorite part was the favors I made to give to each of the guests.  I was a little worried, but they ended up turning out really well and I had a blast making them!  What do you think?

I found the cookie cutter online at www.cookiecutter.com.  

A cellophane bag, some rafia and a round tag and voila!

So many of our favorite people were able to be there! 

Ashley and Aunt Carollyn

Jani and Michele

Lori, Ashley P. and Shellie

Ashley looks so great!  She received some really wonderful things for the baby, too. 

The whole experience was a bit surreal for me.  It wasn't that many years ago that there was a similar gathering with many of the same women.  Only I was the one having the baby!  It's wonderful to have long time friends!  It's also very exciting to think about being a g.....a gr.......a gra...... - the mother of a mother!

Healthy Advice....

Too cute!

If you want a museum.... go to the Met!

The other day I was chatting with a friend and she mentioned she had spent the night at a mutual friend's house and how it was a disaster (I'm not quoting her). I was truly surprised (and relieved) to hear that this woman could have a less than orderly home 24/7. Anyway, we talked for a bit about how neither one of us really care about the state of cleanliness or tidyness of our friend's homes. We just like being together and being "real'. I love being comfortable enough with someone to allow them to see me - and my house - in all states. (For instance, both Rhoberta and Sally saw me last week at my very worst during my kidney stone saga.) I appreciate my friends who know I'm far from perfect and want to be my friend anyway.  No judging allowed. It's pretty annoying to have someone (I'm sure we all know someone like this) walk into my house and begin looking around. They look up and down, side to side. What are they looking at??  My mess?  Go right ahead and look, though, my house is not a museum...

Well today, I was wandering aimlessly around blogblogland and I found this site where you can post photos of rooms in your house.  It's not one of those where you post your beautifully designed living room with expensive furniture and gorgeous artwork that you paid some guy way too much money to create, It's called Normal Room, and that's pretty much what's on there.  Normal Rooms.  Granted, you 'll probably find some rooms that are cool or beautiful, for the most part it's just ordinary people from around the world taking photos of their rooms as they look right now.  It's quite refreshing, sometimes humbling and yet fun to see how other people live!  Check it out!