Must be Santa ...

One morning, as I was walking around deck 4 watching the boat dock, I ran into Santa in the lobby. Unfortunately I looked homeless, and I hadn't showered yet, but hey - it's Santa!!!

I also ran into a different looking Santa in Nassau, Bahamas.

I just notice something funny about these 2 photos. Photo with Santa in the lobby - I'm unshowered. Photo with plastic dark Santa, I'm showered. Yet, I look pretty much the same, and I seem to be wearing almost the same clothing. Gross ...

Jonathan's new toy

My Black Friday deal was a ladder from Lowes (see my 365 photo-a-day album on facebook).

Jonathan's black Friday deal was a flip cam. I guess he uses them at work alot, so he was familiar with how awesome they are.

He's been playing around by taking short videos at the Osborn lights (at Disney), and he walked around HP land at Universal all day.

I caught him in action a couple times. Hee hee. Here he is standing outside of the 3 Broomsticks restaurant. See the actual 3 broomsticks above his head? There's also a "wanted - Serius Black" poster to his right.

Adios Halloween!

I love 75% off sales after the holidays!

Let's face it, I don't need any more Halloween decorations or any candy, but I always seem to find a gem in the clearance isle.

Today my big find was 25 cent candles (black, but when they are inside a votive, nobody can tell) and a 2 pack of Halloween underwear for $1! So what if they are black and say "spooky" on the butt (I'm so embarrassed right now)?!? As long as I'm not wearing white shorts, I should be ok.

Happy Birthday Corey!

My little brother (aka: Walter Payton) is 29 today.

Happy Birthday!

Shamrock Shakes

Why wait another 11 months for a Shamrock shake? Make one yourself!

2 c. vanilla ice cream

1 1/4 c. milk

1/4 tsp. mint extract

8 drops green food coloring

Blend until smooth (I used my magic bullet!). If needed, stop blender and stir with spoon to help blend in ice cream.

These suckers are pretty thick! I ended up adding a tad more milk to help the blending process.

Mint extract is STRONG. Don't pour a lot in. It will knock your socks off.

I love God and Shamrock Shakes ...

... in that order.

So today is St. Patrick's Day. I'm not much of a drinker, nor am I Irish, so I don't really celebrate. However, I do *heart* McDonald's Shamrock shakes. Not only are they delicious, but they remind me of my childhood. Nothing weird or anything, but I just drank them as a kid.

So today, driving home from a friend's house, I decide to get one. McDonalds #1 - sold out. McDonalds #2 - sold out. McDonalds #3 (which I hate going to, because when you exit the place you can't turn left. You have to turn right, drive 2 miles down the road and make a U turn) - sold out. Way to go McDonalds. I can't imagine how much revenue you're losing today!

I knew at home I had a recipe for home made Shamrock Shakes. I had all the ingredients except mint extract, so I was off to Wal-mart.

As I'm slowing driving over the speed bump that's in front of the gate in my community, I hear a noise. I look up as 2 cars are plowing into each other on the highway. One car's right side was totall smashed (the wheel was turned 90 degrees) and the car in front of me was totally crunched. It was also leaking a ton of fluid. I just kept imaging cars in movies exploding on impact.

Everybody was totally ok, but I just kept thinking to myself, "I owe you one God! If I was driving even 5mph faster I might have been right in the middle of that."

Happy Resolution Day!

Besides dusting off those old usual resolutions (lose weight, eat more veggies, get more sleep ...), I'm going to do a fun resolution this year.

This was all the rage last year, but in typical "Amber fashion", I'm always behind on the trends.

I'm going to take at least 1 picture every day.

I think that will be a fun 365 end-of-the-year yearbook for me.

I stole the idea from a facebook friend Allyson. She did it last year, and I always loved looking at her photos. Granted, she is a professional photographer, so they were alway quality photos.

My photos will just be ... whatever. Whatever the heck I'm doing. And what I'm normally doing is A) working or B) watching TV. So, if you work with me, watch out! I'm bringing my camera to work next week!

Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party

I'm a little behind on my blogging. Everybody always says "December is such a busy month!" Well, for me, it's honestly not, so I don't really have a good excuse.

But way back on 12/4/09, Jonathan and I went to Mickey's Very Merry Christmas party at the Magic Kingdom. It was raining and freezing. Needless to say, I was NOT excited about going.

Right off monorail was a "lake" we had to walk thru. I figured "what the hell!" and barreled right thru the humongous puddle assuming my feet would get soaked inside the park.

Naturally, they didn't.

Even though it rained all night long, it was a really weird rain. You really couldn't feel it.

The bonus about Mickey's VMCP is the free food. They have free sugar cookies, hot chocolate, apples and apple juice. My goal was to eat as many cookies as possible. I was forced to stop after 3. They are pretty big cookies, and my stomach was not really happy with my decision making.

To kill time before a stage show (that ended up being cancelled b/c of the rain) we road the TTA. For those of you unfamiliar with the TTA, it's a lazy shuttle ride that goes all around Tomorrowland, including inside Space Mountain.

Space Mountain has been under construction lately, but it had opened a couple days prior.

I guess it wasn't 100% ready, b/c the ride was shut down the the lights were on. It was really hard to take pictures because:

A) I'm on a moving vehicle

B) there is a huge pane of glass between you and the ride, so you can't use flash

This is the best I could do.

It's Back!!!

The greatest video on You Tube is back.

This video was my birthday gift from my brother in 2008. He likes to give me the "gift of laughter" (which happens to be free).

It disappeared about a month after my birthday, so I was unable to share it with the rest of the world ... but it's back now!

Enjoy my favorite song (Take On Me), but 'literally".

Just trust me and watch ...


Pipe wrench fight!

Merry Christmas!

A classic photo of my brother and I when we lived in Montgomery, IL.

I'm guessing this is the Christmas of '85, or maybe '84. That would make me 9 or 10, and my brother would be about 3 or 4.

Go Bears!

P.S. Yes, I'm wearing stirrup pants.

Happy Birthday to me!

Every year my brother gives me the gift of laughter for my birthday.

Last year it was the "Take on Me Literally" video on You Tube. That is my all time favorite song, and the 'literal' video made me pee my pants from laughing.

This year is no exception.

He introduced me to Randy Moller, the Florida Panther's (NHL) radio announcer.

Every time a goal is scored, he yells "GOOOOOOOOAL ..." then some random movie quote.

Check out this you tube clip. The 2nd one is my favorite.

Fail!

I stumbled across the greatest website. I spend about an hour browsing thru it, until I felt like such an internet dork.

It's www.failblog.org

It's just hilarious photos of things "failing" and sometimes (like the photos below) "winning".

Now it's a part of my ever expanding google reader.

Check it out!

A Christmas Carol

Jonathan and I ran across this display at Disney's Hollywood Studios the other day.

I'm all for cheesy cardboard cut outs 'stick your head in here' type of thing. I think Disney should do way more of them. You know everybody will stick their head in anything! (get your mind of out of the gutter!)

You can tell by the photo, but Jim Carrey's eyes actually move from right to left very slowly.

Christmas in November

It's not like "Christmas in November" is anything unheard of, but I'm honestly not really in the mood yet.

At Studios we ran into this giant greeting card (to hype up the movie The Christmas Carol - which Jonathan saw with out me, b/c I'm not in the mood yet!).

Since Jonathan thinks I'm the biggest scrooge ever, he found it appropriate that I was all excited to see the inside writing on the card. *groan*

The card is in the back by the Backlot Tour and the giant bottle of Coke.

Boo!

View from my front door.

I can see the Magic Kingdom fireworks inbetween those 2 houses.

Happy Halloween!

This was probably Halloween '93.

My mom was equipment manager for the Oswego, IL youth tackle football for a couple years (my brother would've been in 6th grade at this time), so my friend Julie and I wore FULL football pads this halloween.

Both our brothers played football, and we both coached poms/cheerleading for football, so we were around football all the time. I know I was curious about all the equipment the boys always wore. Thankfully, we both fit into some left over 8th grade football gear.

Those butt pads are not comfy at all!

Happy Halloween!

Friday night Jonathan and I went to Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween party at the Magic Kingdom.

It was our 3rd time attending, so we didn’t feel a need to go nuts. We just ran around and got candy. Lots and lots of candy. I didn’t realize how much we had until I poured it into a bowl. I took a bowl you would normally use to make a batch of cookies. We have to overflowing bowls of candy.

So much for trying to lose a few pounds …

I used a tri pod to steady my little digital camera to take these night time shots.

Jonathan was dying to leave (it was past midnight), but it's not every day that you're inside the Magic Kingdom at night when barely anybody else was there. I was going to take full advantage!

Mary Poppins

In 2008 Jonathan turned 30. He really wanted to see Mary Poppins on Broadway in NYC for his birthday. So we priced out a trip to NYC, but it just wasn't in the cards. Instead we road tripped to Atlanta, GA.

Now its 2009, and Jonathan has yet another birthday. This year Mary Poppins is on tour, and, lucky me, it's stopping in St. Louis (where he's from). So we flew out to Missour-A for a short weekend trip to see the show.

The Fox theater in St. Louis is pretty cool. It's a really old theater that's been totally restored. It's like a pagoda and a rich antique collector threw up in the theater. It was very ornate with tapestries, lion statues, large mirrors and carvings all over the walls.

Now, and I totally alone in my dis-liking for Broadway shows. I've been to about 5 or 6 different shows, and I just don't really enjoy them. It's not that I hate every waking moment, but I'd rather spend my money elsewhere. Mary Poppins (for me) was no different. The show was cool, with the different flying and dancing effects. Most of the songs were from the original movie, even though the show followed the plot lines of the book (Mary Poppins actually bolts from the family with out notice 1/2 way thru the show!). Still, for me … I'd rather spend my money on football tickets.

I wanted to take more photos inside the ornate Fox, but there was a big sign that said, "no cameras allowed", yet they didn't even search my purse. I took a couple photos of the stage (pre-show), until I got yelled at.

All in all, it was a fun show, and I think Jonathan had a great birthday!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Since Jonathan is out of town, I'm all alone for Valentine's Day, watching Live Free or Die Hard.

That's ok though, we aren't really super romantic, going out for expensive dinner types of people anyway.

But I did to grocery shopping at Wal-mart earlier.  It's so cute seeing guys walking around with shopping carts full of flowers, boxes of candy and GIANT stuffed animals.  Especially the big tough biker-looking dudes.  I didn't really realize people still bought heart shaped boxes of chocolates and huge pink stuffed dogs.

On the plus side, all Valentine's stuff was (surprisingly!) 50% off!  Yay for great deals!  (No, I didn't buy any stuffed animals)

Happy Birthday Julie!

Happy Birthday Julie!

Good luck getting your balloon hat thru airport security!