Celebrity Collage by MyHeritage

This is pretty fun to do! I only included 5 of my 10 'look-alikes'. The most embarrassing is when James Spader came up LOL! Never knew I looked so much like a dude. Try your own for a good laugh!!

Check one off the Bucket List...

Yes, that is right...I finally got to go to a New Kids on The Block concert!!! Whoohoo!!! It was good to feel like a 10 year-old again. Even though Joey, Jordan, Jon, Donnie, and Danny are 18 years older, they were indeed still hangin tough. They never missed a beat. It felt like we had been swept away back to 1990. It was great to finally realize a childhood dream like this. I used to spend hours dreaming of being Mrs. Joey McIntire or Mrs. Jon Knight. I just couldn't choose which one I wanted more. I also daydreamed that their tour bus would just happen to breakdown in front of my house on 68-80 (yeah, in the middle of a KY country road...as if) and that they would fall madly in love with me and take me away on the tour bus. I remember spending hours on my basement steps with my cousin Jenny rehearsing our best 'Step-by-Step' moves....yeah I know we weren't very creative to use actual stair steps as our main move.

Too bad I didn't take the time to search for my memorabilia before the concert. I had a nightgown, the board game, cassette tapes, Joe doll, pin, the entire NKOTB trading card collection, and several books.

Alicia was nice enough to crimp all of our hair, even when it started giving her a hand cramp. Thanks Alicia! The look just wouldn't have been complete without the crimp :)

Here is the completed look! Love the girls custome NKOTB shirts!! Check out the sign that Ashley made...she is awesome!

Here we are at Olive Garden before the concert. We were dying laughing going into that restaurant dressed like that and with all that makeup and hair. But, unfortunately we were the only ones that got the joke. I think everyone there just thought we were hookers...oh well.

Here we are at the concert finally!!! Whoohoo!!

Alicia and I have dreamed of this moment since we were in 3rd grade together. My first memory of our friendship was when she came to my house for a sleepover in third grade. We had soooo much fun. We played Barbies & raided my big sisters cassette tapes and played New Kids & Debbie Gibson all night. We felt so cool. Sadly, this is the last time we talked or hung out until we rekindled our friendship in 7th grade. We still talk about how we can't believe we didn't talk again for 4 years after how much fun we both had that night in 3rd grade. I was one weird cat as a child so go figure. I was so shy and had zero confidence so I know I just figured she didn't like me when it wasn't true. Oh the things I deprived myself of in life for being so weird and paranoid. But, I have learned from my mistakes, and I am trying to use my own experience to help move my kids in a more positive direction. I want to teach them to love and respect themselves, and never let fear and worry keep them from getting what they want out of life!

Joey belting out 'Please Don't Go Girl."

Half way through the concert they switched to a second stage out in the middle of the crowd. Here they are singing one of my favorites, 'Tonight'.

They saved the best for last...Hangin Tough!

Are we really that bad?

Last night, Matt was getting the girls around for bed when Ella decided to quiz him. "Daddy, when you got married did they make you promise to not be mean to your kids?" she asked. "Well no they didn't, but it is never a good idea to be mean to your kids," he responded. "But, if my being mean you are talking about making you go to bed then that is not being mean." "Well yes it is...that is very MEAN!" Ella said.

It's beginning to look alot like....Spring. Huh??

Snow Day!!! I am sure the weather men were ready to pee their pants they were so excited to get to scroll the Polar Report just one more time. Krogers was equally excited as they sold their weekly quota of bread and milk in just one day! The snow came and quickly went, but it was fun while it lasted!!


Can you guess the theme to this post? If you said snow guess again. How about hunger! Can you tell that we jumped up and ran outside so fast that we forgot about breakfast? I knew the snow was not supposed to last long, so I wanted to make sure we got out to enjoy it first thing. Next time we will stop and scarf the cheerios first, because they ate snow, snow, and more snow.

...then they took their hunger out on Frosty. His carrot mouth & blueberry eyes didn't last too long.

This was my first attempt at a snowman. This snow must have been very, very good snowman snow, because with very little effort we had a nice snowman in no time. Pretty proud of myself considering I am a novice :)

Poor Frosty! He lost his head within his first hour of life. Hopefully, he will come again someday, and when he does I hope he doesn't scare the kids.

Got to Love Kentucky Weather...

One minute it is 70 & sunny. The next it is 30 & snowing. I just wish winter would have made up its mind that it was going to stick around before my tree bloomed out. I really hope we aren't headed for an ugly spring like we had with the big freeze last year. Sorry for the free advertisement for 'Scotts Waste'. Today was trash day afterall.

Nurse Ella

On the way home Ella was asking to watch Jon & Kate Plus 8, because she wanted to watch the episode where Jon gets his hair transplants. This is nothing new at all. Ella is amazed about the surgery Jon underwent & watches intently everytime she sees it. I do not promote letting kids watch surgery on tv for the fear it might create...But, when we tried to hide it from Ella she only got more and more intrigued until we finally broke and let her see it. I don't think she fully understands what is going on so that helps out with the gross factor. But, now she likes to take fake knifes and pretend to poke daddy in the head like she is giving him transplants.

So I asked Ella if she wanted to be a doctor since she loves to play doctor & loves the sight of blood and guts. "A(b)solutely not," she replied. When I asked further questions I learned that the reason she doesn't want to be a doctor is because she wants to be able to give people shots. I told her that doctors give shots, but nurses give more shots than doctors. "Well I am going to be a nurse," she declared. "I want to give lots of shots," she said. I should probably explain to her that nurses give shots cause they have a desire to help people heal not to merely hurt them. Geeze.

Such a simple question can tell you so much!

Last year Diane Sawyer did an interview with a very inspiring man Randy Pausch. Randy is the man made famous by his 'Last Lecture' that took YouTube by storm. If you haven't watched this video I highly suggest you do; Randy's perspective on life was very refreshing. I guarantee you will come away from that 'lecture' with a new appreciation for the life you have.

Anyway, one of the things that grabbed my attention in his interview with Diane Sawyer was a ritual he had with his kids. As he tucked them in bed at night he would ask them just one question, "What was the favorite part of your day today?" The answer might be silly, original, or typical, or the answer might be one that blows you away. The point is, you will never know until you ask.

After watching that interview I made a point to start asking Ella every night this very question. Although we spend nearly all our time together, I would still have many days where I felt like we never connected throughout the day. This was my 'connecting' time. As with alot of things, I slip in my habits and started forgetting to ask this question.

Last night, Randy and his question popped into my head. We had a very active day yesterday, playing outside in this wonderful weather with Ella's best friend all day long. I asked Ella this question last night thinking I would get the typical, "My favorite part was playing at the park with Taylor all day!" And, of course she did say this. But, then she said her other favorite part was climbing up in that big chair all by herself to eat lunch (big chair=bar stool). She said, "It was pretty scary, but I did it!" She was beaming with pride. She had never sat in one of those chairs before so I guess that really was a very important thing in her own mind.

God gives us such a gift by giving us children! While adults can slip into mundane habits and start to take little things for granted, kids have such a different, refreshing prospective on everything. Each day is a gift in their eyes. Each day is filled with learning, and they are constantly filled with enthusiasm.

While I know the answer Ella gave is not life altering, I did realize there are many times we go through our day thinking we know exactly what the other person is thinking. But, do we really? Maybe we should all start asking each other this simple question everyday. I think it could be a big relationship builder!

Signs of Spring

Nothing says, "spring is here" like bunnies, daffodils, & kites. Yesterday gave us the opportunity to experience all three. We were blessed with temperatures in the mid-70's yesterday, and we decided to take full advantage of it.



Joe & Betty's neighbor has a pet bunny that she brought over for the girls to see yesterday afternoon. Ella was anxious to see 'Crockpot', but Addie was a little more hesitant.

The girls enjoyed the daffodils that Grandma Kunkel has planted. If we would have stayed much longer there wouldn't have been any blooms left, because Addie's favorite thing to do is pick them all off.

Isn't Matt "purty" with the flower Addie gave him? It added a nice flair to his look doing yard work. Yes he will kill me, but I couldn't resist.


Yesterday was a perfect day for kite flying. We bought Ella a Barbie kite & Addie a Sesame Street kite. Grandma & Grandpa went to the park with us to practice flying them. Addie was in total amazement of it, but Ella got mad and thought we were going to break her Barbie kite. She made Matt reel it in and forget it. She said it wasn't for flying, but rather for hanging in her room....sorry Ella not happening. After the girls got bored Grandpa took them up to swing and Matt and I stood there flying our kiddie kites for quite awhile...too bad I don't have a picture of him with his Barbie kite for blackmail :) (Ella didn't like it too much that we went against her wishes, but she got over it.) I quit paying attention of one second and my kite went flying out of my hand. Matt got a good kick out of that yelling, "Run Forrest, Run!" as I made an idiot of myself chasing it up the hill and into a tree. Surprisingly enough that cheap little $3.50 kite survived being pulled down out of two tree limbs. It still flies just perfect.

Addie's Chuck E. Cheese Party 2/28/09

We celebrated Addie's 2nd birthday on 2/28 with our friends & family at CEC's. It was a very chaotic environment to celebrate in. Regardless, I think the kids managed to have a very good time. This is one of Addie's favorite places, so I think it was very fitting to ring in the big 0-2 there. I have added a link to some more pictures of the day. Thanks to everyone that celebrated with us!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2016981&id=1328632420&l=e031b

Will you accept this rose?

Daddy brought all his girls home a dozen roses for V-Day, and yes we did accept them graciously. I broke the thorns off and let Addie have a little sensory fun. She loves the feel of the roses, and she would hold them up to her nose and take a huge sniff, then go, "UHM!!!" Funny how they gets such amazement out of the simpliest things in life.