All Aboard the Boomerang Express!!! VBS 2009

Ok, so I'm a little slow, but I was tired last week!! Last week was VBS! We all got on board the Boomerang Express! I was in the music room with my buddy, Erin. :) I think we had a pretty good time. I hope the kids did too.

Sunday night, all of the kids learned the Boomerang Express theme. The first through fifth graders also learned Gonna Follow. The little kids sang a few songs like This Little Light of Mine, Father Abraham, and the B-I-B-L-E. At the end of the night, the whole group sang the Boomerang Express theme.

Monday night, we reviewed the songs from Sunday night and learned Workin' On My Serve. It was easier, so the little kids learned it too. At the end of the night, we all sang Gonna Follow together.

Traveling over the Amazing Land Down Under

Tuesday night, we reviewed the other songs and learned All Things. It was a little bit too hard for the little kids, so we went back to our easy songs for them. At the end of the night, we all sang Workin' On My Serve together.

Wednesday night, we opened with the Boomerang Express theme in the big group rally. Erin wasn't there yet, so Colin, Mikenna, and Elleigh helped me out.

We reviewed the other songs and then we learned Yes To VBS! I'm a big fan of that song. :) Brenna came in and danced for us. :)

Thursday night was family night. We did the Boomerang Express, Gonna Follow, and Yes to VBS for the parents. After that, it was dinner time.

Sunday morning, we did the same three songs for the whole church. I think Erin and I were a super fun team. VBS 2009 was a success! :)

NieceandNephewpalooza!! Part Two.

On Friday, we loaded up the gang and went to Discovery Place for some more learning stuff. Pete was pretty excited about the buildings in Charlotte. I guess he's not used to that because of the building restrictions in Charleston. I was pretty excited because we were close to my happy place--the Belk Theater--and I could see all the show posters. :) While we were waiting for Brenna to get in her stoller, I snapped a few pictures of us. :)

Helena said she looked squished, so I took one of just us. :)

We went into Discovery Place and fount out that there were only 5 seats for the IMAX and we needed six. Fail. So we just did the museum part. The big exhibit right now is about shipwrecks and pirates. It was pretty neat. They had a bunch of artifacts from shipwrecks, a movie about how they recover stuff from the ocean floor, and some neat interactive things for the kids to do. Mere and I were bored waiting for the movie.

Then we went upstairs to the third floor. That's where all the "discovery" things are. Science-y things. The kids wandered around doing different activities. I think they were having fun.

Helena took my camera again. "Make a funny face, Aunt Stephanie."

"Make a funny face with me, Helena."

After Discovery Place, we had lunch at McAlister's and then headed for home. When we got to my house, Helena stayed with me because we had some very important work to do. Her birthday cake! :) She wanted me to make a Candy Land cake for her birthday party. She helped me in the kitchen. She watched me make the icing and I talked to her about all the things I was doing. I really enjoyed spending that time with her! Here she is with the finished product.

When the cake was finished, we went back to Mom and Dad's. Mom, Dad, Pete, Colin, Helena, and I went to Courtney's Barbecue in Clover for dinner. Yum. After dinner, Meredith and Brenna met us back at the house so that we could all say goodbye to Pete and Helena.

It was so nice to have them here for a few days! I LOVE my nieces and nephews!!! :)

NieceandNephewpalooza!!!! Part One.

Pete and Helena have been in town for the past few days! YAY! They came to spend a few days with Mom and Dad and the rest of us. Mom (and Mere, Colin, and Brenna) went to get them on Wednesday afternoon. They went to Kings Mountain to do some learning stuff. I met them back at Mom and Dad's for dinner. I was so glad to see them! After dinner, I took Pete, Colin, and Helena to choir practice with me, where we learned some songs for VBS and played Red Rover. After choir every Wednesday, I take Colin to Sonic for ice cream and we go back to his house and watch people do stupid things on Wipeout. This week, I got to take the three big kids! We got our ice cream/milkshakes and headed to Meredith and Corey's. Brenna always loves to see me coming with a red straw in my cup. :) Little moocher.

Thursday morning, I had Annabelle, so Mom, Mere, and all the kids went to Lancaster to visit Grandmother and Granddaddy. They stopped at Andrew Jackson State Park to do some more learning stuff. I met them at Mom and Dad's for dinner. I took the Wii with me so we could all play together. Mom made a really good dinner (chicken rolled in lime tortilla chips and baked). While Mom was working on dinner, Brenna and Helena serenaded us.

After dinner, we herded the kids outside to play. They ran around for a bit and we played Cosmic Catch. Bless little Brenna's heart. She wanted to play with us. She tried so hard to be as big as the big kids. I love her. :)

Helena was exceptionally fond of my camera. She spent a lot of time Thursday night and Friday taking pictures. I was so happy to have all of my kids together at once!! :) I love them all. :)

Hangin' with Annabelle

Seriously. Look at that face. PRECIOUS.
I got to hang out with Annabelle for three days this week. Poor Kim had to go to some goofy training at school, so Annabelle couldn't stay home alone! On Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, Kim brought Annabelle to me at around 8:15 or so. Kim's class started at 9, so she got her settled and took off. She was an angel for me. I think she maybe cried a total of 5 minutes on Monday. Same thing on Tuesday. She cried a little more on Thursday..maybe about 10 minutes total. I really enjoyed having her here. We watched Beauty and the Beast on Monday. I thought we should give her unrealistic expectations from an early age. :) Tuesday and Thursday, we watched a lot of the Golden Girls. Heehee. I think we watched a whole season and half of another. :) She is already growing up so quickly. I'm glad Kim and Dat let me be a part of her life. I love her. :)

Ok, I think this would have been one of the cutest pictures ever if the stupid camera hadn't zoomed itself and cut off half of my face. So I cropped it so you just see her cute face!

Look at this big girl sitting up in my chair!!

To clarify....

The bat that attacked me in my bed did NOT, I repeat, DID NOT attack me in my parents' home. I was at a church camp in the mountains of North Carolina when I was brutally assaulted. My parents would never allow such a terrible and traumatizing thing to happen to me under their roof.

(There, Mom. Is that better?)

I Love Summer

On Thursday, I went with Mom, Kathy, and Grandmother to visit my cousin Randy, who is very sick right now. The purpose of the trip was not a fun one, but we managed to have some fun along the way. I think Kathy may have officially lost her mind. Haha. Funny ride. :)

Thursday night, I met Katie for dinner at Chili's and then we went to South Point High School to see a community theatre prduction of RENT. Jacob met us at the school. Yay! I love RENT. It's such a good show. Katie and I were very nervous about what we were going to see. (Community theatre can be a little iffy...*especially* when there is singing involved!) We were pleasantly surprised! Most of the vocals were good. The kid (literally...he was 16) who played Mark was very impressive. The girl who played Maureen did an absolutely HILARIOUS version of Over The Moon. But I think the best part of all was watching the people in the crowd react to the show. It was quite obvious that many of them were family and friends of the cast, not musical theatre people. Watching grandmothers (and this one really hilarious dude in front of us) react to Angel the cross-dressing homosexual character as he/she sang and danced was priceless.

After RENT, Katie came to spend the night at my house. My hoodrat dog decided she would rather sleep with Katie than come upstairs with me. She claimed Katie's bed for herself. Silly puppy.

I spent most of Friday doing cake related activities. Typical. Friday evening, Devin came by my house to take me to Shirley's annual midsummer party. It was great to catch up with the old Pat-A-Cakes/Caffino crowd. We had fun times working together back in the day. :) Everything was great until I heard the bats. Wildlife. Fail. I was seriously freaking out. And then I saw one. Heart. Fail. (Yes, I know they eat bugs and that this is a completely irrational fear. You just wait until one attacks you in your bed and then you can judge me.)

I love summer. It's so wonderful to have time to do the things I want to do and to be able to spend time with my friends and family.

Take Me Out To The Ballgame

Tuesday night was Buffalo Steve's last night in South Carolina. (Well, at least until we convince him to move down here.) Krystle and I decided that we needed to do something super fun, but we're not very creative. She sent Chris a message and he came up with a brilliant idea! The Knights game!

The game was so much fun! Chris's company has a box at the stadium and we got to use it! It was neat. We had couches and a fridge and our own private bathroom (!) and our own little section of seats and a nice little lady that waited on us all night. :)

So, the Knights...not that great...During the first inning, I think the other team scored 4 runs. I'm certain that they batted all the way around their lineup. It was kinda boring watching the Knights get stomped right away, so we played wih the cameras for a little while. I didn't get one with Chris because he was off procuring snacks for the hungry girls. :) Yum, stadium nachos. :)




The game got more interesting as it went on. The Knights managed to score several runs, including two home runs in one inning. At one point, Chris said "Guys look in the box" and we turned around and Homer the Dragon was in our box! Chillin on the couch! He came out and posed with us for some pictures. Chris took the first one and then Homer's handler took one of our whole group. Love it! :)

We had a great week hanging out with Buffalo Steve. (He is stuck with that nickname now, by the way.) We think he should live here. Seriously.

Please Don't Touch My Stapler, Mrs. Lampert...

Monday night was movie night at my house. Not too long after I met Buffalo Steve at Chris and Krystle's wedding, we discovered that we both have a fondness for old movies. This fondness includes a particular obsession with the Cary Grant-Audrey Hepburn mystery, Charade. (By the way, if you haven't seen it, shame on you. Go get it. Right now. It's great. I mean it. Go.) Anyway, we decided that the next time Steve came south, we would get together and watch Charade. (Nevermind the fact that we can pretty much quote it word for word.)

So Monday night, since Steve was still in town, he came over for our Charade party. Love that movie. Not ready to call it a night when it was over, he scanned my movie collection and we settled on Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. You can't go wrong with Indy. Ever. Finally, we watched Office Space. Milton. Love that dude. "My desk used to be by the window and I could see the squirrels and they were married." "The ratio of people to cake is too high." "I could burn this place down." Classic. Hilarious.

At some point, Steve decided I should wear his Mets hat. Not to be outdone, I fetched a Gamecock hat for him. It was his door prize for the evening. That hat had always been too big for my head...He'd better be rockin' it in New York now. It's a great hat.

Stars and Stripes and Friends

It's been a fun couple of days around here! On Thursday, I went to meet the Mizwas for dinner at Charanda's. Buffalo Steve had very sneakily snuck into town and was there too. Heehee. Bless his heart. He decided Rock Hill was a vacation destination...The four of us had a great dinner and then had some fun visiting and playing the Wii back at the Mizwa residence.

I spent ALL DAY Friday working on cakes (UGH). Not exactly how I wanted to spend the day, but it was ok. Friday night, I headed back over to the Mizwas for some more fun and Wii time. When Red White and Boom was over downtown, Chris and Susan came over to hang out too. It was a very fun night!

Saturday was the Fourth of July. It was also Krystle's dad's birthday. After chilling out at home and trying to get a few things accomplished, I headed over to Chris and Lee Ann's for the big birthday bash. I, of course, had DC's birthday cake. :) That's just how I roll. Chris and Lee Ann have a great backyard!!! :) There was grilling, eating, corn hole, swimming, and lots of talking and playing. It was a great party! Krystle's brother had me cracking up all night with lines like, "That's how we do it in the South, Yankee Boy" and "Put your Jesus sandals on and get with it, brother." So funny. And Lee Ann has a great dog, a black cocker spaniel named Layla who does the best dog trick I've ever seen. Lee Ann says "Layla, would you rather be a dead dog or a Clemson Fan?" Layla flops over on her back and sticks her paws up in the air! SOOOOO CUTE!

Here are a couple of pictures....

Hanging with the girls. One of our signature "I'll take it" pictures. :)

Finally got a picture of Buffalo Steve without the gang signs....silly New Yorker...

The Music of the Night

YAY! I went to see Phantom on Tuesday night!!!!! :) It was so so so good! :) <3 I was so excited I forgot to take pictures! (Fail.)

I decided I really really wanted to go while we were at the beach. So I hopped online and checked on tickets! I sent G's mom a facebook message to see if she wanted to go too. (With a house full of men, she does not get to do such things very often!) She said she would love to go, so click, click, type, click, boom! I had tickets! :)

She came to pick me up on Tuesday afternoon at around 4:30. We drove up to Pineville and had dinner at Olive Garden. It was very good and our waitress was very dumb. Well, perhaps not dumb, but she did say, "I hope you enjoy your opera. It is an opera, right?" Doofus.

After dinner, we went over and got on the light rail to head into downtown. What a great thing that is!! No traffic to speak of, no parking fee, cute little train to ride on. Love it! :)

We picked up our tickets and headed downstairs to wait for the doors to open. (Of course, while we were waiting, I had to shop. LOVE my Prima Donna shirt!) We were also waiting for Katie and Sara Ashley to get there. While we waited they were playing the preview video for next season. South Pacific, Mary Poppins, Jersey Boys, WICKED!!! BOOM! :) SO SO SO excited for all of that!! :)

Our seats were pretty good. I was a little disappointed that we were under the mezz, so we couldn't really see the chandelier once it was up and until it started to fall... :(

The cast was great. Raoul was my favorite voice, followed very closely by the Phantom. Christine was great most of the time, but there was something about the way she said (sang) "music" that I didn't like. It got on my nerves. Visually, I loved it all. The things they can do on stage never cease to amaze me.

Next up: MAMMA MIA!!! July 30!! :)