Tapping Chicks

Here are my tapping friends.....at our Christmas recital with Fredbird. These ladies make me smile and laugh every Monday night and for that I am so grateful.

Card club---Christmas style!

Card club was postponed due to weather, but Wednesday night was a blast. We chose these three cards and I loved them all-especially the Santa one. And I happen to have what I need to make more. A fun night with fun & creative people.

KC Marathon

I have never had aspirations (or the body type) to run a marathon. But I can say that watching someone you know & love run a marathon is wonderful. Karla, niece, ran a marathon in October in Kansas City. It was an early morning, but was incredible. She finished in 3 hours and 45 minutes...great time really. And she smiled the whole time. So proud to witness this feat and she's already training for one in April. You go girl!

60 years and counting

The whole family was together for a 60th Anniversary celebration for Paul's mom and dad. All of Paul's seven siblings were in town. That hasn't happened in a few years. We had a great time with mass and a special blessing; dinner and a little question & answer after. I made a scrapbook of photos and memories that family members had given me. Such a great night and what a thing to celebrate.

Baskets for my birthday

I was able to make some baskets with Joanne Kelly Catsos over my birthday weekend. LOVE the black ash baskets and the crisp clean lines. Reorganized my ash kits when I got home and hope to weave some on my own.

Happy anniversary!

Happy anniversary to the best parents.

Happy Fall to all

Darker earlier....cold and damp. Only good thing is sweater weather!

Wisconsin-Day Two

Milwaukee has this thing they do called "Open Door Milwaukee." It is where buildings that aren't normally open to the public open their doors for tours. There are tons of buildings open, more than you could do in the weekend. We started with Walthers, train distributors. If you look close in the layout, you can see the Star Wars addition....a true nerd at work.

Then we went to the US Bank building, tallest building in Milwaukee. There is a volleyball court just beneath the baseball field in the middle. That is where we left Chris in 2007 when he started college. Seems like forever ago.

Toured the Bradley Center...Chris with size 18 shoes from one of the players.

This was in the concert rooms where they had things from the artists that had played there. We saw Rod Stewart in 2012.

Before we went on the brewery tour (think more beer drinking, less touring!) we stopped for lunch at the Old German Beer Hall. Great brats and beer. No pictures from the brewery tour, but was really fun.

Wisconsin-Day one

First stop....WOOL!

National Train Museum in Green Bay: Big Boy Diesel engine

We were passengers in the cab and this was our conductor; a retired military man.

Green Bay trip not complete without a drive around Lambeau

Baseball: the Cards and Brewers in Miller park

the great sausage race

New Cards

Went to my first card club with a Stampin' Up demonstrator friend. The girls and I made these cool cards. These are from our monthly card swap for August. Shabby Chic/Vintage was the theme.

August wrap-up

Guess who is now (well, has been for a while) old enough for a fish bowl? three generations of Reininger men, and Paul's grandfather was worried about the family name being carried on Becky meeting her granddaughter Carley for the first time Grizzlies baseball game with my hubby When we visited Carley, I was still a pro at getting her settled. Even Paul had her napping. My annual nantucket basket, this one is a market basket.

Ophelia is dressed

My wonderful mom has finished Ophelia's dress, even with the lace. Ophelia was a class that was taken on a cruise in 2004 with Merry Cox. Monica and Carole were there and we had the most fun. We made small sewing pieces to go with Ophelia, some done, some not quite. We also papered the inside of her trunk and collected travel ephemera. Since the cruise went into San Francisco and Canada, tried to find things for each place. In 2008, we went to Williamsburg for Ophelia 2, where we made small quilts, a small wool rug, and a shaker box with accessories. She is already a well accessorized girl.....and hopefully I will finish the rest soon so that she is complete.

City Deer

On my way home from work one night, I came across these deer right next to the road. I turned around to take pictures....love the two small young ones. They are apparently used to the city life as they didn't run, even with traffic.

TNT

Thursday Night Trains (TNT) is a group that Paul has belonged to for many years. When the boys were younger, he really wasn't able to make many Thursday nights. But now he is able to go more frequently.They meet at different houses each Thursday night to work on that guy's train layout-tracks, engines, scenery, whatever they need. Love the batman car under the train table. Last night was our first TNT at our house. With brownies, nuts, and chips, they had a great time and Paul got lots of help.

Minneapolis: Mississippi, Twins, and Snoopy

A couple weeks ago, we were able to go to Minneapolis for Paul's company summer event. It was a Twins game with a social time before. We shopped (no tax on apparel and shoes!), worked on finding the best juicy lucy burger, and saw some fun sights-even trains. The first picture is by the Mississippi waterfalls....lots of biking and walking downtown.

Target Field....see that Budweiser deck in the middle.......

Here is a closer picture-because that's where we watched the game from-with all the food and drinks provided.

Paul loved Snoopy when he was little.....told me he was Snoopy for Halloween one year. Hope I can find a picture of that. Paul works for a wonderful and generous company. It was such a fun weekend.

They say it's your birthday

He, like wine, only gets better with age. Happy birthday to my honey.