Vacation 2010

Here's vacation in a quick outlined & pictures included version

Left on August 26th (Thursday) around 3 pm.... our route took us up thru Utica & then across to LA, Arkansas & Missouri. We drove straight thru the night, so no pictures to show...

27th travels took us thru Iowa & South Dakota....South Dakota...aka the Bad Lands...let me tell ya, it pretty much sucked! The stretch between Sioux Falls & Rapid City was for the birds!! There is a stretch of almost 400 miles of nothing .. literally nothing

but maybe a rest area and if you saw the little tee-pee, you best be stopping because that is the only form of civilization till the next little town that may be miles away... every now and then you saw a little "town art"or in this case some field art ...Looking from my side mirror back to where we just came...HOT...DRY...WINDY and let me tell you that 400 mile stretch had you...if you needed gas and were lucky enough to make it to one of the gas stations, you paid almost 40cents higher...hotel room in the one town was almost $90 for an Econo Lodge that wasn't nothing to it... but it's now 4pm on Friday and we've been traveling for 24+ hours and we gladly took the Econo lodge hotel room, found a over priced Dairy Queen in the little town of Walls and called it an evening. And for the first time in forever, I was asleep by 7 pm.

More to come tomorrow...and it's the good part of South Dakota!!!

Here's what has been going on around here....

Clay Walker Concert...w 3 amazing ladies....

And yes, he can still swing them hips!!! He put on an awesome concert

And somewhere up in the middle of my passings, Caden turned 1!!!

Mr. Kenneth Golman retired AGAIN...I informed him this was the only cake he was getting from me so if he comes back, someone else is making it!! I'm afraid this Herring Gas truck may end up causing me to have to create a few more cakes similar to this truck...but it's all good....every one I do is fun!!

The boys have been trying to stay cool with our redneck AC....A huge shop fan is good for staying cool on these 100+ degree days plus it keeps the skeeters away when you are outside working..

hAPPY BIRTHDAY Cheyenne!!

Baby girl (&only girl) turns 12 Wednesday. We had an early birthday party at the house for her this weekend...

Picutres of Caden's Bday party and The Clay Walker Concert to follow once I find my thumb drive!!

My latest creations...Star cake is for Mrs. Donna's Birthday

This is for baby Caden's bday..will post pictures of the birthday boy shortly

I'LL GIVE YOU THE BOOT!!

Birthday cake for my co-worker's son! Which matched his boot almost perfectly!!! I still need to work on my writing, but i can see progress.... and I'm enjoying this. I love seeing the look on the kids and parent's faces!!!

Stay tuned, I have a HUGE cake to do for next weekend (18 x 20 w 2 tiers) for some friends who have a family function... Which means practice all weekend!! Which I have nothing else to do anyways!!

ALLIGATOR CAKE!!!

I had so much fun (tired but fun) doing this cake for Colten.
He wasn't real sure about it at first...

Yes, I plan on doing a few cakes for other people. I have Cheyenne and Caden's birthdays a day apart to do cakes for. Cheyenne has found a Money cake she wants...it looks simple enough and Bridget is still deciding between a "1" cake or a topsy turvy cake pan for Caden's. Either way those will be easy I think compared to ole Gator here. I have agreed a kids fun kinda cake for a family reunion...any ideas... the gator may make another appearance...

I'm checking into a few more cake decorating classes hopefully to better myself at this. I think this is something I can see myself doing on the side

I need an E!!! Nathan's Fundraiser
Do you know how many E's are in Nathan Steele Fundraiser Hamburger plates. We sounded like the Wheel of Fortune group saying " I need an E" or Do you have a M?? But this was how the morning started out!! Bikes lining up for a 50 mile fun run... the fun was to make the ride and get back before the bottom fell out of the sky!

And they are off..... In the mean time, the kids...old and young were entertained by our favorite retired State trooper!! Buddy was a "trooper".. He rode the dunking booth for prob close to 2 hours total...Never once complained...but he did have his trash talking going on with the throwers....

Looks like someone hit the bulls eye!!!

The cooks....burgers were good!!

Cake walk got transfered inside due to the rain (as you see the water washing off our numbers)....Lil Bo was good enough to keep everyone on the right numbers!! And the lady in the red is Nathan's mawmaw...and my adopted one.... She was one lucky lady this day...she won 3 or 4 cakes...some got donated back to raise more money.

All in all we had a wonderful day and raised lots for Nathan. Please remember him & Rebecca in your prayers as he is still recovering from his surgery. He's had a few complications in the last few weeks and still has his chemo yet to face...

Happy Birthday Colten!

My blond hair blue eyed boy!!!

Super man?!?!?
My blond hair blue eyed little super man/ or maybe shall I say his Mamo's superman... he went thru this phase where he had to have his "cape" on the minute he got out of Bridget's van... But I think he's realized that cape is just hot now!!!

I'm a BAT!!! (now is that good or bad?!?!?)

ROAD TRIP....back a few months ago, it was decided that Mrs. Donna (my coworker) and I would be going to class to learn to give Breath Alcohol Test, which mean ROAD TRIP! Oh how exciting....but I so forgot how long it was to Knoxville especially driving....but it was nice to be out of the office for a bit. Donna and I left that Monday around 10:15 from Brookhaven and manged to get to Knoxville around 8:30 that night. With a brief stop at the hotel, we were off to locate our building where class would be. Little did we realize that we were in the middle of University of TN campus. Drove thru it that night not thinking about it, but geeze the next morning we realized something was going on when it took FOREVER to get out at the red light...Mind you I'm in a Herring Gas Vehicle, so I can't chance things like I would if I were in the Great Escape.

We had a long day of class. We were hoping to get out early and get back on the road, but that didn't happen. Class lasted till about 4:45. Which we are offically certified Breath Alcohol Technicians or BAT and something else to do with calibrating the machine. After class Donna and I both went back to our room and CRASHED... this studying and class work is hard stuff!!! About 6:30 we decided to get up and go find supper... We rode around the downtown district of Knoxville just to find alot of people and this... Don't ask me what this was in front of, I took it while sitting at a red light, didn't have time to look and see what it belonged too. We went to a little mall up the interstate. Figuring we'd find some restraunts and boy did we!!! If you ever get the chance, stop at Texas Roadhouse and order you a steak, baked potato (loaded of course), and a salad. This is my new favorite restraunt!! I could be the new spokes woman for them. Oh the rolls and cinnimon butter was delicious...Steak you could just about cut with your fork...seasoned just so right that I didn't even was steak sauce or ketchup with it...oh and the salad dressing is homemade and you could tell it....SWEET TEA was best I'd had in a long time... I'm putting this out as a big ole hint...I'll take any gift certificate to the Texas Roadhouse anyone wants to give me!!! LOL (infact, I found there is one in Baton Rouge and I have some friends who went and tried it out this weekend and said it was pretty good)....

AFter eating and stuffing ourself till we were miserable, back to the hotel to pack and get ready to roll out early the next morning...oh and this is what we saw when we opened our blindskinda makes you wonder what you'd get if you called right?!?! Next morning we were off early and took our time coming home. Stopped in Valley Head, AL and checked out the Miracle Pottery place (which it would be a miracle if I could afford that stuff).... then stopped in Ft. Payne and saw the Alabama Museum and Fan Club Shop. I was very disappointed in how this place has went down over the years. I remembered coming when I was little and being amazed by it...but the AC was out, the stuff in the cases were faded so bad and just wasn't taken well care of. But I guess those things happen over time. We finally made it back into good ole Franklin county around 7:00 that Wednesday night. We enjoyed our trip, even though it was a fast and tiring one....

Let's play catch up...
Cake class first.....

I do belive my Smurfette cake was my favorite...even though it took the whole class time to finish it!!!

I'm not sure what class was next, but my basket weave cake I just didn't finish....said I'd come home and finish it up...well that never happened...so here is what it looked like (sad wasn't it)
I have to practice, because I want to be able to do a clown like this one day

I wasn't able to attend my last night of cake decorating class becasue of a work trip, but hopefully I'll be able to take her next class....I really enjoyed this, all but for being sick every Monday night from eating too much icing :)

Cake Decorating class with Ms. Annie P!!!

Class #1 all we done was watched Mrs. Annie make this and classify us as the "Cake Divas"

My flowers & Mrs. Rhonda's practice boards.....

My 1st rose that looked decent...then I dropped the stupid thing and flattened the side of it!!!

Mrs. Beth's board....yes it's empty....good thing about cake decorating class was we got to eat our mistakes. Mrs. Beth said she had a mistake...LOVE it....mine looked like this a few times....

My final rose of the night!!! Wonder what next week brings....but I do know that this week, I must do some playing around and get some practice in!!!

i'm still here!!
Cake decorating class starts in 2 weeks...I'm sure I'll have some interesting pictures then..not much interesting has happened lately....will try to find something in the next few days to entertain you with!!!

That white stuff came down from the sky again this morning!! This makes me feel like we live further north than we actually do!!! Would be nice if we had a not so HOT and MUGGY summer but I doubt that really happens....