A FANTASTIC VISIT....

These are the adventures of
Sherry and Roxann


(isn't that the most AWESOME picture....it was a self-portrait!)


So...on Friday, we watched tv in bed all morning and then spent the afternoon in the pool. Due to the children being there....I did not bring the camera out to the pool. For the record, the water was freezing, but we very much enjoyed laying out by the pool!!!


On Saturday, Big Daddy was on kid duty and the Mommies went out with a LONG to-do list!!!!


First we hit the local scrapbook store so Sherry could check it out and so we could take advantage of a Buy 10, Get 5 FREE Sale on Bazzill cardstock! Awesome!!!

<----Here's Sherry matching color to the prints we bought at Archiver's.









So, I walk in and near the front door, what do I spot?!

MORE ...... Love, Elsie!!!!


Now, I know your thinking...hmmm, that's not surprising. Well, actually
IT IS!!!!!


You see.....if you remember, this is the lss that I unfairly was screwed over at regarding a job.

(no, I'm not bitter....really)

So, anyway, not long after I got to town and after I began trying to get a job at this lss....I inquired with the owner whether or not she was getting the entire Love, Elsie line. When I asked her...I was shocked by her response.
She said, "Who's Elsie??"

Excuse Me?!!!

Who's Elsie? Are you kidding me?

So, I kindly replied, "You've never heard of Elsie Flannigan?!" Her: nope. "Well, Elsie Flannigan is one of the most up-in-coming, hip, hot designer and scrapbook artists right now. You've never seen her book?" Her: what book? "Her book 52 Scrapbooking Challanges." Her: nope, never heard of it.


Me: seriously floored!!

How can she be a store owner and not know who Elsie Flannigan is?! (I think somewhere during this conversation she realized that I would be a good hire...that I know stuff and I could be useful to them.)

So, when I saw an entire rack of the Love, Elsie stuff....I started cracking up!!!! I knew that the only reason they had this was because of ME!!!!
(and I bought mine at Archiver's!!! Ha ha ha!!!!)


And she tells me they only got a partial order...just this one line. The rest is coming soon!!!!!
(probably because they didn't order until SUPER LATE.....after I told them about it!!!!

After we finished our shopping, we decided to get some lunch. We went to a new place called Red Robin.

<----It was cool! They had a tv IN the floor right inside the door, right below this:

------>
This should have been my first clue of what was to happen to me a later, after we finished our hamburgers!

These are the BIGGEST hamburgers I have ever seen at a restaurant. So, of course, we had to take a silly picture! (even w/ my big mouth....this thing was wayyyyy too big!)


And they even had this SUPER YUMMY sauce for the steak fries called Campfire Sauce. O my gosh, was it delish!!! (it's a bbq sauce and mayo mixture)


So, anyway, after we finished, we were sitting there and I was wondering where our cutie waiter was......and I look over and here they come! All I could say was, "Oh, crap!" But they were already on their way over!


So, they sang. They tied balloons on my head, like giant pink/yellow ears.

I was embarrassed.

But, I got a fudge sundae, so I was happy.

So, wanna guess where our adventures took us after lunch?!?


The CASINO!!!!! WOO HOO!!!!

Sherry and I both must have the "gambling" gene. It's really hard for me to stop, especially if I am having good luck! Sherry says that she loves the kids game where you put tokens in and try to knock the tokens off the shelf and win them. She says she'll blow thru tokens and be beggin' Doug to buy her more! She just can't stop.


So, we both agreed, we'd only go in with a set amount of money and NO MORE. We didn't take the ATM cards, credit cards or anything else. In advance, we had agreed on $30. Well, the cash we had, turned out to be $26.00 each...so that's what we took.

So, we head towards the door both of us excited!!!


So the security guards at the door? We got ID'd!!!!
Hilarious!!! I am going to be
38 in 2 days (3 days, then) and WE got ID'd!!!!


So we got inside and Sherry was in AWE! She had never seen anything like it!!! When we saw the cash machines, they had stickers that said... "Got a gambling problem? Need help? Call 1-800-gambler." We cracked up! (i know, i know....it's not funny! But, I seriously thought about programming it into my phone just in case!)


She couldn't believe that all the drinks were free. They have waitresses who bring you drinks or a soda fountain where you can get all you want! The only drawback at the casino...the cigarette smoke.


We decided to do slots first. Since I have some experience, Sherry wanted me to go first. We walked around until I found my FAVORITE slot machine called Haywire! It's such a blast!! And within about 20 minutes....I had gone from $26 to $54!!! Woo Hoo!


Unfortunately the Slot Machine wasn't quite as nice to Sherry. It continued to unfairly steal her money. Meanie machine!!!


We decided to take a break and walk around and check things out. Then...we found the ROULETTE WHEEL. Now, I have to tell you....I absolutely love the ROULETTE WHEEL!!! Sherry was intrigued, but a little apprehensive, so she wanted to watch me play. Well, I managed to win, win and WIN some more! Yea, ME!!! I played about 2 hours and ended up with about $180. But, I kept playing. (like an idiot!) But, I made a goal in my head that I wouldn't go below $100, so I walked away with that! (still pretty good...doubled my money two separate times!!!)

It was soooo fun!!!! (Even Sherry had fun enjoying my win!)

All in all, we had an excellent visit. I was so happy to have these days together...I have missed Sherry so much! I am so glad we have remained close! I hope I get to see her again real soon!!!! Thanks for coming, Sherry!!! I love ya!


(Ironically....we did not stamp AT ALL!!! And that's what we do!! We played with all the stuff we bought and I finished a page I was working on before Sherry got here!)

So....I picked Sherry up at the airport......

And I wanted to make sure she wasn't hungry....so I took her to one of the most fantastic Mexican restaurants I know of... Abuelo's Mexican Food Embassy. Sure, I know the name is "cheesy," and lucky for us....so is the food! Mmmmm, good!! We absolutely stuffed ourselves on the most divine Mexican eats and left completely satisfied!


This picture of us is in front of Abuelo's and the Kansas wind did not dissapoint....it is WINDY today. Wind gusts to 40-50 mph! Can you believe that?! Insanely wild winds! So....after we finished eating....we set out to find.....

(drumroll, please!)

Neither Sherry or I have ever been to an Archiver's before. It's only been something we both had wanted to do FOREVER! We were beside ourselves excited!!!!

<------- This is us in front of Archiver's! Aren't we cute?!

Let the SHOPPING begin!!!

--------->
Here is Sherry at the beginning of our MARATHON SHOPPING SPREE!!




Things were going great and we were plugging right along, when we spotted something that made us REALLY EXCITED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You guessed it!!!!

Love, Elsie!



(if you haven't seen it....it's fantastic! There are three lines and one of them is named ROXIE, so of course, it's FABULOUS!!!!!!!!!!! And yes, I bought the whole line!!!

So, get your butt to Savannah Scrapbooking and get it before it's all gone!!!!! Jamie expects it to arrive this weekend!!!!!)

For the record, I spent $157 and Sherry spent $125!


This has been a *fantastic* day!!! It's so great to see Sherry and it was great to hug her!!!!! I've missed her sooo much! I am happy to have her here!!!!


More adventures to come......so far our short list includes:

• lounging by the pool
• movies (we don't even know what's playing, that's how "out of it" we mommies are!)
• the local scrapbook store
• Kohl's
• Harrah's casino
• pedicures
• stamping
• scrapbooking
• drooling over our Archiver's conquests
• the mall

Look out Topeka....here we come!!!!

(Big Daddy is on kid duty all weekend!!!)

I'm back!!!!!

Well, I'm finally home. I ended up staying a day longer than originally planned.



We had a good trip.....it's a little longer drive than I'd like....but WAY BETTER than the 1050 miles it's been for the past 3 years! (it's a bit over 4 hours)



We had a blast. My brother and his family came down and met us at my dad/stepmom's house in Bixby. We took the kids to Build-A-Bear in honor of my niece's birthday. And we had lunch at Chili's, but those were the only places we went while we were there. We spent hours and hours and hours outside, watching the cousins play. It was so nice. And relaxing. In fact, on Thursday, the kids played outside from 9am till dark, only coming in to eat lunch and go to the restroom!!! They had so much fun! It's sad, because the older children are pre-teen, which means the days of moody are coming. This may be the last Summer they spend where they actually all enjoy playing together....



They played baseball, swang on the tree-swing, gave each other turns riding in the wagon, rode bikes, played in the playhouse, looked for bugs, played pirates, played "Swiss Family Robinson", played frisbee and even took a walk around the block w/ the parents after dinner. It was a picture perfect couple of Spring Days.



My bliss was ruined, for a few hours, by an unsettling phone call from one owner of the scrapbook store. I returned her call w/ my heart beating fast. She told me "the other woman's" story was completely different than mine and that she didn't know what to think. (I took this as they believe her over me.) She went on to say that they had never really had a conflict in the store and they didn't really want to deal with one now. And with that, they said that because this woman has worked for them for 7 years and she works 3 Saturdays a month and that's what they hired me for (Saturdays,) they didn't feel like it was going to work out. (I was stunned, I truly didn't think they'd decide to let me just walk away.)



I told her I was very dissapointed and I was having trouble hiding the fact I was on the verge of crying. I told her I had told the truth and I had no reason to lie or make up what had happened. She told me that they'd still like me to teach some classes if I wanted to and we could try that. (Again, I was hugely dissapointed. I could teach classes for them, but I think I might always feel like I was the "stepchild" or something like that. I don't want some "consolation prize" job. I know I might be being a baby, but I am really dissapointed how this all worked out.)



She told me to think about it.



I told them I knew I could rise above it and I assumed the other girl said she couldn't work with me. She says the other girl says she can work w/ me, but they are afraid it would just be conflict all the time between us. (So I guess she's gonna call me this week to see what I decide. What do YOU think I should do?? Am I being a baby? Tell me the truth, please.....)



I think what they said about the conflict is dumb. Are there people who really conflict all the time? I suppose it's possible if your personalities are completely just uncompatible, but really, can't most people get along with anyone. I know I can. Anyway, I just don't know if I can work for people who never fully stood up and said what happened to me was wrong. Because IT WAS. I don't care what the other girl told them, they should know that no one would make up a crazy story like that. And let's not forget, all of this happened to me when I was THEIR CUSTOMER!!



I guess my dissapointment stems from knowing this is the ONLY store in town. My only opportunity to do what I love and meet people who love scrapbooking, as well. Oh well, enough whining about that......



How was your week?????