Movie Night

Friday night has become movie night in my house. My youngest daughter and I usually like to rent a couple of movies on the weekend and watch something together. Well this Friday was a little different. We went to Fon du lac shopping after school. Just a quick trip....I had to exchange something from a previous day. Paige went to her stores...Hot Topic and Pac Sun. Emily had to go to Waldenbooks. And I bought my perfume at Victoria's Secret. Emi found a couple of books she has been wanting. Paige bought a pair of hot pink converse at Hot Topic with her birthday money. We got back from shopping about 7pm. Paige went to her girlfriends house for a sleepover. I was excited to get home, pick out a movie and veg out.

I had picked up the movie "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" but wasn't sure that Emi should watch it. She looked at the back of the case to see what it was rated and saw that it was PG-13. [for brief war violence, sexual content, language and smoking] WOW....I couldn't believe it said "smoking" as a warning on this movie. I told her that I would feel more comfortable watching it first and then letting her know if it was appropriate for her to see. She was fine with that. She grabbed one of her new books and was off reading. So I put the movie in.

I couldn't get out of my head the warning on the cover about smoking. I was doing my synthesis paper on smoking and the affects it has on out youth and there was a huge step in the movie industry to acknowledge smoking as a bad influence on youth. Working to help parents be aware of what their children are exposed to in movies is a great accomplishment. We never had anything like that when i was growing up. I had just read articles on this subject for my annotated bib. It was great to see it in print.

The movie was an amazing portrayal of F. Scott Fitzgerald's fantasy short story. It's an adult fairytale. I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. Will I let my daughter see it? Maybe when she is a little older.

Tire #2

It started out as a good day....but didn't stay that way for long. If you read my previous blog about Monday, i ran over a nail and that resulted in a flat right front tire. Well, it was Thursday and what seemed to be a normal day. I took the girls to school in the morning. Emily had called me to drop off her flute. it wasnt a band day but apparently they had something special planned and Emily wasnt in school on Tuesday and didnt know that she would need her flute....anyway; that is normal in my world. i went to work. i had a super busy day....which i like! after work i was driving home and as i got closer to the z-spot i started to think i needed an iced coffee to jump start my night. knowing i had school til 8:30pm; i wanted to stay awake. at the last second i decided to turn into the drive through and when i did my car went a little wide and the curb around the building got in the way of my left front tire and i heard a sheeeeeeeeeeeee!!!! i looked in disbelief but there it was......right in front of my eyes........my tire was deflating!! i quickly pulled into a parking spot to be out of the way and immediately called... my step-dad. As i was waiting for him to come i did go in and get my latte (needing it more now than ever) George put my spare on and we were off to pomps for another tire. of course i couldnt just fix the tire....i had to buy another one! two in one week....not good for the budget. the weird thing about this is i've been driving since i've been 16...let's just say a long time and i've never experienced a flat tire before and then i get two in one week! that's a little crazy.
i got home in time to change clothes,grab my school bag, kiss the girls good-bye and run out the door for school. i was about 10min late for my math class (which i did apologize for after class). my night was better after that. My parents joke about not answering their phone anymore when i call unless i tell them all my tires are ok! we joke about it but i tend to watch what i'm driving on more that i used to. Friday, Paige was driving (she's got her learners permit) and had to pull in a parking space. well she hit the curb with the back right tire and i just about cried....afraid to look to see if we had yet another flat tire but i straightened out the car and all the tires were ok!

It's Another Monday

I'm enjoying writing these blogs....it's a way to let out the little things that go on in my life...whether you actually want to here about it is one thing but entertaining i hope it is.

My Monday started out early at 6am. I had to meet my co-worker at 7:30am and i was driving us to Green Bay for an up-do class. Keeping up with all the trends of the new season is important for my job. We do weddings every weekend and all the formal dances for all the high schools. Anyway, after my shower i woke Emi up....not easy as she is not a morning girl(wonder who she takes after!?) They were a little more on their own this morning because i had to leave at 7 in order to get my latte from the Z-spot and get to Jomaji by 7:30. Their dad was picking them up for school today which always makes me nervous; i called him and he assured me that he remembered to pick them up. So off i went. i called in my coffee so its ready when i get there and i was on my way. i was almost out of Sheboygan Falls and i heard something loud coming from my car. I turned off the radio and realized it was indeed my car. omg! what could be wrong? i kept driving as i analized in my head what to do. i called my friend, Shelia, who i was meeting and told her that i thought something was wrong with my car and she may have to drive but i would still meet her at the salon. I made it to Sheboygan and now my car wasnt driving right and i thought maybe i should pull over and just check out what was going on. To my surprise the right front tire was blown out. It's raining. i've never changed a tire before. My coffee was ordered. Sheila was waiting for me. Who do i call? My mom!! i explained to her what happened and she told me that my step-dad would come and take care of my car and she told me to still go to the class and when i got home the tire would be fixed. i was so thankful for the parents i have. this wasnt the first time they have come to the rescue. Sheila picked me up at my car and we went and got our lattes and we were finally on our way. No sooner were we on the highway heading out of town when my cell rang and it was Emi's school calling. it was her telling me she forgot her flute and it was her first day practicing with the flute choir. i felt like i should have just stayed in bed today; on a normal Monday i would have been available to help her but today i had to say no, i couldnt bring her flute to school. I asked her to try her dad and maybe he would be willing to come into town and do that for her. i found out later that he did and all was well!
The class was fun and after the crazy morning we werent even late. After the class we went for lunch and it was nice to relax and reflect on the morning. This is why i dont work on Monday's.....!!!

Happy Easter!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter!

My morning started out by my alarm blaring at 7am. No! i said to myself it's tooo early. it was just a few hours earlier that the Easter Bunny AKA:me was hiding the eggs and Easter baskets. Well, i conceded to the morning and got up and showered and dressed for church. in the meantime the girls got up and were excited to find their baskets and see all the treasures they held. Even Paige, age 16(in two more days) was excited to get her basket. they both know there isn't an Easter bunny but still have fun continuing the traditions from when they did....

we got to church(not as early as i had planned) and it was packed as always on a holiday. i think aside from all the family that visit you see people that only attend for the holidays. anyway, as i was standing in the back of church trying to see where the girls and i could sit my girlfriend, Julie walked into church. She is in the Praise and Worship Team that sing during service. we wished each other Happy Easter and she told me that God must have known she needed to see me this morning. What a wonderful gift to know that she felt that way. she's a person that we confide everything to and help build each other up....it was a nice start to the morning. well, we found seats.....right in the front row. OK my me. Pastor was very passionate during his sermon and i really felt connected to what he was saying. i left church with a renewed sense of life.

we stopped at home and changed out of our church clothes and picked up the hard boiled eggs for grandma's and set out to Starbucks for coffee and hot chocolate for the kids. At my mom's we helped with last minute things for the table and conversed with family. the food arrived at 12:30. (my mom ordered our meal from Woodlake and had it delivered) it was fabulous.

we all finished eating just about the time the Masters was starting in TV. Tiger and Phil were paired up to together today which always makes for exciting golf. the kids took the Wii downstairs and played games and monkeyed around in the wreck room and after the food was put away the rest of us relaxed in front of the TV to watch golf and chat.

what an awesome day with family....beautiful weather, great food, and we celebrate the resurrection of our Lord. Couldn't get any better.

Milwaukee Public Museum

Yesterday i took my daughters Paige and Emily, my mother and Paige's boyfriend Luke to the Milwaukee Public Museum. We wanted to go to the traveling Titanic Exhibit. I had gone on-line the night before and bought our tickets to the IMAXX and to the special exhibit. This exhibit is so popular and with it being a holiday (Good Friday) most of the schools are off and I'm sure that meant the museum would be a lot busier than normal for a Friday.

We got there about 11:30am which gave us time to look around the museum before our 1:30 entrance to the IMAXX:Ghosts of the Abyss. Emily and i spent quite a bit of time in the butterfly area....we both love butterflies and are intrigued by them. Emi had them landing on her fingers and of course i was there with my camera to capture her with her little friends. My other daughter Paige is freaked out by butterflies and will have nothing to do with them. Talk about opposites.

The IMAXX movie took to to the depths of the Atlantic Ocean to the site of the sinking of the Titanic. It was quite a sight to see and they have better equipment now to help in their exploration of this massive ship. It's amazing to that through this technology we can see the remains of this tragic sinking. My hat is off to all the researchers involved. They are risking their lives to be able to research and share that with us.

At 3:30 we lined up to enter the special Titanic exhibit. We were each given a boarding pass with one of the original passengers, from the actual voyage, name on it. It gave you information about that passenger; where they were from; their occupation; what class they were staying and so on. All of our group had people in first class. At the end of the exhibit there is a book with all the passengers and if they survived or not and you could check if you survived or not. They also took your picture and you could buy a picture of yourself standing in front of the ship or the grand staircase. It's a nice souvenir. Walking through the exhibit was very eery.....to see someones personal things on display knowing how they died was just overwhelming. We all enjoyed the experience of it. We all survived which felt good but then you felt bad too for those that were lost. it's one of those things that you need to be there to get the full affect of it....words don't even do it justice.

Cell phone crisis

i was never more frustrated that i was last night. it was about 10:30pm. i got the brainy idea to upgrade my iPhone. i haven't had it very long and already they have updates for it. this phone is like having a mini computer in your hand. love the phone......still amazed at all the features you can download for it.

well, i have my phone synced to my laptop so naturally i went on itunes and just clicked on updates and it started to update and then it happened....error!!! What? What could be an error? then a window popped up telling me i have to do a restore to my phone. knowing a little about computers i knew darn well that a restore to my phone would erase all the apps and information i currently have on my phone and set it back to like i first got it....i was not happy but it was my only option. luckily i had just synced my phone to itunes right before trying to update so i was hoping the information lost would be minimal.

i clicked on the restore button and it started my preparing my phone for a restore and then it started to restore...........then............it stopped!! it just stopped in the middle of restoring and ERROR! OMG! what do i do now??? well, i of course tried it again to no avail and again for good measure. NOTHING. i tried restarting my laptop. i tried downloading a newer version of itunes. still nothing.....

there was a "help" page and suggested if you had another computer to try to restore on that one. thankfully we are a house with three computers. i used the newest one in the living room and downloaded the newest itunes and took a breathe and plugged in my iPhone and it began to restore and then

IT STOPPED AGAIN!!!!

by now it's going on 1am and i can barely keep my eyes open but want to get this problem resolved. I've become dependent on the use of this little convenience and its source of communication, especially with my girls, that i couldn't imagine being without it. i disconnected it and was going to just give up and than i thought one more time and to my surprise IT WORKED!!! i had my phone back....well sort of. i still had to re-download everything and i was thankful that all my contacts were saved! that would have been quite a chore to re-enter all my contacts. i was disappointed to find out that on the games i had installed and now re-installed all the high scores were gone...oh well, not even something to worry about....i was glad to have my phone working again. i do have to re schedule all my appointment and I'm going to make sure i sync my calendar from now on.

a tired day but a happy one!

The Airplane Incident

Spring break is always a great time to fly off to somewhere and escape from life as you know it for a taste of adventure and experience somewhere other than home. To do this we sometimes have to take an airplane to get there.

I used to hate to fly. My ears would bother me and I tend to be somewhat claustrophobic. Over the years I've gotten to actually look forward to flying. It's much faster than driving which allows for a longer vacation! :)

This spring break I went to Hilton Head Island in South Carolina, which is amazing by the way. It was great to have weather in the 70's....perfect for golfing!!!! Well, it was the plane ride home that is my focus. I had a connecting flight in Atlanta, GA.

Everyone boarded the plane and to our discomfort there was a screaming child in the back of the plane. Not just a little crying and fussiness. This was all out whaling to the point of piercing in your ears. It was a two year old little girl and she was having nothing to do with putting on her seat belt. The male stewardess was trying to get the mother to calm her child down so we could taxi down the runway. To no avail. He approached the mother again and I heard her say,"she's two years old.....what do you expect?" I really felt sorry for her. You could see the annoyance by all the passengers. Everyone just wanted to get in the air so you could put your headphones on and tune the crying out.

We began to taxi out and for a second it was quiet. Finally, we were on our way. All of a sudden the pilot came on the speaker saying he had a "concerned passenger" and we would be returning to the dock for a brief time and he apologized for the delay it would cause. Nobody knew what was going on. I was hoping they weren't going to ask the mother to leave the plane. A security guard came on the plane and went to the back of the plane and escorted a man off the plane. He returned a short while later only to tell the woman with the child that he was being ejected from this flight and she is to fly home without him. She was upset and crying but stayed on the plane without him. It must have been awful for her to do that knowing he was the cause of the plane to be delayed and the unknown of what is going to happen to him. The plane finally resumed its flight and we were about 25mins. late getting into Milwaukee. The little girl was quiet the whole way until we were about to land then she began to get fussy but not to the degree before.

When we got off the plane I saw the mother standing off to the side and I approached her and let her know that i felt for her and she thanked me. I found out later that the husband made a personal assault on the male stewardess' sexual preference. I'm appalled that someone would spew their mouth off like that in this day and age. I'm sure just being kicked off the plane was only the beginning of the trouble he caused for himself.