Wicked, We're Wicked

A few weekends back we went to see the highly acclaimed Broadway show Wicked!




I'd been wanting to see it for a while & even had toyed with the idea of driving to New Orleans to catch the production. Luckily it came to Houston & I snapped up some tickets.



What can I say that hasn't already been said about Wicked? We LOVED it. It's funny and entertaining, the music is modern and enjoyable, the characters and costumes are amazing.

Now I want to go back and re-watch the Wizard of Oz with Glenda being the not-so-good witch.

We went to an early Sunday afternoon show with our friends & then out for dinner and drinks after the show- it was a perfect way to end the weekend.

One of the few shots I actually took with my camera- I didn't want to take any during the actual performance.

All in all, I highly recommend seeing this show if you get a chance, even if you aren't typically into musicals.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Doing my civic duty today and reporting downtown for jury duty this morning.

Fundraiser

Back in May, H's office held a fundraiser for one of their clients who is based in Nashville & who had many employees lose everything in the flooding. They decided to make it a crawfish picnic with a raffle to raise money.



It was great that his boss was cool with most of the company spending Friday preparing for the big shindig. They had a giant tent delivered, dozens of table & chairs, many BBQ pits & boil pots, a DJ, tons of yard games.



It was sort of like a company picnic for many of the employees & I got to see some of his coworkers that I hadn't seen in a while.



Many of the boss men from corporate headquarters even showed up on a Friday afternoon to support the party.



The owner of the company even showed up and made a generous contribution to the fundraiser.



Mmmm, mmmm, mmmm!



His customer has an office located here & some of the employees came out to support their coworkers in Nashville. H's mom also works with the company & made it out for the fun.



In addition to the raffle, the other fundraiser was $5 Pie Throwing Contest, where hubby & the President of the company volunteered to take a pudding pie to the face to raise money.



Everybody in the office was excited for a chance to toss objects at these guys!



H got off easy at first, but ended up with a few direct hits.



This is where the trouble started...one of the employees wanted to skip the throwing part, so she did a drive-by pie in the face.



Boss man pays her back with a nice little hug to cover her in pudding too.



She retaliates by dumping a whole can of pudding on him! Unfortunately, he cut his hand pretty bad on the lid & most of the fun was over.



One of H's customer's got up-close dumping privileges and she was hysterical.



Soon after, a massive gigantic storm hit & we were all soaked. There were several inches of standing water in the yard, people were running around cleaning up & packing up. It was a giant, fun, wet mess.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Just found out that H won a mini-vacation from work. It's going to be in Houston, but we get to take a few days off & relax in August.

Smokin' At Home

A few weekend back, H finally got around to putting together his birthday present- a smoker! He wanted one of the big fancy, wood or coal burning smokers, but we decided to start him off with an electric one while he learned the art of grilling & then he can move onto mastering the fire portion of it ;)



We marinated the meat on Saturday & he woke up extra early on Sunday morning to put it on the smoker with some wood chips.



Early afternoon, we pulled it off & it was delicious! Don't mind that little bite missing from the corner- somebody had to have a taste test! We learned a few lessons and are eager to smoke more things- like some salmon and ribs.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Took the pups to the beach yesterday & had a blast!

Great American Ballpark

A few weekends back, hubby was headed to Ohio for another work trip & decided to swing through Cincinnati and check out the Great American Ballpark for a Reds Game.



Summer time- blue skies, freshly mowed fields, and lots of fans.



The stadium is pretty new & had some super-sizes graphics on the outside.



Somebody got some good seats along the first base line.



I think the all digital boards are cool- the ads, batter info, league games and everything are all electronic.



A red, red stadium- all the fans are decked out in red.



Guess they walked around to the other side. Snow cones on a hot day at the ballpark are a brilliant idea.



What's up with the baggy pants in baseball? When are the nice tight ones coming back?



The ballpark is right on the Ohio River and that is Kentucky right over there. Apparently there isn't much going on in downtown Cincinnati, so they went across the river to hang out in Kentucky for the evening.



The Roebling Suspension Bridge was under renovation & (hopefully) they are doing something to spruce up the walkway by the river.



H said it was HOT! At least in Houston, they with close the retractable roof when it's too hot. This misters were genius.



Looks like there is some new construction going on in downtown Cincinnati.



I love ball parks that are downtown and have a beautiful skyline in the background.



I'm sure this is somebody famous in Red's history, but I haven't a clue. It's a pretty neat sculpture none the less.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Got a spiffy new briefcase as my other one has seen too many airplanes & depositions in the last 8 years.

Turner Field in Atlanta

Hubby has been traveling more than usual for work & he was in Atlanta a few weeks back to meet with a client. They were able to go in the night before & catch a Braves game & he visited a new baseball field for him- Turner Field.



I was a bad wife and forgot to leave our newer P&S camera with him, so he dug our old one out of my desk & it had very little charge on it.



The stadium was originally built and used for the 1996 Summer Olympics before being converted to the Braves' home.



H had great seats & enjoyed a lovely game. One more stadium checked off the list!

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Same scenario tomorrow- he's getting to see Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati.

Pretty in Pink

Last weekend, I also got started on working on my office. This is what it looked like before I moved in all my junk & the dogs.



I still have a little futon daybed, aka the dog sleeper, and was really tired of the bleh brown walls.



Adding the shutters was a great first step & I love looking out the window all all the trees & birds & storms every day while I sit at my desk.



I am fully a 2 computer kinda gal now. I love my iMac dearly, but I still use my laptop for so many tasks- including sitting downstairs with hubby while watching TV.



I really, really struggled with what I wanted to do with my room- what colors and what type of feel. I loved my old office, but we've already got tons of blue in our bedroom. We've got green in our kitchen & yellow in our living room. Deep down, I still really loved pink!



I brought up a dozen color swatches from Home Depot with 50 colors & finally selected a pink that I thought was happy, soothing & not too loud.



I was up bright & early Saturday to start my big project.



I shoved all the furniture in the middle of the room & started painting. I quickly realized it was much louder than I'd anticipated & got a much lighter shade of pink for the 3 remaining walls.



H was outside working on the yard & cleaning the driveway.



I really like how the colors turned out & the pink makes me smile every time I walk in the room.



I really liked the couch diagonal, but it just took up to much room & the dogs were forever losing the pillows off the back of it.



I ordered new flooring & bought some smaller shelf racks from the Container Store. I'm going to add crown molding & a chair rail to add some spice to the room, then start hanging up all my stuff on the walls again.



This is from this past weekend and is my new favorite picture of my gang. The girls love it when H lays on the couch & they can snuggle with him.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: In town all this week & getting to much closer to getting caught up.