Tomatoes anyone?

This is a picture of a typical tomato harvest from our garden. This does not include the literal hundreds of red and yellow cherry tomatoes that we have. We have to harvest these little goodies every other day, sooo...you can imagine the poundage of tomato-y goodness at our house. We have always weighed our watermelons and occasionally our cherry tomatoes. I am now kicking myself for not weighing these each time that we pick them. I would love to have a grand total of how many pounds of tomatoes we grew this year. We have canned some, given away bags, frozen some, eaten some, and still....we have plenty. I am always on the look-out for new ways to cook or use them so please share any ideas that you have. I know we have had over 100 pounds, easily. Hmmm, factor in that vine ripened ones are around $1.50 a pound and cherry tomatoes are even more.....I think we got our money's worth with our 8 plants. =)

PS- We have 2 or 3 plants that are about 8 feet tall!!!

Costume Malfunction

Tonight was an interesting show for me. There is a number that we do called "Showtune"...the picture is from that number. We open the second half of our show with this number so I have about 30 or so minutes to kill between my last number and this one. During that time I like to sit in my car and listen to music, read, or check my twitter or email on my phone. The skirt is pretty fitted on the waist and has no give at all so sometimes I will undo the top hook so I can be more comfortable while relaxing in my car. Apparently I forgot to re-hook it. DOH!

The beginning of the number starts with Mara singing and then I join her up front for a few lines (See the picture above). During those lines I must have made a sudden enough movement that made the skirt unzip. I had no idea until Adam told me. We are constantly moving and changing formations throughout the number and there is one point where he is right next to me. He was closer than normal tonight and was trying to tell me something. I didn't understand him at first and was thinking, "What? I'm doing the right steps, right?" Then he leans over and tells me that my skirt is falling off! AHHHH. Needless to say, I was freaking out inside trying to figure out how to make it through the rest of the number. SO, I got to take smaller than normal steps while hitching up my skirt every once in a while. It's always interesting what goes through your mind at that point...."OK, I can grab it on this next move and then I'll be behind Jason for a second and I can grab it then. At the end while you are spinning forward to the middle...grab your skirt while you turn!OK...final pose...you're in the middle..ummm, hand on hip..." For those of you that perform, you so know what I mean, right?

My first Mini Tweet-up

(Left to Right: Adam, Tessa, Anthony, Emeline, Me)

Tonight was my first mini Tweet-up. Yay!

What is a tweet-up you maybe asking yourself? Tweet-up is a coined word combining meet-up and Twitter. Basically, it's meeting up with people you have met on Twitter.

Now, in theory, I met Anthony through a great podcast called Nobody's Listening. It's a clean and funny podcast that I love listening to when I get a chance. You can also follow Nobody's Listening on Twitter. There are a bunch of us who follow the podcast on Twitter, hence meeting Anthony.

Anthony and his now fiance', Tess, came out to Branson this week. He proposed to her at the Branson Landing and they have been spending the week out here on vacation. Tonight they came to our show and we finally got to meet.

There is a point in our show where the Brothers sing a love song, It's Something That We Do. Before the song begins Jason likes to find out which couple in the audience has been married the longest. Tonight is was 67 years! After he talked to that couple he congratulated Anthony and Tess on their engagement and then dedicated the song to those two couples. Awwwwww

SO glad that we got to meet. They are wonderful people and an adorable couple.

The Groundhog did it!!!

For the past 3 or so years we have planted melons in our garden. We plant them right next to a retaining wall in a nice long stretch of space. The area gets great sun... which the melons love. Normally we have the crows to contend with. They attack our watermelons and eat a few of them before we can get to them. The best way that we have found to deter them is using water scarecrows. These are motion sensored and spray a nice stream of water at them. Mwah ha ha.

This year we have another critter attacking our garden. However, he isn't attacking the watermelons...noooo....he's attacking the cantaloupes. We couldn't figure out what was eating all of the leaves and fruit. We literally had stems. We finally figured it out. We had a groundhog living in the retaining wall. Yep, IN the wall. The wall is made of bricks and he lived in the spaces. Each day he just went out there for a nibble and went back in his hole. We even caught him sunbathing on the bricks. Grrrrrrr

We borrowed a trap and lured him into it with apples and cabbage. SUCCESS!!! Adam released him a few miles away.

Now, you would think that was it, right? NOPE! A few weeks later we had ANOTHER groundhog. Apparently he was strolling by and saw the new cantaloupe growth that we were finally starting to get again. He decided that the wall was INDEED a mighty nice home and settled right in. This guy was more active though. He was constantly out, sunbathing on the wall. Adam pointed the scarecrows in his direction and caught him playing soldier with it. He saw them getting set off by his movement and he literally acted like he was in the trenches. He ducked under the watermelon leaves when he moved and popped his head up every once in a while. He kept doing that so that he could move along the wall. SO....we trapped him and released him too.

Wonder when we'll have another one move in....

A Teenager did this?

I thought that I would pass on this e-mail that I received. There were more photos but I am only allowed to post five pictures at a time so I chose my favorite five. He also painted "Thank you Veterans" on the side.

There is a huge rock near a gravel pit on Hwy.25 in rural Iowa. For generations, kids have painted slogans, names, and obscenities on this rock, changing its character many times. A few months back, the rock received its latest paint job, and since then it has been left completely undisturbed.

It's quite an impressive sight. Be sure to scroll down and check out the multiple photos. (all angles) of the rock.

I thought the flag was draped over the rock, but it's not. It's actually painted on the rock too.

Here's the artist:
Ray 'Bubba' Sorensen.

AWESOME Work, RAY ....
Thank you!

Turning 36...eek!

Once again I have fallen behind on my blog. Seriously though, are you really that surprised?
Time for a little backtracking.

My 36th b-day was on Saturday , July 11th. That particular day was great, though the rest of the weekend...not so much. The day started with Adam making me breakfast in bed....scrambled eggs with zucchini from our garden AND whole wheat pancakes. Yummmm. A plate was broken in the process but hey, the food was still great.


Later that day we got lunch at the Chateau on the Lake and some dessert. YUM on the chocolate mousse cake and chocolates!!!

One of my favorite gifts was from my brother's family. They sent me an Official Tour de France Souvenir Musette bag full of goodies. Being the Cycling Geek that I am I LOVED it! At first I couldn't figure out why I was getting a package from France. LOL
Of COURSE I had to attempt to put everything on all at once for a photo. =)


As for the rest of the weekend, I got sick the next night...BOO! Stomach flu again. Second time in three weeks. Argg. Not cool. At the moment I'm fighting off something again. This year has been the year for getting sick. There are 6 people in my family are/were sick over the past 4 days. Yikes! Hopefully everyone will get healthy soon so we can enjoy the rest of the summer!