Chop House

On Saturday night James and I got dressed up, dropped the girls off, and went on a date!

As we were getting ready, James wondered if he should wear his suit. I told hm he really didn't need to and he would probably be over dressed. He wore khaki pants and a nice button down shirt and I wore a cute black dress. Annabelle documented the moment for us.

We made a reservation because we weren't sure of their policy and it seemed a little fancier than just showing up.

We get inside and I secretly wonder if they are open because it is so dark. We make our way to the hostess station and she checks our reservation and bring us to our table.

Before my eyes even adjust to the darkness we have about 5 people doing things at our table.
Someone is arranging silverware, someone is taking away extra dishes, someone is putting a napkin on my lap.

After we are settled in, the water waiter shows up and offers us 3 choices of water - something we missed, sparkling water, or tap. James (smart guy that he is) chose tap and got a lovely glass of refreshing ice water. I decided to be fancy and get sparkling water. A moment later the water waiter returns with a lovely glass bottle of water. He pours it for me. As soon as he leaces I take a drink and realize I've made a huge mistake. This stuff is horrible. First of all, it is warm. Second, there is absolutely no flavor at all. I was stuck with it though because I couldn't ask for tap water now.

Time to Order
The waitress goes through the whole menu explaining everything including how one choice is from a cow from Austraila that is given a Japanese massage and fed organic food (should a cow be treated better than many people?). James was really looking forward to having lobster. He asked the market price and it turns out that if he wanted two tails it was only $115 and just a single tail was $59. He decided to choose something else.

I ordered the North Atlantic Salmon, James went with the Beef Wellington (waitress' favorite), and for our sides (one side feeds two people) we chose the garlic mashed potatoes and the macaroni and cheese with poblano peppers.

My salmon was delicious. I discreetly took out my camera and quickly took a picture. Because of the darkness my picture did not turn out very well.

James enjoyed his beef wellington, but decided that if he had to spend $50 on the beef wellington or $50 on a whopper junior, he would definetly choose the whopper junior.
As I am eating my meal, I am pretty much overcome with thirst. I tell James to take a drink and then put his water down on the otherside so that I can take it and not look like I am reaching for his water.

I do feel like I need to drink my water because we are pretty sure that water that is served from a glass bottle is not free like the tap water.

Oh I better fill you in on the bathroom situation here at the Chop House. The waitress walks James almost to the bathroom. There is a bathroom attendant in there who hands him a towel after washing his hands. Do you tip him?

James and I never get dessert when we go out for two reasons:
1. We are usually too full
2. We do not want to spend the money.

However, I feel we need to get dessert because we are at this fancy place and it seems like the fancy thing to do. We need to cleanse our palate with a nice COT (change of taste). After reviewing the dessert menu we decided that it is worth it to spend $8 on a Mint Creme Brulee Cheesecake with an Oreo crust. It was just the right amount of mint to taste refreshing, but not be overwhelming.

After dessert, the waitress brings us our bill and we realize that my fancy water was $5. I decided that I needed to dik all of it and quickly drink the remainder of what I have. Seriously $5 for water and I don't even get to keep the bottle? (They took that away after refilling my glass for me).

Our total bill was higher than groceries for almost 2 weeks. Thank goodness we have a gift certificate that James' dad gave him for his birthday.

It was a lovely experience, but we decided we will not be returning anytime in the near future. We would rather go somewhere that just gives you tap water, doesn't feel the need to massage their cows, and where we can actually see each other.

Oh yeah, James would have fit in nicely with his suit.

Cousins

"A cousin is a ready-made friend for life."

-unknown

My Friend Kristin

I have a really great friend named Kristin. She was my suite mate our freshman year and then we lived together the next 4 years in college.

Our freshman year we had breakfast each morning before our early 8am class.

Through the years Kristin and I have remained friends even though we don't see each other very often. I have been blessed to be friends with such a wonderful person who loves Jesus so much. Her love for Christ is evident in all that she does.

I just found out that Kristin is going to be embarking on a very special adventure with her sister and another friend. She is hearing what the Lord is telling her and following the plan He has for her life.

I am so proud to be friends with such an amazing, special, kind hearted, humble, musical, punctuation-knowing, loyal, caring, God-fearing, enthusiastic person.

Kristin, you are such a wonderful person. You are going to be such a blessing to the new people in your life.

“May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity among yourselves as you follow Christ Jesus, so that with one heart and mouth you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Romans 15:5-6

All Grown Up

So now that Ariel is 1 she thinks she is a big girl. And since she is a big girl she needs her own popsicle in the tubby. The other day Annabelle decided she didn't want her so Ariel took over for her. Well that just got her thinking that she needed her own popsicle in the tubby.

I wasn't ready to allow Ariel to have a huge popsicle for every bath at the age of 1. That seemed like a lot for such a little peanut.

Fortunately for Ariel, Annabelle picked out these popsicles called Magnificient Minis. Oops, I guess they are Mighty Minis, but they really are magnificient for a little one.

Well they are quite small, which turned out to be perfect for Ariel. She is so proud to have her own popsicle in the tubby. Most of it ends up melting, but she is one happy bather.

Annabelle's popsicle of choice are the Dora the Explorer popsicles.

They are actually one of the better tasting popsicles. I do not recommend the Super Hero ones unless you like your child to have a black mouth.

I'm a Runner

James was home on Thursday night so he told me to go for a run. I wasn't sure I could even get around the circle in or neighborhood one time and it is only a half mile. James told me to do it 3 times. I decided that the goal was to get around 1 time running the whole way and the second time I could walk and run.

Well I was able to run the entire mile!!!!!

And then I went again tonight and I ran the whole mile again! I think I did better than last night because I felt like I kept the same pace the whole time. I think tomorrow I will try to add a lap. I may walk, but at least I will have gone farther.

In high school James bought me these awesome shoes and I am still wearing them. I guess that means they don't get much use. Anyway, I really like them.

I am going to be doing the Panther Prowl 5K in the beginning of June with Colleen, one of my friends from work. We may walk it, run it, or do a combination, but we are going to do it!

We Match!

Annabelle and I found some matching shoes at Wal Mart and I couldn't resist.

Time To Get In Shape

I am really out of shape. I'm winded just thinking about typing this :) j/k

I used to be able to do the splits, run a couple miles, and have a small amount of muscle line in my legs.

I can run up and down the steps and then I'm done. I have about 12 inches to go before I can do the splits, and my legs and just bright white things. I couldn't even do a backbend to show Annabelle how it is supposed to look.

I would love to have a an hour or so a few times a week to run or work out. I did a 1 week trial at a gym and got there 1 time.

I've rented work out videos and done them 1 or 2 times and then they have to go back. I've bought a few workout videos, but somehow it is too difficult to put it in the DVD player and push play.

I work during the day and James works at night so there is really no child-free time for me to workout.

I've used the baby jogger, but its a bit heavy for me. Maybe once I get in shape and am stronger I can use it.

Me now

What I hope to be

Okay, so this may be a bit extreme. I'm not a couch potato and I"m not looking to have a 6 pack.

Any suggestions on how to get in shape?

Cotton Candy

On Thursday afternoon all Annabelle could talk about was getting cotton candy. I told her we would probalby wait until Friday to get it with Daddy. She said she didn't want to wait because she loved cotton candy so much (not sure when she has had it before). So I gave in.

We talked about how I had wipes for her hands when they got sticky and that she didn't have to cry about them being dirty. we went over what to do if she didn't like the stickiness about 5 times.

She wanted to have the money in her purse so she could buy it herself. We got to the cotton candy booth and she wanted to get a pink one. She pays for it and the lady hands her the bag. She smells it and says, "This smells sooooo good. You have to smell it mommy."

This was so exciting so I took her picture with her first bag of cotton candy.

Then she gets all settled in her stroller ready to take her first bite of cotton candy. I open the bag and hand it to her. She barely touches it with one finger and says, "I don't like cotton candy." Seriously, this afternoon you loved it so much. I even tried to feed it to her since stickiness sometimes bothers her. Nope, she would have nothing to do with it.

I had a couple bites, but realized I'm getting older and cotton candy just doesn't taste as good as it did a few years ago. Thats okay, I like to throw away money (not!)

Downtown Fun

I love going downtown. I like to take the girls for a walk after work when it is nice out.

Some of our favorite things about downtown are:

*Going to the Peanut Store

*Playing on the statues

*Looking at the toys at Sand Castle

*Playing in the tree house at Tip Toes

*Going to JP's

*Smelling the flowers

*Looking at all the fun things in the windows

*Watching the fun fountains

*Dancing to the street performers

I love this picture of Annabelle dancing.

She hears music and can't help herself but dance.

Don't you just love Holland? What is your favorite thing to do in Holland?

Our Little Dutch Girls

Tulips are blooming in Holland, Michigan

Tulips are blooming today!

Ariel is 1

My baby is 1 year old today!

We celebrated her birthday yesterday with family. I had a pink and green garden theme party for er. Even though she didn't say so, I'm can tell she loved the theme.

Opening presents

Trying out the new car. This was also Annabelle and Ariel's first official "fight" where both of them cared about the outcome. Ariel was in it, Annabelle squeezed in and moved Ariel out, Ariel circled around and got right back in basically pushing Annabelle out.

Ariel with her special cake.

Cake for everyone else

Not too sure about it

Digging in

All done

I can't believe how fast she went from

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