Family Visitors

This summer we were thrilled to have my mom and 2 of my nephews come out for a week to visit.  I tried to plan some fun activities for us while they were here so we wouldn't be just sitting at the house day after day.

Here are the pictures and some brief notes on the fun we had.

We had my cousin Nikki's high school graduation party and some of my aunts and uncles were able to make it down for the celebration as well.

We did a lot more on this trip, but I will leave what I have and post this from the past and am hopeful that we have them visit again in the upcoming year. (April 2013)

Lapse In Time

I took a little break from blogging for a bit.  Life was getting to chaotic and my to do lists large and it seemed I just was running out of time.  I also was posting more snippets and pictures to facebook instead of my blog because it was so much easier.  A lot has happened obviously since I stopped posting so I will spare myself the pain of trying to go back and rehash the past year in any kind of detail.  The kids are doing great and about to end 1st grade and 3 year old kindergarten class.  I survived my thyroid surgery and am cancer free (at least that's what they told me) and am feeling fine.  Dan and I are coming up on our 10 year anniversary - the last year has been a tough year, but we are trying to muddle through and make some positive changes.  May is always a busy month, but I am looking forward to lots of activities and end of school year stuff and the start of some warm summer days!

Stationery card

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Dan's 40th Birthday Party and Graduation Time in Minnesota

June was a busy month and lots to do.  Dan's niece, Cassie, was graduating from High School and we wanted to be sure and get home to be a part of it.  I also had been trying to figure out what I was going to do for Dan's 40th birthday.  He had said many times that he did not want to go home for it and did not want to have a party.  Well, that never detours me from the plans that I have in mind.  As soon as it was decided that we were for sure heading to Minnesota for Cassie's graduation my wheels started spinning.  It was only a week or so before Dan's birthday that we would be home and a perfect opportunity to throw him a surprise party!  Once I got the okay from his family to have the party on the Friday night before Cassie's graduation on Sunday all plans moved forward.  I wanted to make sure that the weekend was still about Cassie and not have us overshadowing it.  I decided to throw the party at the Dakota Magic Casino.  They have catering for food and if people wanted to stay then they could.  I contacted everyone and it was all a go.  I had Dan's friends in on it so that they would get him to the casino for the surprise.  The party turned out great and everyone had a good time and Dan was so surprised.  I think he enjoyed it even though he said he didn't want a party.  I took limited pictures I guess at the party since it went so fast, but we had a great time.

Graduation:
Cassie's graduation was very nice and we were so happy to be able to be there for it.  Susan had another relative taking pictures for the day so I was off the hook.  Dan really enjoyed spending the day with his family and we did get some great family pictures since everyone was home.

Easter 2012

Okay so I am way behind and still living in March of 2012.  I'm going to run through posts quickly and attempt to get caught back up~!  Here are the Easter pictures from this year.

Day 6 Boston - Time to go Home

So much for getting up and doing more sight seeing the next morning.  I didn't answer the phone when some of my co-workers were trying to call me.  I was tired and wanted to lay in bed for awhile.  I knew it was going to take me some time to pack all of my stuff back up as well.  I couldn't believe the trip was coming to an end, but I was happy to be heading home.  I eventually did crawl out of bed and jumped in the shower and then slowly started re-packing my suitcase.  How did I get all of this stuff in here the first time?  I hadn't even bought many souvenirs.  I eventually went downstairs and had some breakfast and some of my co-workers were just getting back from walking around the city.  It was rainy and cold that morning and needless to say I was not feeling all that fantastic and chipper.  Put not feeling fantastic on top of the anxiety of flying later and you get a mess with me.  I didn't do my hair and hardly my make-up and had jeans, tennis shoes, and a t-shirt and sweatshirt on.  I'm sure my travel companions were wondering what happened to me.  Well, this is what you get at the end of any trip.  I need to muddle through the morning, get to the airport and then pass out on the plane ride home.  I called the front desk and asked for us all to have a late check out since our flight wasn't until later.  Apparently nobody got the memo.  I was laying in my bed and then all of my co-workers and all of their luggage showed up at my door.  They all had checked out of their rooms and came to mine thinking that I had only asked for my room for a late checkout.  We decided to go and walk around since we had an hour or so to kill before heading to the airport.  It was cold and rainy and not so fun.  When it was time to go we did get lucky and there was a van just getting ready to go to the airport.  They hauled all of our suitcases in and we jumped in.  We got to the airport and paid for the van ride and then got in line to check-in and check our bags.  We had tried to check-in at the hotel and I was able to get a seat assignment, but 2 of my co-workers weren't able to.  As we were checking in I threw my heavy as suitcase up and the lady told me it was overweight - shit!  I grabbed my suitcase and started grabbing a few things out of it and put them in my laptop bag.  This was not an easy task and I was not in the mood.  I did ask how much it would cost for my overweight bag and it was $100 - no way I was paying that.  I was making a big mess of my suitcase and putting myself into a tizzy and I think the lady eventually felt sorry for me and when I put my bag up there again she just said ok, we'll let it pass.  It wasn't too long in the airport security line, but it was the first time I had been through the x-ray security.  It was pretty interesting.  I must have looked horrified or something because one of the security people came up and said to me that it wouldn't hurt me and I would be fine.  I let him know it wasn't his machine that I was scared of it was the upcoming 4 hour flight.  We all made it through security and found our gate and just sat for a bit.  I eventually got up and walked around and went to some shops and bought the kids some t-shirts.  (Yes, I suck and I hadn't bought them anything yet.)  Apparently while I was off shopping in the airport they had called my name.  There was an error in my seat assignment and also Derik and Mark had not been assigned seats yet either.  The plane was obviously full and possibly overbooked.  Mark was having a fit about getting bumped from the flight and honestly I wanted to smack him at this point because he kept going on and on and on about it like a little kid.  I came back to see what I needed to do about my seat and Mark said he had taken care of it and he had gotten me a seat in an exit row.  He thought he was being nice by getting me this seat so I would have extra leg room, but all I blurted out was that if our plane went down I couldn't hardly help myself and I wouldn't help other people.  This seat was not going to work for me.  I walked up to the gate and told the attendants that I needed to change my seat because I was in an exit row and I wouldn't help other people if something went wrong.  They stared at me for a second and said, okay, we will change your seat.  I got a new seat assignment and went back to where we were sitting.  My co-workers couldn't believe that I just went up there and said that I wouldn't help anyone.  I just shrugged and said, well, that was the truth.  I'm already a mess and feeling not well to get on the flight and if they asked me if I could do this and that the answer would be no.  We all got seat assignments and no one was bumped from the plane.  I hadn't assigned us seats previously because I had no intention of sitting by anyone on the flight home.  I knew that I would just want to sleep.  This was not the best flight that I had been on.  Although the turbulence was not terrible there were a few instances.  At one point I was sleeping and the pilot got on the intercom and said that we may be having some bad turbulence and everyone including the flight attendants needed to sit down and buckle up.  I was freaking out.  I don't know that I have ever been on a flight where they asked the flight attendants to sit down as well.  I was bracing myself for the worse and let the kid next to me know that if I started screaming that he could just ignore me.  It was a relief when there wasn't much turbulence or any at all, thank you good pilot!  Later during the flight the pilot got on again and was asking if there was any medical staff on the flight - what the hell?  I have no idea what happened or who was ill or if someone died on our flight, but something must have been wrong.  Of course my co-workers figured that it was me that was freaking out and that I needed the medical assistance, but it wasn't me this time.  It was a long flight to say the least.  We made it back safe and sound, grabbed our luggage, found the county van and they dropped me off first to an awaiting crew of my husband, kids, and in-laws with lots of hugs and kisses.
This was a trip that I will never forget and will probably be one of the most adventurous and fun packed work trainings I will ever go on.

Day 5 Boston - Last day of Training and Sight Seeing

I could not believe it was already the last day of training. I got up and did my routine that I was greatly enjoying every morning - shower, coffee, get ready for class and breakfast was waiting.  No kids to get ready, no dropping off at daycare, no driving at all,  just extremely stress free mornings and then someone else cleaned and straightened my room and bathroom everyday.  I already knew I was going to miss it.  I was excited to finish our training and see what the last day had in store for us.  I already had numerous notes and couldn't wait to get back to work and start putting some of them into play.  Our class was also supposed to be done around 3pm which meant we would have time to go and do some sight seeing and actually catch a tour of something and go explore more of Boston.
We all made it through our last day of training and received our certificates.  At some point we had decided that we wanted to go and see the North Church and also we needed to get to the harbor and check it out.
After a pit stop at our rooms we met up in the lobby and it was time to head out and about.  I opted to change into my tennis shoes because my feet couldn't take another day of walking all over Boston in boots.  Everyone was in a good mood, it was Friday and we could do whatever we wanted and also got to go out on a Friday night. We decided we would head out for sightseeing and then I wanted to head back to the hotel to change my outfit for a night out on the town.  We headed out past the pot park again and towards the subway.  I decided after yesterdays incident that I would stand for this ride and hopefully not have another strange encounter, of course this wasn't the case.  We got onto the subway and I stood and grabbed onto a pole.  Two of the guys found a spot to sit and another was standing, but talking on the phone.  No sooner did we pull away when some guy who looked very down on his luck started talking to me.  I wasn't even looking in his direction and he was obviously talking right at me.  He asked me if I thought he should move into an apartment near so and so.  I politely addressed him and said I was not from here so I wouldn't honestly know.  I figured the conversation would be over, but no.  He then continued to ask me about moving into an apartment.  Should he move into an apartment?  I said that if he felt that it was the right move then he should.  He then asked me if I lived in apartment and I said no.  Oh, he said, so you have a house?  I felt like a schmuck, yes, I said I have a house because I have kids and stuff.  He continued to talk to me about housing and apartments and where he should live and what I thought about this and that.  It was the most awkward conversation and I'm pretty sure the guy had no money to rent an apartment.  It doesn't sound like it was that bad based on my writing, but you just never know with some people.  I looked around during our conversation and noticed that nobody else was talking to other people, why did he decide to talk to me. I again was done with the subway, get me off of here.  I was told later that I should be doing something, checking my phone, reading a book or paper, anything to look busy. We got off the subway at our stop and started heading to the North Church.
We saw some awesome things on the way to the North Church.  We also knew that we would only be able to get one tour in and we would be able to make the last one at the church.

The North Church

I was completely in awe while we were inside the North Church.  It wasn't so much as a tour, but they had a someone talking about the history.  We walked around and it was so old inside.  It had an ambiance to it.  I was definitely taken aback a little from being there.  We all kind of just walked around inside and did our own thing.

The pews.  These were very interesting.  They were boxes more or less and people used to have to rent them out or lease them out for a year at a time.  The rich were up front and were provided with pillows to sit on in their pews.  I've never seen anything like this in a church.  The church still has a sermon every Sunday, however they no longer rent out the spots.

After we left the church we walked down towards the harbor.  I walked by myself for a bit to just relax and think about the church and have my own little moment.  Once we got closer to the harbor we were back as a group.  We again walked by the amazing apartments.  This is a much better picture of them in the daytime.

We walked around a bit and checked out some of the harbor.  I think I thought I would be a little more excited about it, but it just wasn't that exciting I guess, just water? We walked down and checked it out and I snapped a few pictures. 

Me at the Harbor

I was supposed to be a little more excited,
so this was my more exciting to be here look.

While we were at the Harbor I had to go to the bathroom. We had been walking for a long time and hadn't stopped really anywhere. We decided to find somewhere to stop and grab a drink, it was Friday and Happy Hour!  I turned to the guys and said, I gotta take a piss.  This got me looks from all three of them.  I guess it was inappropriate for me to say and that only guys can say they have to take a piss.  So after a good laugh we walked over to a bar.  We found a place to sit and I jetted to the restroom.  We decided that instead of trying to break up the bill at each place again we would just buy rounds.  I bought the first 2 rounds at our first stop.  I was in a good mood and a little "beered" out so I started off with a couple of bacardi limon's.  We had a good time and then decided that it was still pretty early to continue boozing without some food so we headed off to find a restaurant.  The task was not an easy one.  It was a Friday during Lent for Catholics which left me with only a shortage of options and obviously I wasn't going to be eating any lobster nor did I want anything to filling.  We walked into one restaurant on the Harbor that had seafood and the place was packed with people and it stunk so badly in there, at least to me.  We didn't stay. We walked around and found another place and got seated fairly quickly.  We opted for beer as our appetizer while we slowly mulled over the menus.  I ended up ordering a plate of fries or something and we sat there for awhile just eating and talking and having beers. And nothing goes without incident for us of course.  Mark had ran to the restroom and I was talking to Derik and Jared was finishing his meal.  I was looking at Derik while I was talking and all of the sudden hear this clink, clink, clink and out of my mouth before even thinking I say to Jared - take it easy OCD.  He immediately looked at me in shock and then put his face in his hands and then mumbled something about trying to keep it under wraps all week and then looked right at me and said clear as a bell - Takes one to Know One.  I honestly hadn't seen what he had done and only heard him placing all of his utensils on his plate and just blurted it out.  Of course then I realize that I completely just busted him and then became aware that he obviously had noticed that I have my own issues too.  Derik sat there wondering what the hell we were talking about. He is the furthest from any type of OCD.  We sit and try to explain it to him and later I realize that all our conversation did was heighten my own awareness of my issues and made them worse after the trip.  We had a few more beers and then decided to start walking around Boston again.  We opted not to take the subway and walked all over the place not really having a care in the world. I really had no idea where we were or where we were going.  We did eventually end back up at the hotel and went into the bar for another beer.  While we were sitting there I decided since we were there that I was going to go and change into my Friday night outfit.  It was only around 9 or 10pm and I wasn't ready to slow down quite yet on a Friday, especially when we didn't have to get up early and didn't have class in the morning.  

We had a few more beers at the hotel bar and I'm pretty certain that not everyone took their turn buying their rounds, but oh well.  Mark and Derik decided they were done for the night and stayed at the hotel so Jared and I took off to go see what we could find to do.  Why is it whenever you are actually looking for somewhere to stop you seem to never find a place?  We walked around quite a bit and popped into different places for beers.  We eventually ended up at a swanky bar and grabbed a beer and shot.  It wasn't a very happening place, but we could hear extremely loud music coming from somewhere below us.  We asked the bartender what was going on downstairs and she said there was a Lebanese band and party going on and we should probably stay at the bar.  This peeked our curiosity of course and we headed downstairs.  This was the craziest bar scene.  The music was good and very loud and nothing I had ever heard before. We hung out for awhile and danced with all the crazy people at this party.  Later we realized that we were probably the only ones that were drinking at that party.  After we had enough of the loud music and strangeness of it all we headed back out to do more walking around.  Eventually we ended up at some downtown area and outside of a club.  We weren't going to go in anymore places (or they probably weren't going to let us in because it was close to closing time?) There were a few bouncers outside of this club and we kind of just hung out for a bit and were people watching.  Apparently at this late in the night my common sense was not at its best.  I kept people watching and couldn't quite put my finger on what was going on with this club and the people coming in and out of it.  I was joking around with the bouncers and must have finally said something and they told me it was a gay club.  Aw, it was all coming together and making sense.  It was some good people watching sitting outside of that place.  It was definitely getting late and time to head back to the hotel, but we had walked all over the place without paying any attention and where in the hell were we?  It was actually pretty comical.  We had no idea where we were.  I already know that I am directionally challenged, always, so to me this was no surprise.  I pulled out my Iphone and told Siri to take me back to the hotel.  Jared pulled out his Iphone and pulled up a map and was leading us back to the hotel.  This may not have been the safest walk of my life since anyone who passed us could probably tell we were not from their looking at us both holding out our Iphones and attempting to go somewhere.  We did eventually make it back to the hotel safe and sound and it was time to definitely go to bed.  It had been a long adventurous day.  

   

Boston Trip - Day 4, Public Transportation, Harvard, and Little Italy

I will not be drinking anymore UFO beers in Boston.  There was a little bit of hell to pay in the morning.  I'm not sure if it was from staying up way too late or the beers or a combination of both, but I had to literally drag my ass out of bed that morning.  I was not too happy to get up.  I got up and showered and then stared at the clothes that I had left in the closet at the hotel and pretty much just stood there.  I finally made some coffee and pulled myself together and got ready to head downstairs for some much needed breakfast.  I was tired and probably a little crabby, but was ready for training.  We all just kind of looked at each other that morning.  Derik did come up to where Jared and I were sitting and said to me that last night "It was nice" and it was in regards to me.  What the hell does that mean, it was nice?  I of course have no issue asking things like that and pretty much said it that way.  What does that mean and his response was that "it was nice".  I just stared at him.  Does this mean that sometimes being around me is not nice.  What I got out of it was that he referencing to me and my attitude or personality after I had had a few of the UFO beers and let down my guard a little bit and had a good time or as some refer to it - took the stick out of my ass.  I bothered him and everyone else about it the rest of the day, but eventually did let it go.  We did have another great day of training and had plans again for sightseeing after class.  I had to have my 30 minute cool down, alone time in my room before we headed out for our next adventures in Boston.  

Our plans for the evening were to take public transportation, which meant the subway system, and head to Harvard and check out some sights on that side of town and make our way to the area of Little Italy and find a nice Italian restaurant to dine at for the evening.  

We all met in the lobby to head out.  This would be my first experience on a subway system and I really had no idea what I was in for.  We walked across the park area, which we now referred to as the Pot Park because that was all you could smell when you walked by and I'm fairly certain that they were smoking it right out in the open without a care in the world.  I was not feeling particularly well from last nights adventures; another rare oddity of mine is the hangover comes after 5pm for me and not in the morning.  It could have also been nerves.  We figure out how to purchase our passes for the subway and then wait for the bus. It was stuffy and weird smelling and was not helping me feel any better.  I decided at that point that when we got on the subway I was finding a seat to sit in.  While we waited Derik proceeded to tell us some horrific story about a girl that was thrown onto the tracks and had survived.  It wasn't helping me in the least bit and was a little unnerving as you are standing there and thinking someone really could just walk up behind you and give you a push and walk away.  The subway comes and we climb on and I find a place to sit and there is a pole right next to me that I can hang on for dear life too.  Everyone else is standing and hanging out and the subway takes off.  As soon as we are moving the gentleman sitting a seat down from me is on his phone screaming obscenities at whoever is on the line with no regard to who can hear or who is sitting next to him, at all or the vulgar language he is using.  He continued on and on and on and was talking like a gangster about to beat the crap out of whoever was on the line for not meeting him at the right stop.  I sat there in my seat hugging my pole.  I then started thinking this guy probably took one look at me and thought - prissy girl - or whatever he may have thought of me.  I started playing scenarios in my head of turning and telling him off in his own verbiage and words and show him how obtrusive I could be and I am not so "prissy" or "classy". Of course at the same time I was also thinking that I had a pole right next to my face and he could easily grab my head and push my face into the pole and that would not be very pretty, best to stay quiet.  We got off at the next stop and I am not one to keep things to myself so I proceeded to tell my co-workers what I wanted to say to him.  They all looked at me and said thank god you didn't because then it would have become our problem.  So, this was experience # 1 of public transportation and left me with a not so great taste in my mouth.  My boss who had told me I needed to try public transportation received a text from me stating "I don't think public transportation is for me".  He hadn't even heard my story, but I'm sure he could only imagine the possibilities.  

First Destination - Harvard.  

We walked around and found Harvard and toured around the campus.  I thought I would be a little more in awe than I was, but there wasn't a lot of hustling and bustling of students or really much of anything. We walked around and found a bookstore off campus that we looked at shirts and souvenirs and then moved on to walk around and see more sights.

Harvard.  I put on my glasses so that I would look smarter?!

 We walked around and around looking for a place to grab a beer or something and after circling around the same area we finally did just stop at one place that wasn't too fancy.  Maybe they don't drink much around Harvard?  We had walked by this extremely old cemetery and spent some time looking at the tombstones.  They were so incredibly old.  It was a little erie and the pictures and things they put on the tombstones were very odd. There was also a wide mixture of different people buried here, from soldiers, to nobodies, to people that properly were well to do.  It was an interesting stop.

After we had stopped for a beverage we walked down to the Little Italy area and again the apartments and buildings were amazing.  It was hard to take pictures at night and these just don't do them justice.  Even the cobblestone streets were interesting.  

I was extremely excited for our night out for Italian food.  Derik had also asked if we could all divulge and share a bottle of wine.  I was all in of course. This was our fancy dining night out.  As we were walking around and scoping out restaurants Derik kept running to each one and checking out there menu.  He talked to someone at one of the  restaurants and they said if we dined with them they would give us each a free shot at the end of our meal.  We finally settled on a place.  It was a fabulous dinner.  I went over and over the menu because I wanted to try it all.  After hearing what everyone else was ordering and my fabulous co-workers saying that I could try some of there's I finally settled on my meal.  We ordered a bottle of wine and they had all different kinds of olives for us to taste.  This was probably one of the longest meals that I have sat down to.  The place was in no rush to get us in and move us out the door.  My co-workers had been insistent on the trip that I had to try lobster while we were in Boston.  I have tried lobster before and wasn't to keen on it.  Jared had ordered lobster fettuccine.  The fettuccine noodles that were served with his meal were black.  So I taste some of his meal and immediately say that the black noodles are strange and taste funny.  Yes, I said it and then I sat there and thought for a second and said, that was dumb, they are noodles, it was the lobster I was tasting.  Yep, I am sometimes that dumb, but it again confirmed for me that I do not care for lobster.  Derik then decided that he was going to treat all of us and we all had to have a cannoli.  We figured our meal was probably already pretty expensive and decide that we would share 2 cannoli's.  So we ordered them up and had let our waiter know we were going to share.  When he brought the plates he only brought 2 plates and 4 forks.  It was hilarious when he placed the plate between Mark and Jared and a little awkward, but we all had a good laugh about it.  I had never had a cannoli before, but they were delicious.  We were then served our free shot at the end of our meal and also heard the life story from our waiter for about 15 minutes.  At first it was quite interesting listening to him tell us a few historical things and then the price of places, but then he started talking about his kids and where they went to school and how much he had to pay for them and this and that and the other thing.  And it went on and on and on and on.   I was getting tired and finally he let us pay his bill and we got out of there.  It was everything I could have wanted it to be for our big, fancy Italian dinner night.  

It was getting late so we headed back to the hotel of course sight seeing as we went along.  Back at the hotel I decided to stop at the bar for a night cap.  I sat and had some yummy drink and talked a little bit to the bartender and then met two gentlemen who were in Boston on business.  I asked them what they did and you just never know what you are going to get I guess.  The 2 guys run a business selling dog chew bones to gas stations and convenient stores and make a nice caboodle of cash doing it.  They sat and told me all about it and how much they travel and who does what and why they were in Boston.  I was trying not to laugh, but I guess everyone has to do something and they make a damn good living at it.  Again it was a late night, but off to bed I went and the next day was our final day of training and we were supposed to be done with class around 3pm so we would actually get a chance to go and do at least one tour the next day and then go out for Friday night!