SUPAF

No, it's not a new cult! It stands for Southern Utah Performing Arts Festival. And that's where we were tonight. Brandon has been taking piano lessons since December from an awesome teacher. No, not me. We tried that and it didn't work out very well. I enlisted someone much better, my old piano teacher! She's amazing and loves Brandon. How could she not though, he's my child! So, there's this performing arts festival and she wanted Brandon to do it. Sure, I said. I love to torture my child by making him practice his fingers off and playing in front of perfect strangers. No problem. His teacher found him a song and we worked on it for a while. When I say "we", I mean he practiced and I threatened. You always need a good threatener right?

Anyways, tonight was the big night and he did awesome! Look for yourself. Here is his certificate that he got. He received a I. That is a roman numeral one or a SUPERIOR! The highest ranking!

We are so proud of him! He worked so hard practicing. He hasn't even played any video games for about two weeks because I've been such a taskmaster and made him practice every. single. day. So horrible! But, it all paid off!

This is him waiting for his turn. I think every child needs thick frames, a mohawk and a skull tie! So cute! But that's a post for another day. Soon.

Here he is playing his song, "The Spider Dance". He said he wasn't nervous when he played (I always was) and that it was so cool that he could see the strings of the piano!

Great job Bubba, we're so proud of you!

Broadway, Here She Comes!

In December, Kendal had a couple recitals. She's been taking tap for a few months and loves it! They performed "Jingle Bell Rock" and she did a great job! Here's a few pictures from her big recital and a video from the Festival of Trees. Enjoy!

She is the second one over from the right. So cute!

Random

Just some random thoughts I'm having. Thought I'd throw them out to y'all and get your observations.

*Watched Hoarders online last night. If you've never seen it, it's about people who hoard things. Lots of things. The episode we watched had a family that had bedbugs in their home. I itched all over through the whole thing. Then, I drove Derek crazy looking for bedbug bite pictures (In the middle of the show) because I was "sure" that Kendal had bedbugs because she had a little red bump on her stomach. He finally threatened to leave the viewing area if we didn't get back to the show. I acquiesced. A little unwillingly.

*Proving that I am all kinds of crazy I went into Kendal's room in the middle of the night, flipped on the lamp, and pulled back the covers to catch those bedbugs in action. Hhmmm....no bedbugs. Maybe Derek was right.

*Making sure I really get institutionalized, I took the sheets off my kids' bed, stuffed them in the washer and hit sanitize (Yep, my washing machine can sanitize your clothes. Anyone else want to join the craziness?) to get rid of the bedbugs.

*There's something in my sock. I bet it's a bedbug.

*I quit the PTVO. I was Treasurer. I gave them two months notice, but now I'm feeling all kinds of crazy guilt. I have really good reasons. Can I give you my reasons? Just to make the guilt go away? No? Okay. I'll keep 'em to myself. Just know, I could never rob a bank. I'd feel too guilty.

*Made these Oatmeal cookies Sunday. So good and now I can't stop eating them. I had pecans, but was too lazy to shell them so I added two cups of chocolate chips. Delicious. When you see my booty walking down the street, just know that what got it to be the size it is is those cookies. Yum!

*Need to go to the gym to work off those cookies. Really don't feel like it.

*Made this chicken for dinner tonight. We'll see how it turns out. I didn't put it in a ziploc bag because I didn't have any and I didn't cut the chicken up because it was frozen and I wanted to do the least amount of work possible. So, I poured the marinade over the frozen chicken in a 9x13 pan and called it good.

*Derek got me this brain for Christmas. I'm using it to finally get my house spic and span using her. Love her so much! My house has never looked so clean! Amazing!

*There's a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup calling my name. I best not let it down. To the cupboard!! (Say it like a superhero - it'll make ya happy!)


Update:
*Took my shoe off. Nothing there. Crazy!
*Took me almost 4 minutes to eat those peanut butter cups. It'll take me hours to work it off though!

A New Addition

You'll notice over to the right a little, there's a new addition to my blog. It's called a Swag Bucks widget. I found the Swag Bucks site through Couponing to Disney. She's using coupons and rewards to save for a trip to Disney. I'm not that adventurous, I'd just like to have enough Swag Bucks earned by October to pay for Christmas. But I need your help to do that. Just think, if you help me earn enough Swag Bucks, you can feel like you had a hand in buying my kids' Christmas. Think of all the warm fuzzy feelings you could have. All you have to do is this:

Click here: Melip

You get three free Swag Bucks and so do I! Awesome huh!

All you have to do to earn Swag Bucks is to use their search engine to search. Just think, each of us search probably a few hundred times a day, now, you get rewarded to do it! You never know when you'll win one, but if you search through Swag Bucks, you could earn at least 4 a day and have your Christmas paid for too!

This is my only goal for this year.
I figure I should start small.
Start with one attainable goal and work my way up.

If you don't want to sign up, then don't.
If you're offended that I'm promoting this, well....tough luck for you!

Getting Old

This morning, I spent an enormous amount of time doing something that I thought I wouldn't be doing till I turned at least...AT LEAST 50....pulling white hairs out!

Not even gray! White!

I spent about 15 minutes on one because it was just a little too short to grab...darn thing!

Now, my arms are a little sore from all that exercise.

Getting old is certainly not for the faint of heart. So, in honor of my getting old I've decided to get a new hair-do. Dye, cut, everything! Here's my options:

What do you think?

Red or afro?

I'm really not quite sure...hhmmm...

Let's take a vote!

Let me know which one you think I should go with to cover up my white hairs.

Most creative answer wins!

What do you win?

My admiration for having an amazing imagination!

National Lampoon's Christmas Light Contest

Hi all! I'm moonlighting over at The Caffeinated Chef for awhile.

Come join us for the best and worst lights of the season.

We post every night between 8:00 and 10:00 pm.

The bonus is that we go out and look for the best and worst lights so you don't have to.

Here's my pick for favorite of all time.

Enjoy!

Randomness

Wow! It only took me two days to figure myself out! And guess what? I'm incredible! {I'm totally tongue in cheek here!} I did remember that I like to sew. So, I've pulled out the 'ole sewing machine and will be attempting to do some cute Christmas gifts for some friends and family. I can't share though, 'cause it's a secret!

To get yourself in the holiday mood, head over to the Caffeinated Chef. He's doing a National Lampoon style Christmas light contest. Many, many years ago we had a neighbor whose Christmas lights were a little odd, so this contest is really in his honor. Hopefully you'll have just as much fun as we do when we go out looking at lights.

Yesterday, I got to spend about 45 minutes on the phone with some REALLY interesting people. Remember the Wal-Mart phone fiasco? So, it turns out that I had to call the third party retailer that Wal-Mart goes through, Letstalk.com. I came to find out that there are people out there who are more odd than me {and that's hard to do}. The guy I talked to made it clear to me and every person at Verizon {we had to talk to them too} that I signed myself up wrong. Because of course it could NEVER be a computer error!

And as we speak, my daughter is shaking Christmas presents trying to figure out what they are. So far, we have a brick, Picsos, beads, and a treasure chest.

Back to the story: Maybe I just need to be more humble and accept my role in the problem. Hhmmm....nope, not going to happen. Anyways, we're on the phone. I say we're because there was me, the Let's Talk guy, and the Verizon guy. And as we get transfered from one person to another, the Let's Talk guy gets madder and madder. Now, we're being transfered to our third person and he forgets that I'm still on there because while I can hear the Verizon hold music, I can also hear him in the background imitating an R-Rated movie. At this point, my head is pounding, I've been trying to get this fixed for about 35 minutes and I'm listening to this guy swear up a storm. As much as I wanted to lose it on this guy, I held it back {Oh! I'm patient!} and said, "Sir, I'm still here and I don't appreciate you swearing at me." There was a pause and a surprised, "What?" And I said again, "I can hear you swearing at me. And I really don't want to hear it." He apologized, was quiet, then disconnected {Thank heavens, he was making me crazy!} after he explained to the third Verizon person what I had done wrong that fateful day two weeks ago.

So, it might be taken care of, it might not be. If I have to call Let's Talk again, I'll need to remember to take some anti-anxiety meds before I get on. I might even offer some to the guy on the other line because apparently at Let's Talk, they really don't want to talk and they're slightly high strung!

Kendal just told me that she hopes we got her some good Christmas presents. What? A brick isn't a good Christmas present? If you want to know what that brick really is...well, you'll have to wait for Christmas just like the rest of us!