The importance of being Earnest

Dillon's play was this past weekend. he played the role of Jack/Earnest, in "The Importance of being Earnest". it was so good and all the actors did an amazing job. i have to say the costumes for the girls were gorgeous! it is so cool to get to watch your child on stage. i was glowing in pride. what made it even funner was that my sister and niece were here to see it with us. Erika, who is also in theater, gave Dillon a bouquet after the show. Next up for the drama club, "The Wizard of Oz"; with tryouts coming up soon. i think dill is going for the part of the Scarecrow.

family is gone

Well, the girls have gone. i took them to the airport yesterday morning (4:30am - ick!) we had such a nice time and packed a lot of fun in a short amount of time. the day before they left, we spent the day driving around, running errands, etc. we went to Marshall's to check out their Christmas section, ran to Petsmart to get a bigger cage for Tuck's finches. i also got them a nest for inside the cage, but so far they haven't figured out that they can go inside of it!
i also took them down to the Asbury Park boardwalk. i've lived in NJ for 12 years and every time my sister has come, i have taken her down there to look around. it's been awhile since she has been here, so there were a lot of new changes. they are in the midst of a revitalization and it is going quite well. new buildings, new stores, new restaurants, new condos, etc. i took them by this one store called "Bodega Shoppe" (website is currently under production). I've been in there a few times and just loved it; but was happy to learn from my Country Living Fair trip with the *Summerhouse girls, Kathe and Joanna*, that they are good friends with the store owner, Michael. (did you get all that?) So when i was in there, i made a point to introduce myself to Michael, who i found to be super charming, pleasant and friendly. he has amazing style and we were oohing and aahing over much of the store. lots of Parisian influence (Marie Antoinette action figures with removable heads for god's sake!), a delicious line of Scandinavian holiday gifts and so much more. his theme this year was, Swans, stemming from Asbury Park's boardwalk heyday, when they had actual swan boats. i never saw the swan boats, but have seen pictures and would love to see them come out of storage and make a come back. anyway, i was just loving the swan idea given its historical sentiment. i bought one of his bigger swans and immediately put it on the top of one of my Christmas trees, now dubbed "the peacock tree".





*the Summerhouse girls, as of yet don't have a blog or website (it's in the works), but you can read Jenny Heid's visit to their store on her blog which is linked in their name.

p.s. i'm having a blog giveaway soon, so stayed tuned!

happy birthday, Tucker!

sent tuck off to school with much fanfare and singing. we will have a little pizza party tonight with a few friends and family over to celebrate.

goings on - monday 11/09/09

ran Grace to the vet this morning. fully expected a Lyme's disease diagnosis, but instead found out that Gracie had fractured one of her toenails and was in quite a lot of pain. poor little bugger. the nail was hidden under her fur, so when we were palpating her paw, we weren't really see it under all the fur. she's on meds and is to take it easy for a few days.

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So tomorrow is Tucker's birthday. for those of you who don't know, Tucker is special needs. He was a victim of medical malpractice at the age of 16 months old and due to negligence was left severely brain injured. it is difficult to talk about, so i often skim over it as if telling a story that happened to someone else, not me. i try not to let this tragedy dictate my life and work hard to find peace with the hand i have been dealt. so my sweet boy is turning 20 tomorrow and i wanted to give him a gift that had meaning and purpose. i thought long and hard and discussed my idea with Dillon (my younger son), who whole heartedly approved my idea. tucker is classified as cortically blind, which is a yet another side affect of a brain injury. so he does not see well. but his auditory skills are absolutely amazing. so my idea was to give him some little birds who make enough noise and chatter to amuse and delight him, but not enough to overwhelm him after awhile. dillon and i picked out these 2 zebra finches and will be picking them up tomorrow while tuck is in school. i let dillon name them, so i chose to call them "Gambit and Rogue" after some X-men characters.

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in other news, this BEAUTIFUL ring arrived in the mail today. it was from my friend, Barbe St. John. We both realized that each of us had an article in the Dec. issue of Belle Amoire Jewelry, so we emailed each other our article proofs and i just adored the ring she made. sure looks pretty on my hand! i am quite lucky to have such thoughtful and generous friends.
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Company is here!

My sister, niece and brother-in-law arrived this morning after taking the red eye in from California. they weren't here an hour before we were leaving and heading to the flea market. jeff slipped my niece $20 to spend there and she made it go far. she had a great time and found some wonderful purchases. i usually don't go on Sundays as i have found the Sunday crowd to be "not to my liking". but today was different, there were tons of vendors and great stuff was out. everyone seemed like they wanted to sell and make deals. i only saw one case of someone "not to my liking". (who is the person that i do not like? it is the parents that drag their children to these things and then proceed to yell at them and treat them like crap. for the most part as well, these poor kids are usually improperly dressed. i don't understand these parents that speak to their children in this way. (now mind you, i am not referring to the misbehaving child that needs to be scolded. this is just downright wrong and mean). i just find it upsetting. Okay, enough of that. so we hit the flea running and it turned out to be a gorgeous day. it got so warm and i am so glad i had them bundle up, as i swore up and down the wind would be in high gear and we'd be freezing. NOT! we couldn't peel off our layers fast enough.
then we came home, got something to eat, grabbed dillon and then headed into the back field on a nest hunt. it was fun. we ended up finding 4 nests; although 3 of them were a few seasons old. (meaning they were falling apart). not sure what is on the agenda tomorrow. have some silly errands to run (bank, post office) and then need to get Gracie to the vet as she's not feeling well again - i'm making the call now that she's got that darn Lymes disease again (and yes, we have them on tick meds).

and check out that awesome bug that showed up on my porch today (am thinking it is a katydid....) i was going crazy taking pictures of it when it jumped onto my camera and then flew at me. talk about a wuss - i SCREAMED so loud! i didn't even know i could scream that loud. it was hilarious!