I WON!!!!!

I am never lucky when it comes to winning stuff (or at least I have a pretty solid non-winning track record for most of my life).  BUT!!  I won the random drawing for a $100 gift certificate for a tattoo! SWEET!!  I know I am FAR more excited about it than my mom......but I did promise her no sleeves :)

DNA Inksgiving Contest

Soooooooo, maybe I've been contemplating a tattoo for a few years now....yes, I have.  Right now there is a contest going on at a local (reputable) business where I COULD win a gift certificate to have $100 off  :)  I entered with this photo: 

Yesssss, those are approximately 80 temporary tattoos making up my "sleeve", it was quite a process of getting them all on...and then all off, but I was amused and had fun for the whole process.  I call it my $6 KMart Blue Light Special sleeve :)   Kinda felt like I had dipped my arm in Elmer's glue by the time I was finished and the nail polish remover to get it all off was a little much.....LOL  (Have no fear, I will never, NEVER, have a permanent tattoo sleeve! LOL)

C is for Cookie

O!  I forgot to add this to my last post!  I apologize in advance for the poor video quality....it was taken with my cell phone.....but this is my little cousin James singing "C is for Cookie" (the cookie monster song from back when Cookie Monster actually ate cookies instead of veggies) while we ate breakfast. I can't even listen to this without DYING laughing....I was having a really hard time keeping a straight face through this....he'd only been singing for about 10 minutes before I started to record it :)

Rammin' the Roads

A conversation with my little cousin, Noah, at the Fryeburg Fair at the beginning of the month went a little like this: "Elizabeth, how come...you never come visit me at MY house?  How come I always come visit you at YOUR house?"  Oops.  Truth from the mouth of a 4 year old....LOL  I knew I was long overdue for a visit down to my cousins and I had a weekend off coming up so I decided to combine a bunch of appointments and visits into one week-long road trip around Maine and Massachusetts. 

The 966 miles looked a little like this: :)

First off, the visit at the Civiello's was lovely :)  I had a great time with the Noah, James and little Ben (who really isn't so little for only being 2 months old!!) We got to play hide and seek, duck-duck-goose, dinosaurs, puzzles, and read lots of books......not to mention lots of piggy back rides!  Jen, you're amazing....I have no clue how you can do it....I know I definitely didn't have enough arms to take care of 3 little boys by myself!!  O, and it was nice to get to visit with Jen and Gabe, too ;)  And to find someone else to watch the Big Bang Theory with and laugh with :):)  BAZINGA!

Next stop was Boston for an appointment to figure out WHY I was feeling so yucky over the past few months.  Turns out I had a decent case of Mono sometime between last April and now.  My immune system is still recovering and I still have a lot of antibodies left in my system.  YAY for figuring out was wrong!  RIDICULOUS I had to go clear to Boston and have ~15 vials of blood drawn over the past few weeks just to figure it out.....sigh.  PATHETIC that I was so sick at whatever point and didn't even realize it because I'm so used to my body being "off".  O well!

On my way back home to my family I stopped in Skowhegan to visit my friend Matt at his business The Bankery.  GAH!  Pastries to die for!  While I would love to be able to see Matt and enjoy his stuff more often...I'm afraid I'd weigh 500 lbs!  I only ever hear fantastic things about his shop from my students who hail from the Skowhegan area and I will testify myself, if you are headed through there OR don't mind a minor detour on your way south down I-95.....STOP!!!   Your taste buds will love you :)

I got to catch up with so many more friends on this trip too....and got to play Heroscape with my brother a couple times :)  However, as much fun as it was, I was really excited to climb into my own bed on Tuesday night!