You've Been Egged!

This past weekend I decided to egg my neighbors house and I have to say it was a lot of fun. Yes, you heard me right, I egged my neighbors house.....Ok...... You know I did enough of that as a teenager I'm too nice to do that but rather I got this really cute idea from the eighteen 25 blog and decided that I couldn't wait until Easter to do this to the twins next door. All you do is get a couple dozen plastic eggs and fill them with candy, coins, toys and sweet little notes about what you like about them. You hide the eggs in their yard, hang the "you've been egged" sign on their front door, ring the doorbell, and run like heck so they don't see you. I timed it in the afternoon after their afternoon nap and then hid in my yard with my camera to catch all of the fun! I can't tell you how excited they were - they absolutely loved it and they are still trying to "investigate" and solve the mystery. I was surpised by how much they got into the "investigation" part of this and I decided to leave clues behind in their mailbox for the following 7 days. They have no idea it was me and that's half the fun since it's too early for the Easter bunny.

I thought egging my neighbors was the perfect chance to capture FUN for Beth's You Capture challenge this week. So what do you think....wanna egg your neighbors? If so download the template at eighteen 25.

The Blizzard of 2011

The Midwest was slammed by a blizzard otherwise known as "the blizzard of 2011" and it didn't miss us in the Chicagoland area. It's hard to tell how much we got but it's around 18-20 inches with some very high drifts. Our backyard took the most beating from the storm with 4 to 5 foot drifts against our patio door and all around the deck. Tanner and Stella were very confused in the morning when we were scrambling trying to figure out where to start digging a place for them to go outside. Despite how much we hate snow, there actually was quite a bit of excitement in the house and around the neighborhood. We may never see snow like this again so might as well make the most of it!

David digging a spot in front the garage for the dogs. See how deep the snow is?

 We live in a split level home and the drifts along the side of the house looked like a wave from the ocean. I thought it was a cool view to capture through the window.

 In the winter we leave a shovel near the back door so we can shovel for the dogs when necessary. Look at how buried the shovel became overnight! This is after we shoveled 5 times the night before.

 Our front steps are buried - it may stay this way for a while. Guests can come through the garage in the meantime.

 A cool shot of the snow on the roof. I like how it looks like a wave from the wind.

 Me helping to shovel out a good spot for the dogs.

 David lending a helping hand too.

 David taking a break and rolling around in the snow.

 My cute neighbor having an absolute ball in all of the snow. They kept losing their boots in the deep snow but it didn't stop them from having fun. She loves posing for the camera for me.

My neighbors front steps are worst than ours. Her she is again posing.

We hope that everyone else is safe and sound from the blizzard. We know someone who got stranded from driving into a snow drift and was stuck for 24 hours. Just glad I wasn't one of those stuck on Lake Shore Drive all night long. I have a fear of that happening so I left work plenty early on Tuesday and then worked the rest of the day from the safety of my home.

P.S. So glad that the groundhog didn't see his shadow!

Cardinals vs. Brewers

There is nothing like a holiday weekend in the summer and baseball. Around our house that would be Cardinals baseball! My husband has been a Cardinals fan his entire life and I have his teeny tiny little jersey to prove it. I look forward to the day that our children get to wear the same jersey that David did. In the meantime we'll continue cheering on the redbirds and taking lots of pictures of the action. Here's a few from our weekend.

Labor Day

Our friend's son Ryan enjoying a little break from the game.

The man Pujols hitting a double

Here he is warming up and getting ready for the big game. Sorry I couldn't help the view.

And this was right after the GRAND SLAM!!! That's the first time we have seen that in person and it was totally awesome! The score was 8 - 2 at this point and a short while later we decided to leave the game a bit early to beat the traffic. Good thing....they ended up winning only by 8 - 6. Another memorable day at the ballpark! Go Redbirds.

What I Loved in August

I love reading other blogs that share what the blogger loved during the previous month and I thought I would try something similar. Let's start with August and see where we go from here.

1. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson. I finished the 3rd book in the trilogy and thoroughly enjoyed the twists and turns that this book had. The author passed away several years ago after turning in the manuscripts and what a wonderful author he was. I highly recommend this trilogy and I'm sure you will love it!

2. Josie Maran Argan Oil. It's 100% pure argan oil from Morocco and I absolutely love it. It's an oil that provides the ultimate hydration and is great for the skin, cuticles, and split ends. I'm constantly finding more and more ways to use this product. Try it, I think you'll love it.

 3. Garden Veggies! I never thought that 1 cucumber plant, 1 tomato plant, and 1 cherry tomato plant would produce enough vegetables to feed the neighborhood. I think I got about 30 cucumbers from my one plant and too many cherry tomatoes to count therefore I've been sharing the fruits of my labor with everyone I can. My book club friends have begun to request my veggies which is a true compliment. What's my secret? Well I use compost, rain water from my rain barrel, and talk really nicely to the plants.....don't you do the same thing?

4. Time spent at Ravinia with my husband and friends. It's a great outdoor music venue where you can camp out in the park and picnic while listening to great music. We saw the Temptations and Carrie Underwood in August which was a blast.

5. My new Washer and Dryer! Our Laundry Room Demo was life altering - seriously! My husband and I have so much more time thanks to our super capacity washer and dryer. We used to do more than 10 loads a week because of the small capacity appliances we had and now we can do 3 a week - huge difference. It was the wisest money we have spent in a long time. The big reveal is coming soon so please ignore the tape since we are still painting and putting some final touches on the room. I'm excited to show you the finished product but you can see quite a bit of it here.

From Our Pond to Yours....

HOPPY MONDAY!!!

Our pond in the backyard attracts frogs and the occassional turtle. My niece loves to watch them and I thought I would capture a few pictures for her since I know she loves looking at my blog. This is for you K!

The Shirts Off Their Backs

This past weekend my husband and a couple of his friend's headed down to St. Louis to see the Cardinals play the Milwaukee Brewers. Yes, another guy's weekend but after a HIGHLY stressful week of layoff's at work, it was really nice to be at home and do whatever I want whenever I wanted to. Anyways, they were having a "Shirts Off Their Backs" promotion at Busch Stadium and so David bought a couple of tickets and ended up winning out of 20,000 tickets sold. He wasn't sure what that meant but he knew he had to be in a designated spot in the middle of the 7th inning. Well they ended up going down below and got to draw #'s to see which players game jersey they would each win. While he didn't draw Pujols number, he did get a really good player - Ryan Ludwick #47!!!! He was ecstatic and he said besides the day he married and the day we got Tanner, it was the happiest day of his life. Wow - glad we can check that off our list now. Luckily we had some friends at the game that snapped some pictures while he was on the field. Now if I had been there I would have taken about 100 more!

Beautiful picture of the field from David's seat

A really close up view after winning the raffle and getting ready to go on the field.

Nothing like front row seats for a couple of extra innings.

And here's the signed game jersey that was worn the whole game. I envision it being framed and ending up on a wall in our house sometime in the future. In the meantime he likes to show off the autograph and the dirt on the jersey from the game. Mr. Ludwick is a dirty boy!

David enjoying his 15 minutes of fame after getting his jersey from Ludwick.

Getting to meet a couple of the players too.

David has been a Cardinals fan his entire life and I was so happy for him to have such a once in a lifetime moment down at Busch Stadium. I was so happy for him but I really was sad that I wasn't there for his baseball dream to unfold for him. While he was enjoying time at the game and on the field - Tanner I were sitting in the dark with no electricity! Sure do love those thunderstorms!

Memorial Day Parade

We had a busy weekend - Cubs Game, boating at the lake, a BBQ gathering, and the Memorial Day Parade. I have a lot of pictures but in memory of all of those who have fought for our country, I thought I would share with you pictures from our local Memorial Day parade. It started 45 minutes late because of a rainstorm that passed through, luckily we had a great place to take cover from the showers. It finally ended and I have to say it was a pretty good parade. My favorite part was all of the dogs that they had in the parade. Many were available for adoption too! Tanner was asked to participate in the parade but his lazy mama couldn't commit to being up on Monday by 10:00 after a margarita party at the house. It turned out to be a good thing because he wouldn't have liked the rainstorm!

The parade was full of the different parts of the Medinah Shriners - my hubby's favorite was the coolers on wheels! He has found a hobby for when he retires!

We hope everyone had a great Memorial Day! We are truly blessed to live in such a wonderful country with all of the freedoms we have.