Happy Weekend Photos!

Posting all my happy photos from the weekend is starting become a trend for me... so here goes again. Happy Photos 34 - 36.

Happy Photo #34.  Early Birthday fun from my big bro and family!  All kinds of fun goodies! And Margo desperately wanted to play with it all!

Happy Photos #35 Painting fun!  I'm a messy painter but the walls look so pretty now!  2 walls down.. 2 to go!

 

Happy Photo #36 My friend Hobbs.  I checked in on my sweet kitty friend while a neighbor watching him was out of town (and his owner is deployed)...I love Hobbles as his owner calls him.  He's such a sweet boy!  Happy to be able to send some pics of him to his daddy!

Happy Photo #33

I'm lazy about getting my mail.  There's never anything exciting in it so sometimes I will go days without even checking it, which I'm sure my mailman loves when it gets full of Kohls advertisements and Penny Savers making it hard to squeeze even another postcard in.  So this morning on my way to my car I realized I hadn't gotten my mail in a few days (mostly because it was dark out by the time I got home and I'm a scaredy cat and go straight inside when unseen scariness is lurking around my neighborhood late at night --I don't know what this scariness actually is as I've never actually seen anything frightening but you know... the dark is scary by itself!).  OK, so back to the point - I got my mail and it held a fabulous surprise!  

1. I had an envelope addressed to Jenny (never-mind it has my old last name on it... not everyone realizes I changed it back). The only people that call me Jenny are family members or really old friends so just seeing that made me smile!

2.  It was full of pictures of my beautiful niece and her beautiful family.  I'm not biased, they are for real an awesome family!  This started my morning off perfectly!  Happy Thursday everyone!

Happy Happy Weekend Full of Happy Photos!

Busy weekend: After I was finally feeling better last week I had a pretty busy weekend here in happy photo land :-)

#28: On Thursday I bought a new perch for my favorite kitty.  Watching "My Cat From Hell" while laid up on the couch sick inspired me to give my sometimes aggressive girl some more high up space to take in the world from.  She's still a little skeptical of it's suitability for her needs but she's checking it out regularly and then dive bombing whoever is relaxing on the couch.  Note to self: do not leave beverages on that end table.

#29: I went on a nice walk on Friday with some friends and we did a little off roading on some of the dirt trails at Kinder Farm Park.  It was a fun time exploring... I had no idea these beautiful little nooks were tucked back in the park.  

#30: Concert Time!  My best concert bud (and friend extraordinaire in general) Tammy and I drove down to Southern Maryland to see Cole Swindell and Lee Brice.  The show was great and the fans were absolutely crazy for their Lee Brice but the most entertaining moment of the night might have come when we were waiting in line for the port-a-potty.  Picture a long line of port-a-potties each with their own line of patiently waiting (ok not everyone was patient) concert goers who have probably drank too much beer and suddenly one line just stops moving (our line of course!) All of the other lines keep moving but ours just keeps on standing still and no one is exiting our nice little portable bathroom.  And then about 15 minutes later a man AND a woman come out and quickly exit stage right.  WHAT!?!?  REALLY?!?  I have to say that aside from my absolute shock (and the gross factor) half of the entertainment came from the potty mouthed yet adorable young woman behind us in line who was indignantly angry that they were taking up our potty while she really had to pee. "Priorities People!"

#31: Nature walk on Sunday -- an awesome and incredibly silly person taught me that you can take seed pods (we called them helicopters) and pop the seed out of the one end and then magically the sticky parts can be stuck to your nose!  or wherever I guess, but its fun having a seed pod nose :-)

#32: a karate class full of 4 year olds... need I say more.  So much cuteness in one room I could hardly stand it.  I think the most skilled little ninja of course is the one pictured :-) He gets all of his coordination skills from his Aunt Jenny!

Many Happy Photos!

Happy Photo #24 - Someone super nice made me a perfect first meal after being sick for days.  SOO delicious!

Happy Photo #25 - I picked up a scarf I've been working on for like forever while watching TV last night.  It was good to feel the knitting needles in my hand.  Unsurprising added level of difficulty came into play though.  Her name is Margo and she LOVES yarn :-)

Happy Photos #26 - OK - it's three photos but one lovely experience.  The wallpaper removal magician came and visited me while I was sick and pulled down all the wallpaper that I have been loathing FOREVER while I laid on the couch and interrupted wallpaper pulling for more gatorade and tylenol. I am a lucky lucky girl.  Both below the chair rail and border (not pictured but equally yuck) are gone forever! AND I get to cross it off my Rocking 2014 List!

Happy Photo #27 Tiny Origami Frog! My awesome co-worker made this very tiny, very adorable froggie. It makes me smile sitting there looking at me while I work.

I read a grown up book!

Top Secret Twenty One by Janet Evanovich


I even surprised myself when I got to the end of a book that was over 300 pages... it's been a while!  Lately the only books I've finished are the kinds with LOTS of pictures.  Now don't get me wrong, I love picture books and easy readers and I'm happy to count them in my number of books for the year but I was starting think that my nearly 37 year old attention span couldn't handle a book with more than one sentence on each page.

So what was the trick... reading something light, something where I already know and love the characters and pretty much know how things are going to turn out.  The trick was the 21st installment of my favorite comfort series with my old friends Stephanie, Ranger, Morelli, and of course Grandma. You will notice Ranger gets first mention there... I'm Team Ranger in my reading life, though I'd probably be team Morelli in real life.

In any case, I enjoyed this book like an evening out with old friends.  I always look forward to the new installment of this series to be part of my summer reading even though lots of fans complain that the story is getting old and Stephanie never picks between the two men in her life.  Somehow I'm OK with that.

Special perk of this book: Grandma has a bucket lists.  I love crazy Grandma and I love bucket lists :-) and hers has some pretty spectacular things on it... a few she manages to accomplish!  Way to go Grandma!

Now -- What to read next?

Music To My Ears and Happy Photo #23

One of my awesome friends and I have hit a few concerts recently with another one on the way next week and we are having a blast as always.

This past Saturday we hit up the Delaware State Fair to see Lady Antebellum and Joe Nichols and for the first time in our concert going dates we had PIT tickets... and let's just say it's going to be hard to want to buy normal seats EVER AGAIN!  It was so much fun to be standing in the very front row and we found there was actually much more space to move around in the pit then we have ever had in our assigned seats or even on the lawn... we had plenty of room to dance around and somehow there were no overly intoxicated fans running into us... this had been an ongoing problem for us in the past...I was beginning to think we were magnets :-)

Anyway - Lady A is incredible live... one of the best concerts I've ever seen... they sound great and and they do a lovely job interacting with their fans, something I find country musicians are lots better at doing than other genres.  So go see them.  Or go see any live music, there are plenty of free summer concerts happening and it's a lovely way to spend an evening.  If you're local to Anne Arundel County, check out the Dept of Recreation and Parks Summer Concert Series or if you are a Carroll County native check out Sam Hunt at the Carroll County Fair this Saturday evening (this one isn't free- but it's a nominal $15 fee and it's a great organization).

So get out there and enjoy some tunes... at the very least turn on your boom box (is that still an actual thing or is it all just ipods now) in the back yard and enjoy some music under the stars... It's good for the soul :-)

Just for fun... here are some pictures from our awesome time last weekend!

Happy Photos #19, 20, 21, & 22 - AKA Catching Up!

My favorite reading spot: my mom's chair with a cup of coffee!

Chocolate Blizzard with Peanut Butter Cup!  Yum!  Delivered to me after a long day by an awesome person.. even better

I signed many many papers with this pen! And now I own my very own house.

My favorite sneaks with hot pink accents... the pink makes me run faster :-)