WICKED!

I want to get back into blogging.  I really do.  So, I thought I'd start with a very easy post.  Quick synopsis and just 1 picture!

Basically, I had an incredible opportunity to see Wicked recently.  I've been in a Bible Study for the past 5 months with some incredible ladies from my church.  Two of them happen to be Broadway superstars.  One of them has been playing the role of Glinda in Wicked for some time now and recently had her final performance.  We got to go see her perform during her last week.  It was my 3rd time to see Wicked and it is always an excellent show but this was by far my favorite experience.  Katie was incredible and it was just so fun to see her in this role - she fits it perfectly and is so very good at it. We had excellent seats at half-price and then we got to go backstage afterwards and visit with Katie in her dressing room and then she gave us a fabulous tour of the stage and she told us all their tricks and showed us all the fun props and such.  The evening was finished with an exit out the stage door where a crowd of people were waiting to see Katie herself and get her picture or autograph.  It was all so much fun!

That's Katie in the white dress and the rest of our Bible Study crew

Katie told us that she pumped up the cast that night by occasionally shouting out throughout the evening "Let's do it for the church ladies!!!"  Hilarious!

P.S.  For my Chicago readers, Katie recently made a tough decision to spend the next 4 months doing the Wicked tour.  She'll be in LA most of that time, but there is a short time that you can catch her as Glinda in Chicago!  I'm not sure of the dates, but I can find out if you're interested.

The Rest of the 4th

So, 4th of July was filled with more than just Mr. Personality and a Swim Meet!  Here's what else I got to do while in Dallas...

- Met baby Truett!  My sweet friend Brooke had her first baby in March and it was so good to finally meet the little guy!  And he could NOT have been sweeter.  Andi went with me to meet Brooke and Truett for lunch (they indulged me with Chick-fil-a).  Truett let me hold him for quite some time and even fell asleep in my arms.  Soooo precious!  I am kicking myself that I didn't get a picture with these ladies and Truett.

- LOTS of pool time with my sister and the boys.

Ryder has become quite the swimmer and

it is fun to have races with him (he gets

a big head-start!)

Shep LOVES the water and loves to "jump" (more like fall) in

He also showed off his "survival swimming" skills for me.

If you drop him in the pool and he's close enough to the edge

(must be VERY close), he can get to it and pull himself up to breathe

And if he's not close to an edge, he knows how to flip himself

over and float on his back and breathe.  (Brian is under him

in this pic "just in case", but Shep can totally do this with no assistance!)

It is very cool!

Shep also loves him some hats!  If Shep & a hat are

in the same room, it is definitely going to be on his head.

I wish I had taken more pics of the many hats I saw him

in during my weekend visit!

Beau tried out the Slip-n-Slide!

Beth tried it out, too!  I hope you can

see her facial expressions in these pictures, but it

was one of the funniest things I've seen/heard.

She said it was extremely painful!

- Dinner at Rafa's, a Mexican joint around the corner from the Mc's house, with my entire family.

- 4th of July BBQ with the family (on the 3rd of July).  Burgers and my Greek Panzanella.

- Serious patriotic flare from Beau and Ryder!  Running the streets with flags and belting out rousing renditions of God Bless America!

- Kaboomtown!  An air-show and fireworks (also on the 3rd)!

We could see airplanes from my parent's house but drove

over closer to be able to see the fireworks.

We set-up camp in a parking lot and I decorated with the flags!

When it started to get dark, a night writer came out and it

was really cool!

An Ice Cream van came by!

While we waited for the fireworks to begin,

the boys enjoyed playing with some light-up

flying toys I bought them in Barcelona.

- Shopping at the Le Creuset outlet with my mom!  We were so wow'd by this place!!  The prices were incredible.  Most the pots have dings on them, but some are so small they are nearly impossible to find.  And the man working that day went in the back to find us the very best ones.  My mom is helping me start my collection in Dijon (a yellow color) and bought some stuff for my birthday (and then we couldn't stop, so she's already bought my Christmas, too!!)

- A cancelled flight on the evening of the 4th on an airline with limited flights to NYC meant I'd only get back in time for 1/2 a work day so I made it a full day and stayed an extra 24-hours.  Four days is much better than three!

- Getting to see more fireworks on the 4th with Andi & Michelle was an extra bonus to my extra 24-hours!  We took the Dart Rail to the Cotton Bowl where we thought we were seeing fireworks to the tune of the Dallas symphony.  Turns out we missed the symphony and saw the fireworks to random music (the typical 4th of July songs and, of course, Katy Perry's firework.  They played her at Kaboomtown, too.  I think she was pretty smart to hit the nearly un-tapped market of 4th of July songs.  They'll be playing her for years alongside Lee Greenwood!)

- Checking out the old downtown Carollton with mom (not super impressed) and eating lunch there at Babes (which was okay).

- Layover in Atlanta = one more meal of Chick-Fil-A!

Swim Meet!

I flew home the Friday night before 4th of July and stayed at my parent's house.  Sheppy spent a couple of nights with us, including that first one.  Since the guest room is nearest to the kiddos nursery, I knew there was a good chance I'd be the first to hear Shep wake up and I wasn't sure how he'd respond to me. I feel like I saw Ry & Beau a lot more by this age and that they knew who I was (Ryder for sure), but I was pretty sure Shep would have NO recollection of who I was and it might freak him out a bit to be greeted by a stranger first thing in the morning.  When I expressed this concern to Beth she told me "Oh, no.  He's real friendly.  Except for when he's rude.  Sometimes he grunts in people's faces".  Grrreatt!  Luckily, when I did get him up that morning, he was quite sweet.  Of course, as soon as he saw that my mom was around and could change his diaper instead of me, he grunted in my face.  I consider that perfect timing since I didn't have to change that nasty diaper (not really....I love doing anything with these kids, including changing nasty diapers)!

Isn't he a handsome little dude?!

We all got ready that Saturday morning and headed to the Country Club to meet the rest of the Mc clan for Ryder & Beau's swim meet.  They don't belong to the Country Club, just get to be part of their swim team and it's a pretty nice little deal because that meant they got to spend some of their summer hanging out at a really great pool!  I was most impressed by the free, unlimited serve-yourself drinks!

I was a little shocked when my mom called in June and said she'd been to the Ryder's first swim meet.  "What?  He can swim the whole length of a pool?!"  My mom's response, "Well, I don't think he's ever swam that far before, but he did it today!"  Ryder apparently complained afterwards that it was too hard, but when I asked him about it on the phone a few days later, he was very excited about it and rather proud of himself.  Beth overheard the conversation and was surprised he'd had a change of heart.  So, he kept on swimming.  At some point later, I learned that Beau had joined the team as well.  Swim team was only a month long adventure with 4 meets.  I was so excited when I learned that one of those meets coincided with my trip home.  I must say, it was rather impressive to watch these little guys.

For their first race, they swam freestyle against each other and a few other boys.  Ryder won!!!  It was so fun and exciting to cheer him on and see him tap that wall first.  He was so proud of himself.  I think Brian and I had a little trouble containing our excitement while Beth was down cheering on Beau in his lane.

Beau is on the left w/ Beth behind him giving him some last

minute tips.  Ryder is two lanes over on the far right of this

picture, bent down and ready to dive in!

Good form, Ry!

By the time Brian and I got over from Ryder's lane to Beau's lane, the WHOLE pool was cheering for Beau as he was the only swimmer left in the pool.  He had to stop every so often and hang on to the lap lane divider to catch his breath, but he finished that swim and was mighty happy with his performance.

It was a long morning with lots of waiting in between races.  The boys had fun playing in the water fountains and on the playground.  I had fun catching up with my family and a sorority sister whose kids were on Ryder & Beau's team.  She was a year older than me in school and I never knew her too well, but she was SO sweet at the meet and I enjoyed talking to her.  She was there with her parents and they happen to know my pastor, so it was fun to make that connection.

Shep was mostly happy to hang out and watch all the excitement.

For their second races, the boys swam backstroke.  Ryder did fairly well, but didn't win this one.

Looks like Ryder knows the backstroke, too!

Beau had NO clue how to do the backstroke and hung out at the far end of the pool while B&B shouted at him to either swim to the other end of the pool (where I was cheering him on!) or swim to the side and get out.  He finally opted to just get out.  We were afraid he'd be upset, but he didn't seem to be bothered at all.

The final race was the butterfly.  Ryder and Beau simultaneously burst into tears when they were given this information.  I could totally feel their pain as I remember feeling the same way when I was assigned to the butterfly race EVERY single meet for the 3-4 summers I swam on a team.  They claimed to have no idea how to swim butterfly.  Beth and I finally convinced them to just swim however they could and make it to the end of the pool.  They finally agreed and did just fine.

Shep lined up for the Butterfly race while

Beth & I tried to pump the big boys up!

Mr. Personality

A couple of weeks ago, Ryder & Beau did a 1 week soccer camp in the evenings.  There were a lot of kids there ranging in age from 4 to 12, making R&B some of the youngest kids.  On the last evening, all the kids got participation certificates and there were 3 special awards that were each given to only 1 kid in the entire camp - best player, most improved, and best personality.  Beau got the award for Best Personality out of all the kids!  Hilarious!  And awesome!  While I was in Dallas for the 4th of July weekend, Beau enjoyed posing for pictures for me quite a bit.  You can catch a glimpse of some of his big personality in these pics.

He is quite the poser.

And a little bit of a whiner.

He's a trooper!

This was about 80% down the length of the pool at his

swim meet.  He was in dead last place and the only

swimmer left in the pool, but he kept on swimming!

And when he got out of the pool, he happily exclaimed,

"Hey, everybody was cheering for me!"

Rather fearless.

Silly.

SO Silly.

A little bit sassy.

Funny.

Happy.

Rather mischievous.

A barrel of fun.

Laid-back.

Patriotic!

Bossy.

So sweet.

Joyful!

Key Lime Pie. Fail.

I went to a lovely party just this past Saturday night.  It was yet another feast experience at Claire's apartment.  This time was to celebrate/mourn the loss of our community group leader to London.  She's headed across the pond for a year (or maybe longer) for work (or maybe more so, a boy).  Claire envisioned a wonderful indoor picnic theme and when we offered to help, she had some specific ideas of how to make her vision a reality.  One part of that was Key Lime Pie.  I offered to take that on.  I've never made one (so I can check another recipe off the New Year's Goal list!) and I knew my sister had a good recipe I could use.  The pie came together quickly and easily on Saturday afternoon.  I even got some fresh limes to decorate it with and I got to use my half-price pie plate that I bought during my annual Day-After-Christmas shopping adventure.  Once it was ready, I popped the entire pie plate w/ pie inside one of those plastic cake plates w/ covers.  This seemed to be the smartest way to go since I could put the pie in there without worrying about the top of the pie getting smushed and my decor ruined.  I was ready to go!

As I was stepping out my door, I propped the cake carrier with pie on my left hip, holding it with my left hand while I locked the door with my right.  At this time, the bottom of the carrier snapped apart from the top and the pie plate slid right on out.  Shattered pie plate and key lime gush was all over the entry way to my building.  I felt defeated!  I cleaned it up all the while coming up with a plan to quickly make a 2nd pie.  "I can do this!" is what I kept thinking.  I quickly texted the group (we have this awesome mass texting thing where you send a text to one # and everyone in our group gets it).  I told them the pie was gone, but I'd whip up another and be there only about 30 minutes late.  But, I quickly realized that I was missing two key ingredients.  There was no way I could pull this off.  So, I re-texted the group letting them know it wasn't possible, but I'd pick something up along the way.  I was determined to find us a key lime pie.  I quickly got on Google and started searching for places on the Upper West Side.  After calling a couple of places, I finally located a place that was open and had a whole key lime pie they could sell me.  Success was found at Cafe Lalo!  And it happened to be right on my walk down to Claire's place.  It was also a pretty tasty pie.  I still think mine would have been better though :)

Glee! Live!

I mentioned a while back that I had the opportunity to go to the Glee Live concert with one of the cast member's moms.  It was such a fun night and a great concert!!  My friend, Megan's mom is a friend of Mark Salling's mom.  So, we got to tag along with Mrs. Salling to the show.  She was such a nice lady!!  And while we were there, I made the connection that she knows my friend Elizabeth...it's always a small world!  We had great suites and this was absolutely one of the most fun concerts I've been to (and you know I've been to a lot the past few years).  They perform such fun songs and the cast is extremely talented.  I was especially wow'd by a couple of the dancers!  Since they were taping our show for the 3-D movie, our show had a couple of special guests who aren't touring with the rest of the group...Jane Lynch and Gwyneth Paltrow - woo hoo!  Definitely was awesome to see Gwyneth there.

Jane Lynch started the show off

Mark had his moment to shine with a guitar solo

So fun when Gwyneth made her appearance!

Lea Michelle was definitely the star of the show

Loved these dancers with Kirk!

Final bows

 Backstage after the show with Mrs. Salling

Thanks for taking me with you, Megan!

Of course we got our picture taken with Puck!