Open Up and Say...Ahh!

Like that Poison reference? 

When it rains, it pours. That's how the saying goes, isn't it?  It seems that way lately with us. This summer we have had to shell out so much moola for various things.  Our house got hit by lightning last month and that caused quite a few of the expenses. Then it seems like other things decided that if we were going to be fixing something else, then they should get fixed, too.  Here is a list:


Already Fixed and/or replaced:
Phone line
Complete phone set
Civic brakes
Outdoor lights on house
Ceiling fan light in kids' room
Microwave
Shower fan/light in master bathroom
Air conditioner
Xbox
DSIs (under warranty so only cost shipping)


Still needing repair and/or replacement:
Ceiling fan in bedroom
Dishwasher (went from not working after lightning strike to one cycle working)
Van brakes (getting fixed this weekend)
Shower light in master shower (have the parts to fix it now, just need to do it)
Shower tile in kids' bathroom (this is not a new repair needed - Big J ripped off the soap dish - yes, the tile soap dish out of the tile- a long time ago)


I think that's it. I really can't remember at this point. That's on top of regular stuff (like food for kids that never stop eating) and "non regular stuff"  like the $300+ shelled out for preschool and school registration fees (we live in one of the only states that has fees for having your kid go to public school), school supplies, sports registrations, oil changes, transmission fluid changes, swim lessons, etc.

On a good financial note, we did refinance our house, so we got a great interest rate and knocked a few hundred off our mortgage payment!

Beautiful

LOVED this routine

I've been watching SYTYCD again this season and I like it way better than the fall season. This hip-hop routine from last week with all-star Twitch and this season's contestant Alex ROCKED!! Especially when you consider Alex is a ballet dancer in the Miami City Ballet and when they were teaching him the routine he totally looked like a ballet dancer so far out of his element. But he nailed it. So fun! All the embedding is disabled, so you will have to go to You Tube to watch it. I also loved the one by Ashley and Ade.

Summer Vacation to the Redneck Vegas

Last week we went to Branson, MO, for a family vacation that included my parents and sister Ali. Again, my parents were very generous to let us use their time share points so we had a place to stay. If you've never been to Branson (or heard of it for that matter) the best I can describe it is a sort-of Vegas like atmosphere minus the casinos. And with various lawn ornament vendors dotting the sides of the road. It is purely an entertainment destination with shows, museums, good places to eat and things like that. There are also lots of outdoor things to do like water skiing, although we didn't do any of that. We had a good time.

We pretty much let the boys pick what appealed to them most and did that.We were there from Monday afternoon until Friday morning. The first evening we were there we stayed at the resort and had a really good dinner out on the pavilion with live entertainment in the form of a Branson show sampler. Basically, for 3 hours lots of the different shows around Branson came and did a 3 - 5 minute mini-show to give you a taste of their show in hopes you would buy tickets to the real thing. The boys voted on one called Buckets-n-Boards. It was the perfect show for my group and quite entertaining if you like a show with two goofy guys who do a mixture of rhythm on - you guessed it - buckets and boards and other various things, as well as some tap dance, guitar playing, and silly skits thrown in. It was fun.

My favorite show was the Dixie Stampede. If you have ever gone to Medieval Times or Excalibur at Las Vegas, then it is that same concept, except country-style. You get a 4-course meal that you eat without silverware (and was really good, I might add) while you watch in the middle of the arena a big extravaganza with people doing tricks on horseback, friendly competitions, singing and dancing. They divide the arena between the North and the South and so the entire time you have to cheer for your team and boo the other team. It was really fun and the kids had a blast. We couldn't take any pictures inside, though, so we just got a few outside.

We also went to the Ripley's Believe It or Not museum. That was full of weird stuff, to say the least. I think my favorite things were these tiny little intricate paintings people had done on various objects such as a fly, a grain of rice, and a button. Why? I don't know, but it was cool. You had to look at them through a magnifying glass to be able to see them. They had interesting things like a real shrunken head and a genuine vampire killing kit people in Europe used to carry around with them. The building represents the largest earthquake to hit the U.S. which also happened to be in Missouri, which is a strange fact in itself.

We went to a Dinosaur Museum which had about 50 life-size dinosaur replicas and then an interactive learning center. We mainly liked it because we could take pictures like this:



We also saw the Titanic museum which everyone really enjoyed. In one of the rooms that was simulated to look like the 3rd Class Passenger rooms, there was lots of pictures up that had been taken of a little boy playing with a top on the deck of the Titanic. Little J told me later that when he saw all those pictures his "legs got all shaky" because he thought about all the people who had died on that boat. It was a sad thing, but a really great museum with several hands-on interactive things you could do like putting your hand into water that was the temperature of the water when they hit the iceberg, climbing up the various inclines the deck would have been at as it sank, touching the side of an "iceberg". Again, no pictures inside.

We went to the Family Fun Factory and played a few rounds of laser tag and glow-in-the-dark mini golf, both of which were lots of fun. Everyone got in on the laser tag action and we even went back the night before we left for some more. We also did lots of swimming at the resort and eating of good food. We had to take off on Friday so we could get back in time to close on the refinancing of our house, but it was a good trip. We were pooped out.