Reciepe request

Hi All.
I have a request:) I am going to try and make a sample reciepe book with my scrapbooking software and I only cook about 4 things:) I was wondering if any of you would be willing to share a reciepe or two (or more if so inclined!) that I could use for this. I want to try some things out and I could just pick reciepes from a book but I thought it would be more fun to do with reciepes from my friends. I will share it with you all to see when its done.

If you want to help me out, either post a reciepe here or email it to me. If you have any photos of it (if its something special you made or something) feel free to include them too but photos are not needed! I just need ideas. And, maybe from reading this post we will all get a new reciepe or something from it!

Happy Anniversary to my friend!

I just wanted to be sure and post a special message here for my good friend Kim and her husband Tim who are celebrating 10 yrs of marriage today! Congrats and keep it going! I wish you many, many, many more years of happiness and love!



Congrats to Kim and Tim!!!

My niece's Pagent

So this past weekend was a bit busy. On Thurs night my sister arrived into town with my niece Tara and her baby sister Samantha (Sami). They were staying at the hotel where the pagent was for the weekend. I saw them on Thurs and dropped off the photos so they could submit them the next morning at check-in.

Friday I went over to the hotel around dinner when Tara was done some swimming. I brought some McD's for dinner and it was STORMING out. It stormed crazy last year when they were up for the pagent too!

Tara did get a special "portfolio" award for submitting 4 photos into the photogenic contest. And a ribbon so that was pretty cool and she was happy about that.

A little while later it was time for Tara to get ready for the formal wear thing that night. Then I stayed with the girls while my sister when down to get the flowers and we met her down when it was time to line up. The one thing I will say was insane was the elevators in this hotel. They had 15 floors and only 4 elevators and all in one spot. It was insane taking the girls downstairs with the stroller, trying to get into an elevator we could all fit into!
Here is Sami when I first got there. Check out those eye lashes!!!

And check her out with my cell phone-she didn't want to give that back!

Tara ready for the event

Sisters

With her Portfolio Award

Ready to go downstairs (still with the cell phone) and I can still not get over those eye lashes!


The Friday evening event is free (Thankfully!) so I was able to go in and watch and keep an eye on Sami when my sister had to go help her get changed and stuff. Basically all the formal wear night is is she walks in with an escort in her fancy dress and they introduce her. Then she comes back on stage after all that is done and gets to come out in a different outfit and actually talk into the mic and say who she is, where she is from and what she wants to be when she grows up and anything else she might want to say. Of course I was limited with my point and shoot camera and I was really annoyed b/c the focus just wouldn't focus because of the lights and I got crap for pics.

With her escort on stage

When she was on stage waiting to talk on the mic

The Girls after the show


Always smiling!

Those eyes!


After the show I went home for the night and we set up to get together for lunch the next day during their big break between check-out and when Tara had to be dressed and ready. We met in the afternoon at the mall near my house for lunch and while we were walking around we passed Libby Lu and decided to get Tara's hair done for the show that night. And then after we could go back to my house for some lite snack/dinner and curl the rest of her hair and get her dressed for the main event that night.
Here are pics from Libby Lu:




After my sister curled it a bit at my house


Dinner! Chicken nuggets and water-no ketchup(we weren't taking any chances!)
Sami!

The Girls


And we were on our way. Once we got back to the hotel, I stayed with Sami in line to get into the ballroom (I will do a separate post on the pagent and the hotel).Once we got in and she ended up waking up I was entertaining her (or she was probably really entertaining me!).Her thing is she can grab her feet and put her toes to her mouth! Talk about the next gymnast! Here are a few cute pics of her playing.


It may look like she is moving to her foot but no, she is actually laying down, its just the angle.


Once the show started I wasn't able to really get many good pics. I couldn't get any good ones of their opening number but I got a couple when she walked out on stage with her finalist trophy (they all get one)

And then one of her on stage at the end when they all came out

After the show. She didn't "win" anything but we had the tiara from libby lu so we let her put it on for photos. She was upset after it not getting to be up on stage at the end with those who were finalist or something like that but she got over it. She kept saying the whole weekend that it was about having fun and making friends. I think its just the whole long weekend and disappointment gets the best of many girls at the ened.




She loves being the big sister.



My little gymnast doing her split!



That about covers the pagent. After that they drove home. We were suppossed to have Sami's baptism on sunday but it turned out Luke was really sick when my sister got home. She ended up taking him to the hospital b/c it was a sunday and he threw up and had spiked a fever. They admitted him for being dehydrated and it turned out he was dehydrated because he had strep throat and wasn't drinking b/c it hurt and of course being 2 he couldn't exactly verbalize it. He had been playing so it didn't seem he was as sick until sunday. He is all better now and home so I am sure the baptism will be rescheduled soon.

I will try to do another update and my comments on the actual pagent from an outside point of view later this week.

ta ta for now!

Farmer's Market via cell phone!

In effort to get this started with my cell phone photos, I decided to take some pics of my morning adventure at the Farmer's Market!

The town has set up a Farmer's Market in the bank parking lot across the street from my house. It is very convienent. They started it about a month ago but this weekend was the first time I had actually gotten a chance to go. Its only on sundays from 8-2pm.

So here is my first Farmer's Market experience!
(all photos taken with my cell phone)
The view from our front gate-you can see the farmer's market:






Not quite as crowded when I got there, although it seemed to pick up later (and based on availability of some items, I imagine it was busier in the morning too!)


The "Pickle Man" Dr. Pickle came highly recommended so I had to be sure and get some!


My goodies when I got home:

I gathered a piece of crumb cake to snack on, fresh corn on the cob, watermelon chunks, banana nut bread, small cinnamin bread and some pumpkin bread, italian bread, some pickles and some fresh thin cut organic or some healthy type of chicken cutlet. Hopefully it will all be as good as it looks!


And that was my farmer's market adventure!

Life and a cell phone...what a great team!!

I am in the midst of uploading photos from this weekend with my niece. Of course there are not nearly enough since I was limited with my camera but I did get some cute photos I think. I also got some adorable ones of the baby:) Her baptism was suppossed to be today but my nephew ended up being really sick and having to go to the hospital b/c he got dehydrated. He has strep throat so he was not drinking like he should and then this morning he got worse (throwing up and a fever) so she took him to the hospital and postponed the baptism. I will keep you posted on him but it sounds like he will be ok and go home tomorrow. They kept him overnight tonight to get fluid and stuff into him I think.

But what got me fired up this weekend was I realized how much I capture of my life on my cell phone in photos. My new phone is fantastic and as long as there is good light, I get great photos on it (low light or no light is not as good!). But as I scrolled through the pics on my camera (I was actually copying the memory card onto my computer for backup) and I saw how this nifty little device keeps track of things well. Part of it is because one of my best college friends has the same phone (and we both have unlimited "IN" texting of txt,pix,and vid!) but we are constantly sharing the "randomness" in our days such as where we go, what we are doing, what we are eating! And its tons of fun. I enjoy it at a lot and as I went through my pics I realized what a great tool in documenting the "everyday" aspects of my life. We all know I take plenty of photos at events and important things in my life but how fun can it be to share the "everyday" stuff. Things that to me I don't think twice about but others might get a laugh at!

So, I am going to make an attempt to do some random posting of the randomness I specifically capture on my cell phone.

So don't be surprised if you see some randomness in my days here with my cell phone. Feel free to skip them if they don't interest you-I get a kick out of them either way LOL!

ta ta for now!

Best Buy Saga continues...

So just an FYI, I stopped in my local Best Buy (Woodbridge, NJ) tonight to check on the status of my camera. The guy was really nice and told me that I could call 1-888-Best Buy and get them to change where it gets shipped to so I can have it shipped locally. He said it is in the process of being fixed and could be fixed as early as tomorrow b/c the status might not be up to date so I should call right away. So I did while I was in the store! I talked to a lady there who said that it can be done but it had to be done by the original store so I needed to call them, and speak with a Geeksquad supervisor and if he wouldn't do it tell him to call them (the lady I was talking to aka Precision Camera Dept on three way with me and she would tell them they could do it.

So I do that. I call the original store in Mount Laurel NJ. First time I call it just rings and rings and rings and rings. After a few minutes I hang up and try again. This time after letting it ring and ring I got put on hold. No problem, right? Not so much. I was on hold for 15minutes! I then hung up and tried again. This time it rang for over 3 minutes and some kid answered "what?" He quickly realized I was a customer and not his friend from across the store he thought was just trying to bug him and apologized. No problem as far as I am concerned, I understand. I asked to speak to a Geek Squad supervisor. I was put on hold for a few min and then got a person, who I then asked if he was supervisor and he said no he would go get him. Then I finally got the supervisor. I explained the situation and then he tells me it can not be done. I told him, that the woman at Precision Camera dept said if he said that to have him call them on a three way. He THEN tells me that my camera is actually being shipped to my home!!!! I said that is good to know and would have been helpful to know originally (especially since I did actually ask if they did that!) He then tries to tell me there is no way they could have changed it because then it would be a manual ship and they need to track everything. I said I was pretty sure UPS tracks packages no matter where they go so if it was changed it could still be tracked. I was impressed he didn't get too nasty. He did seem to have a "tude" but I think that was because I had specifically asked for a supervisor so he had to know it was trouble:)

So after I got off the phone with him...I called the 1-888-Best Buy number again and asked to speak with someone who handled complaints and concerns. I got transferred to a very nice woman who was shocked when I told her about the whole waiting on hold and letting the phone ring for 3+ minutes and stuff. She also tried to verify that it does appear to be being shipped directly to me (yeah!) and she noted how they had told me it would be shipped out on Saturday but didn't go out til Monday and such and the whole mess on where I could pick up my camera when it was fixed. She was very nice and I do believe she will pass the info onto the store manager, especially because she was really bothered about the letting the phone ring thing and I told her that was what really set me off tonight and mostly because it had actually occurred each time I tried to call to get status updates this week. She did then verify for me that the correct answer to the question "can I bring into one store and pick it up at another?" and the answer is YES. It is an option. It is just something that needs to be inputted when the service order is set up. It can get changed after, its just more complicated but it can be done. I posed it in the sense that what would happen if I was on vacation and it broke. Would I have to wait til I got home or could I take it in right way. And she said it is definitely an option.

So that is my Best Buy experience for the day. Ultimately I am happy and relieved to know my camera will arrive at my home, I just wish someone had said that to me originally though b/c I might have had it go to my work if it needs a signature. Now I will have to go find the UPS place if I am not home I imagine. But I will deal with that when it comes (hopefully soon!)

My Niece's pics and update

I had a friend ask to see what pictures we ended up deciding to use for my niece's thing. My sister picked out 7 and I added one more I liked and had them all printed. A few didn't translate as well as 8x10s so I ordered some prints of 5x7 and 4x6 today too. My sister said they just needed to be no larger than 8.5x11. I figure they can look and see what they liked best. There were some I liked that she didn't pick but I figured its there things so whatever they wanted!

Here are the pictures they choose:











And just for fun....one of me and my niece:


So that is that.

In other news...I chipped a tooth/filling in my mouth so now I have fit in going to the dentist tomorrow or thurs. I have an appt for thurs but I am going to call another place to see if they can fit me in tomorrow so I don't have to wait. It feels weird in my mouth and I really don't want to do any more damage to it by accident.

This weekend will be busy with my niece's pagent thing. I also want to get a jump on putting together stuff for our football pool at work. I think if I can get stuff together ahead of time it will be a little easier. We will see.

Work is a little hectic this week with two people on vacation in our department but nothing we can't handle. Been watching the Olympics at night and really enjoying it. Tomorrow I have scrapbooking stuff too so its a busy week. And on top of it all my allergies are hitting me (I tihnk its allergy not a cold but who knows). And no news on my camera yet other than it is at the service facility. The girl I talked to today (not my normal girl) was not as pleasant. I love Canon but I did think it was not a positive thing that the girl said they send out "rebels" all the time. It was good she said they get fixed but still didn't make me feel better! She said the estimated return date was next week but of course she also said that she couldn't tell if they had looked at it yet, just that they recieved it and opened a work order to look at it. Not thinking she was the best informant. I think she just annoyed because I called 4 times today and no one answered the phone and so the last time I just let it ring and ring and ring until someone answered-and that happened to be her. And it rang a LOT before anyone answered:)

I guess that keeps me up to date for now! Hope all is well!!