Funny Friday

I decided that since everyone is already glad it's Friday why not add to it with some funny stuff every Friday.

The Happy Arch

Jeff Foxworthy-like Quotes about St.Louis
(most of these are SOOOOOOtrue)

-If your local Dairy Queen is closed from October through May, you might live in St. Louis .

-If someone in a Home Depot store offers you assistance and they don't work there, you might live in St. Louis .

-If someone mentions "The Landing" and it has nothing to do with the space shuttle, you might live in St. Louis .

-If you've worn shorts and a parka at the same time, you might live in St. Louis.

-If you've seen a tornado touch down and ONLY thought "Darn it, I just waxed the car", you might live in St. Louis .

-If you've had a lengthy  conversation with someone about where they went to high school, you might live in St. Louis .

-If you measure distance in hours instead of miles, you might live in St. Louis.  ( you know...it's 2  hours to the Lake)

-If you have switched from 'heat' to 'A/C' in the same day and back again, you might live in St. Louis .

-If you drive 75 miles through 2 feet of snow during a raging blizzard for some White Castles, you might live in St. Louis .

-If someone says concrete and you think of Ted Drewes instead of pavement, you might live in St. Louis .

-If you design your kid's Halloween costume to fit over a snowsuit, you might live in St. Louis .

-If the speed limit on the highway is 55 mph -- you're going 80 and everybody is passing you, you might live in St. Louis .

-If you've ever skipped school, work, or even a court-date because you had tickets to an afternoon Cards, Blues or Rams game, you might live in St. Louis .

-If you can say the words "Cahokia Mounds" and not think of a candybar or boobies, you might live in St. Louis .

-If driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled with snow, you might live in St. Louis .

-If you know all 4 seasons: almost winter, winter, still winter and road construction, you might live in St. Louis .

-If you find 10 degrees a little 'chilly', you might live in St. Louis .

If you actually understand these jokes and tell your St. Louis friends & others, you live or have lived in St. Louis .

Man-Dates

Have you ever been out and seen a guy or talked to a guy at the store and thought to yourself...."Man.. he would really get along with my husband/boyfriend. They have alot in common."

You haven't? I have.

My husband has great friends. Friends that would do anything for him anytime. Friends he has known since high school and friends he has met at work. But who doesn't want new friends and to meet new people that you have stuff in common with? It makes life fun and keep things from getting boring.

I think my husband would love to find more friends that would live within walking distance of our house. A guy with kids our kids' ages who is about our age.Who doesn't want a bud to go walk down and drink some "Buds" with in his driveway?  But what guy really wants to be introduced by his wife/girlfriend  to some stranger or neighbor he's never met before? If  they both didn't know it was happening...mmm....they might.

Organize the South Side : Clothes

Sorry it's blurry but you get the idea. Those are bags and boxes of extra clothes/

My sister L wanted me to help her organize.... and she has stuff. Alot of stuff. And she does have a house but she wants to reduce the amount of stuff in that house and in her life. Ah... the whole metaphor for our houses representing our lives. Deep.

She has many categories we will be tackling:
-Clothes
-Shoes
-Bags
-Magazines
-Books
-Paper Stuff
-Kitchen Stuff
-Memorabilia
-Dog Stuff

Stack of t-shirts with logos

So she decided she wanted to start with her clothes. She has alot of clothes that are seasonal and she doesn't need in her closet all the time. First we went through all of the closets she has and put everything on the bed. We also lined up some plastic bins she bought from Target against the wall in her dining room.

The bins ended up being:
-Give away
-Maybe
-T-Shirts
-Memory clothes ( you know stuff you don't need or don't want or can't fit into but don't want to give away)
-Skinny Clothes(2x) ( clothes she wants to wear when she looses some weight)
-Winter Accessories ( hats, gloves, scarves)
-Kid Stuff ( like a hope chest)

We went through everything. She tried on almost everything. She used these very handy gray slimline hangers to make putting things back in her closet alot easier.   In her bedroom closet,  we put her work clothes: short sleeve on top and long on the bottom. In the front entryway closet, we put all jackets, hoodies, and coats.  Any long dresses or pants she didn't want to crease, we put in a hanging closet downstairs.


When we were all done that room you saw earlier looked like this..

I was a great first project and I can't wait to help her with the next  one which I think she said will be the kitchen.

Word of the Day: Momnipulator

(n) : a mom who uses her kid or flattery to make you think she's your friend (she really isn't) and she likes you (she really doesn't) so you will help her, do things for her, and not feel bad about it.

She's like a frenemy but worse because kids are involved.   Learn to spot them before they spot you :) This has been a pubic service announcement.

Places I want to visit: El Dorado Royale....oh how I miss you

Hola! This beautiful weather here in St.Louis makes me think of where I want to go on vacation.  That could be very soon or just some day. So I decided to start the " Places I want to visit " series.


One of those places is the El Dorado Royale in Rivera Maya, Mexico.  To be fair, we have been there before back in 2004.  It was such a good experience that I would like to go back someday. It was really great. The flight was nice and short (4 hours) the bus ride to the resort was not too bad (45minutes)

View from main building looking towards the ocean.

The resort was visually beautiful and clean and sparkly. The staff was very friendly and I never felt weird or cautious. We had a beach view room with a king bed and jacuzzi tub. And a comfy blue hammock on the balcony.

Main Building

The restaurants were great. There was a fresh breakfast buffet with fresh omelets every morning and mimosas
(I mean...hello). There weren't any I was disappointed in.  It was just so nice to not have to cook for a whole week. Or do dishes. Or go grocery shopping.

Our building we stayed at

And did I mention that this is an adults only resort? yes....yes it is.  I love my kids more than anything in this world  but if I am going to leave them someday and go somewhere international. I don't want to be reminded that I miss them so much.  Nor do I want to hear anyone else's kid having a major meltdown. When we had gone there before we weren't even engaged so I didn't yet understand how relaxing that whole part could be.

J had flowers delivered to our room for our "dating" anniversary at the time.

Looking at the pictures now on the website and pictures from others we know that have gone... I can't believe how much the vegetation has grown and I'm sure how much else had changed in 8 years. There have been a few hurricanes that have blew in there since then and I'm sure they've tweaked things here and there.

Before we had kids, I compared every vacation we ever took, even our honeymoon, to the El Dorado Royale. It is  pricier than other places. But I would totally recommend it for an adult only mommy and daddy getaway.

 A photo of the beach and you can see the coral rocks so  you need beach shoes.

They did offer ( 8 years ago ) free shuttle down the road to Playa Del Carmen which is  beach town that is across from Cozumel and it is a great place to grab some food, drinks , and lots of great souvenirs.

A store in Playa Del Carmen.  That is all vanilla or tequila. Either way...yummy.

The whole street was totally pedestrian which was super nice.

Wish I was here ( and you too)

( I was in no way paid for this article. These are my own opinions. But if they want to give me a free trip, I wont say no!)

She LOVES ketchup

Little S LOVES ketchup. No really...she llllloooooovvvveeeeessss it. Like dips everything in it  loves it.  I'm all about the condiments: mayo, mustard, ranch dressing, honey mustard, and ketchup. But this girl can't get enough.  I'll ask her :

Me: S, do you want some hot dogs?
S:  (shakes head yes)  Ketchup!
Me: Yes, you can have ketchup with your hot dogs
S:  More ketchup!

Food is merely a transport for ketchup for S. Everything is made to get ketchup from the plate to her mouth.  we've tried to branch her out to mustard and she will but nothing like her beloved ketchup.

See...she really loves it. I'm a little scared.


And not to be outdone...K does love her mustard as well. She needed to pose too after she saw S's impromptu photo shoot.

What do you do with all those tickets?

So I had the key chains and  my husband , J, has the ticket stub collection.  Twenty plus years of tickets stubs shoved in an over sized  mug  first on his dresser, then on a self in our closet. There are tons of concerts and tons of sporting events. Some I was around for and a bunch I wasn't.

Close Up....Cardinal Games, Concerts, Blues Games

Again, why have a collection if you aren't going to look at it and enjoy it?

So last year for Father's day I had the brilliant idea of making a poster size collage out of all of them. I started out by very loosely laying them all out on the floor in as much of a rectangular shape as I could and measuring them. Then I went to Michaels armed with my 40% off coupon, as they have every week, and found a frame that was about the size I needed. Then I went to the framing counter and got a black mat to fit my frame. They have in stock and will cut for your plain old mat board. They don't have a ton of  choices but usually a clack, gray , off white  or white. Now if you want anything fancy, that'll cost you.

I wanted to have them in as close of chronological order as I could without looking all matchy-matchy. I wanted the colors, sizes, and shapes to all  blend together in a non-perfect way. Now I'm not going to lie, I had to sacrifice a few to get them into a already in stock frame. But when you have 30+ Cardinals game stubs, I let a couple of them go. I used photo square stickies to attach them in a non- permanent way at first but then they started to fall off so I had to reenforce them.  Now this hangs in the hallway of our finished basement and every time any of his friends comes over they look at it to see if they remember one of the concerts that they went to in high school.  Ahh...memory lane.

Here it is hanging downstairs in the hallway... sorry about the lights.

My giant pile of neverending stuff

Everyone has it. That oooonnnnneeeee spot in your house that you dump your stuff at when you get home. And no matter how much you try to keep it clean  it only lasts a day or two at the most. Why is that? Why can't we keep it clean?


Our spot is our dining room table.  It just collects everything. The mail gets put there, any bags of stuff we buy gets put there, Library books go there, stuff that needs attention (ironically) goes there, stuff K doesn't want S to get  goes there, my camera stays there, stuff that doesn't necessarily have a home goes there until we figure out where it goes or we can't see the top of the table at all.

I consider myself to be very organized. The rest of my house always is but that one.....stubborn....place.

ARGGHH!!(channeling Charlie Brown there)

It's just so annoying. It sits there mocking me as I pass by....." You're never going to get rid of me. Stop trying . I'm just going to keep growing and growing until I fall off the table!"

Sometimes if people are coming over and I need to clean ASAP, the stuff goes into bags and shoved somewhere until they leave.


But life just happens and I can't keep up with it. I just don't think you can get by without some spot in your house where you can dump stuff.  I know some people have a bin or a basket or a box but that's still a dumping spot. If any of you can do it... please.... tell me how to make it stop.

Key chains, Key chains, and Key chains....oh my!

Everyone has something they collect: baseball cards, purses, fancy dolls from when they were little.  A while back I started collecting key chains from places I had been and places other people had been. The way I looked at it  they were small, cheap, and you never saw the same one twice. They were pretty interesting and I avoided getting really ugly t-shirts from well meaning relatives.

 So fast forward 15 years later and I had not one but two shoe boxes jam packed full of key chains.  I heard Nate Berkus (hot-tee) say on his show that if you had a collection of something, anything,  that it should be displayed so you could actually enjoy it.

 You can see California, Colorado, Delaware, and Florida.

Ok. Sounds like a plan.  I told my husband, J,  that and said I wish there was a way we could hang them on the wall without leaving  lots and lots of little holes from push pins ( which I had done in my childhood bedroom..yikes) We went to Micheals and found these huge shadow boxes 24x 18. I think you are supposed to put clothes or something else big in there but they looked great for this project.  J also had the genius idea of taking wire and  looping that through the back to hang the key chains without having some huge gaudy hook  that took away from their looks.   He's definitely the construction behind most of my designs.

Georgia (1996 Olympics) through Kentucky

So I set them all out and went through them. I had ,all along, had the goal of getting a key chain from all 50 states. I thought that would be pretty cool. Of course some times I would get 2 or 3, or in the case of Las Vegas 20, from the same city. We haven't done that one yet. I'll post those picture when we do.

Mississippi  through Wyoming

All the Saint Louis/Missouri  key chains

Grant's Farm...one of my favorite places!

International and  unique key chains

Singapore...maybe the one from farthest away

Hola! Mexico!

Little man from Germany

I ended up having 3 huge shadow boxes and one little square one, just for Las Vegas. I couldn't help it. They had some really awesome key chains there. Now I can look at them all the time when we are in our basement and every time we have a party I always see someone standing in front of them looking at them  and then asking me about certain ones which makes me very happy. I have left space to complete the 50 states goal and I know one day I will.

The Girl Scout Patches of Life

I think that everyone earns patches everyday.   You know, like girl scout patches. You just don't see them and don't get to sew them onto a sash or a vest.  When  I think of all of the patches that I would have earned , the list is endless:

In my twenties:
- The surviving a hangover every weekend for month straight patch.
- The not sleeping with someone you won't remember  the next day patch
- The crappy Boss patch ( 10x over)
- The overtime patch
- The stupid ex-boyfriend patch..followed by....
- The so glad I didn't marry THAT guy patch

Then in my thirties:


- The only getting two hours of sleep and still being a human being patch
- The finally took a shower in a couple days patch
- The cleaning up barf  patch
- The taking care of a whole sick family patch
- The crazy relatives patch
- The biting my tongue around stupid people patch
- The cooking while kids hang on your leg patch
- The not running away from home when you kids are screaming patch

I was a Girl Scout in one way or another for almost 9 years. I really liked it.  The crafts..the singing... the camping.. the learning and for a while, the friendships. I was a brownie, a junior, a senior and then a part of a mounted horse riding troop. Yes, they have those.

Mrs. Laurie Casey was my girl scout leader for 7 years.  When I was younger I thought she was loud, boisterous, and way to outgoing for me. She was always pushing us and making us do things that at the time were"stupid" and "dorky". We were the troop that sang everywhere. In fact we were invited to sing different places. I think everyone here in Saint Louis knew about Laurie's girls.

It wasn't until I was getting married and she was battling cancer that I realized how much of an impact she had on my life. I sing the songs she taught us all the time. One will randomly jump into my head and then I sing them to my girls. I really wish she was still here to meet my girls and sing the songs with them. They would have loved that.  And every time I start a new craft , I think of all of the crafts we did with her.

 It's weird to me that I find myself  thinking about her more now than I seemed to before. Wanting to show her things and  talk to her about things.  As much as I didn't realize it, she was a big cheerleader of mine and  I will be forever grateful  for that.