Minnesota Twins!

Like many companies, my company has busy and less busy times. During our 'quarter launch' times my department likes to provide incentives to help get us through the craziness that can ensue. This quarter one of those incentives was free Twin's tickets... and I was the lucky one to win them. The best part was that the game was in the middle of the day and I wasn't required to use any of my paid time off to go to it. Oh, and not only that, but these were pretty awesome seats too.

When the email went out announcing that I won the tickets I received a flurry of emails from other people in my department congratulating me. People stopped me in the halls and I was even told “It’s kind of exciting to know the person who won instead of it being someone from Marketing or something”. I felt a little like a celebrity. When I left work that day my teammates said goodbye to me as if I was headed out to Fort Myers. It was all pretty exciting.

My husband's company is also going through a busy time of the quarter, but he knew it was a great opportunity to spend some alone time with his wife (and thousands of other people) so he took some time off of work to join me. He's not really a baseball fan so he wasn't as excited as me (especially since he did have to use PTO), but he did look forward to having some 'us' time without the kid.

This was earlier on in the game when we were probably losing 6 - 0... and you can see the disappointment in Jesse's face.

I guess I should back up and say that I used to love baseball when I was younger. It was really the only entertainment in the town I grew up in. But as I got older I seemed to lose interest in it (and start to watch football instead - what happened? I have no idea). I have to admit that the last Twin's game I went to was in 1987. Yeah, that's 25 years ago. Of course, the last game I went to was game 6 of the World Series so it was a doozy of a game, but certainly too long ago.

I'd been wanting to check out the new Target Field as everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, seems to think it is the bees knees, but we just hadn't gotten around to it yet. And then this opportunity came along. I work on a team that has some serious Twin's fans so I felt a little guilty about going to this game instead of them, but I figured I deserved it for a number of reasons (Hello! I haven't seen the Twins play live in 25 years!).

One of my co-workers, Maggie, has gone to the home opener every year for 8 years where she has received the promotional magnet schedule, but she wasn't able to do so this year. This was game three of the series, but they were still handing the magnets out to the first 20,000 people. She really wanted one so I was on a mission to get one for her. I was a little worried I'd be able to accomplish this task since we were late to the game, but I got her one... and, hopefully, that void in her is now filled.

The game at first wasn't too exciting. It was going pretty fast because we'd get up to bat and pretty much 1 out, 2 out, 3 out... done, but mid game we started fighting back and in the end won 10 - 9. We had to leave at the top of the 9th to pick our kid up from daycare, but this also allowed us to miss most of the end of the game congestion. 

Bases loaded!... which then became a blown opportunity. But we fought back shortly after this.

One of my favorite parts of the game was when a couple fouls balls came down near us... not close enough to catch, but close enough to see how people rejoiced and responded. The first one came down, bounced off some people, rolled around on the ground, and was snatched up by a guy who jumped up triumphantly displaying the ball. Most people clapped and let him have his moment, but I heard a few murmurs of "he didn't even catch it" as if his excitement was a little too much for what it was. Only moments later another foul ball came down on the other side of me where it was caught by a guy who turned around and handed it to a little boy. That is apparently how you catch a ball with style and class and everyone acknowledged it. And the look on that little boy's face was priceless.  

As far as food goes there were waitresses in our area, but we went inside and ordered food at one of the many counters. I had the typical hot dog even though I had some pretty awesome stuff to choose from inside the Legend's Club. It just seemed right, although now I wish I had tried the shrimp sandwich for $11.00... or something that isn't probably offered elsewhere in the stadium. Chances are I'm not going to sit in this area again anytime soon (oh, how I loved the cushions seats). At any rate, I only shelled out $9.75 for my hot dog and water... and the water cost more than the hot dog. Wah, wah...

Inside the Legend's club you could still watch the game and eat at the window. I expected to use this area to warm up since it was a little chilly out, but our seats were in the sun and we were hot (I even got a bit of a farmer's tan)! We actually had to come in here and cool down. 

In the end we had a great time and Jesse even wants to come back and check out an evening game. I guess I won't have to wait another 25 years to see another game live. That is if we can get a babysitter...

Easter Weekend

Holiday celebrations are always a struggle in our household (probably like many households) because we have to figure out which side of the family to attend. Oh, it could be way worse... we could be trying to squeeze in both sides on the same day. No, thank you. We make it a point to swap every other year, although we've had a few goofs where we go two years in a row to the same family. This year we spent Easter with my family... and last year too, but since we spent the last two Thanksgivings at Jesse's family's this was our attempt to even things out. As suspected though, Jesse's mom had an Easter basket for Riley so she and Michael came over on Saturday and we went out to lunch.

Of course, the only thing she would eat at the restaurant was fries... until she saw the ketchup. Then the fries were simply a tool to get the ketchup into her mouth.

Grandma's so cute... always trying to get my little "I won't sit still or listen to directions" Riley to look at the camera. This one is pretty darn close.

Later that day we decided to fly our new kite. It was a perfectly windy day for it.

I have to admit I'm not really an Easter person. I'm not religious, I don't really like pastels... I could actually be fine without celebrating this day. I was talking with a co-worker who also isn't religious, but she makes Easter baskets for her son and granddaughter. Her granddaughter, by the way is 2 months old. I didn't really get it, and noted that Riley has never received a basket from us. She was a little shocked and it got me to thinking that I could make this into a fun holiday for the kid... which would make it a fun holiday for me. Grandma and grandpa already got her a basket so I decided to do an Easter egg hunt. My family usually does one, but my brother planned different games and I knew we'd be arriving late due to Riley's nap schedule. So off to Menard's to get some plastic eggs on Easter morning. Luckily, they had one package left and, if anything, Riley got to drive this cart around.

Once at home we decided to not fill the eggs with candy. We don't really give candy to Riley and don't want to encourage it. I decided to put some of her magnetic letters in them, and because I'm weird like this I made sure that the letters ended up spelling 'easter'. Jesse suggested we also put food in some of them so I broke up some crackers and dispersed them between the remaining eggs. She really loves crackers so it's like we were giving her candy. What awesome parents are we?

Then we headed out to the yard after daddy hid the eggs.

She had a fun time finding the eggs even if she didn't quite get what we were asking her to do at first. And while she got really excited about the crackers she was super excited about finding letters.

In the afternoon we headed over to my brother's house. The celebration started at 1:00, but Riley is usually sleeping at that time. We hoped that we could get her down for a nap early to ensure that we'd show up by 3:00 when dinner was being served. Since I was bringing salad and bread I needed to be there by that time. I knew this plan would be impossible to stick to when she slept in until 7:45 that morning. She's usually up around 6 am so I'm not sure what miracle occurred that allowed her to sleep in (wish it occurred for me too, but I was up before 6 am). After multiple attempts to get her to nap (including finding her knee stuck in the side of her crib) we finally gave up a little after 2:00. So off to my brother's house we went.

Every time baby Rocky cried Riley had to go check him out and make sure he was ok. 

Rocky has quite the moves. 

Golf. Yeah, I didn't spend much time in this room.

Riley discovered my niece's cat, CC, and proceeded to chase her around the house and outside. I'm not sure if she understood that her name was CC as I'm pretty sure she was calling her Lucy, which is one of our cat's names. 

CC ran into the trees and disappeared. This was  pretty perplexing for my kid. "Where she go? Where she go? Where she go?..."

Still lamenting the disappearance of the cat...

My mom has Alzheimer's. She's at a stage where she doesn't really talk or know who we are. She sleeps a lot, but still gets around somewhat ok. I take Riley to see her and my dad a lot at my mom's memory care facility so Riley has had plenty of experiences around people with Alzheimer's, but I'm not sure what she understands or what she thinks of grandma. This day I had her standing in front of grandma when grandma grabbed Riley's arms and held on to her pretty tight. My mom was talking, but you couldn't understand what she was saying. I was impressed with Riley as she just stood there looking at Grandma Ann. She looks a little scared here, but I think it was more curiosity... trying to figure out this new side of grandma that she hasn't really seen. 

Riley was very well behaved considering that she didn't nap, but you can see that she was tired. Apparently, everyone was tired as even Jesse is sleeping in the background here. We headed out shortly after this and dropped my parents off at my mom's nursing home. Riley was pretty upset that she couldn't go in as she loves running around that place, but we got her home, got her ready for bed, and she was pretty much out before she hit the crib.

April Photo a Day - Week 1

Week 1 of April Photo a Day inspired by Fat Mum Slim

4/1

Your Reflection

We've been doing some work on our kitchen. Actually, my husband has been doing most of the work while I've run after a 2 year old. Regardless of that fact, I identify with being the one who is very involved in home remodeling. So when I saw Riley playing with the tools I immediately thought that she was a mini reflection of me.  And, please never mind the chisel she has in her hand. It's dull. I swear.

4/2 

Colour

Children bring a lot of color into your life (in so many ways). My life hasn't had this much (visual) color since the 80's.

4/3

Mail

Red house. Red mail box. I think it's pretty clear I like the color red. 

4/4

Someone Who Makes You Happy

So I actually took this picture on 4/5, but I had every intention of taking it on 4/4. 4/4 was a fail picture day, but the next couple days felt like that too. It felt a little more like an obligation than something to do for fun... or for a challenge. At any rate, I like this picture above because I know that she was dancing and singing "Ring Around The Rosie" and this is where she fell down... her favorite part. This kid makes me happy beyond words.

4/5

Tiny

As noted above, this day felt a little forced. I was taking a picture because I had to, but I didn't really challenge myself. This one could have been really fun, but I'm not going to worry about it. It turned out in the end. The turtle is tiny... and I am moving on.

4/6

Lunch

OMG. How pitiful am I? Totally forgot to take a picture of my lunch... which I wasn't very excited about anyway. I've been without a stove for a week and a half so I have been eating out a little bit more than usual. A couple hours after lunch I snuck my camera out of my purse and took a quick picture of the remaining evidence of my lunch (and breakfast and snack, actually)... and totally got busted by my co-worker who was all like "did you just take a picture of your garbage?"

4/7

Shadow

Ok, this day I was back on track with being inspired to take my picture of the day, but I was worried I might not be able to get a good shadow shot as it started out as a rainy, gloomy day. Luckily, the sun came out and I was able to get this picture while we were out flying a kite.

See April Photo a Day week 2.

Kitchen Remodel part 3ish

So the last time I posted any updates about the kitchen was last September. Yeah, September was quite some time ago, but there hasn't been much movement on finishing it... until recently. Jesse and I had decided we would tile the floor or have someone else tile it. That was our first roadblock. I thought we could totally tile it ourselves, but he was worried about a few areas and thought we should have a professional install it, but I just couldn't get over what it would cost.

Our next obstacle was actually finding tile that we liked and was within budget. We had someone donate extra tile they had, but the color didn't quite look right with our counter top so we kept looking. Besides not being able to find tile in a color/style that I liked I also realized how hard and cold it would be. I did not like this at all and even thought for a moment, that it may be in our best interest to put vinyl  back in...but then I came to my senses.

Our kitchen flows into our dining room which has 60+ year old oak wood floors so I had assumed that it would be too hard to match the hardwood. I dismissed the hardwood idea outright, but after struggling with the tile I decided to contact my hardwood floor guy to actually ask him. Turns out it's no big deal and he does it all the time. We set up a time for him to install, and after me screwing up the the install date (which led to some frantic clearing of appliances out of the kitchen) we got the floors done a couple weeks ago.

For reference, this is the vinyl we just took out and the flooring that was below that.

Vinyl out and floor prepped.

Wood in. Next step... sand and seal.

Final floor. So happy with how it turned out.

With the floor complete we could work on finishing some of those minor details like trim. Riley ended up getting sick so Jesse did most of the work of installing trim, finishing tile, and painting. We still have a corner between the kitchen and dining room that needs to be done, but for the most part the kitchen remodel is done. Now just to get window treatments, and a new toaster oven...

Just a reminder... here's a before and after.

Before:

After:

Randoms

Here's a random (long) catch up...


* Jesse recently taught Riley how to go down the slide on her belly. Now she absolutely has no hesitation about the slide and can easily make 20 trips down the slide in a short visit to the park. So fun to see her embrace this.

She saw grandpa climb up this pole and then wanted to do it herself. When she couldn't do it one of us told her it was broken. She totally bought it. Ah, the lies we tell our children...


* Someone really loves salad... as long as it has a creamy dressing.

* Menards opened! They tore down our local Menards to build a bigger and better one and it recently reopened. We survived without it because Home Depot is close by and Lowes isn't that far either, but I'm a Menard's girl. I grew up on Menards and my dad loves Menards. They even send him birthday cards.

We decided to check it out a week before they had their official grand opening celebration. Riley wanted to crawl/walk through any opening she could find and we sorta let her lead the way as we checked out the new store. 

Riley insisted on wearing her hat and glasses the whole time in the store. She received a multitude of comments from staff and customers alike. Everyone seemed to think she was fabulous. I even had a pack of employees cheering her on as she ran away from me. She sure does win people over.

If we ever move into a medieval castle this door will be perfect. Let's just say that this Menards appears to offer a larger selection than the last store did.

* My nephew, Michael, married his wife, Diana, in San Diego this past year, but recently had a reception here in MN. To start the celebrating we threw Diana a shower at Crave:

I finally gave in and decided to turn the flash on for this photo. I didn't want to be the annoying one with the flash, but I figured one picture wouldn't irritate too many people... and hey, I wasn't talking the picture anyway. Above are Jenny, Diana, Judy, and myself. Jenny and Diana are my sister, Judy's, daughter-in-laws.

On the night of the reception we had Riley with us so we weren't able to stay too late, but we still had a lot of fun. Plus, Riley wore the new dress grandma and grandpa gave her.

I bought Riley these new sandals which she told me were "pretty", but once I put them on she freaked out so she wore some other black shoes she has. I'm trying to decide if I just return them or see if she'll get used to them. I really, really want her to get used to them, but I know you can't make a kid like something they just won't.

I didn't get the best pictures at the reception, but here's a taste of the event.

The early crowd. Family was encouraged to come early to be included in pictures.

My sister, Angel, and her husband, Greg, got to sit at the 'cool' table with us.

Michael is in the Navy (hence the uniform). He was deployed shortly after they were married so hopefully, he doesn't have to go anywhere soon and they can enjoy being newlyweds.

Father of the groom, Jim, toasting the couple.

When Riley got a little distracted we pulled out the iPad. She usually knows which apps are hers, but occasionally she explores the other apps. She found this one of Jesse's where you land planes and helicopters on different landing strips/pads trying to avoid accidents. It can get a little tricky at times as the planes come faster and faster. It wish I had a shot of how she had these plans going in crazy circles. Obviously, she's gonna need a little more training before becoming a pilot.


* This weekend grandma and grandpa were going to babysit while Jesse and I went to see the Hunger Games movie, but that didn't work out since Riley was sick. Little one had a fever so she was half parts super cuddly and half parts "devil child". If I looked at her, or stood too close, or just existed... she'd freak out, but then moments later would snuggle up to me. Luckily she's feeling like her old self again.

Not happy. Oddly, she's wearing a hoodie here as she's not usually a fan. In fact, if her hoodie came off she got upset.

Luckily, monkey hugs are just the thing when you don't feel well.