Fun in the SUN

Blake points out a big cruise ship...maybe next vacation?

We thought he was nuts till he said he's making a sand angel

I'd love to take him fishing, if I knew of an active fishing spot.

Total fun in the sun

Seth, Joel and Blake having a good time digging a hole.

Even Jayde enjoyed playing in the sand.

This is Cori with Jayde, this is a special one because nearly 13 years ago Jennifer, Jayde's mom, was posing with Cori this size in a pool also in Florida.

"Good-bye vacation"

Jayde gets her hands on some food (CULTURE)?

Here are some pictures of our little darling, tasting a variety of food, she was getting a lesson on food "culture". I used the word "culture" for Nicole, she enjoys different food cultures so I thought I'd use it. Jayde was not too crazy about any of it, but she did take a few taste of each one at her own will. So at least she gave it a good try. :-)

While waiting for dinner, Jayde keeps happy

Crab Anyone?

Poor Jennifer was forced to make a heart-breaking decison, she just couldn't tell Blake "NO" but instead purposely left it behind. We all agreed it was the best decision of the morning. He never asked for the crab leg till he was home and showing daddy the pictures. She said "it would have stunk up all our luggage and besides we have a picture so daddy can still see it"

Our Thanksgiving trip to Tampa

This is Blake saying "cheeeeeese!" :-)

We took our daughter and grandchildren on a vacation. (This is her holding the baby). We flew into Tampa and drove to Ruskin, Florida. That's where we spent our Thanksgiving week. We stayed in a condo with a good view of the beach, water and marina. Our son-in-law, Jim, was unfortunately unable to get off work to join us, however, he was fortunate enough to take us to the airport and stay with us till security. (Thanks Jim you save us a lot of $$$ for me not having to park my car.) Sam was already there (airport) since he is contracting work there, so we didn't have a big fat parking fee. We were gone for 9 days. Most days were great, those were the days we did little driving and spent a lot of time out on the beach, in the pool, playground and hot tub.

This is everyone but me heading for the

luggage carrousel in Tampa.

ALL of our luggage minus the stroller.

We are waiting for our rental van to show

up.

JAYDE'S FIRST BIRTHDAY

Happy Birthday to our special little grand daughter, Jayde who turned 1 October 28. Here she is:

NO WAY? YES WAY!!

This is from my CVS stop. Read the sign, it cost me $1.00 for all this. Yes, this is true! Before you start "no waying" me, let me say something. I did not hand the cashier $1.00. No, I handed him a lot of coupons well, actually only 6. READ ON:

When I asked the manager for the Loreal product they had for $11.99 and giving you $11.99 Extra Care Bucks back, he regrettable informed me they were totally OUT. This is the best part... so the manager said he would give me something else for free, and HE chose something valued at 16.99. I asked if I could take this instead, (same price, $16.99) and he happily said yes, get what you want. He rang me up and took off the $16.99 as a "coupon". So with my ECB I got BACK and the overage on some items and the other coupons, I made out better than a bandit.

You can do this too, Andrea at Mommy Snacks.net and Sherry atSaving Sherry will gladly tell you EXACTLY how to do this. More stuff for the pantry at church. The candy will be added to some Christmas gifts, If it wasn't for the $4.00 candy it ALL would have been free.

My husband came home from work and asked me what I bought that I didn't need today. I told him it only cost me a buck for all this. He was amazed. I don't think he was too concerned about the buck being gone anymore. LOL

P.S. I didn't even have to ask the manager for a substitute, he offered. I accepted.

Shopping bargains

I bought all this yesterday at Walgreen's. I used coupons, and sale prices combined. My favorite deal in this picture was that both coffee mates were just 25cents EACH. I really wish you would check out Saving Sherry she tells you exactly how to do this!

I am getting no payback from her for informing you all. I am getting enjoyment and having fun watching the cashier say "ha?" (when they tell me my total).

For those that don't want to click on the picture, I paid $14.76 but w/o coupons and sales it would have cost $24.49. I am starting a stock pile for the pantry our church has.

Lilah, the REDnosed DOG?

A lot late, but I wanted to show you all what kinda condition we found Lilah in when we arrived home from Miami. Apparently, she had been trying unsuccessfully to pry her cage door open at night. She is used to her cage, she sleeps in there every night for the last almost 5 years but guess she really wanted out badly, and failed. Poor Girl!

a Puppy, Superman and Anakin?

Halloween!

It was busy evening here on Friday. I first made a big crock pot of vegetable beef stew and Jennifer and the kids had dinner with me before Trick-Or-Treat. Then we went over to help the kids I watch get ready, we were both busy painting their faces green and spraying hair black of course I had to first hot roll it and put make-up on Cori, after all witches need BLACK hair and defined eyes and lips! We all had a great time doing it. Then I drove Jennifers car back to my house because she always ends at my house. Here is a picture. L-R we have Blake: Superman, Joel: Anakin Skywalker, Cori: Elephaba from Wicked, Jayde: the little puppy dog and last but not least is Seth: Master Yoda

MIAMI Florida

I thought I'd share some more of our favorite pictures from Miami and Marco Island. Like I said earlier, we went to Miami for Sam's work and then we went onto Marco Island for the rest of the week and then back to Miami for an over night stay to catch the airplane early in the morning to come home. This was a much needed and appreciated vacation.

These salamanders were all over outside.

I want the boat in the middle with the
cabin cruiser.

This is the pool at the Hilton where we stayed.

Sam took this shot of me in

swimming mode.

Bargain shopping!!!!

My pal, Savingsherry@blogger.com just tagged me. If your into saving money and who isn't I'm talking lot's of it, just visit her site, she tells you practically exactly how to do it! Of course coupons are nearly mandatory. But you can still save by getting the CVS and Walgreens sales and end up getting Register Rewards=walgreens or Cash Back=CVS you do however need a CVS card/ you can get it for free right at the store. Then you use these rewards to purchase the next stuff. Walgreens however does not require anything special.

This is from a recent shopping trip:

Miami Trip

Once again, I was fortunate to travel along with my dear husband to Miami for a business trip. We stayed at an awsome resort/spa (not on his dime this time), called Doral golf resort/spa. It's actually where the "Blue Monster" golf course is, also known as the home to the PGA. I am not a golfer of any sort so whoopie do. But I did take a looooong walk around the many golf courses and being surrounded by green lush lawn, beautiful palm trees, and coconut trees was thrilling enough for me. I was also a pool lounger and even got in a cat nap there. All this was enough to keep me occupied till the greet, meet and eat with all the other "techies".
All these pictures were taken with my camera phone. I've noticed these can not be enlarged by clicking on them.






A tangled up mess of tree roots.

My ultimate hang out. I swam, and slept here.

FALL TIME

Off to Mishawaka, Indiana

This is some grill'in on the RANGE!


We also "roasted" marshmallows.

I was fortunate to run off to my sister and brother-in-law's house for 5 days. We had a blast. As you will see in the pictures we did some very unusual grilling, we played lots of backgammon, Aggravation, dominoes, battleship, (thanks Cori for the tip) and some other card game where we matched up colored tiled squares called Connecto.

We went to a sauerkraut dinner, several parks, one was a Japanese garden, went mushroom hunting (picture to follow), helped set up for a gigantic "rummage sale" where I found Blake and Jayde some clothes at a church she does sewing at on Tuesdays (picture to follow), went to the zoo, and went to CiCi pizza, "Welcome to CiCi's!" I love that place and Sam does not so my favorite brother-in-law took me there. (Sorry Tom, if you are my b.i.l., not sure what you are) haha.

Anyway, these are not listed in the order we went there and I am thinking I forgot a few places but that's OK. I had a great time sleeping in and having weird dreams, that's what too much sleep med does to me. I'm stuck on 1/4 tablet of my sleep pill but I took 3/4 since I had no reason to wake up early.

After a mushroom seminar at a local

park we found this cauliflower

mushroom. We had it checked out by the

instructor and he assured us it was edible.

I cut it up and Sharyn coated it in flour

and sauteed it in butter. We sure enjoyed it!

My silly brother-in-law served us cookies and

milk. He was keeping our clothes clean with

towels. Does he actually think we would waste

a single crumb? I thought he knew us better

than that.

Not the best shot of an anteater, but I never

saw one at a zoo or anywhere but t.v. The

photo below has info on them.

One day my sister came upon this castle

so she wanted to show me too.

My panda clothes

I had to include this final picture of me. Check out my socks!

T I double Gaa R's!!!!

These shots were taken by Sam at the Memphis zoo. They're remarkable in color, quality and pose. The second to bottom tiger has a fish in his mouth. Click on it and you will see.