Party...Working....Party

Friday night we had a family birthday party for Laura at my house. We just cooked out burgers and dogs and had a yummy cake with ice cream and magic shell. I am addicted to magic shell!!

When Mark and I were in Amish country, we stopped at a fireworks store and picked up a huge bag of stuff. I couldn't get pictures of the good ones up in the sky, but these were the ones that went off on the ground.




Saturday morning daddy came over at 9 am to help Mark and I clean out the garage. We worked non-stop until 4. Mark is going to grind off the painted cement in our garage and put some sort of epoxy with these gritty specs in it. It will be nice when it's done, but the entire garage had to be emptied and stay that way for three days until it dries. It's amazing how much crap was in our garage-yikes!

Saturday night Mark and I went to his team leader's deep frying turkey party. I've never had a deep fried turkey but it was pretty good. It was nice spending time with his work buddies.

Nice weekend, nice weather. Looking forward to a four day week this week as Mark and I are going away for the weekend and are off work on Friday.

Happy Birthday Laura!!!!

Today is my baby sister's birthday!!!!!


Here's her first birthday cake which my mom made - Oscar the Grouch!



Laura and I were always blessed with more toys than we ever knew what to do with!! I think this was one of her Cabbage Patch dolls. Whenever Laura is focusing on something, she sticks her tongue out just a little bit.


I think this was my birthday party, but these are two of my favorite dresses that Laura and I had. I love Chuck E Cheese



Laura and her stuffed animal Hershey Kiss. We always went on such great vacations!


I love Laura's supermodel pose and face on this one.

Laura loved Barbie and we went to the mall to meet her.


One of our great birthday parties. See the Barbie house on the right of this picture.



Laura's best friend Andrea (I think since they've been best friends since pre-K)

Stanual L. Jackson

Bugsy

Her and her high school sweetheart

Her and Jeff's beautiful wedding





Marie with us a few Christmases ago.
Jeff's sister's wedding




At my bachelorette party
Thanks for always doing my hair, Wowa, you're the best and I love you. Winna.

My rehearsal dinner


Mom and I making fun of Laura with our tongues while making my wedding favors


Before we had the pleasure of meeting D Man
I don't know what happened, but I love this pic. We weren't mad at each other or anything, but the camera snapped just at the wrong time. We both have our hands on our hips and are giving each other the stink eye.
With Grandpa last Thanksgiving

Laura with her baby and me with mine

Dylan's baptism





First professional family photo


At Aunt Kelly's house this summer


At Saturday's wedding

Our lap dog

Marie and I have been getting together almost every Thursday since we could drive to each other's house to watch the first 90210 on TV. The tradition has kept on and I love it! Thursday is also one of my favorite days because Blarney doesn't sit on my lap all night, he sits on Marie! No one told Blarney that he's not a 38 pound lap dog!! Thanks to the "dogmother" for allowing him to smother her.

Weekend so far

Marie is a pretty big Indian’s fan, and although I don’t watch games on TV – I love going to the ballpark. I especially love the nachos there! I’ve been to four games this year and the last two came with some extras. We went over Labor Day weekend and could see the air show from our seats. The Blue Angels rock! I didn’t know what to watch-it was great!! Marie and I went yesterday because there were fireworks after the games which were set to 80’s music. I love fireworks and watch them every chance I get. Fireworks ended up being bonus #2 because there was a huge fight in the game. It was awesome. Marie has some video on her blog-check it out. Since it’s the last series at home, they were also giving out shirts and bobble heads, I guess they were just cleaning out their closets. The shirt is a kids shirt, so hopefully Aidan will be able to wear it soon. There were also two very cute girls in front of us with pink Indians shirts on. Detroit is too close to Cleveland because there were lots of Detroit fans there. In fact, this was my second game against Detroit this year. Anyways, two women from Detroit were very loud and obnoxious but very nice to these two little girls, asking how old they were. During this, Detroit scored a home run, and the Detroit fans started cheering. The little girls started jumping up and down and screaming too. Their dad says, they are cheering for the other team, not us. The girl with the pink Indians shirt exclaims “UGH!” and looks at the women in disgust. She then states that she’s rooting for the Tribe and turns around. That was the end of their conversation. Priceless. Too bad I can’t get that on You Tube. We had pretty good seats, right under the Toyota home run porch, so we were one of the first ones out of the ballpark. There is this large raised grassy area outside and we got seats on the cement steps, which was nice. We had great seats for the game and great seats for the fireworks. The first 80’s song they played was Living on a Prayer! Yippie!

My mom’s brother has four daughters. Kelly (the oldest) got married in December and Kristen (the second oldest) got married today. I had never been to their reception hall before, but was beautiful. She had the ceremony outside in front of this beautiful pond in a very wooded setting at 5:30, then a cocktail hour and the reception right after. It was really nice.

New 90210

I am totally watching the new 90210 show!! I am a little behind on the new one and only watched the first episode, but I liked it. Now the question is - did I like it because I wanted to like it or because it was good? Only time will tell.






The original Beverly Hills 90210 aired in 1990 so I feel like I am 100 years old, not 30.

Thanks to my family

While Mark and I were at Amish, Laura and Dylan came over to let Blarney outside at lunchtime. Thanks Laura! Blarney loves Dylan!!

Since we were gone into the evening too, my parents came over to give him dinner and play with him until we got home. I set out a new toy for Blarney so my parents could have a little break from Blarn. He's so needy and hyper, sometimes only a new toy can calm him down for a little while. Unfortunately, the toy that I gave him isn't that sturdy and the bikini wearing Henrietta the rubber chicken that Laura bought him was





be-headed about 5 minutes into play. So, Gampa went to the pet store and bought him two new toys. They are both squeaky toys which are his favorite!!

While trying to get a good nights sleep (exhausted from our day trip) Blarney was kind enough to squeak the toy in my face around 1 am.

Amish

Mark and I took vacation days on Friday and headed down to Amish country. It's odd there because everything is only open 9-5:30, so you have to get there early and leave early. Neither Mark nor I had been there before, so we weren't what sure to expect. Mark's motorcycle group had been to a few flea markets on a motorcycle ride, but they weren't in the Amish country county we went to, they went a county over. There is an old (and super huge) Victorian house that you can tour, but that didn't open until 1 and we were several hours early for that. We hit a few gift shops, but didn't really buy anything except for some sesame stick snacks. I liked some of the stuff, but Mark hates chotchkies. Our main goal of going down there was for the huge flea market. It was all indoors so we didn't have to worry about the rain. I think the only thing we bought was a toy for the dog! I love the idea of flea markets and love to go to them. However, I hate junk so we never buy anything. We then went to an antique mall, and I had never been to one of those either. I had imagined they would be all beautiful antique furniture, lamps, and china. It's the exact same junk as a flea market! I did see a beautiful pitcher with four matching glasses, but Mark said I already have one that I have never used so I couldn't buy a second one. I hate to admit it, but he was right. We found a Christmas shoppe and went there and I bought an ornament that was painted like a peacock feather-beautiful and unique! I love Christmas decorations. We ate lunch at Der Dutchman Restaurant and I had broasted chicken for the first time. They supposedly have a bakery, but it's a separate entrance and it was pouring so hard that we didn't couldn't get to it. We hit a few more gift shops and then went to Wendell August forge. They have the workshop open to the public, but the guys were just getting ready to leave for the day. They did have the guy working the air hammer to stamp out the design onto the metal. It was kind-of neat to see. Mark and I need to get back down to Amish again to see all the stuff that wasn't open and we couldn't see. It was fun. The best part was seeing all the horse drawn buggies. Each time I saw one I would call out "horse!" like it was the first one I had seen all day. I love the horses.

Pop!!

Us Welch's are born with Pepsi in our blood. Laura and I love to say that Daddy put Pepsi in our baby bottles. Mom...did he? Marie and I love to say that the best part of her sleeping over at my house was drinking pop. Marie…I hope that isn’t the only reason we became friends. Anyways, my doctor told me that I should give up caffeine and pop, so I did. Mark likes to say that he needs a pop an hour, and he loves Diet Pepsi. I have never seen someone drink pop as much as he does, not even Daddy. Thank goodness he loves Pepsi, I never could have married him if he was one of those Coke-people. However, for some reason I bought Mark one case of Diet Mountain Dew. For some even stranger reason, I decided to have one a little bit ago. Sorry, Mark - there's a new love in my life - it's Diet Mountain Dew. I'm trying not to OD on it though, since it has aspartame and that gives me headaches. I am limiting myself to one can a day.

I love Aaron Tippin!!!

Song


DRILL HERE DRILL NOW - LYRICS

Hello…..Is anybody out there listenin’ in Washington D.C.
This is the suffering voice of America crying out for relief
Now I don’t know what a gallon of gas costs up on capitol hill
But we sure know what it cost down here in realityville
And the damage already done has been a mighty heavy toll
And if we’re gonna fix it we gotta start right here at home

CHORUS:
Drill here, drill now
How ‘bout some oil from our own soil that belongs to us anyhow
No more debatin’ we’re tired of waitin’ everybody shout out loud
Drill here, drill now

Every time a foreign tanker pulls up to our shore
They got us over a barrel while they bleed us a little more
And think how much it costs just to bring it all that way
And how many American jobs that’d make if we were drillin’ in the USA
Oh and God forbid if our oily friends should decide to cut us off
We’d be standin’ around with our britches down now listen to me ya’ll

REPEAT CHORUS

Well the winds of change are blowin’
Yes and we recognize that need
But tractors, trucks, cars and planes can’t run on tomorrow’s dreams
So while we’re workin’ on the future we can’t ignore today
Cuz who knows how much time the alternative might take
Somethin’s gotta be done right now cuz friends it won’t be long
Before this great big country comes grinding to a halt

REPEAT CHORUS

Aaron Tippin/Thea Tippin/Philip Douglas/Dan Murph
Songs of Kicking Bird Music(BMI)/TCT Wind(BMI)/Songs of Windswept Pacific(BMI)/All rights obo Songs of Kicking Bird Music and TCT Wind adm. by Songs of Windswept Pacific/Thea Later Music(BMI)/LisaMane Music(SESAC)/Loud Hungry Lion Music(BMI)

The boys

I was snapping picture of Evan at Carol's and noticed that Evan was wearing the same outfit as an old picture of Aidan that was on the coffee table. I did set this picture up a little bit by putting the picture a little closer, but how cool is that!!!

Both born on Friday's

I had the scanner out and scanned in a bunch of old pictures. If I have nothing else to post, I thought I'd throw in some old pictures.

Jury update

Damn it!! I went downtown for my grand jury duty today. I was a little nervous, but sooo very excited at the same time. I got there in plenty of time and found the courtroom fairly easily. They called 175 people and only need 14 for the grand jury. They picked those out fairly quickly and then picked 25 alternates. I didn't even get an interview because my jury number was in the 160s. I was very sad that I didn't get picked! It's probably for the better though because work is getting hard and they probably would have missed me badly. The other bummer is once you've been picked or denied (like me) for the grand jury - you can never be picked for grand jury again. My dream...shattered :(

Happy Birthday Neeley!