happy halloween!

happy halloween!  we are looking forward to doing trick-or-treating at our house after work tonight!  leko's already on the lookout for the trick-or-treaters!!!

happy halloween!

love, laurie

indoor waterpark

so glad we got a new kitchen sink this past summer for leko so that he can have his own indoor water park on a daily basis!  he's going to need to start contributing to the water bill in this house!

love, laurie

"it"

saturday was a super cold, dreary, rainy, and windy day all day.  since i actually didn't have anywhere to be for the first time in a long time, i stayed home to get caught up on a bunch of house chores.  it was a marathon. 

ryan got out of work at a decent hour which meant all three of us got a chance to sit down on the couch and relax together.  since halloween is this week, we decided to watch the it movie that came out last year.  we hadn't seen it before and it was free on demand.  i remember seeing parts of the original it on tv in the 90s, but i didn't remember much about it other than the clown in the sewers.

oh my goodness it was crazy scary and ridiculously violent!  we watched the whole thing but definitely didn't love it!  leko stayed on our laps the whole time (thank goodness) and kept his head buried in our laps because it was too scary for him too!  after the movie was over we had to neutralize by watching a calm episode of flip or flop before going to bed!

love, laurie

20/15

it's so hard to believe today marks one year since we had our lasik eye surgery!  we visited the eye doctor this week for our final post-op appointment and we were thrilled that everything was great with our eyes and that we're both reading better than 20/20 at 20/15!  here's to many more years of good sight!!!

love, laurie

cool kitten

it doesn't matter that it's absolutely freezing outside this week and feels like winter.  this guy still needs to cool off in the fridge.  ryan showed me these pictures that he snapped on his phone the other day and all i could do was shake my head.

love, laurie

bread, bread, bread, and juice

ryan worked a large food vendor expo recently and after the event was over the employees got to take home leftover food.  the majority of what was leftover was bread products in every fashion imaginable.  i couldn't believe my eyes when ryan walked in the door that night with boxes full of carbohydrates!  we put a bunch in the freezer and had a ton to share with our families too.  this will certainly last us a long time!  along with all of the bread, there was also some lettuce, juice, quinoa, and garbage bags.  random for sure, but much appreciated!

love, laurie

this guy . . .

this guy always keeps me smiling.  it's super chilly now, so he's extra cuddly.  apparently he's extra thirsty too because he has been stealing drinks out of my water glasses lately!

love, laurie

almost queen

on saturday night we had a queen tribute band called "almost queen" at the theater.  we've been planning this show for the past 7 months, so it was crazy to see it finally happening on stage in front of my eyes.  the band was great, we had a huge crowd, and everyone loved it. 

i'm glad i had my camera with me because i got some awesome shots of the show.  here are just a few of them, but you can see the entire album of my photos on the theatre's facebook page here.

onto the next show!
love, laurie

the things i do for my job . . .

yup, that's right, i'm standing on stage holding a show poster and a bag of swedish fish candies.

why?  good question.

tomorrow night we have a show called "almost queen" coming to our theatre.  everyone is beyond excited about it because short of going back in time in a time machine, they are the closest thing you can get to seeing the real queen.  

it turns out that "almost queen" is our local weather man's favorite band and he has gone all over following the band to see them play at different venues.  he reached out to me and asked if he could promote the show on this morning's forecast.  ummmm, yes please!

one of the antics that he does on his forecast every morning is have the local audience send in photos of themselves pointing and then he overlays the photos on top of the weather map to match it up with whatever weather system is coming into our area.  he asked me to be his "pointer girl" this morning holding an "almost queen" show poster and anything that was related to fish (because fish was the theme this week for his pointers).  i couldn't find a correlation between queen and fish, so we grabbed a bag of swedish fish candy since we sell that at our theatre's concession stand.  

thus, here is yours truly looking like a nut on television for tons and tons of people to see this morning on all 5 forecast broadcasts!  (and if you know me at all, you know i have all 5 broadcasts recorded on my dvr!)

listen, i don't want anyone to ever question my dedication to my job or what kind of crazy antic i will do in order to promote the theatre or to sell tickets!  i definitely deserve a raise for this, right?! ;-)

here is one of the five broadcasts . . .

have a great weekend (and come see my show!!!)

love, laurie

happy anniversary, mom and dad!

happy 38th anniversary to my parents today!

love, laurie

what a view

ryan carried leko up the steps in a football hold on monday night and i was behind them.  i could not stop laughing at the view of leko's two back feet dangling there under ryan's arm.  surprisingly he was pretty comfortable in that position and liked it there!

these two make me smile

love, laurie

wacky wavy

on sunday, ryan and i worked goodwill's annual fashion show at the theatre.  my parents were models in the fashion show (and i can't believe i never got a picture of them)!

when we were setting up, i did snap a picture on my phone of ryan posing with the "wacky wavy" after he got it set up outside.  here is a clip of the fashion show that aired on our local tv station on sunday night.

love, laurie 

a chance to dance!

on saturday afternoon i got the chance to join my mom at her dance class!  it has been 4 months since my dance recital when i last danced, and it has been nearly two years since i last danced with maria.  even though my dancing body was unbelievably out of shape, it was so nice to be able to dance with both my mom and maria again!  it was such a nice unexpected treat that really brightened my weekend up after a very crazy week at work!  i'm glad my mom snapped a picture on her phone of me with maria.

love, laurie

busy, busy, busy

it's been a busy week prepping for an annual fashion show which will be held at the theatre this sunday.  we've transformed our lobby into a pop-up shop filled with the best-of-the-best finds from the local goodwill stores and we've been on a "media tour" to promote the show.

we stopped by our local tv station on tuesday for a live broadcast (you can see the clip here) and then went to a local radio station on wednesday to tape an interview which will aired this morning (you can listen to the interview here)!

have a great weekend!

love, laurie

hey, thursday

we found this unique flower when we visited ritter's farm stand with our parents two weekends ago.  i'm not sure what type of flower it is, but i think it looks like coral under the ocean.

it's thursday and we're trucking through trying to survive this week.  it's been a nutty one.  i'm convinced the three-day columbus day weekend messed with everyone's heads.

here's to thursday!  i'm super looking forward to seeing my mama this morning for breakfast before work!  what a nice treat!

love, laurie

many "sits"

this guy has been loving the cooler fall weather and hasn't missed any opportunities to sit on my lap whenever i've sat down on the couch.  i am certainly not complaining!!!

love, laurie

on air

over the last three years, i have had the opportunity to go our our local tv station's "pa live" segment to promote upcoming shows (may 2018 / june 2017 / june 2016).  today i'm going back on the show to promote some of the fall shows at our theatre and the company that owns our theatre.  if you live in the area, be sure to tune in between 4pm and 5pm eastern standard time.  our portion should be on near the end of the hour.  i'll be sure to post a link to the segment once it goes online!

tomorrow morning i'll be continuing my local "media tour" (ha!) and going on the rock 107 radio station to record an interview about the same upcoming shows.  i'm not sure yet when that will air, but i'll be sure to share a link to that too when it's available!

love, laurie

a day off!

very much looking forward to a day off work today for columbus day and hopefully fitting in a few cuddles with this guy!

love, laurie

happy birthday, little blog!

tomorrow my blog turns 7 years old!  it's really hard to believe that it has been 7 years since i started this blog back in 2011 on a whim.  7 years later, i'm still grateful to have my little corner of the internet as a virtual scrapbook to chronicle the highlights of our lives.

happy birthday, little blog!

love, laurie

. . .

previous blogiversaries: year one, year two, year three, year four, year five, year six

a sunday trip to ritter's cider mill

on sunday, we made our annual pilgrimage to ritter's cider mill.  our parents joined us as we visited the animals, watched fresh cider being pressed, and picked out a few fall treats.  i always look forward to our tradition of visiting ritter's each fall.

love, laurie

. . .

previous trips to ritter's cider mill: 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2016, 2017