Is it really Monday????

Unemployment sure messes with my schedule! I'm so unaware of what day it is half the time :-) Today (Monday right??? Memorial day!) I woke up at 11:30. I helped Roy at work last night so didn't get to bed until around six this morning. Woke up, lazed around and then we went to see "The Longest Yard". I thought it was good! Had a few serious parts that I wasn't expecting based on the previews and never having seen the original. But, we liked it. Always nice to go to the movies and not be angry at the end that you spent money to see crap!

After we got home from the movie I ran over to Jeremy and Rachel's for a bit. Their new kitty is adorable!!! He and Lester fell asleep together on their bed, looked so cute snuggling! Visited with them and the kiddos and then came on home. Had some leftover hot dogs for dinner and have just been hanging ever since! Rachel lent some movies to me, so after Roy went to nap I watched "Steel Magnolias". Never get tired of that one!

Tomorrow I need to hit the job search hard! Checked the Pantagraph online and saw a couple of possibilities to pursue. I didn't even attempt today as I'm sure most offices were closed.

Katie left for Europe today! She is going on a tour of Europe with her Mom. Please pray that they have a safe trip. Shawn went to see her off today and he is starting a new job tomorrow. I can't believe the baby is going to be here in a few months!

Well, time to take an antihistimine (stuffy head!) and get ready for bed! I hope everyone had a great Memorial Day! Take care and God bless!

Sunday with the Fam!

Good day today! Mom & Dad and Jeremy & Rachel and the kiddos came over for a cookout. We grilled out hamburgers and hot dogs, had to move the grill behind the house 'cause it started to get windy! Had a great time with everyone!

I've been scanning pictures lately. I have a bunch from Vegas and Shawn's wedding, soon as I figure out how to email them I'll send some out :) Gotta really cute one of Ken and Shawn dancing at the reception that Kristi must have!!!

Tomorrow after I job search I'm heading over to Jeremy and Rachel's, then I'm going to visit Pam for awhile. We need to get everything in order for booking our second Vegas trip! I think Pam and I are going to share a room with Kelli (her husband isn't going after all) and another friend of Annie's so that the rate will be cheaper.

Well, I think its time for a leftover hot dog! Hope everyone had a great Sunday! Nighty-night!

Chubby Hubby!!!!!!!!!!

Lazy Saturday! My friend Melton was supposed to come down from Rockford to visit and I was going to go to Pam's to see her. She's had some bad stuff happen this week and she wanted to get away for awhile, but then her car wouldn't work this morning so the visit was cancelled. I was disappointed 'cause I wanted to see her, but I'm glad to have a day with nothing planned too :-)

Cleaned the kitchen, made some dinner, now we're watching movies and doing nothing else. Mom and Dad and Jeremy and family are coming over tomorrow for a cook-out! Excited about that! Still gotta get a little cleaning done before they come.

Chubby Hubby ice cream is the best freakin' invention ever!!! Had to get some yesterday. Its vanilla with fudge and peanut butter swirled in, with chunks of peanut butter filled pretzels dipped in chocolate. When I was in college our food court had every flavor of Ben and Jerry's imaginable, that's where the addiction began. Roy was jealous so he had to go out and get some Cherry Garcia :-)

Well, obviously I have nothing more interesting to write about since I'm rambling about my ice cream ;) Hope everyone's having a good Saturday! Take care!!!

HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY DIANE!!!!!!!!

Big month for birthdays in May! So far, Matthew, Annie, Jeremy, and Diane.....and my nephew Neako and SIL Angie is coming up in the next week!

Well, still in the land of the unemployed. I can't believe how much housework I'm getting done! I have a couple of possibilities coming up so I'm going to change my resume (again!) tonight and send it out to a couple of places. Tomorrow I'm going to a temp agency. I don't want to start another social work job as I'm unsure how long we'll be in the area, its not fair to the clients. So, everyone please keep it in your prayers that I'll find something soon :-)

We had fun with Jeremy and family on Sunday. Matthew was so cute, when we were eating cake he was covered from head to toe in it. He saw us all looking at him and he just started laughing. Adorable!

Going back to see nurse Pam tomorrow for a follow up visit (Kristi, thank you so much for your gracious offer :-) I'm going to try to get some meds when I'm there tomorrow....gotta stop being a marshemellow!). Other than that, just job searching and cleaning are my only plans for this week! Exciting huh :)

Well, gonna run to the post office and maybe Wal-Mart so I'll sign off. Hope everyone's having a good ngiht! "The Contender" finally is on tonight! Bye bye!

Happy Birthday Nermy!!!!!!

Today is Jeremy's birthday! AND, he has started a blog :-) I'll put a link up later but for now if you'd like to visit his site the address is http://jeremyp3969.blogspot.com/ He and Rachel and the kiddos are coming over soon for a cookout, should be fun times!

Well, haven't blogged in a bit. I did finally go to the doctor and they said I probably just knocked a tendon out of joint. Its doing much better but still gets swollen and sore if I do too much on it. I was hoping they'd prescribe me some pain medication for at night when its really sore but they didn't think it was necessary and since I'm a big marshmellow I didn't press for it. I did get some Aleve which helps with the swelling a bit.

Roy and I went on a "date" Friday night :-) Hadn't been to dinner and a movie in ages so we finally did (probably our last time in quite a while since we'll be trying to conserve money). We went to the new chicken wing place in town. Very tasty and it was really reasonably priced. They had several degrees of "heat" to offer. Roy stuck with the honey barbeque and thai seasoned wings, I got the next to hottest level and they were yummy (my lips were numb for a couple hours afterwards though). They have a deal where if you get the hottest level and eat twelve wings in six minutes you get your picture on their wall and a t-shirt. Roy wanted me to try it but I had already filled up on wings and potato skins so I didn't. That'll be my goal before we move, to get my picture on the wall in the freakin' wing place!

After dinner we went to see the new "Star Wars". I have to say, out of the three new ones this is my favorite. The story and the special effects were all excellent. My knee was very sore by the end though. I'm always uncomfortable in movie theatres 'cause my legs are too long to be cooped up in the teeny space they give you and my "injury" just tipped it over. But, the movie and popcorn were good and the audience kept their mouths shut through most of the movie so life was good!

Well, I have got to get some stuff started for our cookout! I already made Jeremy's cake, just need to get the beans going and make sure the steaks are defrosted. Hope everyone's having a great weekend!

'Ello!!! Well, very slowly recovering :) I'm still moving around slowly and a little unstable. But, the swelling and soreness has gone down a lot! Praise the Lord!!!

Not much has been happening around here this week. I've been a couch potato and Roy is on his night schedule. I've been trying to get everything done for work since this is my last week (gasp!). Getting a little freaked out about the job situation, but I'll still get two more paychecks, one of which will have my vacation time on it. We also have some saved back so we'll be fine, I'd just feel better if I had a job ready for me. Something will come up though!

Grandma and Mom are coming up tomorrow to have lunch at Maddy's school. I have an appointment so I won't be going but I'm sure they're going to have fun. I need to get over to Karla's and see my little cousins sometime this week! They went to Arthur today to visit, I know everyone was anxious to see them.

Well, gotta get some more stuff done before bedtime so I'll sign off. Hope everyone had a great day! Take care and God bless!

I'm Broken :(

Yep, had to go and hurt my leg this morning (and my good knee to boot! Boy am I going to be fun when I'm eighty!). Happened when I was mopping this morning, see why I don't clean! :) I slipped and fell and when I did I felt a muscle move in my leg. Now, my area directly above my knee is swollen and causes me extreme pain when I sit up or down. I was able to stand up aftwards (which was encouraging, when I tore the ACL in my other knee I couldn't stand afterwards). I can bear weight on it, but its constantly sore and is downright painful when I bend it. So, I'm going to keep icing and elevating, if its not better by Monday I'll hobble to the doctor. Hopefully its just sprained and will heal over the weekend.

So, that's pretty much been my day :) Roy has been wonderful and is trying to keep me comfortable. He even ran and got KFC for lunch for us! Talked to Mom and Dad for awhile, sounds like they're having a good Saturday. We've been watching "24" all day today safely from the couch. Been really windy, but hasn't rained yet. Well, time to return to my little couch world. I hope everyone's having a great Saturday! Take care and God bless!

Back in black!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

OMG!!!!! Been trying to blog forever and it hasn't been working out this week :( Anyhoo, back with a vengence! And I can't think of anything noteworthy that's happened today!!! Oh, the irony ;)

Well, been a busy week and a half since my last blog. I'm still frantically trying to get everything prepared for my departure from my current job. Lots of loose ends to tie up and I haven't had much of a chance to tidy up my filing, casenotes, etc. with all of the last minute meetings I've had to schedule.

Big, breaking news on the home front. Roy and I have OFFICIALLY decided to move to Tennessee!!!! We've been wanting to for a long time, and we've decided if we're going to do it we need to get in gear. So, this weekend will be spent getting our trailer prepared to put on the market. We have a spot that we're going working on purchasing. It is right next door to....you guessed it....Julie and Brain! Its 3 or 5 acres of land, already has a well and septic built in, a circle blacktop driveway, and an inground pool. The pool we're not going to keep, it has a lot of damage and we're going to bulldoze over it 'cause it would cost too much to try to repair. So, please keep it in your prayers. We're in love with it, but if its not meant to be we're still moving down and it just means God has another place in store. We're hopefully going to move in the next 3 to 4 months. Just have to get a little more money saved and out trailer sold!!! Yee haw!!!!

Had a wonderful Mother's day with my family! We drove down to Arthur and had a cook-out and it was great to spend time with them. Got to visit with Grandma and Grandpa, and Diane for awhile too which was really nice. Shawn and Katie went to prom that night so we got to see them all dressed up :) My Mom has exciting news as well.......she's going back to school!!! I'm so happy for and proud of her, she is going to do great!

Can't believe the weather today, I had to wear a coat to my morning meetings! Didn't storm last night like I thought it would, we could use the rain too. Well, my mini tacos are done so I'm going to eat and watch the rest of the "Apprentice". Hope everyone is having a great week!!! Take care and God bless!

Vegas saga part II!!!!!!!!!!

Work today, cold, windy, blah blah blah..........BACK to reminiscing about Vegas!

Tuesday:
We were so overly ambitious on Monday that Tuesday we were draggin' butt! We slept in, ate junk food for breakfast, then jumped in our swimsuits and hit the pool. Perfect day for laying out, it was about 75-80 degrees. Hung out there for awhile, came inside and I realized how pink I was getting :) Just on my chest, part of my belly and the tops of my theighs. Surprisingly, my shoulders and face didn't get burnt! Anyhoo, we came back in, showered, and grabbed some pizza for lunch. Hung around our casino for awhile on a mission to play blackjack! Finally got a table, I had never played blackjack before so it took me a few times around to figure out what was going on! Didn't do to bad, I only lost fifteen dollars, then pulled the rest of my chips out. Everyone else lost more than that, so they were teasing me about being a blackjack "champ!". I blame it on our crabby little vegas man we had as a dealer! Decided we sucked at table games, so we played a few slots and then headed back to the room to decide where to go that night. We all called our boys, then Annie's boyfriend called right back. Turns out, his brother and girlfriend were in Vegas as well! Annie called and they wanted us to meet them so we headed to the Hard Rock hotel!

Had a great time with them, both very nice people. The Hard Rock hotel is very cool by the way! Set up similar to the restaurants, rock memorabilia (sp?) displayed on all the walls. It was really nice and the music was at a perfect volume to drown out the sound of the slots :) After parting with Matt's brother we wandered around the casino for a bit, stopping at some slots. We tired pretty quickly so grabbed a cab and headed home!

Wednesday:
Took it easy in the morning but still wanted to take advantage of our last full day! Hung out by the pool again, though for a significantly shorter period of time :) Grabbed lunch at the hotel and then headed off to explore the other area of the strip. The world poker championship was going on at the Bellagio, so we stopped by hoping to spot some famous people. The Bellagio is gorgeous!!! Very extravagant hotel. We stopped in the conservatory and also window shopped at some of the little stores. Played some slots just to brag that we gambeled at the Bellagio ;) and I actually won thirty bucks! Left there and went to explore the Paris and Flamingo! Both beautiful! The casino in the Paris is decorated to give you the feeling of being outside. There is a slight breeze blowing, the ceiling is painted to look like the sky, and the walls are decorated to look like a balcony. The shops are set up to look like you're walking down an actual sidewalk in Paris, with street lamps and sidewalks included! Very cool!

At the Flamingo we saw....what else?......the flamingos and PENGUINS!!!! We stopped and got lunch at a little Mexican bar 'cause all of the restaurants were ridiculously priced. Had some delicious nachos and a caffiene fix, then headed back to our hotel!

We decided that we wanted to go dancing on our last night, so we looked through and picked out a couple of places to try. First, we went to the Stratosphere (sp?) just to look around, drink, and play some slots. The new hotel (Wynn) was opening that night and it looked like there was a big party going on, didn't want to stop though 'cause it would have been crazy. We had looked at a club in our book before leaving called "Syn City". Thought we'd check it out 'cause there no cover for girls and dollar drinks on Wednesdays. Yeah, that club SUCKED!!!!! I think we were there for all of five minutes. Walked in, pretty shady looking crowd and one sad little go-go dancer on stage. There was a dance floor, but I swear the whole thing put together was the size of my trailer. So, headed from there and decided to go to Studio 54.

Oh yeah, VERY happy with Studio 54 :) First of all, no cover for us but geez, it would really suck to be a guy in Vegas because they have to pay ridiculous covers everywhere! Studio 54 was in the MGM Grand so we were close to home. Walked in and I can honestly say its the coolest bar I've ever been too! Huge dance floor, tables with couches and comfy chairs everywhere! We took a break from dancing for a bit, and just when we sat down we noticed to traipeze artists swinging over the dance floor! So cool! We had noticed several people standing over the floor on a balcony, so though we'd go up and investigate. Sure enough, there was an entire other bar, teeny dance floor and places to lounge on the upper floor! We parked ourselves there and had a ball! It was so much fun! Made it back to the hotel around 3:30 a.m. and crawled into bed. And that was Wednesday!

Alrighty, sorry about the second novel but so much to cover and I'm sure I've missed some stuff ;) I'll finish up the saga tomorrow after my carpel tunnel surgery (ha!). I hope everyone's having a great night! Take care and God bless!

Return of the BLOG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hello hello!!!! Long time no write! :) Well, back in semi-full force! Quite the week and weekend! Had a GREAT time! So much to tell about, hopefully I can remember everything! However, one thing really bums me out.......I have NO pictures to capture my experience :( Forgot to bring a disposable camera and didn't want to take my good camera when we were out....so, I believe Annie and Kelly said they'd get me extras! Long story short, pictures to come but may take a little longer than expected :) Anyhoo, here's a breakdown of our fun-filled Vegas trip!
Monday:
Kelly and Annie picked me up around 6:30 a.m. I had already given Roy hugs and kisses goodbye before he left for work :) We headed for Peoria to catch our plane. Must say, the airport experience was not as frustrating as it could have been. The airport in Peoria is fairly small and we were able to get through baggage and security quickly. Arrived in Vegas at about 10:45 (Vegas time!). Took a cab to our hotel and dumped our bags! We stayed at the Boardwalk, not the worst hotel on the strip but certainly not one of the best. But, it was affordable, it was right on the strip and our room was perfectly situated between the pool, gift shop (for snacks!), and casino. We were a little over-ambitious our first day :) We dropped off our bags, changed, grabbed lunch at the hotel buffet, and immediately went out to explore.

Our hotel was very close walking distance to other hotel/casino's such as the New York New York, Monte Carlo, and the MGM Grand. We went to all three, I believe first to the Monte Carlo. We were on a mission to stake out wedding chapels as well as explore. Played a couple slots and got a beverage at that casino, then headed up to view their chapel. Very nice and had a lot included with the wedding chapel. After getting information there we headed to the New York New York.

Outside of the New York is this awesome 9-11 tribute under the statue of liberty. Apparantly, after 9-11 people started flocking there and leaving poems, letters, shirts, etc. in honor of the people who lost their lives. So, the city organized it into shadow boxes built around the harbor replica. Very moving, they also play music outside of it constantly. While we were viewing, the song "Let it Be" was playing. Not a dry eye around.

Went inside the New York New York, of course stopping off first to play some slots and get a drink. The inside of the casino is built to look like central park! There were trees and the aisles were built to look like sidewalks. Very cool! After we (well, I!) lost money on the slots we headed over to the MGM Grand.

This hotel is freakin' huge!!! We got lost three times! When we walked in the lion habitat is right by the door. They were sleeping and one of the workers was sleeping on them! He even woke one up, and it turned around and cradled him under its paw! So cute, I ain't trying it though! After seeing the chapel at the MGM Annie was sold! It is absolutely gorgeous, and she can take pictures afterwards on their grounds. We spent some time there getting more information and then stopped at the food court (there's a mall in there as well, see why we got lost three times!) to get something to eat.

Headed back to our hotel to play some more slots. I actually won some on video poker, but it basically evened out what I'd lost at the other casinos :) Most places are now using tickets that you take to the cashier to claim your winnings, but our hotel still gave out actual change. So, I had to scoop 40 dollars worth of nickels into cups :) Not complainin' though! After giving up on the gambling for awhile we got into our "going out" clothes and took off down the strip. We planned to go to Harrah's, on our way there we caught the fountains at the Bellagio, and it was unbelievable! They go off every 15 minutes and we just happened to arrive when they were starting. The water shoots, moves, and sprays to music and its beautiful! They were playing to "All that Jazz". Awesome!!!!
After watching the fountains we started again on our mission to Harrah's. However, we were distracted on the way by the sound of two awful girls singing "Hey Mickey" at a kareoke bar. Had to stop and mock! The name of the bar was Tequila Joe's, very small and located right outside of a casino. We ended up staying there the rest of the night! It was so much fun, there were some really good singers and the crowd was awesome! After that we headed back to our hotel after a very long walk (the strip is a lot bigger than it looks on the map, especially when you're walking!). Made it back to our room around 2:00 and crashed!
Well, I think I've written a novel about our first day alone so I'll wait and write more tomorrow! Its very good to be home and I'll definitely be getting caught up on everyone else's blogs tonight! I hope everyone's doing well! Take care and God bless! Nighty-Night!