Myrtle Beach

A couple in our ward invited us to go with them to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina this weekend to see the Dolly Parton Dixie Stampede. Not only were we intrigued, but once we saw that the online advertisement boasted a Christmas celebration involving a 4-course dinner, music and livestock, we had to go check it out. The Dixie Stampede is very similar to Medieval Times. There is a large arena and people sit around it at long dinner tables. Throughout the show, we were served a 4-course dinner consisting of soup, bread, Cornish game hen, a baked potato, ham, an apple turnover etc. The real kicker was that they didn't give us any utensils. I really didn't understand that part of it...I mean, if I were at Medieval Times, then maybe real knights didn't use silverware or maybe they weren't around at that time. But the Dixie Stampede....I guess they were trying to up the redneck factor...? I dunno.

The show was a series of horse races and horseback riding tricks. At one point, the performers reenacted the Nativity Scene and it was really nice. They even had camels there. Here are a few pictures.




We spent the night in Myrtle Beach hoping to be able to see the sights in the morning, but the weather was horrible on Saturday. In fact, it has rained almost the entire weekend. So after walking around the "Broadway" and stopping at Krispy Kreme for donuts and hot chocolate, we decided to head home.

Our Project

Anyone who knows Carol knows how much she loves to do things for other people. She arrived here on Saturday night and decided that Emma needed a chest of drawers for her room. She came up with a really cute idea to fix up an old dresser, paint it white and have Emma help paint flowers on it to match her room. We found an old dresser on Craig's List for $60. Here's what it looks like before.
We moved the dresser into our garage so we could sand it, prime it and paint it. Here are a couple great "during" shots.

Here's a picture of Emma carefully arranging the flower decals on her dresser.

Here's Emma posing with her new dresser in her room. I think she likes it.

Mmmmm...tryptophan

Andy's mom, Carol, came out for Thanksgiving this year. It's been so much fun to have her here. We had Thanksgiving early this year because Emma decided she wanted to come over on Wednesday and Friday so she could spend Thursday at her grandparent's house. It was a good thing that Carol was here because there was no way I would have been able to prepare dinner because I had to work all day. So I had everything set out and ready and Carol assembled several side dishes and the turkey. I need to mention that I bought a Jennie-o "Fool-Proof Turkey" and it did not disappoint. It was delish! So mad props to Jennie-o.

Here we are holding our pear place card holders just before we took Emma home. Emma really liked hers. I'm afraid that with how rushed our pre-Thanksgiving dinner was for me, the only thing I could contribute was a nicely set table.

It was nice to have a leisurely Thanksgiving Day that wasn't eaten up (tee hee) by spending a bunch of time in the kitchen. We were content to eat leftovers and I made a couple more side dishes to add to the feast as well. This year, I'm grateful that Carol was here, I'm grateful to work from home (it would have only made this Thanksgiving even more stressful if I didn't), I'm grateful for the changes in my life that have lead to rich opportunities for growth, and I'm very grateful to be married to Andy--a positive, gregarious, go getter who, it seems, lives to make me happy. I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving Day!!

This is what I train for....

Last week, I was in California. I worked from Vista for most of the week and had the opportunity to eat at some of my all-time favorite restaurants. My absolute favorite place in San Diego is calle "Extraordinary Desserts".
Of course, this place lives up to its name. Jessie and I went to the Little Italy location and had some delicious paninis (mine was a portabello mushroom, goat cheese, zucchini and pesto panini).

Then we each got a delicious dessert!! They were so good!!! I got a slice of a chocolate macadamia nut cake and Jessie got something chocolaty too. It was strange. At one point, Jessie looked around and noticed that there were a lot of women at the restaurant. Hmmm. How could that be?

I highly recommend this place if you're ever in the San Diego area. I wish they would open stores all over the place, but it's probably a good thing for my waistline that they haven't. Mmmmmmm.


I also ate lunch (twice) at In-n-Out. Always excellent. I'm a fan of their 'Animal Style' burgers. I also couldn't leave California without having a carne asada burrito for lunch one day at "Albertaco's". It's one of the many hole-in-the-wall Mexican places where the food is excellent and not too expensive. Good Mexican food is hard to find in Wilmington.

Like I said, I run about 2.5 miles a day and THIS is what I train for!!!!