It's My Life

Happy Easter! This was a quiet one for us. The Boy had a community service project for a leadership class at college and could not come home. It was just the three of us. Brisket was on sale at our local grocery store so our dear friend purchased a whole brisket. The Husband volunteered to smoke it for her (and one for us). He just got a new smoker and has been anxious to try it out.  I made some homemade mac and cheese, roasted asparagus, and maple garlic roasted carrots. It was the perfect Easter meal. For the past several years we have been having Easter Scavenger Hunts. We started off drawing photos because The Short Chic could not read yet. Each year we have gotten a little more challenging.   We had so much fun with the scavenger hunt this year that we decided to keep playing with it and made this video. Hope you enjoy it!

Another Oscar Season has finished. I feel a little sadness today knowing that it is over. I am also holding my eyelids open today because I am so tired!  I will never for the life of me understand why the Oscar's do not start until 6:30 Central Time. Hasn't anyone else figured out no matter how quickly you que the music to cut off the acceptance speeches the show is NEVER going to end on time.  I will say this, this was a great Oscar season. I absolutely loved 7 out of 8 nominations. I was inspired by some of the true stories behind the movies and found myself researching and learning more about the real life moments. This was our 19th year celebrating Oscar. One one hand 19 years seems so long but on the other hand, it feels like it was just a few years ago. So many things have changed in the past 19 years. We started off with little hope of seeing Documentary Shorts, or Live Action Shorts, or even Foreign Films. Then we found ourselves running down to independent th

Last weekend, The Husband and I spent some time out on the town having a couple's date night. I can't even tell you when the last time we did something without either one of our children and with other adults.  We are more likely to go do things solo so the other is with the kids but this time we called in the grandparents and asked for a sleep over. You know what: we had the most fun imaginable and had a great time! A few months ago, back when it was still fall, my cousin called up and wanted to know if we would go to a new business here in Kansas City called Breakout KC. I had never heard of them but felt we were game for anything. Little did we know just how much game we were going to get into. Breakout KC opened here in Kansas City in the Spring of 2015 and is a live action escape room. Here is the five minute details:  there are four themed rooms to select from, you enter the room of your choice and are "locked" in. You must solve a series of clues, whi

Winter continues here and so does my reflection of warmer times. We had an amazing 2015 camping season that took us to new places and some of our old favorites. Reflecting on past trips and planning new ones is honestly how I get through these winter months.  Unanimously, The Taylor's and The Todd's agree that  Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park  was our favorite 2015 destination. Johnson's Shut-Ins is located near Lesterville, Missouri which is just over 100 miles south of St Louis, under 200 miles east of Springfield, and 295 miles southeast of Kansas City, MO, which is where we are based. Park Details: Johnson's Shut-Ins is a state park. Senior Citizens receive a discount. Special sites are designated ADA and can't be used by the general population. There are 5 different loops with a total of 85 sites. There is designated sites for camping, hike-in camping, camper cabins, electric only, electric/water, and electric/water/sewer sites. Due to the 2005

An unseasonably warm weekend has kicked my cabin fever into overdrive. Normally, I spend the winter months hibernating from the cold and snow under blankets and dreaming of camping trips to come. It was so warm this weekend, that I actually begged my husband to take me camping. A man of logic, he said no, because it was winterized.  To add to my desire to be out roaming, we went to visit our camper in storage this weekend. It was a routine check to make sure no unwanted critters had found their way inside. The Bullet and The Rockwood are stored next to each other and both were in great shape. Fourteen short weeks until their first scheduled trip of 2016. Even though we have not been able to camp, not a day goes by when we are not thinking about camping or The Bullet. During our downtime we took the RV in for routine maintenance. We have purchased new step covers as well as LED flexible lighting. I am shopping around for a new outdoor patio rug as a critter chewed a hole in my

I am an addict. My addiction is not illegal, which on some level means it is not a big deal. But it is. Or I should say it was. My addiction is to a certain diet soda, Diet Coke. I have been addicted to Diet Coke for the past thirty years. My love affair with Diet Coke, started way back in high school or maybe even late junior high school. My next door neighbor, best friend, running buddy, Page, was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes when she was 12 years old. After she spent what seemed like an eternity in a children's hospital getting stabilized and learning how to manage her new life style, she returned home and introduced me to Diet Coke. Before she went into the hospital, we both drank Pepsi Cola. All we knew of diet soda was Tab and we both agreed it was awful. Just plain awful. What we did not know what that NutraSweet had replaced Saccharine as the artificial sweetener and when Page assured me it tasted really good, I jumped on her band wagon. Through out the yea