Phillies World Series Celebration

Citizens Bank Park!

BubbleShare: Share photos - Craft Ideas


We decided to go to the parade since my husband has been talking about it since before we met. I thought it might be a nice idea to "Sleep Over" instead of fighting the traffic on Friday morning. We booked a hotel, got our tickets to the Lincoln Field Rally, packed and headed out. It was very spur of the moment and I am so glad we did it.

   Our hotel, the Econo Lodge in Philadelphia, .7 miles from Lincoln Field. Lovely staff, horrible electric outlets. This place doesn't earn a star for their rooms, it is a very low budget place, but their staff more than makes up for the rooms. It is a short walk to the stadiums.

The Penrose Diner food is good. They are right across the street from the Econo Lodge. This is where my husband got to shake hands with the Phillies first base coach, Davey Lopes. Guess he had time for breakfast before the parade. Nice staff, they were all dressed up for halloween and I never so a diner so full of red before.




Everyone walked all together in the streets lining up for the parade. There was not one person in a bad mood, it was wonderful!

The Spectrum, soon to be torn down. I know it is in bad shape, but it is sad to see the past broken up for shopping and bars.

This was a freaky shot, we went up to "visit" my husband football seats, I cannot imagine sitting up that high on a cold snowy day. There is no leg room and the pitch is so crazy that you would fall over seats if you stood up a sneezed real hard. I know that the new stadium seats are closer to the field, but I thought is was worse than Veteran's stadium. I am not going to an Eagles game in those seats, no way, no how.

My son in his Phillies gear.





Family Photos! Love those helpful strangers.

The William Penn Curse Is Dead!

It's Going to be a Long Winter...

Yesterday, I had to buy tomatoes for the first time since mid-summer. My garden is only producing the smallest sized tomatoes now, as it is close to the end of October. They are impossible to slice for sandwiches, so I went to the store to buy some. The taste was not the same at all, even though I bought them on the vine. The tomatoes smelled good, but the lack of flavor sent me to my garden to eat a few grape tomatoes right off of the plant. It is going to be a long winter. I have a few lonely peppers, some leaf lettuce and my little tomatoes left. Underground, my carrots are still growing very slowly. I bought the Danvers variety and they will not be ready until March, although I planted them in May. I must remember to buy a new variety next year.

Halloween Parade for Eagle Theatre

Our fearless characters




Linus, me and the Float.


This is what I have been working so hard on the last few weeks. It was a lot of work, but oodles of fun. We have such a great group of creative people. It is inspiring!

My "Special" Pinky

My Pinky will never be the same, my pinky toe that is, not my sister. I broke it by trying to put the foldable TV table away. I dropped it instead and smashed the #@$% out of my toe. This is what happens when women clean the house, they get attacked with furniture. We should just know better by now; men should move all the big stuff that they leave out. Anyway, it has been over a month, it is still really red, and I still can't get my sneakers on. I am going to lose the little nail too, I can just tell. I assume that when the cuticle of the nail stays black for over a month, that it may not even grow back? I might be getting a fake pinky nail at the salon for the rest of my life. Acrylic on my feet? eeeeeeaaawwww! By the way Wendy, thanks for giving me that table, me and my pinky toe will remember you always.

I am not going to get excited...

I am not going to get excited, I am not going to get excited..Oh, h...e...double hockey sticks, I am a little bit excited. It is a smoke day. There is simply too much smoke from the forest fire to open the schools. I have all these wonderful plans for my day with my kids and nephew now, we can do ANYTHING! I am thinking I can get so much done. BUT you know that I will probably be sitting on my duff reading everyone's posts from twittermoms or somewhere. I always do this, If there is an extra day of life, i think I am going to get so much accomplished and I get all excited. I should just amend my expectations and KNOW that I will not get a thing done, the house will actually get messier as all the kid's friends come over to "visit." "Visit" is code word for, " I know teachers don't have to go to work today, could my kids hang out with your kids?" It is always fun, so I am not complaining, but my husband does wonder why our house looks like tornado alley when we have been home all day. Ok, I am at least calling my sister for a good talk, baking something good, and I am throwing another layer of paper mache on the character heads, I will post about that experience later. I am also going to get the fabric and make Lucy's dress today. OK, there are my plans, Everyone of you crazy moms better not post today or you will throw me off my game.

Mole Day

Happy Mole Day!

I have been driving my daughter crazy with mole day jokes for the past three days. She may be leaving the family fold over it. I plan on texting her and bugging her all day. Too much fun. I tried to convince her to wear a big felt mole on her face but she wasn't going for it. Maybe in high school. I mean, who doesn't want a MOLE? She wasn't even excited to make her little stuffed mole. What a great science project, I mean how often do you get to make a stuffed animal for homework?

Don't Feed the Animals...

Tonight we wendt to a family party for my sister in law. It was BYOB, (Bring your own baby). So there are 4 babies of various stages under 1 year old and my sister in law is throwing Cheerios at them and they were shoving them in their mouths. I was laughing so hard because when I give my dogs treats I make them sit, and shake, and take each morsel from my hand in a gentle manner. This was a Cheerios free-for-all, they were scrambling around the carpet grabbing Cheerios with their chubby little hands. Too cute! They were falling over and rolling around trying to get the little o's.If I threw food at my kids, they would throw it back, they are too old for such cuteness.

Not a Five-Star Restaurant...

Today my ten-year old son told me a little story. He said they had chicken patties for lunch in school yesterday, but it was only half a patty and half of a hotdog roll. Apparently, his class had gotten to lunch too late to get the whole sandwich, there wasn’t enough left of the regular rolls or patties, so each kid received half a chicken patty on top of half of a hotdog roll. The funniest bit was the part that happened before they even got to the cafeteria. Their teacher was perturbed about the way they were pushing and shoving to line up for lunch. She said, “Calm down, it is not a five-star restaurant.”
According to my son, she was right, “It was more like a negative 5,” he told me while giggling at the same time. My poor son, spoiled by home-cooked meals, complained that he didn’t have enough time to eat the ½ patty on ½ bun because, “ I wasted all my time trying to figure out how to eat it and laughing about it with my friends.” We put ketchup on it and tried to eat it, but it was hard. The lunch ladies are never going to live this down. I wish I could have been there.

A love affair...

I am supposed to be making Halloween costumes for a float, clearing out a shed and writing three papers due this week. My bedroom is a mess and I am pretty sure that the laundry has set up it's own system of government by now. So, where do I start? I know, Coffee! I think I'm in love, love, love with that coffee press. For those of you who don't know about the three years of coffee drama I recently went through, you many think I am obsessing. I may be, and that's fine. But I have a coffee press now and I think I can tackle the aforementioned jobs.

You see, it all started with a beautiful cup of coffee I had on a camping trip with Wendy in college. It was Chock-Full-of Nuts coffee in an old fashioned percolator. Delicious, right? I liked it. I had always drank tea, my whole life. Now I liked coffee. It was good. Then my friends Maggie and Ralph moved in, we lived together during college. They were big time coffee drinkers. Maggie had this little spanish percolator, she steamed the milk and I liked that. But she moved to Puerto Rico and took her coffee making skills with her. Now Fernando gets what I had used to have, my own live-in barista. A few years later a beautiful Krupps, ten cup coffee maker made it appearance; my friend Michele gave it to me when she bought a different color one. After 10 years of making one cup a day, it got cranky. It started spitting my beloved brew out the sides and down the front of the machine.

Wendy, decided to give me a new machine. I liked it very much, but it was too big for my ONE cup that I needed each day, and the grinder was way too noisy. We used it for a few years. It also had a lot of parts to clean. Every time Wendy asked me if I like it, I felt bad because she spent so much money on it. It was okay, but the thought was better than the machine. I visited friends in florida and had the chance to use Kevin's one cup machine with the little plastic cups of flavored coffee. I thought it was cool. One cup, no mess, what could be better? I went home, looked up the machine, it was Three-hundred dollars. I thought, no way!

My husband bought me a one cup coffee maker by Melitta for Christmas. it was Fifty dollars. The big coffee maker went into the cabinet to be used when we had guests. Best gift ever, I thought, I loved the one cup pod machine and used it for two years in my classroom because I wasn't finding the time to use it at home. My sister, Pinky, bought me a case of their coffee pods. I made coffee for all my friends in the morning. We were all so happy.

Then, I mistakenly went to Pinky's house and she made me a latte. A real latte with her Starbucks machine. OK, that was it, The coffee I had been drinking was "just coffee." I knew there was something way better out there calling my name. I started buying other pods for my machine and it didn't like it, it started leaking and I couldn't make coffee at home on the weekends without lugging it home. The other teachers started to get nervous, and brought in their own machine. When I went to Starbucks, I was no longer getting my Mocha Frappiccino, I was buying lattes. I started going to Starbucks on my way to school once a week to treat myself, but the other days I was unhappy. I was going broke over brown water.

For some reason, I resisted buying a new coffee maker, after all, everyone else always bought me one, and I just couldn't decide. I wanted strong coffee, I wanted my froth, and I couldn't afford to keep going into Starbucks. So I went cheap, I bought a little $3 coffee funnel and some good coffee and went coffee commando for a few months. I patted myself on the back that I had solved all my problems, and very cheaply, I might add, though I missed the froth.

Well, then I saw the cooking channel and a chef using his coffee press. I had seen them before, but never in use and always thought they looked so complicated. According to the show, they were easy, and my obsession started anew. Thankfully my sister, catching my schizoid behavior, and probably unconsciously admitting that she started the whole problem with the amazing latte in the first place, bought me a coffee press. I used it and it was so easy and the coffee was amazing. I started using my immersion blender to make frothy milk. But this created a big mess and the thing made a lot of noise.

I ran out and got a little froth whipper at the Goodwill store. I am now in coffee heaven. I have miles of quiet froth, and my kids and husband are bugging me for coffee. They have learned how to use the press and expect caramel macchiattos every weekend. (I really need to get some decaf for them.) After reading what I have written, I must have driven everyone around me crazy for more than the three years I originally thought. I was in L.L. Bean the other day looking for raincoats for the kids and I saw a camping coffee press. Too cool, now I have to go camping so I can buy it. No doubt after reading this, one of my friends will get it for me. They always come through when we are talking coffee.

Cursing Comics

We went out to a comedy show last night with some friends and it was a good time. But It would be nice to see a comic with a cleaner act, I am a bit tired of cursing comics and potty talk. The parts I liked best were real and pretty clean. Life is funny, people are funny and we don't have to dirty things up to be cool. Cursing should be saved for housework and bills.

Golden Gate Managers Vote to Build Suicide Net

So, I am reading this article in the NYT about the 50 million dollar plan to put a net under the Golden Gate Bridge to discourage jumpers. Considering the economy, that may seem like a great idea, but honestly, is this really viable? I can just see friends daring each other to jump into the net, costing rescue teams and the city untold amounts of dollars. Plus, we really are messing with someone's last wish. If they want to jump, who are we to stop them? I am not a strong advocate for the live and let die mentality, I would do anything I could to prevent someone from taking their life, but 50 million dollars? Lets get real. People put their pets to sleep when necessary operations don't fit their budgets. I just thought it was ridiculous. Put a bunch of people to work, like social workers, let them patrol the bridge looking for jumpers. It will cost less, and the jumpers will have someone to talk to who may help them out of their personal predicaments.

Piano Lessons Paying Off

After years of badgering my daughter and my son to practice the piano, I have my revenge and payoff. My daughter actually wrote a song, and a good one at that. She composed the music and everything. It was what I always hoped she would be able to do if she ever got the whim to do so. I love writing lyrics but the inability to write my own music held me back. I wanted my kids to have a better shot if they were so inclined. Now, if I start calculating how much this has cost me, lets see...$17.50 a lesson for 6 years at one lesson a week... That is $5, 460.00, One Beautiful song...priceless!

COFFEE

I love my coffee press, I love my coffee press, thank you Pinky, my sister. I realize I haven't thanked you in over a week for this delightful addition to my life. Isn't it pretty? I had a bit of caramel topping this morning as well and now my daughter is eyeballing my latte. Have to froth some more milk!