Oh hi September. Where did you come from? I seem to have skipped the August edition of Behind the Screen- August was a little crazy around these parts.
My kiddos don’t start school until after Labor Day so literally at the last minute we were invited to a family conference held at Universal Studios in Florida. I hadn’t even considered travelling to Florida in August but we got an excellent, excellent rate and had all sorts of fun activities planned plus super cool people to hang out with and well- we decided to just go!
It was so much fun despite the steamy, steamy Florida weather and for sure something we won’t forget! Travelling from CA to FL is no joke my friends and required a 4am wakeup and Mommy turning into crazy Mary Poppins lady trying to stay chipper and motivate everyone to go go go! Here we are with our new friends Sponge Bob and the other guys (lol- what are their names again?). My girls love Sponge Bob although my little one looks a bit surly here. We call her Grumpy Cat because morning is not her thing. (No idea where she gets that from… certainly not me.)
When we booked the trip to FL I decided we better hurry up and get going on the Harry Potter books. I found them to be magical and read every last one of them but I thought I’d wait just another year or so to start reading them with the kids. Well boom! A trip to Universal and the land of Harry Potter means dust off the books and get started. My 5 year old is moderately interested and then she wanders off to look at Barbie and Princess books. My 7 year old is obsessed! Right at bedtime she stands at the top of the stairs holding the book waiting for me to hurry up and read to her ;). She LOVED seeing all the Harry Potter stuff at Universal- it really made the books come alive for her and so far we have watched (2) of the movies.
Here we are escaping (just barely) from Gringott’s Bank on Hagrid’s motorcycle at Universal. Apparently the cameraman had a bit too much Butter Beer as the pics turned out a teensy blurry- (or maybe it was just the lightening speed of the little driver there.)
Before the trip it was my big girl’s 7th birthday and so I was up to my eyeballs in tissue paper flowers and pineapple stickers and we had a pool party with a Luau theme. So fun!
I did all the food in cute little sand buckets (just $.10 each on clearance!) and that worked out beautifully. They had sandwiches and fruit cups and Goldfish crackers inside.
And now it is September and the days are so full- both stinkers are in soccer so here is what after school looks like for us:
LOL- so much fun to watch these guys play soccer and seriously on Soccer Saturday when they have games I feel like I might need a Valium I get so excited :).
Both of the stinkers got parts in the local theater’s Nutcracker this year- yup there is one Bon Bon and one little Mouse. Can’t wait for December to see them on stage!
So here is what I am loving these days:
Have you seen The Hundred Foot Journey? I loved this movie! I actually couldn’t wait to read the book after and while I also liked the book- this might be the first time I have loved a movie more then the book.
So don’t miss this one if you have a chance to see it.
Any local readers? If you are in Roseville, Sacramento or Davis do yourself a favor and check out Krush Burger. Holy smokes it is so good! And don’t cheat yourself out of the Toffee Milkshake. Just amazing. Hopdoddy in Austin used to be my favorite burger place but I think Krush has taken over the grand award.
And that’s about it for now… the little stinkers are back in school now so I can actually get some work done again… Many, many projects behind the scenes. We had a little issue with the newsletter – fixed!- still working on getting bullet point headers for the newsletter. Working on some design work to make the blog a bit prettier as well as the gallery images for various categories of posts.
Dusting off some old posts and snazzing them up again. Oh and my big project has been getting all the accounting for our home and for the blog caught up. I HATE doing it so it tends to get pushed aside… and aside… and aside… and then suddenly there are piles of bank statements and such giving me dirty looks.
And how about you? Ready for fall?
Love, love, love me some Krush Burger! We got so lucky and had them out last year for our small time non-profit’s 1st Annual Car Show & Vendor Fair in Citrus Heights! They’re fantastic! And did you know … they just opened a brick and mortar at the Galleria!
I really do look forward to reading all your posts. Love how creative you are! I don’t know if I’m ready for fall…my youngest left for college and seeing your wonderful pictures of your children makes me miss mine so much! Enjoy every single hectic second with them…in a blink they r all grown up.
Sigh– Dodi I know it :(. Two in school full time now is taking some getting used to for me :). Blink of an eye is exactly right.
Tiffany– sadly we have been 3 times already :P. I say sadly because my rear end really doesn’t need the fries and Veggie Philly Burger but dang they are good! And I can’t resist the awesome Coke machine. I normally stay away from soda but the Diet Lime Coke calls my name 🙂
What a beautiful family! I enjoyed your post!
my family and i just got back from universal last weekend,what a fun time.that place is incredible.i wanted to ask you if you still have the recipe for the tomatoes and a special coating you mentioned