Goodbye January

We celebrated Rene's birthday on Tuesday evening with Ben, Shannon and Macey. Macey was suitably impressed with all the candles. There are two birthdays between Rene's and her's--mine in February and Shannon's a couple of weeks before Macey's. Hopefully, seeing us all blow out candles will teach her how to blow out her own!

Rene and I went to the Art Museum to see the exhibit called "Las Artes de Mexico." It was okay. The coolest (and oldest) things were some jade carvings. They were dated around 1500 BC, if I'm remembering correctly. The jade was absolutely gorgeous. The other impressive thing was this ice sculpture.

Last week, I was able to go for my walk outside every day. It was warmish (for Wisconsin in the winter) and the ice was just melting away. Over the weekend, however, we had rain, freezing rain and then topped that with snow. Now it's turning colder. So I feel that my walk this week will be indoors. Last year, I bought a Leslie Sansone walking video, but soon discovered that I can do all that without actually watching the video. I have developed a regular circuit that I can do right here in the house.

And fortuitously, I have discovered that one of my new passions is on TV at the exact time I want to exercise! If you haven't discovered Cash Cab for yourself, I high recommend it. Unsuspecting people get into a cab in New York City and suddenly, the lights starts flashing and, voila, you're on Cash Cab. The host, Ben Bailey, asks you general knowledge trivia questions as he drives you to your destination and you win money. Woohoo! That would be my dream; unfortunately, I think there's one cab in the Wausau area, and I pretty sure Ben Bailey doesn't drive it.

You should all check it out. You can go here and take some of the actual quizzes and see how you'd do. You can also go to the show's website for other fun stuff, like a slider puzzle, bloopers and Ben Bailey's Top Ten list of places to visit in NYC. It's a highly entertaining solution for boredom during a long, cold winter.

And you guys make fun of my smile...

This week is a birthday week at our house. Rene's birthday is Tuesday and Joanna's is Thursday. Yesterday, Rene and I went to the temple. Joanna met us there. After the session, we went over to Emily and Preston's and had lunch and visited and had a little birthday celebration. I'm sure there will be some other celebrations this week, but it was nice to get together.

Surprises

I will readily admit that I don't like unpleasant surprises--a phone call in the middle of the night, being told you've lost your job due to downsizing, hearing that someone I love is ill, waking up to a foot of new snow that ruins your plans--ugh, not good. But I am a big, big fan of happy surprises. They don't have to be big, either. Something unexpected and fun in the mail, reconnecting with an old friend on Facebook and singing my favorite hymn in church all make me happy. Here are some of my favorite fun surprises:

--Walking into the kitchen and finding a vase of flowers on the table. Rene is really good at this.

--Being able to see family and friends when you hadn't expected to see them for quite awhile.

--Working on genealogy and finding a whole family that you didn't have a clue about before. This has happened to me a couple of times lately.

--Finding out that one of our married kids and their spouse is expecting a baby. It was a wonderful surprise when we learned that Tracy was pregnant with Logan, because we had no idea if or when that would happen.

Because surprises make me happy, I have tried to make others happy with little surprises, too. It's almost as good as getting your own surprise when you do that!

Cat's Meow

Okay, so this is the second post about things I love. Cat's Meow is a company out of Wooster, Ohio. They make collectible wooden keepsakes in the form of things around town. They're kind of expensive, so I only have a few, but here's an example:

This is Dan Emmett Elementary School in Mount Vernon, which all our kids attended. Joanna, Sarah and Janet all have one of these that Dan Emmett gave to them when they graduated from high school. Notice the little black kitty? That's the Cat's Meow logo and appears on each piece.

I got this set when Janet, Jodi and I went to Mount Vernon the summer that Emily and Preston were married.

I have a welcome sign which is located in a tiny park located near the high school in Mount Vernon. Dad would always comment on it when we passed. I can't get a good picture of it.

This is a statue that was located on the square in Mount Vernon. It's some kind of memorial to soldiers, probably Civil War soldiers. Joseph dubbed this guy "General Interest" as in "not of general interest."

I was very excited a couple of years ago when I was in Aberdeen and went to Nearly New with my mom and my sister Susan. I found this:


It's a Cat's Meow of Storybook Land, a park in Aberdeen, SD, which we have visited many times on many family occasions. I'm pretty sure I got a great deal on this Cat's Meow, because it was stuff a bag day!

There are lots of cute things, even the international space station and the Hubble telescope for the space minded (you know who you are!), but right now I'm coveting the Amish ones, the Buckeye Candy company and the Ohio Bicentennial Barns.

By the way, if you want to check out Cat's Meow for yourself, here's the address: http://www.catsmeow.com/ . I apologize for my blurry photos, but at the Cat's Meow website, you can see their cute pieces in much better pictures.

Since February, which is a month I do like, is coming up and since February is all about love, I thought I'd entertain (or bore) you with a few posts about things I love. Let me say right now that these are in totally random order; I don't want anyone thinking that I don't love my family.

So, one of the things I love is.....

Musicals!

I like lots of different kinds of music and I may have to do another post about music, but musicals are just so darn entertaining. One summer, we checked out a bunch of musicals on video from the library and watched them. We saw some pretty good ones and some pretty obscure ones. We spent one fall being entertained by "Fiddler on the Roof" when Ben was in high school and was part of a pretty sophisticated production. I remember when I was a young teenager, Dad wouldn't let me watch "West Side Story" because it was immoral. I'm pretty sure he said that same thing about Rogers and Hammerstein's "Carousel". One musical that I didn't really even know about until we saw it at Rene's parents is "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers." Once, Sarah was invited to a sleepover at a friend's house and the girl's mom wanted to rent each invitee's favorite movie and Sarah said hers was "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers." The mom called to ask me "Really?"

Anyway, here are some of my favorites:

"Annie, Get Your Gun" has my favorite, favorite music. I would have loved to have seen the modern production of it with Bernadette Peters and Tom Wopat. That's the soundtrack shown here.

"The Sound of Music" has long been a staple at our house. I think the girls can all pretty much quote it. I'm old enough to remember when it first came out. And that's pretty old!

No mention of musicals and our family would be complete without including "Saturday's Warrior." It will always have a special place in our kids' hearts. And yes, they know it's not doctrine; they know it's dated; they know it's corny.

One of my favorite CD's is this one, entitled The Only Broadway CD You'll Ever Need. I highly recommend it!

A Blast from the Past

It doesn't seem like that long ago that we were involved in this or this. My, how time flies!

The Cruelest Month

The poet T.S. Elliott wrote that April is the cruelest month. I disagree. January has always been my least favorite month. Maybe it's because Christmas is over and the kids have all gone back to school and to their own lives. Maybe it's because it gets dark at 4:30 and it's cold (-8 degrees this morning) and snowy. The long walks I enjoy most of the year are impossible now because of the ice everywhere. There's not really much exciting to look forward to. (Of course, this year I'll get to go meet baby Logan sometime soon!!) The house, which was clean and beautifully decorated three weeks ago, now needs a good cleaning. Some people think that January is exciting, but to me...ugh!

I like February, though :)