My Stinking Heart

My niece is a girl after my own heart. 

She LOVES to sing.  She sings all the time.

all.the.time.

And she can be somewhat of a ham.   Really nothing like her mother (my sister).  My sister was just the quiet brilliant type.  She sings, is musical, but in a very subdued way.  When is a mood Abby is a performer.  This is just one of about 7 videos I took while we were home. 

She has memorized most of the Frozen soundtrack and Wicked soundtrack.

In this video she is singing Defying Gravity. 

I hope you enjoy it and that you can reassemble your heart when it is over.


Happy Friday!!

More Later

- A Ro

Happy New Year Hodgepodge

Oh my gosh, Oh my gosh, Oh my gosh...A Ro is back at the Hodgepodge!!!  

I know wonders never cease.  

So to celebrate the occasion read my answers and then head on over to Joyce's  and read hers then answer them yourself and link up.

Simple.

Here goes nothing:

1. Every January 1st since 1976 Lake Superior University has published a list of words they'd like to see banished from the Queen's English.  Words may be banished due to misuse, overuse or just general uselessness (go here to read more about how the words were chosen).  Here are the words/phrases they'd like to see banished in 2014-

selfie, twerk/twerking, hashtag, Twittersphere, Mr. Mom, T-bone, ____on steroids, the suffixes-ageddon, and -pocalypse added to anything and everything, from the world of politics the words-intellectually/morally bankrupt and Obamacare, and from the world of sports the words-adversity and fan base

Which of these words/phrases would you most like to see banished from everyday speech and why? Is there a word not on the list you'd like to add?

I am afraid I do hop on the word-of-the-month bandwagon.   I do get off that wagon pretty quick though and was really getting tired of toats mygoats until James Earl Jones renewed my usage of that word, but only with my teenagers and only at very appropriate times!!

2. What one unfinished project nags at you begging to be completed in this new year?

SCRAPBOOKING.

Yeah that pretty much sums it up.

3. When did you last have a bowl of soup? What kind? Homemade or from a can? What's your favorite soup?
I am on a Trader Joes Organic Split Pea Soup kick

I know that Split Pea Soup gets a bad rap thanks to The Exorcists, but let me tell you it is very tasty.  Throw in a few multi grain pita chips and you have a great lunch.

4. Snowed in, snowed under, snow job...which one most applies to your life in recent days, figuratively speaking.

snow job and that is all I can say

5. What's the funniest movie you've ever seen, or at least one of the funniest?

Uh...duh Christmas Vacation...

and if you agree with me make sure you get yourself something **click** real nice.

6.  In general, would you say you're clumsy?

Oh yes.  I always tell my students that they never have to worry about being the person that trips on stage because I have that job all tied up.

Just call me Grace.

7. Elvis Presley was born on Hodgepodge Day (January 8th) back in 1935.  Are you an Elvis fan?  What's your favorite Elvis tune? If that's too hard, which Elvis tune do you dislike the least?  Click here for a list of his songs.

My sister-in-law will never forgive me as she had dogs named Elvis and Vegas, but I have never been a fan...sorry Michelle.  I would have to say Jailhouse Rock would be my favorite Elvis song though.

8. Insert your own random thought here.

Lets see if I can still sum it all up.

I am a stumbling scrapbooking slowpoke, who scorns snow jobs but is stuck on split pea soup...so toats mygoats

More Later

- A Ro

Project 365 - Week One

OK so I did this a few years back and really enjoyed it.  But par for the blogging (or lack there of ) course I didn't finish.  But I love taking pictures and love sharing my life with my fam that is far away so I'll try to keep it up.

However, I didn't know if the Project 365 was even still going, but then I spied Bug's post and saw that at least someone was keeping up the tradition.  She has some really great pics so head on over there and give her some kudos.

Usually this is posted on Saturday, but for lots of reasons Saturday didn't happen for me so this will be posted today.  I'll try to find someone to link this up to so you can go look at everone else's week in pictures.  If not here are mine at least.

OK here goes.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 1
Cold Andrew on the porch with cold cows right behind.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 2nd.

Making good use of my new Starbucks cup.

FRIDAY JAUARY 3rd

More cold cows...everything was cold this week.

SATURDAY JANUARY 4th

On the way home, very silly girls!!'

More Later

- A Ro
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Back to Reality

(got this as soon as we landed yesterday..love these silly girls)

So funny how things work.  I dreaded this day back on December 20th when I started my vacation.  I knew this day would come when we all had to go back to "reality".  I am sitting here and thinking to myself...it isn't too bad!!  It is all about perspective.  I decided that each day I am going to try to enjoy every moment, vacation or not.

I did that during my vacation to try to make it seem longer, and it really worked.  I can remember many many moments because I chose to focus on them.

However, this attitude was particularly hard yesterday when I faced a house full of Christmas decorations, piles of laundry, empty refrigerator, and finals looming for the Bella girl.  Then I changed my attitude rolled up my sleeves and dug in.  Rich was on board, he knows me all too well, and we got it done.  I didn't relax once yesterday, but most of my house is back in working condition.

This morning I got to ride into school with Andrew at the wheel (he is still back from AZ), Bella looking so cute in her new sweater from my sister Kate, and me looking forward to seeing all of my wonderful students.

Each moment...a true blessing.

Thanks to all of you blogger friends who put smiles on my face and I look forward to catching up with you soon.

I'll leave you with some memorable pictures from our break.

Missing Tyler, but such a cute cousin's picture!!

Happy and delirious might have been worth the hours of vacuuming up the confetti??

More Later

-A Ro

Headed Home

As you can see we are all excited to be heading home.

This morning started out at a balmy 35 but only a mere 2 hours later it is 20 and dropping. I believe it is 80 in California.

Thank heaven.

I lived here. I lived here for 21 years of my life. I walked to school in college across a frozen river when it was so cold that your forehead hurt. (Not to mention every other exposed bit of flesh). The schools in this area sent an email stating that they might close school on Monday because the wind chill might get as low as 40 below.

40 BELOW!!!!

I know that I, much younger mind you, endured those kind of temperatures...often.

I am a weaker woman now. I can't even imagine it.

Good luck nieces and nephews, brothers and sisters in law, mom and John.

This wimp is outah here.

More Later
-A Ro


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Starbucks

I got this cool cup in my stocking this year. It is the cup that you can take to Starbucks each day in January and get a drip coffee for free. I love my morning joe so I am glad to have it.




I am still in Iowa and the Starbucks situation is very different than in CA and it might just be a good thing. They don't have very many and they all close before 8:00 pm. So I have been carrying my cup around because I want to get the best use of my "free" coffee.

We were in downtown Des Moines yesterday at a really cool t-shirt shop (more on that later) and found a Starbucks. The lady who helped us was super nice and noticed I had a rewards card. She asked me if I wanted her to ring up our orders separately so I could get more stars. No one in CA would have ever suggested that. (And if it wasn't 9 degrees at the time I might have had another I-want-to-move-back-here-thought)

Now I realize some of you think that Starbucks is an evil empire and I somewhat tend to agree. In my defense I do frequent my local coffee shop in Simi A LOT so I don't feel too bad.

Headed to the mall on our last day here with said cup in tow hoping to get another days use out of my cup.

I'll leave you with two pictures I love from our trip.


The in laws.


The sibs

Love these guys and will miss them terribly.

More later

- A Ro


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Happy New Year

Still in snowy Iowa and loving every minute of it.






Spent New Years Eve with some of my favorite people.











Sarah was with her mom so she was the only loved one sadly missing.

Here is to an amazing 2014!!

More later

-A Ro

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