My Tiny Ballerina

My husband's Mother so generously offered to pay for dance classes for my daughter. A month or so ago, we met up with my mother-in-law. We went and enrolled her at the arts school, and then to buy her first pair of ballet slippers.

She had a long wait till the first class. The more she waited, the more excited she would get, but finally(!), the day arrived. Her first dance class!

She had so much fun and can't wait to go back.

I'm so proud of my beautiful prima-ballerina.

Thank you, Nana Su!

I Live in Kansas, Y'all!

My husband works on his Grandfather's sod farm. Just for something to do, and while the kids have been in school, my husband has taken me out to "the country" a few times. It's only five or ten minutes from our house.

(Public service announcement: The speed limit on 56 hwy has been raised from 50 mph to 60 mph. Please keep this in mind when we are driving behind you. Thank you.)

Shots of "the farm" Such a classy place.

(look real close and you will see an empty beer bottle to the left of the tank, and to the right, the beer case that the empty bottle must of came from.)

Ha! ha! Yes it really looks like this out at the shop. This is where all the equipment is kept, and where the men gather before work. Most, but not all, of the old cars and debris are from the renters of the farmhouse. They rebuild cars and motorcycles as somewhat of a hobby. They have lived there for almost forever.

Wild life I have encountered on my farm adventures:

Grandpa's cows are scared of me. A few got wide eyed when I pointed at them, and I caused a miniature stampede when I got out of the truck. (Oh yeah, cows? Well, the feeling is mutual! pshh! Stupid cows......)

It was like the dragonflies stopped to pose for pictures. The blue on the wings is absolutely beautiful.

It is not uncommon to see a blue heron in one of the ponds. They are easily scared, so I was excited to get such a good picture.

And this is me in the middle of a corn field. I had never been in a corn field before, so I took a picture. It was fun, I giggled a lot. If you ever get the chance to run down a corn row, do it, just don't get lost.
I absolutely love where I live. Close enough to take advantage of all the big city amenities, but also all the beauty and charm of the country.

It's lovely.

Saucy

Today I am feeling sassy. My husband would say that I'm being sassy with a weird inflection so that it would sound like I am being saucy. But I am not feeling saucy, I am feeling sassy. Are we clear on the matter?

• Bruce Springstein makes my ears bleed!! Okay they don't' actually bleed, they just feel like it when I have to hear that mumble that others pass off as singing. I will not pass it off as singing, oh no!! It is mumbling and the only good thing about Bruce Springsteen is his drummer, Max Weinburg. That guy is funny on Conan, ever watch?
• One time, someone called Glenn Beck brother Beck in church and I was offended. I know he is member and all, but when did we start quoting political talk show hosts in our church meetings? I'm sorry but there is something not right about that. But that was a long time ago, but I was reminded of Glenn Beck on facebook today.
• Did you know that the cleanliness of my house is inversely proportional to the time I spent on facebook? Interesting.
• Ohhh! Did you hear the story about the guy who was on the VH1 Show called Megan wants a millionaire? He was the main suspect in his wife's murder and then found him dead in a hotel room. Crazy. I read some comments to an article online, they were all VH1 needs to screen the people they let on their shows better. Well.......I don't think you can really screen people for future murders. Just sayin.....
• Dear Brett Favre, you are a turn coat rat fink. Seriously, how could you even put on that purple uniform? Purple is not your color. Me thinks you should have put on a golf shirt and gone golfing instead. That's what you are supposed to do when you retire.
• Ha,ha!! How great is Todd Haley? Every time the camera is on him during the game, they have to cut away very fast because he is yelling @#$%$# and $%^# at the players. Ha!! I love football soooo much.
• The Cowboys have a new stadium with a big, huge screen hanging right in the middle. Nice huh? Not really, punters have been hitting it with the ball. It even caused Tennessee Titan's coach to challenge a play when the refs didn't see the ball hit the mega screen. The Cowboy's owner refuses to move it. He says the players are trying to hit it and it is not a problem otherwise. What the heck? Why would you intentionally hit the screen when the goal of a punt is to move the ball away from your opponents end zone? Move the dang screen already!! Sheesh.
• Here is an equation for you(I take calculus you know...), Adrenaline from working out + adrenaline from throwing up= Leslie bouncing off the walls!! AHHH! I love jazzercise.
• Our neigbors across the street abandoned their house many, many months ago. A tow truck just pulled up and I was surprised to see two cars sitting in the garage! You just up and leave a house with two cars? What happened? Why would you do that? Just sell the dang stuff.

Happy Monday everybody!

Carry-Us-All

We went to the C.W. Parker Museum in Leavenworth. Just a short jaunt up K-7. It was very easy to find.

The museum is home to three antique Merry-go-rounds. Two of them were made by CW Parker and are called a Carry-Us-All, and the other is a hand cranked model from the mid to late 1800's.

They also had many carousel horses in various stages of refurbishment and an assortment of carnival sideshow paraphernalia.

The boys were not too interested, actually. But my daughter and I really enjoyed it, so I guess that's all that matters anyway. You know the old saying that everyone is happy when Mom is happy? Yep, it went something like that.

The volunteer staff was very nice, but also very old. In fact, they were mourning the loss of one of their Carousel operators earlier in the week. They said he had worked the carousel all day, then went home and had a stroke. They had a sign with his name tag draped over it by the gate.

It was a fun and not too expensive. In fact, I believe the cashier didn't even charge us for the kids. They even had a penny smashing machine. And most importantly, it had great picture taking opportunities!

So, in regards to my list, I guess that makes it three down and three to go!! Can I finish my list by the end of the year? Hmmmm, maybe.

The Infamous Elongated Pennies

Here are a few of my pennies that I have acquired recently in my travels.
These are from the C.W. Parker Museum in the post above.

From the OZ Museum in Wamego, KS

These were from a sports Memorabilia store in the Mall of America in MN. I have hunted these things down for a few years, but when I went to get them, the machine had been moved to an unknown location. I think I did that twice, but finally, they resurfaced, and I was able to get them. Sometimes the long wait makes the victory so much sweeter!

It's Been Turned Off

Pretty sure at the beginning of the summer, I turned my brain off. I forgot about playdates. I even forgot about babysitting for my friends, twice. Yep, genuine airheadedness. Today I go back to class. I don't think my brain has turned back on yet.

Come on brain! I have calculus and accounting to do! Turn on brain, turn on, turn on, turn on!!!