What did she win????

So are you wondering what was in my giveaway??

Ta Da!

Just a few of my favorite things...

Chocolate Covered Pretzels

A Gift Card to Starbucks

A Can of Old Bay Seasoning...

and if you want to know what's in the package....

You'll need to go here to find out.

Have a great weekend!  We finally get to sleep in tomorrow!  Yea! 

F. D. O. S. -- Tears of Sorrow or Jumping for Joy??

Yes, I'm still here....we've just been super busy with the last days of Summer and the First Day of School!!!

Here are the pictures....

10th Grader!!

(She wasn't too thrilled because the cheerleaders had to all dress alike for the first day...polo shirt and flip flops that they made.  Normally, she loves the cheerleader spirit days....but not the very first day of school.  I thought she looked cute anyway!)

7th Grader!!!

The middle of Middle School!

3rd Grader!!!

The year of playing the recorder and learning cursive writing!

The Middle School bus stop.

The Elementary School bus stop!

(35 kids are at our Elementary School bus stop.....it looked like they weren't going to fit on the bus, but they did!)

And they're out of here!!!

So, what did I do????  First, I met some friends at Panera for Back to School Bagels....then I met up with another group of friends and went out to lunch at Mimi's Cafe and hit Tar-jay for some shopping.  I spent the last hour of my time back at home all by myself enjoying the sound of silence!!

Ahhhh.  

Usually, I am sad on the first day of school.  I miss having the kids around.  This year though, no tears for me.  I am happy for them.  It is neat to think of all that lies ahead.  I am looking forward to seeing what the year brings for each one of them.

What about you???  What does the first day of school mean....

Tears of sorrow or..... Jumping for joy?????

Sorry, I took down the pics of my kids with the signs...because they had their real names on them....brain cramp!!  So, if you're just now reading this...imagine them all holding cute little signs with their names and grade!!!  ~Kath

We have a WINNER!!

First of all, I just wanted to say thank you, thank you, thank you to each of you for stopping by my blog.

I was blown away by all of your comments!!  Thanks for helping me feel the love.  If you were here, I'd hug you all.  

Without further delay, let's get to our winner.....

103 of you commented....so I used the old fashioned method (aka:  Debbie's method)....because I have zero skills when it comes to technology and computers.

(I mean seriously, it is a miracle that I've been able to actually have this blog.  I am that pathetic.)  

So, no random generator for me.

Can I get a drum roll???

Isn't my helper cute??

Our winner is.....

S'more of My Thoughts at My Wheels are Turning!!!!!

Now here's the funny part, when I went to her blog...guess what it's theme is???  It's all about camping!  I thought that was pretty funny considering I am so...."not the camping type."  

(Although, maybe if I had an RV, I'd be singing a different tune!)

Congratulations S'more!! I'll be in touch with you.

For the rest of you, I've got a question....  

Earlier today I had commented on a friends blog that I was so excited because unleaded gas was $3.53 a gallon here.  Well, when I was running around today I saw that it had dropped to $3.49 a gallon for unleaded!!  Boy was I excited.  I pulled right in and filled up my Mommivan.

Isn't that sad that in my mind $3.49 is a bargain???!!!

When I was in college gas was 70 cents a gallon for unleaded!  That right people I said 70 cents!! (Yes, I'm old....it's okay...the 40's rock!)

So, here's my question...since you guys are from all over....how much is a gallon of unleaded gas where you live??

Come On In!!

Hey Everyone! 

Come on in. I am so excited to be one of the featured bloggers representing the great state of Maryland!!!  All of you ladies from "Blog Around the World"  come on in and make yourselves comfortable.  For my old friends, who don't know about BATW, click on the link and go check it out.  Basically, it started as a post that turned into a Ms. USA pageant, that turned into a brand new blog for my friend Debbie.

  

I am so excited that Debbie chose Maryland today, because guess what??? This is also my 100th post!! You know what that means??? That's right a giveaway!!Keep reading and I'll give you the details.

So, I guess I should post some fascinating facts about Maryland, but I'm too lazy to look anything up.

Here's what I can tell you off the top of my head......

Maryland is just a hop, skip, and a jump from Washington DC.

You pronounce it Mair-uh-lind.  Kind of like Meryl Streep, but Meryl Lind instead. You do not pronounce it Mary Land. Got it?  Good, let's move on.

Maryland is all about steamed crabs.  (Sorry Louisiana, we don't boil the crabs over here on the East Coast.)  We steam them and then smother then in Old Bay. What's Old Bay, you ask??? Only the best seasoning ever invented by anyone anywhere.  You can put Old Bay on just about anything (right Jon??) It is especially good on crabs!!!  

(It is sooo good that when my hubby and I moved out west we actually packed a case of it to take with us.  They didn't sell it where we were moving to, and there was no way we could live without it...that's how good it is!)

Maryland is the home of the Baltimore Orioles....even though they've stunk since Cal Ripken Jr. retired....we still love em!  Go O's.  

If you come visit, be sure to spend a day at the O's super nice stadium, Camden Yards and then you can shop and dine at the nearby Inner Harbor.

My friend Steph just reminded me that Maryland is also the home of Duff aka: The Ace of Cakes.  We can swing by Charm City Cakes and see what he and the gang are up to this week.

If you like boating and history, then we'll head on over to Annapolis for a day at our beautiful waterfront state capital.

I almost forgot to mention, we also have a football team here.  They shall remain nameless. My hubby and I aren't fans of that team.  We were both born and raised in Maryland. We moved away and came back after that other team came to Maryland....so we are die hard REDSKINS fans here in our household.  We've done our duty well and have raised our sons accordingly.    

(Our daughter has somehow decided that she is a Cowboy's fan....I'm afraid she's going to have to be disowned.)

Maryland is also the home of the Gold Medal Man, Michael Phelps.  Woo Hoo!!!  Was he awesome in the Olympics or what???  My friend Mikki asked the question that I just can't seem to answer.....Why was his suit sooooooo low?????  My goodness, every time he swam I was afraid we were just one air bubble away from finding out if he shaved his whole body before each race -- do ya know what I mean???!!!  

Michael, we love you, but please do us all a favor and hike up your suit.

If you decide to stay we can "go down the ocean, Hon."  Now that is not how I really speak, but that is how a true blue Baltimorian speaks.  Translation = we can "drive to the beach."  (Don't worry, I am fluent in their language, I'll stick close by your side and translate all of your conversations for you.)

I know you've got lots of other blogs to get to today so, lets move on to our giveaway.  

What will you win????   You'll have to wait and see!  All I can say is it'll be good.

When will you know if you're the big winner? Check back with me on Friday and I'll let you know.

What do you need to do to enter this fabulous, wonderful, one of a kind, 100th post/BATW giveaway???

Leave me a comment.

That's it!!!

  

Thanks for stopping by.  Now go check out those other awesome ladies that Debbie has listed today! 

I'll see you Friday, when we reveal the big winner!!

PS.  Since Debbie mentioned my Hot Air Balloon Ride.....click HERE if you want to read about it!

Adventures in Camping

So, while I'm backtracking....I thought I'd show you some pictures from our camping trip two weeks ago.   

Jennifer P. and Amy B. both posted about camping last week, so I had to post these pictures.

Amy's post especially spurred me on because it was titled "10 Things I Love About Camping." Now, just to give you some background, I grew up with a camping family.  We had a pop-up camper and camped across the country for several vacations.  (That is how I visited over 40 states in the US!)

As a kid I loved it.   

As a teen I remember asking my Mom & Dad why couldn't we just get a condo at the beach for a week like a normal family??  

As an adult I've dreaded it, even hated it....but I continue to go once a year, because my kids love it.  

We didn't camp for the first time until our Little Buddy was two years old and Brian was soooo excited about it.  In fact he was so thrilled about it I thought maybe he'd bought a camper and was going to surprise me with it.  

No such luck.

We camped the first two years in a tent.

After that we "moved on up" and now we camp in a cabin.   Well, they call it a cabin.  I call it a shed with beds.  But, at least we don't have to set it up....and if it rains we stay dry.  

In the spirit of Amy's post I give you:

10 Things I Hate About Camping

10.  The bugs & spiders!

9.  Fear of being attacked by a snake.

8.  Yucky campground showers.  Yikes!

7.  No sleep.....too many strange noises.

6.  The sound of snoring, coming from another campsite!

5.  Packing up half of the house just to go for a weekend....then coming home washing everything and putting it all away.

4.  The smell of the "Camping Man"...men and boys who do not see the need to shower or change their clothes the entire weekend!

3.  Sleeping on a Double bed with my hubby....do you see how big he is???

2.  Did I mention the bugs and spiders??? (Steph, you & I are 2 of a kind!)

1.  No Air Conditioning!

and.....just to be fair......

10 Things I Love About Camping

10.  No video games, computer, or TV!!!

9.  Tons of fun time spent with my hubby and kids.

8.  S'Mores!!!!  Yummy! 

7.  All meals cooked by the men!  Woo Hoo!

6.  No mess from the crabs....it all goes in the campground dumpster.

5.  Spending time laughing and relaxing with good friends.  

4.  Loving wine from a box and Jiffy Pop Popcorn.

3.  Lots of time for playing cornhole.

2. Sitting around the campfire chilling.

1.  Making great memories that you just can't get in a hotel.

So, for one weekend a year, the 'loves' outweigh the 'hates.'  We'll be back again next Summer!!!   

Sitting around the campfire.  (Do you like our fancy lights on our cabin???)  

The crabfeast......mmmmm!

Loving this.....my man cooking!!!

Good friends!

PS.  You'll know you're at the same campground as me, when you hear the blow dryer going at 7AM.

Sorry, I'm a high maintenance girl, what can I say???

A Night With the Jo Bros!!!

That's right ladies, you read correctly.....a night with the Jonas Brothers!!

Quick, go ahead and get your daughters, they are gonna want to see these pictures.  I'm not going anywhere, I'll be right here waiting for you to come back.

Okay, Are you ready???

As you can tell by our tickets, the concert was one week ago today.  I had planned to post about it the following morning but that was when I discovered I had no cable and no internet......for 5 days!!!

Then we got back and I had to post about our hot air balloon ride.

So, now I am going to show you the pictures from the concert.

First, let me introduce you to the ladies that went to the concert with me.

Here are the Future Mrs. Jonas, the Future Mrs. Jonas, and the Future Mrs. Jonas

Aren't they cute???  (That's My Girl in the yellow top.)

All right, they don't have to become The Future Mrs. Jonas's....I think they'd just settle for a date to Homecoming.

Here's the Jo Bros old bus.  

Everybody signs it.

Ready for the concert to start.

Keep in mind that our seats were pretty far away.  Thank goodness for my zoom lens!  Some of the pictures are a little blurry and some are clear.  (Weird!!??)

The Jo Bros as the show began.

Nick and Kevin jamming on their guitars.

All 3 boys!

Joe among a sea of fans.

The concert goers consisted of about 300,000 girls and Moms,  5 boys, and 2 Dads!

The girls ranged from age 19 down to 4....(although why anyone would want to take a 4 year old to a concert that was loud and started at 8:30PM is beyond me.)

Oh Yea!

Nick on the drums.

This picture reminds me a little of the Beatles or maybe the Bee Gees....do you agree??

Joe sings to this little girl who was picked out of the crowd.  The Future Mrs. Jonas's thought he should've chosen one of them instead.

Then Demi L. came out to sing a song from Camp Rock.  She was also the opening act.

Joe sings to the girls.

The boys were up on pedestals that rose up out of the stage.  This was a cool shot with the screen behind him.

Sitting and singing.

Nick sings and plays the guitar.  Are you catching on here that none of the girls really liked Kevin????  I guess he's just too old.  Sorry.

Okay, here's one Kevin picture.  (Look at that one Dad with his arm on the stage looking totally bored!  Ha!)

Joe smiles for the girls.

Jamming with Big during "Burnin' Up."

That's it!  Thank you and good night Baltimore!

(Not sure why this pix is a blur, but I love the arms reaching up to them!)

When we left the building I managed to turn the wrong way.  (Me and my good sense of direction.)  If we'd turned left, it would've been quicker to get to our parking garage.  Instead, we turned right.  This meant we had to go around two extra sides of the building.  In doing so, we ended up on the side where the busses were parked.

There were about 100,000 fans lined up and packed on the sidewalk about 8 feet deep.  They were all hoping to catch a glimpse of the Jo Bros as they left the building.  I told the girls to keep going.  There was no way they were going to see the Jonas Brothers.

After all, I'd been to 100's of concerts before (okay, probably not 100's) and have never seen anyone famous.

Well, as we were squeezing behind the crowd, one of the Future Mrs. Jonas's got lost!!!  In all truthfulness, it was actually pretty scary to think I'd lost someone else's daughter.  She did not have her cell phone with her.  She was lost for about 20 minutes that seemed like 2 hours!

Finally, she did a smart thing and asked a stranger to borrow their cell phone to call.  We met up with her around the corner which was now at the front of the busses.

We were getting ready to cross the street to go to our parking garage when a security officer told us we couldn't cross yet.  He said we had to get back to the curb because the busses were getting ready to leave.

I tried explaining that we weren't waiting for the busses.  We were just trying to cross the street.  He told us we'd have to wait.

So we backed up.  Because we were already in the process of crossing the street, we ended up being right in front of the crowd.

If you look at the pix below, the busses pulled out where the cross walk is.

A minute later we heard screams around the corner.  We couldn't see that side, but I assumed that meant the Jo Bros were exiting the building.

The busses started and the second bus to pull out had it's door open.  We could see all 3 Jo Bros in the bus, but leaning right in the open door was Nick Jonas.   Guess what???  He was about 15 to 20 feet away from us and he waved.  I am not kidding!!  It looked like he waved right at the girls.

Of course they all screamed.  The whole thing lasted about 10 seconds, but it played out in slow motion.  It was so neat!

I could not believe it.  I told the girls to remember that night because it would probably never happen again.

So, that was my night with the Jo Bros!

This is a picture of the side of the bus.  I wish I'd thought to turn my camera on video, but I honestly thought we'd be seeing the side of a bus and that would be it.

Here is just one last thing that I noticed as a Mom.  The boys were all 3 wearing the same exact clothes that they had just performed in.  They left the building about 30 min after the show ended.  There was no hanging around backstage with groupies for them.  

The show was awesome.  It was very wholesome and clean.  You can take your kids to see them and feel good about it.  And if you do, make sure you wait outside by the busses, because you just may get to see them!

PS.  If you go, bring ear plugs.....not because of the music, but because of the screaming girls!!!