And #1 on the list goes to...

This.

Boo!!

Did I scare ya? I know you were checking my blog out of habit, not expecting me and then you were like Whoa! By golly, Ethyl...there's a sign of life here!
Ethyl is my new favorite old lady name. Does anyone even know anyone named Ethyl? Am I even spelling it right? Not important, but did you know that Ethylene gas is a hormone let off by certain fruits that causes early ripening? Yep, last semester I was flauntin' my math skillz now I'm fixin' to demonstrate me some science expertisezes.
Speaking of science (and school) guess what!!!!! I got all A's this semester!! I can not believe it! This was my most difficult semester so far. But, with the help of my most awesome friend Carrie, my fabulous (and way good looking) husband Merkle, and my genius mom...I managed straight A's. Maybe I will graduate with honors after all. And I won't have to resort to plan B which was to go purchase my OWN pretty piece of cord from Joann's, pull it out from under my graduation gown and throw it around my neck just as I'm about to go across the stage-which I am NOT above doing! I mean, who wants to look like this on graduation day:

When you could look like this...

Holy cow, Ethyl!! As I'm perusing Google images for graduation pictures I stumbled on this beauty! And I asked myself, "Alice, why stop with some measly cord I could pick up for 2.99/yrd? Let's go for this...

See that chick in the big blue robe with the dark, velvety bands and beautiful blue sash...yeah, I don't know what any of that means but mama wants. Anybody know where I could pick one up cheap and how I can stash that baby on graduation day?

Keeflie Day 2011

Another great Keeflie Day down in the record books. For myself, it's Keeflie Day #30(ish). Every year, day after Thanksgiving while thousands of shoppers were out pushing their way through throngs of other shoppers, me and my Grandma Kensinger and Great Grandma Miles were down in grandma's basement baking keeflie's by the hundreds. Now, it's my daughters' tradition. The last few years we have been joined by my dear friend Anne and her daughter Grace. I love this picture of us, this pretty much symbolizes my friendship with Anne, she does something goofy and I laugh at her.

Happy Keeflie Day everyone!

Sheldon

asked Amy Farrah Fowler to be his girlfriend!!!!

This is THE BEST show on TV!!

A Full Weekend

What a great weekend we had! It started out on Friday afternoon when the girls and one friend each and I went to Notre Dame to watch the marching band practice. That was awesome! They march down the front steps of the Golden Dome and across campus to this roped off parking lot where they go through their entire game day routine. And let's face it, the best part of college football IS the marching band.

Then we headed over to the bookstore at Eddy Street Commons where Grandpa works. Turns out Notre Dame legend Rudy Rudinger was there signing autographs. He and my dad had connected over a purchase Rudy had made a few days prior to this so Rudy asked my dad if we would like a picture with all the kids. Pretty cool, except I didn't have my camera. So...

After we left there we headed over for some Hot Box pizza. Delicious. Then we met up with my dear friend Carrie and her family and we all walked around the campus for a bit. It was great. The whole campus was alive with the excitement and preparations of a home game the next day. 

So, Saturday morning Emily had her horse lessons so while she and daddy were off doing that Grace and I did a little shopping for a wedding we were going to later that day. Boy, did we have fun! We had our first ever visit to Charming Charlie's! Oh My Word! We had sooooo much fun! Grace is such an accessories girl! We bought 2 headbands, a purse, a coin purse, and some perfume. What a blast!

Then the wedding...beautiful!

And to top it all off, Sunday was my mom's birthday. Can I tell you how much I love her? I don't have the words to tell you how much I love my mom. She is truly my best friend. She always mends my heart when it is broken. She always listens, without judgement, when I call and rattle on and on about school. She always laughs at my vain attempts at humor. She tells me she's proud of me, that I'm a great mom. She's brilliant, patient, kind, a model of conservative values. And...and this is the part that baffles me...she likes me!! She thinks I'm great! My hero likes me. It simply doesn't get better than that.

Rethinking Things

                                                                                                                                                                                              Found these beauties while doing some online Christmas shopping for my girls. A sign for those of you young people who don't have children yet to run, don't walk to the nearest deserted island when you have your children, lest they be infected by this ugliness!! And, you can have this picture of feminine beauty for your TODDLER for the low price of $170.00!!!

Seriously, with what outfit do these shoes work? And where does said toddler wear these, the library for story time? ArGgGGHHhh!!! Oh, wait, I know...the rest of the outfit looks like this...silly me...now I remember.

Ya know, I have to say, it's so great raising little girls today. I mean, they really can be anything they want! But, I'm concerened. My oldest daughter wants to live on a ranch with 50 horses, will this outfit work for that? My other little girl shows signs of a budding architect. But, I dunno, maybe we should rethink things. Maybe vampire slut is the right choice for our family. Man, there are just so many choices today. I've said it before and I will say it again: We've come a long way, baby.

                                              

Amazing Acres

After church today we went up to our favorite fall spot...Amazing Acres in Edwardsburg. There is soooo much to do there! Last year the girls loved the zipline but it appears we have become zipline snobs ever since grandma and grandpa put a super fast one up in their backyard. But, there was still the huge slide built under a hill:

A giant 16 ft. spider web thingy:

Gem mining.Your choice, gems or arrowheads:



Photo Ops:

 Hayrides:

Cow Train:

Corn Box (the girls favorite activity, by far):

Indoor kid maze thingy:

Ingenious goat feeding system, see that little tiny silver bucket going up to the top? It's full of food that dumps out and slides down to where that goat has his face buried:

Not to mention, a 4 mile corn maze! Mark and Emily made it through almost a mile, but Grace and I forged ahead to the end. It was great. We had a blast. All in all, we spent 5 hours at the Pumpkin Patch today. 5 hours!

PSA

Years ago when I worked for the best grocery store EVER we were trained thoroughly on customer service, how to make our shoppers want to keep coming back. Well, one of the big things I took away from that training was this. When giving a customer their change, hand them their coins FIRST then their bills. Don't hand them a stack of bills with coins floating around on top.

This afternoon I was in line at a drive through and I saw the car in front of me get handed their change and then I saw coins fall to the ground. Then, when I pulled up the lady handed me my change with the coins floating around on top and of course it's rainy and windy and the coins slide off and onto the ground. When I opened my door to get my coins there was more than $1.50 in coins down there! She'd been dropping peoples money all day. So, just to recap:

1.) Coins

2.) Bills

You're welcome.

I love the conversations I have with my husband...

Him: Glad you finally got rid of those raw cookies in the fridge.
Me:  Have you been eating them...raw?
Him: Yeah, at night with a glass of milk.
Me: Raw?
Him: They're delicious!
Me: What!!!
Him: (arms thrown up in triumph) You can't kill me with a raw cookie!!


What Mark Sees...Yummy!

 


What Alice Sees...Salmonella.

 

Hee Hee

Grandparents Day

So, my last post had a little anger in it. What can I say? I was angry. School has that effect.

But today? Today was lovely! Today, I got invited by my fully awesome 4 year old neighbor to go with him to his preschool Grandparent/Special Friend Day! It was sooooooo much fun. We read 2 books, almost drew a picture, and got sang to. It made me want to teach preschool! For about 5 minutes. Then I came to my senses. (Anne, I don't know how you do it!)! Anyway, it was so sweet. Afterwards was when I really was able to get a taste of what grandparenthood must be like. We went to McDonalds and then I took him to Martins to buy him a little stuffed puppy! OH! I love that little guy! Thanks for the special day today Braeden!

 

I

HATE IUSB!!!!!!!! I HATE GOING TO SCHOOL!!!!! I HATE IT I HATE IT I HATE IT!!!!!!

These...

I must have...

LOVELOVELOVELOVELOVELOVELOVELOVELOVELOVE

3 things I saw today...

1.) A semi truck driver with both hands off the wheel, texting. Made me mad.
2.) An employee at Target with a safety pin stuck through her eyebrow. Made me a.) want to ask why. b.)throw up.
3.) An airplane pretty low in the sky and as it went through some clouds I could see it's shadow streching out in front of it on the clouds! Made me dizzy.

For My Mom...I love you!

Click each picture to see it bigger...

Happy Birthday to the Joy of my life!

Well, it was difficult to top last years dreamy party at the horse ranch but somehow we managed.

The girls decided that since Santa had delivered a 90 ft. zip line to Grandma and Grandpa Kensinger's house last Christmas, they wanted to have their party at their house. And as if 3 acres of country life, complete with 1/4 acre pond, trail through the woods, frog catching, gynormous tree swings, pumpkin painting and zip line weren't enough, my dad decided to build a tree house!! That's right, a house in the trees!! It was incredible. It was complete with this awesome little launch pad for the zip line. It is an amazing tree house. The party was perfect. My mom and dad are awesome!

Funny story...the morning of the party I woke up and decided 3 hours before people started to arrive was the perfect time to throw together some indoor party games. So, I scanned PINTREST (my favorite new addiction) for some ideas where I happily found this:

So, I ran (in the rain) up to Hobby Lobby to buy a giant piece of foam board, some balloons and oh how about $60 worth of other stuff for the party that I had not yet purchased! THEN, I had to go (in the rain) to Meijer's to get some darts and candy to stuff inside the balloons and $60 worth of other stuff! THEN, I discovered that I had somehow managed to FORGET the foam board that brought me out (in the rain) in the first place! So, back to Hobby Lobby for that...straight home to pick up the fam...and down to G&G's for the party. Thank you A-dub for getting the balloons to tape (in the rain) to G&G's mailbox to let people know where the party was, since I didn't bother putting an address on the invites!!!! And again I tell you...it's weird to be me.

P.S.As you can see God cleared away the rain for us for the rest of the afternoon. It was the perfect day for an outdoor birthday party.

   

The next day we continued the festivities with Grandma and Grandpa Merrill at our house for dinner. And of course, the girls with their all time favorite cousins!