Frag'n Friday

Thank you Mrs. 4444s for being so patient with me since I seem to post my Friday Fragments more often on Saturday morning....

*Check out my ChocBite review. Coupon for 20% off and a chance to make your own deliciously wonderful chocolate bar.

*The reason for not posting yesterday was a mere 27 mile bike ride with the 5th graders. It's an annual thing for the 5th grade.

B and I practiced the night before by riding a mile.

Um, right, so evidently there is a big difference between a mile and 27 miles.

B and her friend A all smiles before we start. (They actually ended with even bigger smiles!)

I was the cool mom with the speaker and the ipod hooked up on my bike. Hey Melisa, like the blue duct tape?

This is what greeted us near the end of our trip. Thank Heavens there is an ice cream shop on the bike path!

*I feel I have an American Idol post in my, so right now I am just going to say, "congratulations, Lee"! And I love, love this song that he and Crystal did together. I hope they do more duets!

*Real proud moment for my alma matta (Bates) and the Lewiston police this past week. Seems a bunch of graduating seniors had a party that got out of hand and the police took a little extra anger out on them. I think the police in Lewiston (predominantly blue collar town) see the Bates kids as spoiled, preppy, entitled kids. I agree that there were a few of those types when I went there, but then there were a lot of kids like me that were grateful to be there (and certainly NOT rich).

*OK, I am off to help my parents with a garage sale, have 2 weddings to shoot this weekend and still have an ear infection despite antibiotics. Any ear infection advice out there? It drained a bit and now is all plugged up again.

*Enjoy your weekend and don't forget to thank a service man/woman!

Gretel is 4!

I never had a dog growing up. Our pets were more on the "small, live for a few months" nature. I had gerbils and fish and that was about it. We were all allergic to furry things and we were on the go so much, that "real" pets didn't fit in our family.

That changed almost 4 years ago when we were shipped a labradoodle from Idaho who was called Gretel. I picked a labradoodle because she was hypoallergenic. The girls picked her because she was cute. Matt didn't care, he just wanted a dog because he had grown up with lots of pets.

We were hoping she would ease the anxieties of K with lots of snuggle time. (It still works) I was hesitant because I knew I would be this puppy's main care giver. It's true, I was and am. Sometimes, when I walk her, it still seems surreal that I have a dog. Me the "non-dog" lover.

We couldn't have asked for a sweeter, more patient dog. Yesterday she turned 4! It was fun to look at some pictures of her over the years.

Happy Birthday Gretel! We love you!

ChocBite

I got my first review through Business to Blogger last week. I am not sure how I was picked, but maybe it was my obvious obsession with chocolate. Yes, I got to review chocolate. Not only review, but create my own piece and review it. I am a lucky girl.

Adeline began her obsession with chocolate when she was dieting, but wanted to treat herself with a nice piece of chocolate at the end of the day. She tasted all kinds of chocolate, but in the end, decided that if she could only have one little piece at the end of the day, then it had to be the BEST CHOCOLATE EVER! (or EVAH! as we say in New England).

Take my advice or take her advice, this is by far a golden ticket of chocolate. What makes it even better is that you can add whatever you want to your piece of chocolate. I decided to go with some of my faves and added mini M&Ms, chocolate sprinkles, Andes' Mints, and peanuts on top of milk chocolate. I was skeptical because of Adz claim to goodness. She basically said that her chocolate was the best. In the case of my creation, she was right! I said, "Ohhh, this is yummy!" My daughter said, "Can I have some more?" and my mom said, "Delicious!". It was devoured in a matter of minutes. I did snap a little picture before the munching began.

I love how it comes in it's little package with a "bite" taken out of it. The little saying is Bite Me. Now, I knew I was going to love it right when I saw that tag line, because sadly enough, I often say that when I am frustrated. But in this case it cracked me up! I might have to buy one of their tshirts that says that!

With this code CHOCBITE20 any blogger who reads this can get 20% off anything in the store FOR THE REST OF THE YEAR!! How great is that?

In addition, if you would like the opportunity to make your own chocolate bar for free, join this contest (US and Cananda).

Tweet your chocbite bar design to @chocbite and leave me a comment and the link. This contest will be open until the end of the day 6/3/2010. Please make sure you leave your email address in case I do not have it. You will have 48 hours to respond.

For extra entries:

"Follow" me here or on FB

Follow me on twitter @ascapecodturns

Let the munching begin!

I was not paid for this review, just given a bar of chocolate. The review is totally my opinion.

Sundays in My City

Sundays in my City, brought to you by Unknown Mami. Check her out and other fabulous shots from around the world!

I promised you squid cutting pictures and I do not disappoint! We had our big Maritime Festival here yesterday and the squid that we cut on Friday became calamari! Let's take an inside look on how squid are cut by a certain group of fabulous women at one of the Cape's most beautiful spots......

Squid have ink in them. They squirt it when they are escaping a predator. Unfortunately, if you break the squid "pen" while you are dissecting the squid, you get black ink on you (and under your nails and in your hair....)

My sister being silly with her piece of squid.

This is actually the good part of the squid that has been cut. This will be washed off and fried!

Like I said, your hands get inky. Probably should have taken the rings off first.

The girls hard at work.

Still more to go in the cooler...

When I said "pretty", I meant it!

We are almost done! And we are still smiling! Where's Mike Rowe when you are doing a good 'dirty job'?

Frag'n Friday

Yup, it's Friday already! What a week! Stop by Mrs. 4444's and share you scattered seedlings of happiness (or crap, depending on how your week went).

*I just took a break from vacuuming with my new vacuum to write this post. I actually had to tear myself away from vacuuming. Yes, you read that right. I just bought a new vacuum cleaner today at Job Lot and I am loving it! Yes, I am officially an old lady.

*The Maritime Festival is in town tomorrow and should be a blast! It will be the first one we will do without RAIN! I don't want to jinx myself, but unless we get a freak hailstorm like Oklahoma City did this week, I think we are good. There will be a bouncy house, Wally the green monster (the Red Sox mascot), food (seafood, burgers, pig) and fishermen Olympic games. Have you ever seen a fisherman in a blown up Sumo Wrestler suit? Me neither, but you can be sure I will have pictures!

*Today I helped to cut squid for the calamari. Yes, those pictures will be up Sunday. Mmm, yummy.

*And drum roll please, ratatatat, ratatat, the winners for 1 month of Picnik premium are

Melisa

Heather

and Tara (I found another one).

*I have another review to do next week and it has to do with CHOCOLATE, so you know it has to be good. Mmmm, chocolate.

*Have a fantastic weekend!!!!

Ride'em Cowgirl!

K has been hard a work lately getting her horse jumping skills refined. She came home from the barn the other day saying that she had jumped over 3 feet. Oy. Sunday, B and I made the trek out to Southbridge, MA to a horse show to watch K jump. (She and her father had left a wee bit earlier with the horses).

It was a beautiful, sunny, warm day! She was jumping in a class called Jumpers (not as obvious as you would think). She jumped in the 2 foot, 3 inch category.

She was unbelievable!

To watch this little wisp of a thing manage a horse that is so (SO SO SO) much bigger than her, was incredible!

This was her favorite jump on the course, which to me looked like the hardest!

Many of her facial shots were of her not breathing or sticking out her tongue. So cute.

Doesn't this look like she is riding a Merry Go Round Horse?

Yee-haw!

The proud rider with her 2 second place and 1 first place ribbons!

B and I liked the sign. B is "show happy" in this picture!

My girls make me so proud :)

Picnik Party

I have loved the site www.picnik.com for over a year now. I love being able to put a copyright on my pictures, I love putting words on my pictures and I love just fooling around with my pictures.

How excited was I, when Picnik asked me to do a party to show people all the great aspects of the site?!! (Um, VERY!!)

In the mail, I received a bunch of "1 month of premium service" coupons, a $25 VISA gift card (so I could buy snacks) and a 6 month coupon for premium service for me!

I invited some friends over who I thought would enjoy the Picnik experience. In the invite from Picnik, they asked my friends to send baby pictures of themselves and any other pictures that they would want to play with to me in advance. This was the only problem I had with the party. Many of my friends do not own scanners, so sending a baby picture was out of the question. What I did to counter the problem of not having their pictures, was I took a picture of each of them and downloaded it right before I did my demo!

First, Picnik sent me a demo picture to use throughout the spiel. Guess what? Even I learned new things! I had never used the "touch up" feature that allows you to erase wrinkles, brighten teeth, take 10lbs off, or change your eye color, amongst other things! How fun!

Here is how we played with K and some of my friends' pictures...




Then I showed them how to put all of our pictures in a sweet collage.

They were all duly impressed with the website and probably stayed up half the night when they got home to play with their own pictures!

I learned a lot, too and was excited to be able to hook up with facebook and flickr thru Picnik. You could also order your Picniked picture on a variety of things straight from the website or you could print your picture on your own printer and/or save it to your desktop!

Actually, I have 2 coupons for 1 month premium membership left. I don't think Picnik would mind if I gave them away. Leave me a comment on this post about anything having to do with photography and I will random generate 2 names after Thurs at midnight (May 20th) and let you know the winners in my Friday Fragments!

Frag'n Friday

Welcome to Mrs. 4444s Fridays where she welcomes bloggers to spit stuff into one big bucket'o fun.

*A friend of mine introduced me to a magazine that she gets called The Week. It is a concise version of everything that has gone on in the world for the past week. It gets to the point and moves on. It is perfect for those busy people like me, who sometimes opt not to take the time to watch the news or read the newspaper every day.

One section of it is called "Only in America", which is one of my favorites! The other week, it told of how a woman in Chicago is suing a salon for not having the right glass in their windows. Evidently the woman and her husband were having an argument while intoxicated on the side walk outside of the salon. The woman stumbled and fell into the window smashing it to bits. She thinks the salon should have safer windows for all the drunk people walking on the sidewalk. Oy.

*I am the assistant coach for B's softball team. Last night we had a home game while some 5th grade boys were having soccer practice on a nearby field. 6 of the boys came over and WATCHED the game after their practice. It was the cutest thing! B was pitching and I made a comment after the game about how nice it was that they came and watched. She said that she was a mess on the inside, but smooth on the outside. If that's what it takes for her to throw strikes, I am sending them a schedule of the rest of our season.

*I got my hair sassified today at the salon. How much do I trust Kelly? She asked me what I wanted to do with my hair and I said whatever you want. It's been one of those weeks. Now I look very sassy. The real reason why I write about the salon is that they are saving all the hair from hair cuts to send to the gulf oil spill. A company is collecting hair and putting it in nylon like bags to spread out in the water because the hair will suck up oil! After it has done it's job, the hair will be transformed into fertilizer! How great is this? Ask your salon to do it!

*A friend of my brother's writes a blog that is hysterical (sweet and nice too, but often times very funny). Check her out here.

*It has been rumored that Matt Lauer is having an affair with Meredith Vierra. I think I just threw up a little.

*Busy weekend with a Picnik (www.picnik.com) party tonight, first wedding to shoot of the season tomorrow and an off Cape horse show for K on Sunday. Weekends should really be 4 days. Hope you have a good one!

Hali-toe-sis

Conversation on the way to school the other day. (K, B, Gretel and me)

Me: Dang Gretel, your breath smells horrible.

K (backseat): Oh, Gretel just farted in my face.

B (frontseat): I think my breath smells too. What can I do to make it stop smelling?

Me: Brush your teeth.

B: I have been!

Me: You need mint tic tacs.

B: But I only like the orange ones.

Me: Maybe you and Gretel have halitosis.

K and B: What's that?

Me: It's a disease where you have bad breath. You know, it has the word "toe" in it for a reason.

Yeah, that gave them something to think about for the rest of the day....

Married? Sheesh!

I am pretty sure Jake's reaction is akin to my brother, Tommy's, friends when they got the news yesterday that he is getting married. Some of his friends have been married long enough to hold him in high regard for being in his late 30's and having "held off". That all changed on Mother's Day when he proposed to the gf.

We are all very excited about the upcoming wedding. They are throwing around places, ideas, etc already.

My question to you is, if you could have a destination wedding, where would you go? It can be in this country or not. Let's hear some ideas, so I can have some control over when and where the wedding will be!

*Edited due to my mom's negative reaction.

Sundays in My City

Sundays in my City takes us off Cape Cod this week to an indoor water park in Danvers, MA. This is where K, 3 friends and her sister spent their time celebrating K's 13th bday!!!


These are the covered slides that start in the building, go outside the building and drop you off back inside the building!

5 very happy girls!

This bucket with hundreds of gallons of water dumps out about every 5 minutes!

It was loads of fun!!!

Happy Mother's Day!

Frag'n Friday

Welome to the grand idea of Mrs. 4444s:

Got any bits and pieces? Spit them out on Fridays! This is a combo week of because I forgot to hit post on last week's post. Brilliant, right?

*Last week was crazy hair/hat day in the middle school. My girls will wait until the last second to get up on a "regular" morning, but on this day they willingly got up a half hour early to do their hair!

*I was with the little dude who I nanny for this week and someone asked me if I was his GRANDMOTHER. O.M.G. I think this was worse than being asked if I was pregnant once when I wasn't. Seriously do I look that old? Maybe it's time to put on makeup every day of my life now. I had been putting off that routine until I got old. Sniff, sniff.

*Speaking of little dude.... He loves "Gretel-dog" to pieces. And torments, I mean, plays with her all the time. She wins the patience award this week.

*I had a dream last night that Bob Hope asked me out on a date. Wow. I have no words for that.

*Thanks for all the birthday wishes for K yesterday. Between her friends on FB and my friends here, she was walking on air by the end of the day!

*You know you live on Cape Cod when you go to the mall for 2 hours and come out to find that your car has been targeted by a flock of seagulls. And I am not talking about this Flock of Seagulls.

*Have a great weekend!

Happy Sweet 13!

K,

You are growing up to be the most beautiful, talented, smartest young lady. (Yes, I can say those things because the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. lol)

When you were little, it seemed like every day you did something new.

Now that you are older, every month you do or say something that gives me a glimpse of who you are becoming and it makes me so proud.

You have a great sense of humor that often pops up in the most unexpected places.

I am truly blessed to have you as my daughter.

My wisdom to impart as you venture through the teen years: There will be ups and downs, but your family will be right next to you through it all. I love you gabillions, bunny.

Mommy