Friday Night....After the sun went down...

Friday was our first full day here.
Everyone in the family was running in a million different directions, it was crazy fun, people coming and going all day!
I was doing my moms hair, my mom did my hair!!! Yes she was my colorist this day, and she def. did a darn good job too!!! I just needed to revive my red a little, and even though I have already cut my hair twice since the initial chopping off, and I have decided we are going shorter! Its just not right yet!!!!
Ok back to Chris and Karens wedding weekend, don't get too excited I am no where's near blogging about the bride and groom, they were busy today! They had bridesmaids luncheons, and rehearsal at church and rehearsal dinner today.
Billy and I went crazy looking for coffee today and to my surprise - AMERICA DOES NOT RUN ON DUNKIN! Dana might, but America NO! Why you ask??? Because the closest Dunkin Donuts to us is in Tennessee and Texas, so its not even possible that America runs on Dunkin because they don't even exist in all of America! Ok I am over it because we found a Starbucks! So then Billy took me tanning, because I, the tanorexic queen, was going through withdraw!!!
Ok sooooo anyway, after my little tanning session, Billy and I met up with my Nonna's brother, Uncle Larry, his wife Aunt Anne, and their son Joey. I guess its probably Joe, but its Joey because thats what my mom calls him and thats how I have always known him so thats that!
Anyway, Billy and I had the greatest time! We went to dinner at McGuires and it was sooo much fun. The place is wallpapered in $1 bills, and wait til you see the drink Uncle Larry got!!

This is a picture of Aunt Anne drinking Uncle Larry's Irish wake, we all tried it, and I had to laugh because I was afraid to take a sip and Uncle Larry said it tastes good like Rum and Coke, It did not taste like a rum and coke!!!!

Anyway, Billy got Senate Bean Soup for $.18, just had to share that because no where can you buy something for less then a quarter but you can at McGuires! He also got the biggest steak ever, and I even got to cook him steak and eggs for breakfast and I made him a potatoe pancake from his left over mashed potatoes! Goooo Meee!!!! Just like my Pop Pop used to do. Speaking of Pop Pop and the bean soup, the Senate Soup smelled just like Mom and Pops house when Pop Pop used to make his bean soup, I am convinced it really was the same soup!

I digress sooo much! Sorry!!!
Ok so back on track! It was tooo funny when we arrived at McGuires I realized my parents were across the street with the rest of the family at Zea, where the rehearsal dinner was being held. And I though Ohhhh Mann, my dad is going to be soooo jealous that I am here. So when we went in and sat with Uncle Larry and Aunt Anne and Joey, Uncle Larry suggested that I may know someone who would really like this place. He also suggested I give that guy a call as soon as the bag pipe player was swinging by us. (He was referring to my dad, just in case you weren't sure)!
I gave him a call. no answer, but thats was ok he was busy!
So I just text him and then I text him again, and I was just teasing him, and before you know he was calling me wondering how I could do this to him! LOL!
I told him it was Uncle Larry's fault!
Anyway my parents and my my Nonna had decided to join us after rehearsal, but my two Cosmos ruined my oppurtunity of coordinating that correctly!! Just ask my mom, she will tell you the phone conversation where I was no help at all, and actually I sat outside waved goodbye to Uncle Larry, Aunt Anne, and Joey as they pulled out of the parking lot and with the same wave I was waving hello to my mom and Nonna as they were walking up to us. My mom said where is Uncle Larry, and I said actually he was in that car that just pulled out.
So my poor dad who was parking the car never got to come in to McGuires that night because we all headed back to the hotel to have a little after party there!

Hello from Pensacola Beach, Florida!

Well, after the longest road trip in our history of road trips we finally have arrived to Pensacola Beach. My cousin Christopher is getting married here this weekend and we wouldn't miss it for the world, so here we are traveling 1300 miles, to celebrate the love of Chris and Karen!!!!
I just wanted to share some pics of our Hotel and the view we have is absolutely amazing!!!! We are staying in 3 bedroom condo at The Portofino, we are here with my parents cousins, Aunts, Uncles, and my Nonna.
I love family functions, and thats funny, the older I get the more I appreciate the time I get to spend with my family. So funny how when your a child you don't think about it at all, as a teenager you don't spend any time with family, and as an adult the time spent just goes too fast...

This is my Dad, Nonna, and Uncle Larry on the balcony Blowing in the wind!!! My nonna looks so cute with her hood up, I was cracking up, you should have seen her from the back!!
...Well here is the view rom our huge balcony that we r just loving to hang out on!







The sun is shining beautifully and the air is crisp and cool. We hear its snowing at home, so we are happy to be here on the beach.
This is us after finally getting a full nights sleep ater a 2 day jaunt across the downaward side of the country. We were having a great time in the car, we are soooo scatterbrained its not even funny, we tried playing games like Michelle and Todd do, but it was funny because we just skip around a lot, neither one of us concentrate on anything for a long period of time. Seriously we have Adult A.D.D., I know it!
Anyway we didn't take any pics on the way down, most of our trip was at night, most of our daylight travel was in Virginia and Tennessee and we didn't really see anything picture worthy! Anyway my sound advice to everyone is Please don't drive through Alabama at night!!!! It was the scariest state I have ever driven through!
When we got off the freeway to drive through and cross the Florida state line, all we could smell was smoke and it was like that for a long time, and a freaking Teradactal seriously swooped down out of the smokey sky and flew into our windshield, it was sooooo freaky!!!!
Anyway the deep south was strange and we were happy to cross into Florida and find some familliar things as we have in the hussle and bussle of home, because Georgia and Alabama, are desolate and boring!
I also want to warn Y'all I am coming home with a Southern Accent!!!! LOL!!!!

kymm and kevin were hitched and I am finally posting some pics!!!

Sooo Kymm and Kevin got married on October 18th, I know this took a while right!!! Well there has been so much going on in my life lately - pretty soon I hope to have some exciting news as I am hoping to be on a new avenue that has possibly opened for me - I will keep you updated I promise! However for now we can rewind to October 18th!
I was seriously the master of tasks this day and I have to admit I was pretty succssful!!! I was Hair dresser extraordinare, Reader at church, and then last minute deliverer and setter upper! Ha those were some words!!!
Billy had a job too he was the boys photographer and he took some great pics of the guys at the hotel and church and then he just continued throughout the day and made Kymm super happy!

Jeff and Kevin doing what they called the K-Mart pose, for what its worth I don't think any of us ever got pics taken at K-Mart so I am not sure what they are referring to but Ok because it was funny!
Do we know these guys? I mean seriously this is a great pic!!! Kevin, Uncle Mark, and Sean - the Russell boys all look smashing! Look at that smile on Seans face, have you ever seen that before? Nice job Billy - see he can be a happy guy! LOL!


...and here is the proof that this is Kevin Russell, It just wouldn't be a day about Kevin without some real tree accessories...Nice Kev, Real Nice!!!

Aunt Maureen and myself waiting at the front of church to be seated! This was the beginning of my nervousness!! I could not believe how shakey I was getting due to having to read - I think it was more about what I had to read then the fact that I was reading but my voice trembled the whole time - it was truley awful!! I am not sure if anyone even realized it but my reading deffinitely was not finished on my paper and I didn't even know it til I was up there reading it and realized - that was not a complete sentence...OMG!!!!! what do I do now??? I have no idea, and suddenly the priest chimed in and finished my reading - thank you God! He was probably thinking - who picked the blonde to read?

Look at Kymm on the altar - so Pretty - loved the church, and I loved the way the lighting came in through the windows, it was all so perfect!!!!




Love this picture of my Aunt Mary and Aunt Anne, they were having a blast!!!! The reception was soooo much fun! We arrived early to set some things up, Kymm is def a great party planner!! She had a a painting that would be their first painting in their new home and everyone had to pic a number fill in their name on a piece of paper and then color in that number on the painting it was really neat, wish I had a pic but I really don't!, andway then I had made her sign in book so it was really a lightly embellished scrap book and everyone got to sign the pages in pink silver or black, and all the pages were white black and grey - it was really cute. When it was all done it looked like a yearbook! It was all so nice! Anyway Billy was like how did you get all these jobs today? and he wasn't annoyed he was just like whoa, were you the little wedding person today, andyway I said "Hey, I know that we only got married 1 year ago, and I know you still have no idea what went into the planing, but I know what its like to be the girl getting ready to go to church and all of a sudden all these forgotten things start to coming to mind and then to have to look around and think who can help, and the you see Joanna, and say Hey Joanna can you please go to AC Moore and grab me a throw away bouquet - I don't have a bouquet to toss!!!! So I wanted to be Kymms Joanna, because I just knew she would need someone not in the wedding to help!

Me and Molly
Katie and Steph, the life of the party!!!!


Rebcca and Tim, the parents to be...

Me and Billy


Christine and Ian, Love Ians new shoes!!!

Ok so this is it for now - my next blog will from somewhere in Pennsacola Beach....we are leaving this week for Chris and Karens wedding - can't wait to shere!!!!

Happy Birthday to the cutest monkey I know!!!!

I remember when you were in your Mommy's Belly and you were in my wedding too, you just didn't even know it....

I remember when you were born you were just a little peanut...

and look how much you have grown...

... and today you are one years old and I can't wait to see you at your birthday party on Saturday!!

The Bus for change...

Ya know - 5 points in Levittown PA is a hotspot lately! Tonight while on my way to vote I saw the Obama/Biden bus for change. I snagged a pic from their website www.busforchange.com.
Anyway last night there were people who displayed a giant flag at the intersection rallying for McCain, well I guess the passerbyes from last night felt the intersection was one sided! Tonight they hauled in this bus, and the 5 corner points were evenly divided, but I have to tell you the corner with the bus looked like a great big party and it looked like fun too! I went back with my camera and the boss had moved on! - Why do I keep missing these photo ops at 5 points??
Anyway Its about midnight and Time Magazine online is saying its a done deal and Obama 08 is the 44th president of the United States - no one else is saying it yet, but I am wishing I lived on the West Coast so I could stay up a few more hours and really find out!!! I know their polls just closed so I know it will be just a little longer of a wait! Well good luck America, I can't wait to wake up tomorrow to find out the final results!!! I am hoping me and little miss Emmy got it right!!! (wink wink kiddo!!)

Some Halloween Previews!!!!

WELL, I would love to tell you all that I had a blast on Halloween, and it was so unforgettable, and actually it was but not in the infamous party and fun way I love to remember things. Are you catching what I am throwing here?
So I had to work all weekend and I was suppossed to go to Jeffs Party with Billy and Katie but sometimes a party in the middle of a 21 day marathon work schedule, just doesn't work out! Or I am feeling like and old married lady who would rather sit home after a hard days work, or I just can't get enough and I get carried away with other things, and I have to tell you I got carried away helping to create Olivia the Lion! Love it!!!
Doesn't she look so cute!!! Ok back to the tale of the evening!
Ok so I went home started getting ready for Jeffs party as you can see the crazy hair that I have - I actually fealt like the Amy Whinehouse version of a hardcore Phillies fan! Gave out candy to a few trick or treaters while I was getting ready! Billy came home and I went up to Livs House.
Her and her friends had the ultimate Halloween thing going on! I think I was a little jealous inside that I couldn't stay and play! Anyway they organized a Halloween Scavanger Hunt and it was really cool. I was doing her hair and they were reading me the challenges on their scavanger hunt list and seriously it was fun and creative and they weren't hurting anything or stealing or anything or doing anything nutty - they were taking pics to prove what they did on the list, and I have to say, it looked like a great time!!! They were dressed up according to their group themes, and Liv was a Lion, her friends were a tiger, a leopard, a zebra and I believe there was a lion tamer too!!
Kudos to them, I hope they all had a great time!!!



So after all that fun I returned home to find that I was absolutely too beat to party! Hey, at least I have an excuse to stop and take a minute every now and then and just enjoy an evening with my husband.
At least thats how I fealt til the fire engines started racing down my street at midnight. Seriously one after the other - 3 different Levittown Companies and then A Fairless Hills. I begged Billy -PLEASE I need to see whats going , I am taking a walk - PLEASE come with me!!! Billy loves to see my nosiness get carried away! But I really can't help it - I need to know - I need to see, I can't wait to find out and I can't wait to tell everyone! And once I know something is up I JUST CAN'T LET IT REST!!!! Ugh!!!!!!
So then he says get in the Jeep - your not walking anywhere - its too cold - I will just drive you!
YAYAYAYAYAYA!!!!! YAY!!!!!!! Billy caved in for the first time!!!!!! This was MAY-JA!
We grabbed the camera and after those fire trucks we went. Come to find out there was a house on "the one way street" - I grew up calling it that because my Aunt used to live down on that street and it was connected to my street so when I was a kid I either told my parents I would be down the street, or down the one way street - so they knew what street I was really on! Crazy HA?
Well by the time we got there it was smoldering to nothing and the atmosphere was very sad - we didn't take any pics because it just fealt really wierd - and disrespectful - there is video on youtube too, but I won't post it because it really is very sad. As far as I know no one was hurt and nothing was in the paper about it - but someones home was lost and that was a really sad thing. Being there made me and Billy both think that maybe something was left on at our house and just to be cautious we needed to go home and make sure all was really well on the homefront.
So today I was so excited because I didn't really get to see anyone on Halloween, so I didn't get pics of the normal kids you would see on my page! But Aunt Shell shared Hunters pics with me and I have to tell you I could eat this kid up! He is the cutest little monkey I ever saw!!!! I just had to share!!!



I mean SERIOUSLY I could eat his little cheeks!!! They are so cute!!! I love that he was a little monkey, it was perfect!!!!
Well Happy Halloween!!!