Party at Trista's!

One of my BFFs from high school, Trista, had a BBQ at her house in Denver, IA this past weekend so the family and I loaded up and headed that way for a great time!

Dayne had a blast playing with all the kids and spending time with her cousin, T.J. They played hide-n-seek, swung on the hammock, jumped on the trampoline and watched Disney Channel! Then stayed up 'til 3am (waiting for the big kids to get home!).

Here are some pictures of the party and of us "out":

Gretchen and I at Trista's house.

Me and Jen-Fer at Trista's!

Kids jumpin' on the trampoline! Jen joined them for a while! She still has tons of energy!

Me and Trista Faye!

Me dancin' out at the big bar in Denver!
Brendan woke up crying while the girls were out. Graden was sweet enough to comfort the little fella and snuggle him back to sleep! I was so proud when we came home to see this! : )
Chris (Graden's BFF) and Jen (my BFF). They started dating about a month ago. They met on their own! We didn't introduce them ... fate landed them together!
The girls! Jen, Gretchen, Me, Trista, Laura and Kim.
The boys playing some sort of back yard game. Might be an Iowa thing ...
The girlies chatting

First day of school

The kids returned to school today!

They were none too excited about getting up early again, but they survived the day! Hunter started 8th grade and Dayne started 3rd grade. My how fast time flies ...

Here is Hunter's school - Summit Lakes Middle School

Here is Dayne's school - Hawthorn Hill Elementary School

Hunter has football practice every day after school from 2:50 - 4:50. He smells pretty bad when he gets home! When he gets home he usually heads for one of the neighborhood kids' yards to get even sweatier and play football or baseball.

I am excited to see how the school year continues ... I will be sure to post school pictures when I get them back!

A day in pictures

Today was pretty uneventful. We puttered around the house and cleaned up a bit then headed to the mall for new shoes for school. The kids had been hounding me for weeks to get them shoes, so today I was able to quiet that!

On the way home from the mall we saw one of the prettiest, fullest rainbows I have ever seen. One that made me just feel in awe of nature.

Right as I settled down and thought about going to bed Hunter asked me if I would take him and his friend, Zach, to Blockbuster to get a movie. While there they spotted an interesting find ... grillz.

Girls Day Out!

Donna, my woonnnnnnnnderful mother in law, is here for the week! She arrived on Wednesday night and will be with us until next Friday, when we go back "home" for Trista's house party.

Today Donna, I and Dayne went to get a pedicure and do some grocery shopping. Sounds silly but one of the things I miss the most is going to the grocery store with Donna and having her around all th the time. I just adore her and spending time with her! Plus, she kind of likes me too ... : )

Here are some pics of our pedi-time today! Dayne has been hounding me for weeks to take her to get a pedicure so we went this afternoon. Donna and I got a spa pedi and Dayne got her toe nails painted and a flower painted on her toe nails!

After our pedi's we went to the grocery store and then headed home for dinner and a movie!

Dinner Guests

I was inspired to recreate the appetizer we had on Saturday night at Longhorn Steakhouse, so I invited Lauren's (Dayne's BFF) family over for dinner. They served as my guinea pigs, I guess.

I wrapped shrimp with chicken, then wrapped that with a piece of bacon. I then mariniated it in teriyaki sauce for a while. I grilled the concoction for about 15 minutes and served it with Teriyaki Chicken skewers, biscuits and corn. It was pretty good! My dinner guests said they'd serve as my guinea pigs again, so they must not have been too bad!

Graden is still in Florida and won't be back until Sunday evening. He went to Epcott Center today for "work." This is his third trip in less than a year. Rough life, I guess.

Not much blogging for tonight .... going to head to bed soon.

Hugs to all.

Tiffany

Creativity has it's price, I learned.

On Saturday I thought I'd be creative and color my hair. As many of you know, I frequently dye the underneath of my hair a different color - usually some shade of red.

Well, I thought I'd be creative and do some "chunks" of red throughout the rest of my hair. Hindsight: baaaaaaaaaaaaad idea. When I took the towel off my head, Dayne's reaction summed it up pretty well. She told me, "Mom, you look evil." It was a shade of red that would be best described as gothic.

After heavy consideration of wearing Dayne's new Hannah Montana wig, I went to work and was quick to make an appointment to have my hair corrected. I felt like I needed to wear a sign around my neck, "Yes, I know my hair is messed up. I do not think it's cool." Funny how many people were nice about my hair ... "Oh, it looks cute!" "Why don't you like it?" ... I learned who my real, honest friends were today!!

It took four hours to correct my hair. When I walked into the salon many heads turned. It took 30 minutes to make a decison on how to correct it. I was a little bit embarassed, truthfully.

All in all, I am happy with the end result. Blonde with brown highlights and dark brown / auburn underneath color. Interesting, but I like it. : )

The kids and I went Miniature golfing this afternoon. It was 100 degrees, so we may have been slightly out of our minds to do it, but it was good for us to get out of the house! We endured the sweat dripping down our backs, off our heads and every other spot on our body. I bet we smelled grrrrrrrrrreat!

After golfing we went to Wal-Mart to make a donation to the Sam Walton estate. Like they need it. Just doing my part to keep the economy going, I guess.

The final score (with 54 being par) was: Dayne - 100, Hunter - 72 and Mom - 71. Who knew I had such golfing talent!??!