Our Saturday Night Out

Steve and I took the kids out on the town Saturday night thanks to a blog entry for FREE Tickets to 101 Dalmatians! The girls were super excited to go, but I don't think they really knew what they were going to. Donny, Roni, and Josey got tickets too, so us mom's decided to plan the evening. A trip to Chuck E. Cheese and then the show after we got all the wiggles out. Great night and great memories!

That was all until we pulled up to Chuck E. Cheese. There was a line out the door and people just hanging out to get in. We got in line and decided to see how long it would take to get in. There were 3 huge parties that were getting in first so the rest of us had to wait. There were masses of people coming for these parties. Like not 3 or 4 people at a time, but more like 10 or more. You would think that if they had parties that large that they would just close the place to all of us regular people for a few hours or tell us while we were waiting in line for more than 30 minutes.

On to plan B, finding somewhere for the girls to eat and a place to play before the show. Well after all of our searching in the rain, we ended up at Chick-fil-a. Which is not bad at all and the girls had some fun getting all the wiggles out before the show.

We got an awesome parking spot right under the freeway for FREE too! It was nice that the car could stay dry while we were in the show. We got the girls all bundled up and headed to the theater. I got our tickets from the Will Call Window and we went in. I guess it didn't take us so long to get there because we had to wait about 20 minutes before we could go in and get seated. Our seats were okay and over on the left side of the theater. The kids had a blast, but you know Steve and I we are always on the lookout for better seating. The Wood's lucked out with 3rd row seats and there were a few near them that no one was sitting in, so that's where we jumped for the second half of the show. It was so much fun to see it up close and I think that live theater is so much better close up. There is just something more magical about it!!

Our good deal ended up great with dinner being about $20 and the tickets were $3.50 plus gas for the van, but it was less than $50 for the whole night. The first seats that we had tickets were $27 each and down front they were $55!! So yeah we had an awesome night. Ruby even got a free treat. She is not afraid of picking up popcorn off of the floor where people have dropped it. Gross I know, but she just does it so fast from picking it up to the mouth there is no way to stop her. At least they were the whole thing and not stepped on right???

We got home at midnight and everyone was asleep very quickly after we put them into bed. I was glad that church starts at 11 the next day, so everyone could sleep in until around 9 and be happy! It really was a great night and it was so nice to go out with another family too!!! It's amazing what a little code of SPOTS will do for your family!

My First Estate Auction

I tried a new thing on Saturday night and it was so much fun! We have a local Auction house here in Jacksonville and they were having an auction on Saturday afternoon and night. I had gone in earlier in the week to see if they still had a quilt that I wanted to get and of course it was gone, but I did find out about the auction so it was all good.

I headed down the street at 3:15 to go get my number and see what else they had. See you have to go early and check out what you want. Look at it, tell yourself how much you want to pay, and just look at all the stuff they are going to be selling that night. I guess it is kinda like eBay, but only live and in person. I got my auction number "191" and I was set. I found a place to sit and it was cold! and another thing that I learned real quick is that this is a gray-haired thing to do. I have finally discovered what old people do with their time and money! They spend it on way old things that they remember when they were NEW!

The auction finally got started at 4 pm and people were off spending money. It was almost too fun to watch all of these older people spend money. They were bidding on jewelery, glass wear, hutches and more. The people sitting behind me dropped $850 for a hutch!!! Holy Cow. Guess you get to do that when you are older. Then a cute lady in front of me was so proud that she won a 3 stringed pearl bracelet with a pink stone for $10.50!! She even had her husband put it on her right away!

But I was there for the quilts, some preschool chairs, and a sleeper sofa. I had my one blank check but had no idea how much I could spend. It was probably better that way since I was too scarred to spend too much! The quilts finally came up for auction and it was my turn to finally use that card that was gathering dust in my lap. It was nice and very colorful but I didn't want to spend more than $10 on it and it went for $12.50. Oh well the next quilt was a guy type of quilt made with lots of darker colors and very warm. Remember it was very cold in the place so I needed something to keep me warm so I could keep bidding! Well turns out that it is fun to win something and I got my quilt for $22.50. The tag on it the person wanted $39.99, so I feel like I got a deal!

I kept warm until the dish set that would be so nice in the kitchen came up. It was 82 pieces of a nice stone set with a pretty cream and yellow, but it went for more than I was willing to pay. Making that check for too much is what I was worried about, so I didn't spend the $65 for the dishes that I really wanted. Hope that the other lady enjoys them.

Then I was able to get the auction guys to put up the little chairs that I wanted for the playroom. They are the super nice hard plastic seats with metal legs. The ones that you usually find in schools. I got a steal for 2 at only $10!!!

By this time of the evening the auction guys are asking for requests. That means that if you want to bid on something tell them and they will get it up for you. Well I wanted the sleeper sofa in the back! and I guess another lady did too. The auctioneer wanted to start it off at $100 and then the price started to drop because no one was bidding. I offered up a price of $30 to start and the lady quickly put it up to $35 and then I went to $40 and it was over! She was mad because she didn't want to pay more than $35 and the couch was mine for $40! A rather large sleeper sofa was mine for $40!

I have found a great place that sells decorator fabric for a very good price, so I am going to get some and try my hand at redoing the sleeper in the next month or so. It just needs a little love to look new again. The bed isn't all that great, but it is way better than sleeping on the floor for visitors!

That was it and I had to take my few purchases home and tell Steve that I spent a whole $86!! Not bad for a fun night at the auction! Steve, I think, felt a little sad that he was the one that got to stay home with the girls, but next time we are getting a sitter and are going to make it a date night. Of course we will have a limit and see what deals we can get. Who knows what treasures we will find for next time. Auctions are so much fun!!!

Snow Day Outing With the Girls

As many of you know, it snowed just a small dusting on Thursday so my kids were out of school on a Snow Day!!! It was almost funny but we took another day to sleep in and enjoy our time together. The only thing that wasn't fun was that Steve still had to work and had lots of appointments scheduled on Friday. That means one thing. I need to get the kids out of the house, so I don't have little girls wanting Daddy's attention at the most perfect moment.....when Steve is on the phone.

I did need to get to the campus bookstore so that I could buy my Lab Safety Kit for Chem lab that starts in 2 weeks and to visit with my chem professor to clarify a few things about our homework that is on-line. So I bundled up all of the girls and we set off for school. We even took a few pictures in our 'huge' amount of snow fall too!! We all walked the 3 blocks to where we can catch the bus around campus. Thank goodness it is FREE and WARM!

While we were waiting for the bus, we jumped around, did silly dances, and Hannah even tried her hand at licking the bus pole. I tried to tell her that it would get stuck b/c it was so cold outside and sure enough she tried it right after I told her not too. What happened??? She licked the pole and it didn't stick!!! Oh well so I was promptly told that it just wasn't true and I have no idea what I am talking about.

The bus ride was fun and it's just two short stops away, so it was long enough to get warm before we had to run into the Chem building. We get to the Chem offices and my professor was not there, but another professor was. I ask him my question about my homework and get ready to go. It takes all of less than 2 minutes to get my question answered and Katy already has herself stuck in a chair and can't get out! While I am undressing her to let her get out, Ruby and Hannah come to look in the professors office. It went like this.

Mom- getting Katy un-stuck from chair.
Professor: WOW! It doesn't look like you have any dull moments during the day!
Mom- That's very true and my husband works at home. It's a whole lot of fun.
Mom turns back to take care of Katy and does manage to get her unstuck.
Ruby (in a questioning voice) Mom, Why is his office so dirty??
**It's one of those can my kids please be quiet and I disappear when i twitch my nose moments!!**
before I can reply the Professor says to Ruby: Well, you see my Mom doesn't come to clean my office.
I am still feeling horrible and a little upset at my kids and then...Katy pipes in with
Mom it's messy in the office!

Thank goodness we finally got out of there without me turning every shade of red that I could! Kids know how to say it right???

We made our way to the bookstore for a treat and my Lab Kit. I get what I need and I too quickly thought that we were going to get out of there fast, but NO that is not possible. The girl rang in my $30 lab kit as $3000 instead! She then needed to go find someone to get it changed and that took forever. I am glad that the kids did have a treat and promptly ate it before I even had a chance to pay for it, but I was NOT paying for a $3000 lab kit!!!

The rest of our way home was great and uneventful! I was glad b/c I was still going over the whole 'your office is messy' thing. It sure is funny to laugh about now, but man can my kids be any more blunt????