Happy Easter!

On the Saturday before Easter Joey and I joined his family for a little egg decorating:-)

OK, so how many of you have actually been successful with the "magic crayon" you get in the egg dying packages? It is supposed to keep the dye from coloring any space that you use it on before you dip it. Now...for some unknown reason Joey ended up being a pro at it! I can never get the stupid thing to work.Nice work, Joey!
This was my method this year. Marit and I saw this in a Martha Stewart magazine and I gave it a shot. Pretty cool:-)

We thought the dogs were feeling a little left out so we invited them to help out.

(Kasey above and Sandy below...sitting at the table..looks like something my mom would let happen but she would probably have bought them some sort of satin coushin sit on:) I love you, Mom!)

Manistee with the Eckers!

To start off my week of freedom from the blessed children I headed up to Michigan to visit my Marit:-) Manistee is about a five hour drive but it went by pretty quickly. Marit took advantage of her cake decorating tools and made me a beautiful (and delicious!) birthday cake:-) It was so much fun to celebrate with them!

We had a pretty low key visit (just the way we like it). Benj and Marit showed me around Manistee a little on Sunday and then Marit and I spent Monday together in Traverse City (about an hour north). Which is where the oversized yellow brontosaurus comes in...
This thing is at a camping area on the way to Traverse City. Yeah...very weird. The name of the campground didn't even have anything to do with dinosaurs! Marit said that they eyes even glow red at night...creepy!

Traverse City was very much like downtown Keene, NH. It was nice to just check out the shops and spend some time in a bookstore. We found a restaurant called Caio Bella which was really good! Marit was livin' it up...wine AND lobster tails!
Monday night we did a little egg dying before dinner and a movie with Benj:-)

Yes...we did a little St. Patrick's Day celebrating:-)

25...Yikes!

Yeah, 25. Do I feel 100% different? Let's be honest...do you EVER feel much different after you get a year older? Not so much. BUT I did change in the sense that I took some time to remember how many people I have that care about me:-) I had a wonderful birthday thanks to all of you!

On Tuesday Sara, Joey's sister, helped me out on a field trip to the Museum of Science and Industry (thank you!!) and stuck around for the remainder of the school day. With a little help from my students and my friend Laura she surprised me with balloons and cupcakes for my whole class! It was so sweet and tons of fun:-) Thanks Sara!

Now.... I was lucky enough to have leftover cupcakes to bring home...yay! BUT being the brat that I am I refused to make two trips from the car that day so on my way into the apartment building I had alittle mishap :-( It was actually quite humorous though. I was carrying my huge teacher bag, presents from the kids, balloons, my purse, a box of Capri Suns and of course the cupcakes....they just fell. Obviously the package landed completely upside down. Being the good sport that he was, Joey still ate them! (ok, I did too:-)

On Wednesday, my actual birthday, Joey brought me out to Maggianos for dinner (mmmm!). He also completed my Gilmore Girls' series and told me about my future birthday outing to Hollywood Boulevard (a really cool theater in the suburbs based on the Chinese Theater in Hollywood:-). I'll be sure to update you on that when we find a movie we want to see there:-)

On Saturday Joey's family and I went to the aquarium for the day. And yes, the Komodo dragons are still there and ferocious as ever!

OK...If you didn't know already I have quite the fear of snakes (as well as clowns but that didn't come up at the aquarium). We decided to see the Shallow Seas 4-d movie. Good idea, right? WRONG! At first...wonderful! So beautiful and relaxing with the wind blowing on us...exploring the ocean and all. Then.... the snakes. Yep....swimming toward me...behind me...and of course the fourth dimension has to chime in....a "snake" swims into my back! Kind of hard to explain but it was terrifying! I then spent the remainder of the segment on evil serpents on the edge of my seat (so I wouldn't be abused by anymore snakes) looking at Joey to wait for the OK that they were off the screen. In the end I was able to bring my heart rate down and enjoy the rest of the day:-)

Mike (Sara's boyfriend), Sara, Carmelita, and Jim.

I'm so proud of my boyfriend. Isn't he just classy!?

After a day at the museum we spent the evening at our apartment watching a movie and then headed down the street to a hot dog joint we see all the time and have wanted to try. You guessed it....It's called "Chubby Wieners". Quite good actually:-)

Safety First!

Now, being the daughter of a Maintenance Director/Firefighter/Air Force Reservist I have been taught to think of "Safety First" :-) Sooo...while constructing the new bedroom TV stand today I wore my safety glasses from my trusty pink tool kit. It actually brings me back to my ever so popular Maintenance Monday of Summer 2007:-)

A little update...we are pretty much moved in now! When I posted pictures last time we had a few more things to get and put together. Today we took ANOTHER trip to the store and got the TV stand for the bedroom and a CD stand for the living room. Looking pretty good here:-)

New apartment!!

Welcome! Joey and I finally got some pictures taken of our new place:-) We really love the apartment... it has been taken care of very well, the area is great, and our stuff fits in here (after a long weekend of nonstop trips up two staircases)! Of course pictures don't quite do justice to the homey feel it has...you really have to visit for that:-) Those of you who live nearby, come on over! All you eastcoasters...well, get on the ball and buy some plane tickets! Living room. Really nice light during the day. These windows face the courtyard so it's pretty quite:-)
It has living, bedroom, dining room, bath and kitchen. Pretty spacious too...I can be in the kitchen and not hear Joey bellowing from the living room;-)

Kitchen. Very exciting to put this together...just the way I wanted it:-) Thanks to Joey I was able to stay at the apartment pretty much all day on Saturday and get things put away while he did a few more trips back to his place. View from the dining room.
Bathroom. Pretty small..but honestly, why does it really need to be any bigger.
Bedroom. We were able to make a compromise with the bedroom furniture....We used my bed frame and headboard/footboard and Joey's mattress. After the battle to put that stupid IKEA bed together for the third time in my life, it worked out well.


Obviously things aren't completely put away. Still looking around for a good TV stand for the bedroom and getting pictures hung up but overall, it came together quite nicely and we're both very happy with our choice of our new Lincoln Square apartment. :-)

Jamie L. Page: High Roller 2008

Well, well, well....apparently Jamie can bowl! This past Sunday, Joey and I went bowling with his family and some friends and I finally beat my previous high score of 172. If you're having trouble seeing the scorecard, that says 190...yep, 190! FIVE strikes in a row! Good day!