Snuggle up

Its going to be a long post.

First, a little video that Kate and I stumbled upon tonight. It's from August 23, 2008. Kate is 15 months old and Scott is home from his first "extended" Rush stay.

Yep, I cried. It was great to hear his voice though. He sounds so strong even though in my mind he was so weak already. I didn't realize then how bad things would get. I didn't think it was possible.
The silver lining though, Scott was still "Scott" right up until his last breaths. He laughed, loved, and played with Kate, his pride and joy.

**Pass the tissues**

Moving along.

I went nuts again today.

My time away being an adult is immeasurable.

Get it? Get it?

Sheesh... tough crowd.

Moving right along.
In our whirlwind trip to Iowa we celebrated the 4th birthday of cousin Talise and the 12th birthday of cousin Amity.

Two very beautiful, very smiley girls that are growing up WAY to fast.

These kids have a way of making me feel old, giving gray hairs and crows feet. But more importantly, they have a way of teaching us unconditional love.

Heart filling, life rewarding, LOVE. Like nothing else on earth.

But then they grow up and turn into this. My cousin Troy trying on Talise's Little Mermaid.

I have quite a few cross dressers in my family. Just look at my cousin Jeremy. You wouldn't know that he's home on leave from his third tour to the middle east.

Deanna (Troy's wife, Jeremy's sister) beat the living daylights out of Jeremy and stole his "princess" gear.

Yep, we're all a bunch of kids.

Or maybe it was just the group I was spending time with. Looks like this bunch was behaving nicely. Or maybe not.

We didn't go back to Iowa on Saturday because Kate and I had a very, VERY important date. My friend Stacy and I reconnected via Facebook (feel free to look me up, I LOVE Facebook friends). Turns out we're both a little nutty about cupcakes.

I have decided that this ^ might be my favorite breakfast of all time. My Starbucks and a Boston creme vanilla cupcake. Oh Heavens!

Stacy had an out of this world peanut butter cup cupcake.

And then there was Kate. She had the one appropriately called Princess right before she had one called Birthday Cake.

Yep, we had multiples while there and we both left with more.

How can you possibly say no to these?

You don't. You take home one of each and force your family to eat them with you so you don't feel like the gigantic pig that you are.

The place we went Keira's Cupcakes in McHenry, is about 25 minutes away and worth every second spent in the car.

And now the moment you've all been waiting for....

*Drum roll please*

Chrystal, you are the WINNER. Or if you're Charlie Sheen you're "WINNING". Send me an email at werewitty@gmail.com to collect your prize. I need to know where you live so I can decide to what your grand prize should be.
My first instinct is to provide you with a Starbucks gift card. I think everyone in the world should be as addicted to Starbucks as I am.

I am amazed that so many people knew the movie Multiplicity. Scott and Dad would forever be asking "Did you bring me a monkey Steve?". It was a staple every time they saw each other.
It eventually branched out and included the entire family and then it poured over to our Rush family. Missy (ready yesterdays comments) was part of it and Scott had me buy her a stuffed monkey named Bongo that presides over the 4th floor Occupational Therapy room at Rush. Everywhere he went, Scott brought the laughter and the love. Sharing it with everyone.

I hope you all made it through the post. Wednesday tomorrow. We're half way through the week kids.

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Quiz Time

We haven't had a contest here in a long time. I've got about 1.2million photos to process tonight so instead of my usual mindless driveling I'm going to post a picture with a caption. Your job is to tell me what movie the line is from. The first person to correctly answer the quiz will win a yet to be determined but wonderful contest prize.
To make this fair I will ban my immediate family from answering. This is a very famous quote in our family and I don't want it spoiled by my brothers.
Hear that Brothers, no spoiling.

So, here's the photo.


And the movie line that inspired the happy little monkey sitting on the dashboard of my parents mini-van...
"Did you bring me a monkey Steve?"

Ready, set, guess....
One guess per person. Don't make me get out my glasses, put my hair in a bun and give you the stern librarian look.

We're home. Kate was asleep about 5 seconds after she went to bed. And now, I'm going to one of my happy places... photo processing land.

Adios! Happy guessing.

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Sneak Peak - stream of consciousness

Jay'me invited Kate and I to go with to play with her 2 year old gelding Nefarious. Such a beautiful baby boy. Many more photos tomorrow.
Jay'me then went home and posted Wordless Wednesday on the other blog. My feet play a staring role. Go over there and make a guess so you can play guest photographer.

A long night spent celebrating my brother Matt's birthday. Mom and Dad returned from Tennessee in time for dinner, peach pie and a few presents. Miss Kate wrote Matt's name on the card as well as signing her own name inside. This is a first for her. The letters were even kind of recognizable. So proud of her.
Happy 34th birthday Matt.

You all know me too well. Scott12 was the first correct guess in the giveaway . S12 you are now the proud winner of a $20 gift card to Starbucks*. I can think of no better gift, well except a fisheye lens or a super telephoto lens or... well... $20 at Starbucks and maybe you can use their free wifi to find a new lens to lust after.
I highly recommend enjoying a pumpkin spice latte while they are still here for the season or if you're a real rebel the toffee mocha is out of this world.
I loved playing with a slow shutter speed and the zoom to take that photo. Here is my favorite of the group of photos I took that night.


Time to say goodnight. Kate is up crying again with leg cramps. Poor kid is growing like a weed and her little legs just can't take it.
******
I'm back. Had to give Kate more Advil. Junior miss has been up 5 of the last 6 nights multiple times with leg cramps and sore knees. Fellow parents, reassure me that this is typical. I keep waiting for her to wake up and be 6' tall.

*This giveaway is sponsored by me and only me. Starbucks corporate doesn't know me, they would however miss me. I'm ashamed to admit that my local Starbucks does indeed know me but they did not sponsor this contest. The prize and on-going Starbucks raves are my way of making other people addicted so that I feel better about myself. Thank you, 10-4, over and out*

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Hey Jude, it's a giveaway

St. Jude that is.

Chili's was having their annual St. Jude's benefit tonight. While this isn't enough to get me to brave taking Scott and Kate out by myself we had to be out anyways so we decided to participate in the charity event and have some dinner for a worthy cause.

This was our first dinner out just the three of us. We usually have my parents with us but they are still in Tennesse from attending my cousins wedding this weekend, so we had to go in it alone.

Things went just fine, as I knew they would.


We even played Sugar while we waited for our dinner.

In this episode of Sugar, Pinkie(Kate - Sweet n Low - socking I know) wanted to go to her friend Blue's (Scott - Equal) house but Dixie (me- pure sugar) wanted to go to the park to swing instead.
It's a great way to pass the time.

To make the evening a complete success, we made a stop at the bank on our way to dinner and a stop on the way home.
To find out where we stopped on the way home just tell me what this picture is of.


Not only will you be super cool for guessing but the first correct guess will win a secret, special prize. I can't tell you what the prize is yet... but trust me, it's GOOD!

Just leave your guess in the comments section.

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Contest Time - hints

What? Too hard of a contest?

A few hints -
I used profanity.
I'm mad at her.


I enlisted help.



New guesses can be posted here.

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Contest Time

It's been awhile kids. Time to bust out another WWW contest.

First person to accurately guess what's going on in this photo wins
drum roll,please...........

2 free movie passes to AMC Theaters

All you need to do is place your guess in the comments section of THIS post.

Ready, set, GO!


*hint-this is the WWW living room*

***********************
Legal mumbo-jumbo
AMC Theaters did not in any way, shape, or form, sponsor this contest. AMC only knows my love for butter in the middle of the popcorn tub. They do not know that while at Costco recently I picked up a packet of tickets. They wouldn't care if they did know.
And so ends the legal mumbo-jumbo.
10-4 over and out

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Contest Time

This contest is only good for those of us that are in the Chicagoland area. Sorry to all the out of state blog visitors. It's nothing personal, they'll be plenty more contests for everyone in the future.

Just answer one simple question - What's this?




This time I have an honest to goodness predetermined prize. The first person to correctly answer the above question will be awarded one $15 iTunes gift card. It's shiny, green and looks good in wallet. I have some excellent musical suggestions for the winner.... can you say Debbie Gibson?


Ready.... set..... GO!!

Disclaimer: This contest is not sponsored by iTunes. iTunes doesn't know I exist. iTunes would not know me in a dark alley or in the light of day. This prize is a direct result of a cleaning project in the home office that uncovered the extra gift cards I purchased for emergency Christmas presents. Thank you, thank you very much.

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