The "sleepover", Caps are back, and the Cox Farms finale...

Well, if Ty didn't have a blast this weekend...I'm throwing in the towel. We started off with a sleepover with Colin and Skye. Colin mostly played with Jumpy, or as he preferred calling it, the "hamper". And for those of you who need further explanation (Dad...), they slept over their sleeping bags. :)

We were off to the Caps game on Saturday night. Ty proudly sported his new Caps jersey with Ovechkin on the back. It was an awesome game, helps that they won too. I missed hockey oh so much over the summer...



Closed it off with a gorgeous day at Cox Farms with Parker and Colin. It was a great time. We managed to briefly lose 2 of the kids in the Corn Maze, Ty nearly got his popsicle eaten by a 2 year old (I'd explain but it was a 'had to be there' moment), and Parker got his "Iron Man" pumpkin. I hope Grant (whom I rightfully reserved on Friday!) looks back at this post and realizes how much more fun his Aunt Mandy is than Grammies. ;-P

People DO read my blog...??

That's the current rumor. So, I suppose I shall indulge you mystery viewers with my usual weekend update ramblings...

Actually, I have two weekends to catch up on. So, last rainy weekend was spent in the mud bath that I shall call the Maryland Renaissance Festival. It was actually really fun (while it stayed dry). The Fat Kid and I took Ty and Colin. And they each got what they came for: swords. So, they were happy campers. I also have some birthday wishes to catch up on: Grant Man and Skye Skye (yes, you all need to vote for that nickname...we can't let Kee-Kai(?!?) win!). Happy birthday to the cutest little niece and nephew an aunt could have. :-D I may be a little biased...

This past weekend was full of Great Falls and band fun. It was a gorgeous weekend, so...it's just about torture to not spend it outdoors. Went to Great Falls to do some hiking and climbing. The band played out at Kirkpatrick's and despite some sound issues and serious lack of practice, it went well. :) Fat Tuesday's coming up next! Oct. 24th, 11pm

No FNP drama for this post, maybe next time. Although, I have a feeling it may morph into a FNP/Rock Band (or FNP/RB) type update...

jenga! - jenga!....

Big shout out to Jason and Ying who were kind enough to throw a party for those of us who couldn't afford a trip to Thailand to be at their actual wedding. I know I should've officially said it months ago (but it wasn't official in my book until I saw the Jenga cake for myself), congratulations Jason and Ying!!

Fat Kid contest...

Contestant #1:



Contestant #2:



Now, Contestant #1 clearly does not even slow down the food shovel for a Kodak moment. And as his Aunt Mandy, whom knows a thing or two about food shoveling, I couldn't be prouder. I also can attest to the fact that he can and will use his belly as a weapon. And that's just BA.

Contestant #2, on the other hand, does have more experience as the Fat Kid although I'm not sure that his comparatively clean face will give him a win here. He does have the advantage in his philanthropic Fat Kid deeds, since he did buy a box of whoopie pies for his roommate. And in true Fat Kid style, buy a whole cake for himself.

Tough call.

Say hello to Jumpy...

Ty acquired a new hamster friend over the weekend. "He's the black thing in the picture." - Ty quote to his Grammies when showing her this pic and right after telling her it's a black hamster. It's one those, funny...but had to be there things.

My first political post...

All reading this probably know I'm not a political person. I vote, and that's about the extent of my involvement. Now, I'm not writing this to start the umpteenth online debate on who everyone should vote for. I'm just merely giving my two cents on how awesome our next vice-president is gonna be... :-D

So seriously, how can I not be excited about the thought of having a 'hockey mom' as vice-president? She hunts, she fishes... To top it off, the woman has 5 kids along with a successful political career. Anyone who can pull that off, IMHO, can do anything. Nice move, McCain.

Go Ms. Johnson...

So, I'm watching the Olympics last night and I gotta say, I wanna adopt Shawn Johnson. She's an adorable, boldsy, little powerhouse...what's not to love about that?! I'd have to say she's made the Olympics for me so far. Everyone has got Phelps phever, and while I think he's awesome as well...he doesn't quite reach the 'I-wanna-adopt' level with me.

Women's beach volleyball tonight, I hope they at least get challenged. And what happened to the men's beach volleyball? Mmmmmmm, Dalhausser... O:-)

FNP, Ty shows me how to golf, and Tuna's big day...

FNP is getting back on track. I won a whole $1.20...so watch out Stacy, I'm slowing taking 1st place back.

Took Ty to the golfing range, which was an interesting experience. Just like his mommy, he was reluctant to try something new but did it anyway. And he had a blast. I was pretty impressed with how quickly he picked it up, he was easily hitting the ball better than me (which I guess isn't saying much...yea, I'm that bad).

Sunday was Jason (aka Tuna) and Yui's wedding. Maybe now that they're married he'll get back into climbing and poker....ha! Congrats to the cute couple. :-D


The poker gang!!! Minus John and Wang (who was recovering from surgery...we missed you!).

Rocked the cas'been, climbed, golfed, partied, and climbed (again)...

Phew...so, I'm a bit tired. :)

Friday night was the Shebeen gig. Everything about it rocked...the stage, the lighting, but most of all...the security fellas guarding the stage. Because how rock star is that?! :)

Saturday morning, I dragged my smoke-reeking self outta bed and headed to Great Falls. I took my co-worker out to show her the ropes...it was fun, but her knee was bugging her. So we packed up after a couple climbs. Since it was such a nice day, we decided to head out to the golfing range where she showed me the ropes. It was a lot of fun, but I'm really bad!! How do these people keep their elbows straight??! It's just not natural...

That night we headed out to DC for Yui's bachlorette party. It was a blast!! I hadn't seen Yui for a while...I almost forgot how sweet she is. And all her friends were so much fun. Next, the wedding! woohoo :)


After 3 hours of sleep and still a bit wobbly from pineapple cocktails...headed out to Crescent Rock for some climbing. At this point, I'm just exhausted, but it's such a gorgeous day and the Starbucks is there...I couldn't not go! As always, a fun day on rocks.

$10 poorer, an ok gig, and KD...

Well, FNP was pretty brutal. Stacy took me out on maybe the 2nd hand when she flopped a straight and I flopped trip queen's. Darn queen's get me every time. The queen of hearts is NEVER your best bet...those lying Eagles. And it didn't get any prettier from there.

Saturday night was our gig in Ashburn, it was just ok. I think everyone was just grouchy from starting late and not having much of a crowd to work with. I will say this though...the 3rd set rocked! Oh, and there was a Redskin there. I did meet him but I can't remember what his name was...shocker, I know. Speaking of which, Auld Shebeen this Friday night everyone. So excited!!!

In conclusion, we took the crew to Kings Dominion on Sunday. The boys (and baby girl) had an awesome time. Ok, I'll admit it...I did too. Scooby Doo roller coaster will never get old and I pulled the victory of my life in the haunted house w/ 1680 pts!! Scott couldn't even compete with his 1200... :P As for the Tyler meltdown of the millenium that ensued at the end, well, we'll just pretend that didn't happen.

Because life has a way of just knowing...

...when you need a random bottle of personalized candy. :)

Why, Facebook, why?!....

First, no Scrabulous, now a re-design?? Facebook is killing me. Ok, the Scrabulous thing...I'm fairly shaken up about but at least they cut me off in the midst of a few games I was losing in. I'll let them off the hook for that, just so long as they bring it back before I get the shakes.

But as I'm coping with the loss of Scrabulous, they're now telling me to try the 'new' Facebook. Now everyone reading this knows that I hate change. And I really hate it when something is not broken! But I try it because I know they're gonna force it on me eventually. Of course, I don't like it. Here goes.

1. 'The Wall' and 'Mini-Feed' are now just a big honkin' combined wall. Info overload, yuck.

2. my iLike application is now on the left hand side and it's telling me that, apparently, I like songs I've never heard of. I just wanted the app for the videos...and now they're tiny. I'm doing away with it.

3. Granted, it is much more intuitive now to create a new photo album. But I don't like how I can either do it through the 'Application Tab' or 'The Publisher'. Give me one option or else I'm going to wonder what the difference is...and if I have to think, they have failed.

4. Looks like their trying to squeeze more ads in there. Boo to that. But I do give them credit for sticking to the Facebook 'style' with their ads. Maybe myspace (with their huge, flashing, distracting ads) will follow suit. Then again, does anyone even use myspace anymore?

Just my .02. Knowing me, a few of months of the new Facebook and I'll be singing it's praises.

Miami and our island hopping adventure...

As most of you already know, we are back from our vacation. Now, I don't have very many pics to share (which we'll get to in a moment), so I apologize if this post gets a bit verbose.

First off...Miami Beach. Best part, definitely the water...so gorgeous. A bit crowded for my liking but overall it was a nice place. Being that it's perfectly okay to bathe in the nude on those beaches, probably would never bring Ty there again. But hey, that's just me. We spent the day at South Beach where Ty devoured the 'best waffle' he'd ever eaten, spent some time in the ocean, capped it off with dinner with some fruity beverages :) and watched some women's beach volleyball. (Ty better look back on this post and realize what a cool mom he has...)

We sailed off on Monday and basically spent the day exploring the ship and splashing around a bit in the pool. I also believe this was the day we brought down the house with "Summer Nights" in the karaoke lounge. :) Ah, good times.

Tuesday we docked at the Grand Bahama Islands and hopped on another boat to go snorkeling. This had to be the highlight of the trip. I absolutely loved it, and it was a blast. To top it off, there was a rock wall on the boat and they did competitions to see who got to the top first. And not that I'm competitive or anything...but I smoked the Fat Kid. :P

Wednesday was Nassau, we did the whole Paradise Island thing. It was fun, but we didn't get to spend as much time on the beach as we should have because 1) it took us forever to figure out how to actually get to the beach (but thanks to some stranger... we pulled some Mission Impossible-ish moves and got into the restricted area for free) and 2) silly us, no one brought a watch.

And finally, our last day of the cruise was Great Stirrup Cay (NCL's island). It was nice, but gotta say...Disney's Castaway Cay island put this island to shame. Surprisingly, the beach area was small and it was just crowded. We did some snorkeling there as well...which again, was awesome. Now, as for the lack of photos, that would be due to the fact that a stranger now possesses my camera and all the pictures from our cruise. :( Yup, someone stole it the last night of the cruise. Leaving me with this lonely pic to share...enjoy! :)

WV trip report....

The much needed climbing weekend getaway! It was so much fun, I forgot how much I missed my little weekend road trips...but I must say, it just wasn't the same without squeaky Jimmy. We headed out Saturday morning and climbed all day at Franklin.



We had dinner at a nearby restaurant which I've coined, the "Italian Surprise". Yea...they give you little treats inside your dinner. Mine was one of those twisty wire things for your bread...mmmm yum.

The next day we climbed at Seneca. I got a good practice session on leading in before the rain hit, so I was happy with that. All in all, good trip. Need to get back into climbing shape, but I got to finally use all my new gear! Now it looks somewhat used...yay. :)

The state of my blogging's...

So, I've been doing a bit of thinking about my poor lil neglected blog. It's the summertime...I should be posting all about my awesome weekends on rocks and random, mildly amusing wedding gig posts, right? But no....

Well, the climbing posts should start popping up soon...I have little league to thank for that. But I'm crossing my fingers for a Utah climbing trip. I've been drooling at pics for far too long!

Now, the wedding gigs... those days are gone (well, with the exception of this weekend). BUT that just means that you all get to actually go to my gigs and be a part of the mildly amusing posts I'll write up. :) And with that said, mark your calendars for July 25th, we shall be rocking out at Kirkpatrick's.

And lastly, stay tuned as Guitar Hero has inspired me to start a blog series (an a.b. first!)...

Take me out to the thunderstorm....

Ty, the Fat Kid, and I went to Nats park yesterday to watch the rain. We were treated with a bit of baseball, maybe caught an inning or two. But I will say that it was pretty interesting to see the whole tarp process they have.


It rained for a good amount of time and Ty was quite the trooper, he wanted to stay until they came back on. We almost made it too, but at 9:50...I called it quits. Come to find out they came back on shortly thereafter, but then it started to pour again. Given the amount of people there when we left...they probably had about 9 people stay till the end.

Getting reacquainted with Martin...

Well, being busy with the new band and all, I haven't spent much time on the acoustic (aka Martin)...but I decided to try out a song that was recommended a while ago. It didn't come out too bad, however, the same rules still apply to my high-quality bedroom recordings...gotta crank it to hear it. Enjoy...

My Idol $0.02...

To think I almost missed the finale! Okay, I honestly didn't really care to see it...until I was flipping through the channels and saw ZZ Top! Nice. The OneRepublic tune was cool...I actually wish Archuleta (sp?) didn't join in on that. Sounded better as is. Jordan Sparks song was horrible... but that girls range just amazes me, doesn't matter what she sings. Ah, same goes to Carrie Underwood...but that song she sang was even more terrible. She's gotten a bit red-neck country. Yek.

As for my thoughts on the winner... how can you compare Archuleta and Cook? They're both awesome in very different ways. I think I was actually pulling a bit more for Archuleta just because being stamped as the American Idol can't be all that great to a rockers career.

FNP and the Burger Off...

FNP rocked. Apparently, the key is: beer. Not sure how I'm doing on the spreadsheet but if I can get a DD for FNP's...watch out! ;)

The Burger Off, which was a bit 'off', went well. The Fat Kid made an excellent burger with a touch of horseradish, twas yummy. But it was a bit disappointing that by the time he got his burgers done everyone was already full. For future reference, Burger Off's should never have more than 4 burgers! But hat's off to all the cooks, all the burgers were awesome.

Lastly...just a little rant. Now, I can't be too bitter about this because I do my fair share of ...um, raising my voice and occasionally picking up the acoustic fairly late at night. But what I do not do is yell, curse words and all, on Saturday AND Sunday mornings! I'm talking 7:30am-9am...just F-this and that...I'm a fairly heavy sleeper too! No, this does not happen during the week when I'd welcome some extra drama to wake me up. I need to win the lotto and move. :-(

Happy belated Mother's day!....

Hope everyone had a good Mother's Day! :) I know I enjoyed my breakfast in bed and Scrubs session. It occurred to me recently that I think 7 is the best age for boys. We go out and play ball and he's able to catch the ball most the time...and lord knows, he bats better than me. And now when I pick him up at the end of the day, he doesn't cry anymore! He actually gives me an unsolicited hug and even went as far as asking me how my day was the other day! So sweet. :-D

A pic from our rainy DC field trip...



And continuing on this Mother's Day post... Norweigan Cruise line is having a kids sail free deal. So, go book your vacation! (Preferably the July 21st sailing...so you can hang with us!)