Hip Hop SB

OK my motto is, if you can't have fun as a parent, then what's the point? Or at least it is now. So this is how I entertain myself. Make sure your sound is turned on and get ready to rock.


The second verse is the funniest; instead of "baggy sweatpants" she says "Maggie's wet pants" and instead of "she turned around and gave that big booty a slap" I taught her "she turned around and gave that SB a clap" (it fits when you put in her actual name) so it's still pretty G-rated.

Oh- and I wasn't driving during the filming of this. We had just arrived at my mom's house and were parked in her driveway. Just so you don't think I think filming my daughter takes presedence over paying attention to the road while driving. (Jeez, does everything need a disclaimer these days?!)

She also does a mean rendition of James Brown's Get Up Off Of That Thing. Maybe you'll get to see that in a future post.

She is SO going to be the coolest kid in her preschool next month.

On Second Thought...

...maybe I wouldn't make a good pastry chef. I'm pretty sure pastry chefs need to be able to decorate, at least semi-competently. As in write Happy Birthday in loudly colored foodstuffs. I obviously am greatly lacking in skill in this area, as evidenced by this disaster:

Tomorrow is a co-worker's birthday so I tried to personalize his cake. This was even after I tested the icing on my request form for vacation days I'm taking next month. It looks like someone tried to stab it to death, with bright red blobs everywhere on it.

I'm not sure exactly what happened with that second P. It looks more like a chili pepper. Or like it has horrible edema. After that explosion I was laughing so hard that I had to get someone else to come in and do the rest. So I am responsible for HAPP.

Here are just a few of the incredibly supportive and encouraging comments that I received regarding my artwork:

-Don't quit your day job.
-Stick to step.
-Wow, you did that? I thought maybe you let SB write on the cake.
-You should have asked me to do it.
-Cake decorating is definitely not at the top of the list of potential alternate careers for you.

I still laugh every time I look at that picture. It might be my new desktop. At least the cake tasted good.

My Autobiography

There's a very good chance that we might be moving soon. And by soon I mean within the next year. We're trying to get away from our neighborhood, which is slowly but surely being overcome by members of the Russian mafia, Mexican immigrants living 17 to a house, and drug traffickers. So I've been slowly trying to go through my stuff and get rid of anything I haven't really used in the past few years so it's less of a blow later on when it's packing time.

As I was cleaning out my office, a never ending task if there ever was one, I came across a paper I wrote in October 1993. I would have been in 10th grade, I believe. I think the assignment was to write our autobiography as if we were adults, looking back on our lives. The first half was the truth, although I felt the need to highlight impertinent information, like the proximity of one of my houses to a playground, and a leather camel that was given to me by a friend in grade school. The second half was obviously made up. So here's how my life would have been had I stuck to my 10th grade guns and not settled for reality:

The summer after my junior year [in high school] was great. I spent two weeks in France with Mona, a friend of my grandmother's. She was really nice but very strict. After my return, my cousin Mark came to spend 5 weeks with us. We became very close.

OK I'm not sure why I said Mona was strict. Perhaps we got into some arguments when I asked her permission to run off and marry a Frenchman? My cousin Mark lives in England, his whole family does. I would assume that if he came to the US he would have brought his younger sister Marie with him. But apparently I wasn't interested in being close with her.

During my senior year I met Matt. I don't recall how we met, old age has gotten the best of me, but I do remember loving him with all my heart. I had dated before, but nobody had ever meant as much to me as Matt did. We stayed together throughout our senior year, and even during college, as far apart as we were.

I specifically remember choosing the name Matt because at time I didn't really know a Matt, plus my next door neighbor/best friend as a toddler was a boy named Matthew. Did you like how I conveniently developed Alzheimer's to avoid thinking up how I could have met my future husband? Who doesn't remember how they met the love of their life? The teacher even wrote "nice touch" next to that. At the time I thought it was a compliment but now I'm thinking there might have been some sarcasm in there. Hmm.

I had received a full scholarship in writing to Columbia University, the college of my dreams. Matt attended Georgetown University. By the time we'd graduated, we were very much in love and ready to make a commitment. So when he proposed marriage to me, I accepted.

Yeah, Columbia and Georgetown aren't really that far away from each other. It's not like I was on one coast and he was on the other. Our ability to stay together during college isn't really all that impressive. And is "writing" a major? I think it probably has to be more specific that that. Like creative writing, or journalism or something like that. I wouldn't really know, my first degree was in Mass Communications. Not writing.

Our wedding was beautiful. It was a large wedding with all our families and friends. Soon after that, a beautiful baby boy was born. Blond hair, blue eyes, just like his father. We were a happy family until two years later when a sweet little girl was added to the family. She looked a lot like me, her mother, with dark skin, dark eyes and dark hair. Just like my brother, Little Charlie, our son, felt he had to protect his little sister Stephanie. Charlie and Stephanie reminded me of Joe and myself.

Ha! OK first of all I never resolved the whole "we were a happy family until 2 years later..." thing. It sounds like the birth of my daughter Stephanie ruined the happy family. And I'm glad that I pointed out that she looked a lot like me, her mother. In case you forgot I was talking about my own daughter. And I think it's hilarious that I thought that I'd be ready to think about having a second child when the first was only about a year old. When SB was about a year, I was too busy thanking my lucky stars that I made it past the first year to think about a second child! Joe is my brother in real life, by the way. Nice guy....not very protective.

Oh- and how's this for creepy? 2-1/2 years after I wrote this, my father and his wife gave birth to my half-brother, then named him Charlie. Well, Charles. But we all call him Charlie. Yeah. Freaky!

For the first five years of Stephanie's life, Matt went to work every day while I stayed home with the kids. When they were old enough to stay home by themselves, I went to work. I had a job as a journalist for a local paper. It seemed like no time at all before Charlie had grown into a young man and moved out of the house to start a life of his own. Stephanie, herself, wasn't too far behind. I hung on as long as I could but they were adults now, and didn't need their dear old mother. They both got married and moved far away.

Wow, how impressive is that? My kids were supposed to be self-sufficient and responsible enough to stay at home on their own at ages 5 and 7 while I went to work! And why am I so depressing? I'm freaking going through Empty Nest Syndrome at age 15! Their dear old mother? Please! I bet I would be thankful to get Charlie and "Stephanie, herself" out of the house so I could have Matt all to myself again! I'm pretty sure he was hot.

But wait- here's the best part:

The last time I saw them was two years ago at my parents' funeral. They were both killed in a car crash. As I think about it now, I realize that I never got the chance to get to know them as people. I moved out at the age of 17 to go to college, but being a free person for the first time, I forgot all the love they gave me. I forgot about them and ran off to live my own life, writing and calling occasionally. It took me nearly 50 years to realize all my parents sacrificed for me and my brother. And now that I realize it, it's too late. But just like I do, I'm sure they had a special feeling in their hearts, knowing that I appreciated them, even though I never really said it.

OK. So I'm thinking that I was either really pissed off at my mom at the time, or she was pissed at me. I can't imagine why else I would put so much thought into killing off my parents. In a totally unlikely scenario, even! My parents were divorced! (They still are.) The only way that they could have both been killed in a car crash is if one hit the other. That would have been more believable. And they certainly wouldn't have shared a funeral.

And talk about morbid- that's the last time I saw my own two kids? At my parents' tragic funeral? I'm sure if they were somewhere really far away that I would have mentioned that. So they were probably fairly local. So in my teenage angst I was creating a dysfunctional future for myself. At least my daughter looked like me, my son looked like his father, and my husband was hot. I'm sure I said somewhere that he looked like Brad Pitt. It must be on the editing room floor. Oh come on, at least give me that. Can't I have one positive thing in my horrible miserable fabricated life?

All my teacher could really think to comment on this was "sorry".

That's why I took the time to write this. My children are the two dearest things in the world to me, and even though they have never said "thank you for loving me, mom," I want to let them know that they're welcome. I don't want them to have to live the last years of their lives feeling remorse for not being there for their poor old mother until it's too late.

Jeez. The "poor old mother" bit definitely comes from my mom. She's always been very much into the guilting thing. But what a depressing thing for a 15-year old to write. If I were to write it out now, I'd be focusing more on how much money I made and what enormous percentages of that went into creating charities and helping the unfortunate. I'd have to devote at least 2 pages to describing all of my 25 cars and how I hate it when the butler puts too much butter on my bread. I probably wouldn't even think to write in how my parents die.

My teacher's comments at the bottom: My. What a fascinating account of your "life"! You are a very good writer, BMore!

I got 50/50. A+. 100%.

I'm thinking she was on the sauce. How else could you get through 20 students' renditions of their lives en passe, including strict French women, ungrateful children, and hopelessly lonely and remorseful mothers killing off her own parents in a freak car accident?

When I Grow Up...

I'm a lucky gal. There are so many things that I could be. Most presently, I could totally be a chef. Or a baker. No- a pastry chef. I am so unfortunately in the wrong field. Instead of helping people get fit, I could base my career on creating delicious temptations that could potentially make them fat. Like this:



OK so maybe food photographer is not among my many career options. But this piece of heavenly goodness is what I call my peanut butter cookie cake. Oh yes. It has cookie. It has peanut butter. It has chocolate. And it has cake. All in one delicious swirl of cellulite-causing delightfulness. And it's sitting on my kitchen table right now.

Unless the dog got to it.

It started out with an entire 16oz log of chocolate chip cookie dough spread out on a pizza pan, then baked.



This in and of itself is enough to get me excited.

Oh, and the fact that it's sitting on a pizza stone is purely coincidental. I didn't bake the cookie on it. It just doubles as my cooling rack/oven mitt/laptop station/paperweight.

Then combine (natural) peanut butter and vanilla frosting, with a little milk to make the most heavenly peanut butter frosting I've ever tasted. Smear it on top of the cookie. Pour some chocolate cake batter into another pizza pan and bake it. Then once it cools, plop it on top of the cookie/peanut butter frosting yumminess. Then top it all off with chocolate frosting. And you get this: Hint: click on photo for full effect.



So if you look back to the first photo above, you see the corner of a Where's Waldo book. The only incident (if you remember from waaaay back, I have a history of bad baking incidents) was when I tried to remove the cake from the pizza pan before it was ready. It kind of broke in several places. So when the time came for me to plop it on top of the cookie/peanut butter combo, I slid the only thing available that was slim and sturdy underneath to keep all the pieces somewhat together. Whatever, I'm sure the book was clean. It was sitting on the kitchen table, it's not like I dug it out from under the dog's bed or anything. Right?

Stop judging me.

SB's favorite part was eating the cake batter. Does that make me a bad parent because I let her lick the beaters? They were out of the mixer, I promise. No Homer Simpson-esque tongue mangling in the egg beaters.

Anyway, the end result was fantastic. It was just the right amount of cookie, cake and peanut butter to satisfy the fiercest sweet cravings, and then some. I should look into pursuing a career as a pastry chef. But the problem is I would eat all my creations. You know, to make sure they tasted ok.

Seriously. Stop judging me.

By the way, that wasn't completely my "creation" per se because I used a recipe from a book of fun kids' food. But I did create it all myself. Except make the cookie dough and the frosting and the dry cake mix.... OK fine, I mixed, baked, piled and enjoyed. Happy now?

On yet another completely unrelated note, I had another exciting day with SB at the park on Sunday. Looking at the photo, I'm seeing a trend here. I think I'm a little too hands-on for SB's own good. I honestly think that I need to back off. I tend to hover. She needs to learn to play on her own and I need to not worry so much about...blah.....blah......blah......oh, whatever, just look at the photo.

To Anonymous:

First of all, that's great that we both agree that The Avenue is great!

Secondly, I realize that I'm not perfect, and that when I splay my personal stuff all over the Internet, people are going to take advantage of the opportunity to point out all of my imperfections. That is perfectly fine with me, as you can probably see, I'm harder on myself than any third party could be!

But I would hope that anyone who believes so strongly that something I did or said I did was wrong that they have to comment on my behavior in a negative manner will have the respect to put a name to his or her comment.

For many reasons.

I would hope that as civilized respectful adults we do not criticize others unless we ourselves are model citizens. So I would look forward to viewing you as a resource where I could get ideas on how to be a better parent, since you question my competence as a parent, based on the fact that I called a 3-year old girl Little Bitch.

On a side note, I'm not sure how you inferred that from my comments. I don't see exactly what one has to do with the other. This blog is the only place where I referred to that girl as Little Bitch. And last I checked, SB didn't read this blog. I've never said that word in front of SB and I've never talked down another kid to SB. My role as a parent and my thoughts on this blog are two separate things. I'm surprised you didn't realize that.

You may have noticed that I deleted your comment. Not because I was embarrassed or insulted by what you had to say, since I feel I'm doing a pretty good job of paraphrasing your comments right here, but because you chose to remain anonymous, which tells me that you're not confident enough in your statements to stand behind them.

If you had provided your name, I could also have hit you up for ideas on what I could have called the little girl that would have provided the same darkly humorous shock value that Little Bitch did. You do realize that's what I was doing, right? That I don't really think this girl is a bitch, but I was calling her that to add an element of raw black humor? That it wasn't meant to be taken literally?

And yes, I'm fully aware, no- hopeful; thankful, even, that no one is as intrigued by SB as I am. She's my daughter, created by myself and my husband. I would expect no less!

Perhaps no one else has commented on my behavior and childishness because they understand all of this.

My intentions with this blog are not to provide a How To book on raising children. That's what Britney Spears' mother is here for. My intentions are to provide an account of how my life is as the wife of a full-time musician. Of course, bits and pieces from my life as a mother are going to make their way in. That's one part of many that make up who I am. But here on this blog I'm typing it as I think it and I'm not sugar coating anything.

Anyway, bottom line is- I have disabled the Anonymous Commenter device, so any non-anonymous comments are welcome.

Now, if you'll pardon me, apparently I need to go and get a grip and a clue!

Martha Stewart and Birth Control

I decided that since SB is practically 3, she's probably old enough to start helping me make fun stuff in the kitchen. So when I saw a cook book geared towards fun kids' meals at Barnes & Noble yesterday on sale for $8, I went for it. I also got her a little set that contained a pink chef's hat, apron, oven mitt, wooden spoon and rolling pin.

So this morning I went to Giant and bought some of the ingredients needed for a couple of the recipes. The bad thing about it is that now I have sitting on my counter the following temptations: a bag of Reese's cups, a bag of Reese's peanut butter chips, chocolate cake mix, a tub each of vanilla and chocolate frosting, a bag of mashmallows, and a box of Nilla Wafers. And in my fridge is a log of chocolate chip cookie dough. Talk about testing my willpower!

We tried the easier of the two recipes today. SB did ok with her part but ran away when I had to turn on the mixer. Basically this recipe involved mashing together cream cheese, cherry preserves, powdered sugar and vanilla extract, putting that in the fridge to harden somewhat (which didn't happen for some reason), then sandwiching it between two Nilla Wafers for a little cherry cream cheese cookie burger.

This is as far as we got:


SB took one bite and decided she didn't like it. Great. Hopefully TB will because I'm not eating the entire batch! Maybe I can bring it to work for the boys to devour. The cheese stuff would make a good fruit dip, though.

On a completely unrelated note, I officially hate Yaz. I heard nothing but good stuff about it so I asked for it at my last girly doctor visit. Ever since I've been on it, I've alternated between bleeding for 2 weeks straight and spotting for 2 weeks. I'm sick of it. So no more bc. At all. And that's all I'm saying about that. Ask me any questions and you'll get the Blank Stare.

Why Moms Can Be Creepy

My mother recently brought over my Box. My Box is filled with stuff representative of my childhood, like report cards, letters to Santa that must have never made it to the mailbox, journals from school, birthday cards, etc. Basically things that we never really had any use for but she didn't want to throw away. Some moms scrapbook, some moms create mementos, mine just threw everything into a cardboard box kept in the basement. Good thing we never had an issue with pipes leaking through the walls!

While cleaning my office recently I took a break to stroll down memory lane and go through all the stuff in my Box. I was having a great time reminiscing when I came across this:



While I realize that at first glance they look like petrified turds (which what I initially thought they were), upon closer inspection one would discover that these are balls of hair. Human hair, if I had to guess. Stored away in little plastic sandwich baggies. One had a tissue stuffed in it, too. To keep the hair company.

A lock of virgin hair from baby's first hair cut- I understand. (In fact, the hair dresser who cut SB's hair automatically put the locks into an envelope for me to keep. I should probably look for that in case TB tries to use the envelope to mail something like our mortgage payment out in.) These horrid masses were obviously not from my first haircut unless there's some awful family secret involving an Oops! moment between Chewbacca and a werewolf that resulted in my birth. These had to have been taken from some subsequent haircut. Why? I have absolutely no idea. I'm not even 100% sure both of these "locks" are mine.

And did my mother wrap them into these little balls for a reason or did they just sort of morph into them after years of being squished in the basement Box?

The worst part about this all is that despite my disgust at my finding, after taking the above photo, instead of throwing them away, I stuffed the hairballs back into their baggies and put them back in the Box. Maybe one day they'll make their way into SB's Box.

Bay Cafe...Round 2

OMG. They were there. You know who I mean. Them. The Crazy Dancers. Were at the Bay Cafe last night.

Despite all the drama surrounding their last appearance at The Band's gig at the Bay Cafe, the Crazy Dancers were there again last night. I'm not sure why. The good news, at least to me, is that the bass player, who had started all the drama by splashing the Crazy Man with water, went right up to the guy and admitted that he had no excuse for acting the way he did, and apologized. I was elated when he told me this- and a very proud band mama. The funny part was that the Crazy Lady was very obviously unhappy to be there. Like she was there out of obligation, not because she wanted to be. She had a pout on her face the entire time that the trombone player likened to the way my almost 3-year old daughter looks when she doesn't get her way.

They did dance. They did keep it tame. For them. There was still some bumping and grinding. The Crazy Lady wore white biker shorts with black tights underneath. Let's ignore for a moment why I would be looking, but I did not see panty lines, and I'll be honest, that scared me a little. He was wearing red jeans. They did stake their claim on certain seats by placing a bath towel down so no one could sit there (seriously, who does this at a bar?). There was one incident where she bent over with her ass in his crotch that no one needed to witness. But other than that, I think they kept pretty much to themselves.

I was with my friend/dance partner in crime Maggie and her friend Crystal. Maggie sluts me up whenever we go anywhere so my neckline was low and my hemline was high. As we were getting ready, meaning as Maggie was yelling at me to put on more mascara while pulling the top down on my dress to "show more boobs", I got a text message from my husband.

Come to side entrance....go to bouncer named Mike....big black guy....he knows you're coming....

Once I got past the unnecessary dot dot dots, and the ominous ending to the message, I found the description of Mike The Bouncer as a big black guy amusing. I don't really know why.

So we felt mega-important as Mike The Bouncer (who was probably the biggest blackest guy I had ever seen. And by big I don't mean fat.) smiled and let us in. We had to eat inside because the Bay Cafe takes complete advantage of its singularity as the only outdoor waterside bar in Canton and treats patrons like crap, but we ate quickly then mosied on outside to dance.

And dance we did. We met Dave who, although lacking in the fancy footwork department, was well-educated in the importance of a strong lead and the impressiveness of multiple spins. So basically he was really good at whipping us around and making us dizzy, and making it look like we all knew what we were doing.

I was already nervous because the dress I was wearing was shorter than I'm used to, and it was kind of windy right next to the water. So when Dave tugged on my hand and started spinning me around relentlessly, I caught Maggie's eye and silently begged her to make sure I wasn't giving onlookers more of a show than I thought. After the dance, she confirmed that I was unexposed the entire time. So after that bit of reassurance I just loose and had fun. There was one dip involved where I might have inadvertently shown my knickers, but I'm trying not to think about that.

After the gig, the following occurred as Maggie and I were walking around:

Bass player: Hey, The Man wanted me to tell you that he just left to go get the car.

Me: Thanks! I walk a little further, maybe 2 feet, and see the keyboard player motion for me to go to him. As I do, I pass the saxophone player.

Saxophone player: TB's getting the car. He wanted me to tell you.

Me: Thanks, Bass Player just told me. Continue walking to keyboard player, who is about 2 feet away.

Keyboard Player: TB said to tell you he's bringing the car up.

Me: Wow, thanks, you're only like the 17th person to tell me! Saxophone Player and Bass Player both heard this and we all had a good laugh.

I went back to Maggie, then a few minutes later approached Keyboard Player and Sax Player and said:

Hey, do any of you know where TB is?

I'm so cute it's sickening.

Willpower

I used to work for a big old insurance company, where we worked in cubicles, constantly had phones attached to our shoulders and had chronically blurred vision from staring at the monitors in front of us for so long. This was one of my first jobs out of college, so it was before my fitness life yet after I'd already been working out a few years.

I made a few friends there, one in particular was actually one of my best friends for a while. I don't remember much about our friendship at work but I do remember there were a lot of emails sent back and forth that contained phrases such as "blah." and "I hate my job." We only sat a few feet away from each other but it was less distracting to our co-workers if we kept our misery, gossiping and joking to ourselves, so we bonded mostly over email during work hours.

Anyway, my point for going into all this is that I remember one day I ventured over to her desk and noticed a Snickers bar (full-sized, not one of those little bite-sized teasers) sitting in front of her, under her monitor. Right in front of her face. Still in its wrapper, untouched.

I didn't understand.

Why wasn't she eating it? I asked her this and her response was that she wasn't hungry.

I didn't understand.

What did hunger have to do with anything? This is chocolate. You don't have to be hungry to eat chocolate. I rarely am. You don't eat chocolate to satisfy hunger. You eat it because you have to because it tastes good.

This was too much for my feeble brain to handle so I left.

I returned the next day and found, to my shock and horror, that the bar was still sitting on her desk. Why? I asked if she was feeling ok. She was. I asked if her teeth were hurting her. They weren't. I also got a strange look along with her response.

Then why have you not eaten that stick of heaven that is sitting on your desk? If Snicker bars were intended to be used as cubicle decor, then they would have made them prettier. Or put funny sayings on the wrapper.

Despite my complete incomprehension, the bar stayed there a long time. At least a week, if not more. I think she ended up giving it to someone else.

Now if that Snickers bar had been mine, it would have been devoured within about 3 seconds flat. I have no self control when it comes to anything sweet or chocolatey. I have to buy single serving treats when I go to the grocery store or the entire box or bag would be inhaled. Most likely on the way home.

I'm the girl who ate the candy decorations from her wedding that my friends had put aside so I could keep as mementos. Candy mementos? Isn't that why we had photographers and videographers there?

I'm the girl who ate the entire top tier of the wedding cake by herself, which you're supposed to keep until your one-year anniversary, then share with your spouse, immediately after the wedding before leaving for her honeymoon.

I'm the girl whose mother used to have to hide candy around the house in places like inside the couch around Halloween so there would be some left for the Trick or Treaters. And this was even while I was in high school.

So the fact that she was able to sit there and stare at this chocolate bar for as long as she did without breaking down and eating it was beyond my comprehension.

Until now.

I'm so proud to be able to say that this has been sitting on my counter since Sunday.


This is not one of those little bite-sized teaser bags, either. This is a 13-oz bag of chocolatey goodness. I'm not sure how long this will last. But it's definitely a step in the right direction.

The Weekend: Highlights and Lowlights

Lowlight: Friday night I accidentally brushed my teeth with SB's Oral B Phases Winnie the Pooh bubble gum toothpaste. The only part of my mouth that felt clean was the roof. The rest just kind of felt dry and sticky. Note to self: Get SB some new toothpaste. Poor girl.....

Highlight: The Man came to visit me at work on Saturday morning, which made the day go by much faster. I needed it; not a single person came into the Fitness Center for pretty much the entire first hour.

Lowlight: This is how the two last people in the gym spent their last few minutes before closing. Meanwhile, I was grinding my teeth and wondering if these people had TVs in their homes they could watch. I mean, they were both just standing there. I know it looks like the one guy is sitting on a bike, but he was actually standing behind it with his foot up behind the seat. And it wasn't anything exciting, like Michael Phelps winning his 8th gold medal- it was women's badminton. And neither of the players were even American. Lame.



Highlight: Saturday evening the family took a trip to nearby Hunt Valley. On the way home, we passed some horse farms and stopped to let SB get a close look.



Lowlight: This guy felt the need to scratch his butt HARD on the fence. The horse was much stronger than the fence, which caved to scary lengths under the weight of the horse's rear end.



Highlight to the Lowlight: At least one of the horses didn't sneeze on me and get grass snot all over my shirt like last time we stopped....



Another Lowlight (or Highlight): Somehow, and I'm not sure of the exact mechanics of how this happened, I managed to bite my own finger (HARD)while yawning. This could be seen as a highlight, since there's a very good chance I'm the only person in the world who could do this unintentionally.

Highlight: Today we went to a local farm that used to be the Enchanted Forest. It was pretty cool! It had tons of giant scenes from well-known nursery rhymes, a playground, a petting zoo and pony rides. The weather was perfect and the price was right ($4.50/person).

Lowlight: SB threw a tantrum when told it was time to go, so I had to go into this little hut to carry her out. I am short but I am not a dwarf so I smacked my head on the doorframe on my way out. I think my husband got a kick out of it although he tried to hide his laughter.



Highlight to the Lowlight: We had bought some ice cream to cool down with and after about 3 bites, SB decided she didn't want her Oreo Ice Cream Bar anymore, she wanted to go play in the Dwarf House. Bmore Mama scored herself an extra half an ice cream bar!

Lowlight: One of my two guinea pigs died today. Sadly, there is no highlight to this....