Movie and Mraz

It was a very busy, very fun weekend. (and it took me a whole day to recover which is why this wasn't posted yesterday!)

It started out on Friday afternoon. Melissa and I went to see the movie Twilight which we both enjoyed. Melissa decided that it was the perfect day to wear her Bella and Edward socks for the first time. She is part of the Twilight sock club and each month she gets a skein of hand dyed sock yarn and a pattern that corresponds to one of the books. So of course the first one was red yarn and a heart patterned sock. Beautiful don't you think?

Friday night was the beginning of Jason Mraz weekend. We drove to Milwaukee to see the first of three shows. (Is there anyone in Milwaukee who doesn't smoke?) The venue was a little funky, but the show was awesome.

Saturday evenings show was in Chicago at the Aragon ballroom. It is a really pretty place and I was actually able to get a seat in the balcony so I didn't have to stand for the whole show which was good. Steve and Melissa ended up going downstairs to stand on the floor, which was packed and I joined them there for the encore. It was another wonderful show.

The crowd went wild when this came up on the screen during one of his songs. Before the show, there were pictures that people sent in displayed on the large squares of the screen. We sent one in, but forgot to bring a camera so we didn't get a picture of it. It was really cool to see ourselves up on the screen. In the little rectangles, they posted messages that people in the crowd sent in from their phones. After the show, they ran credits which was kind of funny.

Night three was at the Fabulous Fox in St. Louis (yes we are a little crazy). We had a really nice dinner at a restaurant across the street and then went in to see another amazing show. We spent the night and had a Waffle House pecan waffle before we left for home.

So we have had our Jason Mraz fix for a while (although Melissa was ready to go to Cleveland for the Monday night show). If you ever get the chance to see him, go. He is an amazing  musician and really funny too.

Have you voted yet?

It is a beautiful day for voting...mid 70's and sunny with a little breeze.

Our polling place is right across the street so it was really easy. Steve went over a little after 6:00 am and had to wait for an hour, which wasn't too bad. Melissa and I went over at 9:00 am and didn't have to wait at all. It was kind of neat to use the touch screen machines. We had never done that before. Melissa was excited because it was the first time she got to vote in person. She was away at school before so she always voted by absentee ballot.

Melissa and Steve considered going down to Grant Park this evening for the big rally but decided against it (I hate big crowds so I never considered it). They decided not to go, so we will stay home and watch the festivities on tv.

Here is my favorite Halloween treat, peanuts and candy corn. Yummy, tastes just like a PayDay candy bar.

Progress

Today I thought I would show you some of the things that I have been working on lately.

First up is some scrapbooking. I have been working on a gift album and this is one of the layouts from it. Hopefully some day soon it will be finished and on it's way to it's new home.

These pictures are from the Panama Canal cruise we took last November (has it been a year already, how time flies). We went to a turtle farm and released baby turtles into the ocean. It was a fun day.

(buddy decided he needed to hold the page down.)

Next up is a sock that has lovingly been referred to as the "sock from hell". The yarn and I have been fighting over what it would become for about a month now. It didn't want to be a pretty little sock with some lace on each side. Did I listen to what the yarn wanted, oh no, I knew best. After much grumbling on my part, not the yarns, it is now becoming a plain vanilla sock. Both the yarn and knitter are extremely happy now.

The Liesel scarf is progressing slowly. I really need to get it finished since it is getting colder. (This yarn didn't put up any fights, it wanted to be lacy.)

The Lady Eleanor is about half way done. I have about 2 1/2 skeins of yarn left. It is going to be so pretty when it is finished.

This is Karen's sock. It is growing slowly, it hasn't had much attention lately. Now that I'm done fighting with the other sock, I can get back to this one.

And last but not least, because there always has to be some Disney goodness going on, here is a dishcloth. Karen this one is going to be in your birthday package, so look for it soon.

Winter is Here

It just started snowing. Hopefully it won't last very long.

On a happier note - I know it isn't quite Halloween yet, but I thought I'd share a picture of Buddy in his Halloween costume.

More Disney World pictures tomorrow!

Animal Kingdom

Melissa and I had a great time at Disney's Animal Kingdom. It is one of the prettiest parks and again there wasn't much of a crowd. The day we were there it was cloudy and kind of misty, a perfect day to be in the jungle.

Our first ride was the Kilimanjaro Safari. We rode it twice, but the first time was the best because there were so many animals to see. There were these elephants, giraffe, lions, rhinos and many others.

Our next stop was a walk through the Pangani Forest trail. Lots of birds, fish gorillas and hippos on this tour.

Melissa rode Expedition Everest a couple of times and then we had a great lunch at Yak & Yeti.

After lunch we watched Finding Nemo-The Musical. It was lots of fun with the puppets.

Of course we had to watch Mickey's Jammin' Jungle Parade. There were lots of amazing animal floats that were really pretty. 

We also watched the Festival of the Lion King. The acrobats were amazing and the show it a lot of fun.

The park closed at 5:00 p.m. I wish we would have had more time to explore since there were a few things that we missed. Oh well, something for the next visit.

After we left the park, we headed over to Downtown Disney to meet Steve and Kristin (one of Steve's co-workers) for dinner.

Next - the Magic Kingdom.

Disney's Hollywood Studios

Day two of our trip was to Hollywood Studios. I think it was the best day ever, we had so much fun. Once again there wasn't much of a crowd. I think the longest we waited in line was 45 minutes, most of the rides had lines of 10 minutes or less.

Our favorite ride was Toy Story Midway Mania. We loved it so much that we ended up riding it six times. It wasn't the only ride of the day however. Melissa rode the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster twice, we also rode The Great Movie Ride and did the Studio Backlot Tour. We were going to see Fantazmic to see how different it was from the one at Disneyland, but Toy Story Midway Mania took over our lives and we missed it.

Melissa and her favorite little green men!

We also got to see our favorite parade, Block Party Bash. We were so sad when it moved from California Adventure to Florida. We even recognized one of the cast members who made the move with the parade. Shows you what kind of Disney geeks we really are. We were able to add another nerf ball to our collection too.

It was a very fun day.

Tomorrow: Animal Kingdom

Better Late than Never

I know we have been home for two weeks and I haven't posted anything about our trip to Disney World and the Disney Cruise. I got sick at the end of the trip and didn't feel like doing much of anything.

So here's the report. I'm going to break it down into several posts that way I can get more pictures in. Melissa ended up taking almost 300 pictures, and no I'm not going to show them all.

We arrived on Saturday afternoon and stayed at the Contemporary Resort. It was really nice and the monorail runs right through the building so that made getting around (at least to Epcot and the Magic Kingdom) really easy.

The soap in the bathroom make me happy. I tried several times to snitch another one to take home, but the maids kept their carts closed when they weren't around, darn it.

We had a room facing the lagoon and every night after the fireworks at the Magic Kingom, there was a lighted boat parade. You can see it here

On Sunday Melissa and I went to Epcot. The park wasn't very busy which was nice. We spent the morning in the Future World section of the park and rode the Test Track twice. Who knew I enjoyed speed so much! I would have done it a third time, but twice was enough for Melissa!

We also got to see the dolphin show which was fun. At the end, the pose for pictures. It was really funny to see them all pose and smile.

The rest of the time we ate our way around the World Showcase. The Food and Wine festival was in full swing. The theme was cities around the world and we tasted treats from several different cities, although we did skip the escargot from Paris. It was quite yummy. 

(Maple glazed salmon from Canada, quite tasty.)

After a trip on Spaceship Earth, it was time to catch the monorail back to the hotel.

Next post Hollywood Studios and Animal Kingdom.