Thunder From Down Under

Wow! What an exciting Saturday night. My darling friend Shannon took me to the show Thunder From Down Under. Her husband got the tickets for us. I have not been out for a "girls" night in a very long time. Warren, her husband, was our designated driver for the night so we could have a drink or two if we wished. Nice guy! Anyway for those of you that don't know Thunder From Down Under is a male stripper/dance group from Australia. Very lean, sculpted men dancing around and taking their clothes off. Very nice...but no picture taking allowed :-(
We both had a couple of drinks at the show and after Shannon ordered a pizza from the casino deli. After telling me that it was truly the best pizza in town I decided to take home two slices, one for me and one for my mom who was kindly watching the kids. And it was the best pizza I have had in a long time! Of course my mom wanted to know why we didn't bring home a sexy Australian.
It was a fantastic night and I loved it. The show was fun and the company great! Thank you Shannon! And Warren!

Halloween and other stories.

What a busy time it's been. Mark made it home for Halloween! We drove to Grand Rapids Friday (the 31st) in the morning to pick him up then hurried back home. Henry's costume this year was Tigger. He was soooo cute! Irene went a a ladybug bug. Again way cute! We walked around to houses and Henry knocked on the doors. Poor guy was so hoarse from the cold we all had but he would knock and say "notch notch". He always said thank you although it comes out as "Tyou". They got a lot of candy even though we really didn't go to that many houses. We ended at Shannon's house where mommy and daddy got an adult beverage. Great way to warm up ;-)
In the morning we went to Traverse City. I got a new phone! Sprint was having a sale and I got a new phone that I needed badly. I got a red Blackberry Curve. Loved it and the woman that helped me was great and changed my plan so I actually get more minutes for less money. I love the calender option on this phone. I can put in everyone's appointments and manage them so much better than I could with my other phone. Of course I had some buyers remorse a couple of days later. Not sure if it's Sprint or the phone but there are some things that are not working correctly. Grrr.
Anyway...Mark and I ended up having a big fight at Borders. I think lack of sleep played a big part. The fight curbed our day and we ended up leaving without going to three of the stores we needed to go to. That night we stayed at Days Inn. Swimming swimming all night long. My kids are fish. Thankfully the kiddies went to bed early and I got a lovely shoulder/back rub ;-)
Sunday morning we decided to head to Grand Rapids so Mark could get back on the road. My mom was going to go with us but she was sick with the cold we've been spreading around. We got to G.R. around 1pm and Mark logged into the truck computer to let them know he was ready to go. Then we headed to Brann's for lunch. Nice lunch but the kids were BRATS! Of course in typical Williams Family style when we got to the restaurant we discovered that Henry had wet his pants. He was drenched. Thankfully Brann's is across the street from the huge Meijer store. I ran in and got Hen sweatpants, sweatshirt and towel to sit on. Fun!
After all that excitement we headed back to the truck. Once there we discovered that there was no load for Mark until Monday. I didn't want to leave him there while we headed home. He would have to sleep in his truck and actually drive to a gas station just to potty. We decided to stay the night in Grand Rapids. Of course our suitcase with all the diapers and clothes I had Mark take into the house before we left town so we did not have any clothes. So off to Wal-Mart. We got the kids inexpensive jammies and diapers for Roo. Then we checked into the Quality Inn Terrace Club where we stayed the last time we were in Grand Rapids. This time we got to see their birds. Last time we were there they darn things were sleeping. Sammy and Mulan were beautiful but they didn't like Roo. That might have had something to do with her squawking as loud as possible at them. Turns out Mark has some strange affinity with birds. He talked "bird talk" with them and nodded his head up and down. What a sight! And I still tease him about it :-)
We went swimming as soon as we check in. Thankfully Mark had left the bag with all our swimsuits in the car so we were able to enjoy the pool. Plus it was Sunday so there was no one else at the pool! After swimming we had dinner then it was back into the pool. Really super fun evening. The kids went to sleep early again and Mark and I just enjoyed some time to ourselves. I was really glad we had that extra night with Mark and we parted happy with each other. And then with the usual Williams Family style it turned out they still did not have a run and he ended up spending Monday night in his truck. AND...Tuesday he got a really s*#ty run making it an overall crappy week for miles...making it a poopy pay week too :-(

Happy Anniversary?

What crazy lives we lead? Is it safe to use that excuse for why we both forgot our wedding anniversary? I just realized today that our wedding anniversary was TWO DAYS ago! How could I forget? Of course Mark didn't remember until I told him so I think I should get extra points for actually remembering ;-) I immediately sent my hubby a text message wishing him a late happy anniversary. He is still on the road until tomorrow so even if either of us had remembered we would not have celebrated together. I guess we'll have to have grandma watch the kiddies so we can have a quiet time out together. I am excited that he'll be home tomorrow in time to go out trick-or-treating with the kids. He hasn't been out with us since Henry's first Halloween back in 2005 when Henry was only a month old. He was dressed as a lobster by the way and we only went to a few neighbors.

Happy (late) Sixth Anniversary Marky! I love you lots and you are still my rock.

Blue Toe Nails...

We finally made it to Kindermusik Family Time. We only missed three(!) classes. I've never had a month conspire against me like this month has. Last week was the first week we actually got there. The kids had a great time and it is always nice to see the kids and moms (and dad) that we've been going to class with since early 2006. Last night was our second night making it to class. I was not going to go at first since I have a cold but Ms. Melinda (our teacher extraordinaire) said if I was feeling up to it that we should come. She'd just bring hand sanitizer for me. I managed to drag myself out of the house, clean but not altogether with it. When we got there I was surprised to see my friend Jennifer there. She was kind enough to bring the children of a mom that couldn't make it. Jennifer was VERY brave! She had five, yes FIVE kids with her!!!! I can hardly handle my two! My hat is off to you Jen! Kindermusik was a lot of fun even with my stuffed up head.

Today I am anxiously awaiting my new winter jacket. My old one has fallen apart and so I ordered a new one. Yippee! However I did not order it soon enough and I have been running around with no jacket in this cold weather. I suspect that when it arrives the weather will suddenly turn sunny and warm ;-) I also splurged on a beautiful mohair scarf but I have had an annoying time with the company I ordered it from. They called saying the billing address didn't match the one on my card and they couldn't approve it blah blah. However I called the card and the charge had already gone through before they called about it! I was NOT happy. The scarf was shipped today though. I wish that this had gone smoothly since there are a few more items I would like to buy as Christmas gifts from there. I just don't want the hassle again.

So the title of this post is blue toe nails...I picked out a crazy blue color of nail polish for my toes. When I painted them Henry was right there wanting to help me. He decided he really wanted his toe nails painted too. I was going to only do one toe on each foot but he wanted them all done. It turned out totally cute.

And in Roo news...On Monday Roo wandered off while I was on the computer. At first I didn't think much of it until I heard the toilet flush. Roo had taken quite a few of my mother's decorative soaps and flushed them. Ahhh! What a stinker! Thankfully they did not plug the toilet.

Our Grand Rapids Weekend. Part Two.

Continuing on the we really should have gone home theme...Mark woke me at 6am. He was in pain and thought he had a kidney stone. While I felt bad for him there is nothing I could do and I was a bit cranky at being woken up an hour before the kids would be up. He went down to the pool to sit in the hot tub. Lovely. I could not fall back asleep. Hmmm. He came up an hour later claiming to feel a bit better. So we trotted down to the lobby for breakfast. I love listening to other people while in a restaurant-like setting. There are always self important people spouting off about their self important whatevers. We had a woman like that sitting near us. SO I got my laugh for the day :-)

After breakfast we went to the John Ball Zoo. I was amazed at the price. Only ten dollars for the four of us! The zoo was just the right size for someone Henry's age to walk through without getting tired. We saw Penguins, tiger, lions, bears, wort hogs, monkeys, lizards. The weather was chilly but sunny so walking wasn't bad. I highly recommend it! The kids loved it. After the zoo we ate at a new little restaurant called Johnny's Lunch. It was a pretend old time diner. Cute. We all had a hot dog and fries.

After lunch we went back to the room for naps. Henry went to sleep after a lot of horsing around. Irene never did sleep. Although I blame that on Mark. She needs quiet and he opened up a package then shaved with electric razor. He made a lot of noise. Then he decided to go back to the hot tub cause his back hurt again. Now normally I would have tried to be understanding about this but never once was it okay for just me to go to the hot tub. I would have loved to sit in it and relax. My neck has a permanent injury and the hot tub would have been great...ANYWAY...when he came back to the room I decided to dose off for a bit since I was tired from getting up early. Needless to say Mark and I were not on great terms...

For dinner we went to Chuck-E-Cheese. Henry loves the commercials. We ordered the pizza and 100 tokens. The pizza was...blah but then I don't think you go there for the food. Of course Mark was still in pain and rather cranky. Henry was wanting to do everything and Roo wanted to tag along. We did end up having a good time. We left about two hours later with three fake sharks and some suckers. Surprisingly there were a lot of things both kids could do. Rides just for little ones and games. I'm just glad there isn't on in town. I would hate to drive by it on a regular basis and listen to the kids shouting to go there :-) Oh and Mark passed his kidney stone there too.

After dinner it was back to the room and down to the pool. Since it was Sunday night there was only one small girl and her mother at the pool. Yippee! Had a lovely, relaxing time. The next morning it was breakfast again then we threw some laundry into the guest washer/dryer. After that we checked out and went to the Rivertown Crossing Mall in Grandville. We were going to ride on the carousal but it was closed. Went to Barnes and Noble and got Mark was books to take on the road with him. We decided to have lunch at Red Robin since it was across the street from the mall. Fun place but we had a terrible time. Henry had a major break down. I had to go to the car with him in the pouring rain so neither of us finished lunch.

When we left there we went back to Mark's truck. Of course it was still pouring rain and I had to run across the parking lot to use the bathroom. And Henry fell asleep just before we got there and we had to wake him. Grrrr...don't wake a sleeping child. Then it was off for home. I was exhausted and when we got back to town we stopped at the store to pick up food. It was an early bedtime that night!

Thankfully this weekend we are not staying in Grand Rapids. In fact it has taken all week just to get this kids settled back in the routine. Oh no. No over nights out of town for a bit. But it will be Halloween and Daddy should be home to go out with us! Yippee!

Our Grand Rapids Weekend. Part One.

Last Saturday, after three weeks, my husband was FINALLY back in Michigan. Although we had planned for him to be out those three weeks it was still a LONG time. We decided to stay two nights in Grand Rapids so he could leave early on Monday. I drove down Saturday morning with the kids. I forgot a lot of the things I needed...I hate having to pack for three people and make sure it all gets to the car. I like the help but of course Mark was in Grand Rapids. Anyway I was making decent time on the road until I got just outside Muskegon. There was a huge traffic jam. Someone had driven off the hill and three lanes of traffic was at a standstill. Henry loved seeing all the state police cars, fire trucks, tow trucks, etc. After making it to Grand Rapids and picking up Mark we lunched at Chili's. It was...not that great. I just felt that we should have gone home instead of staying the weekend there. Little did I know...
We stayed at the Quality Inn Terrace Club on 28th street. It was actually very nice. Off the lobby they had a study, sitting room, and garden room (complete with birds). Also a breakfast room where they served pizza in the late afternoon and a free buffet breakfast in the mornings. The breakfast was actually really good. Way better than continental breakfasts. It had hot foods as well as breads and cereal. And it was free! Our room was large and very nice. The only problem was the crib....or lack of one. We were going to put the kids down for a nap and the front desk staff said a crib would be up shortly. An hour later still no crib. Called front desk...one is coming....still no crib. Mark went down to talk to someone and suddenly no one knew if they had one...BUT...no one would go look!!!! We went to the Goodwill to see if they might have one for sale cheap. The place was packed! Seriously fighting for parking spots. And the place was full of BMWs, Lexus, Escalades. No crib (pack-n-play) there. When we came out someone had hit our car!!!!! I was so MAD! I still get angry every time I think of it. Grrr.
So...we went back to the hotel. The kids and I stayed in the car while Mark went in to talk to someone again about the crib. I really did not want to spend a minimum of fifty bucks on purchasing one. While waiting for Mark, Henry started crying. I was soooo not in the mood for it. He kept getting louder. When I asked him what was wrong he managed to say his head hurt. I got out of the car and was holding him when Mark came out. Henry was hysterical. He kept saying his head hurt and no matter what we did he cried. We hopped into the car and were on the way to Meijer for some medicine. While stopped at a light Henry started throwing up. I was about to get out of the car to help him...forgot we were in traffic on 28th street! So now we had a crying, puking, head hurting little boy. Mark and I were....not freaked but worried...a lot. Instead of Meijer we started heading to an urgent care. Mark is from the Grand Rapids area but he was asking me where an urgent care was. Like I would know. He was flying down the road when Henry quieted down. I asked if his head still hurt. Nope. He was fine. Here we were panicked about our child and now he was fine. Thank you God! So our urgent care visit turned into a meijer visit. Our poor kid was covered in puke and did not smell good but he felt fine!
We had an uneventful dinner and went swimming. The kids love to swim! It was very busy at the pool though. A big group of adults drinking and not watching their kids. We stayed as far away as possible. Then it was off to bed...with a crib. Mark had been successful. Someone finally got off their butt to look for one. And that is my only complaint about the place.
More to come of our weekend but for now I have to make some kiddies some lunch.

My Brother...the Elbow

My big brother Matt finally got the results back from his MRI. If you may recall Matt was in the hospital last month with severe pain in his arm. Everyone was really worried but no one could give a answer to what was wrong. It turns out that back in the summer when he originally injured his elbow while wave boarding what happened was a piece of the elbow lining broke away. This piece then ended up in the joint causing it to swell, hurt, and lock up. Apparently this piece of lining can jam the joint up again if it doesn't heal properly. Right now it is wait and see if it will fuse to the bone. They are giving it six weeks and if everything is healing fine then there will be no need for surgery. Matt says he was about 90% of the movement back in his arm so everyone thinks it is on the road to recovery. Yippee!!