Great Expectations

Last week I confronted my back flower beds. Holy yikes!! In the Fall I wasn't sure how far to chop down my plants so I decided to just wait until Spring. Well, the plants are much bigger now and they were completely hidden under colossal heaps of deadness.
So nasty. Miss Havisham's wedding cake could be hidden under there!!

I'm not even going to tell you how long it took me to trim and weed this much. The good news, however, is that there really are cute little Spring plants growing under all that mess. Hooray for Spring (and for my new electric hedge trimmer)!

Ulta-mate Bargain Shopper

I've wanted to try Bare Minerals and have been pricing starter kits. Across the board, the price for all the products in the left box (2 foundations, a warmth powder, a finishing powder, three brushes and a dvd) is $60. I found the best deal at ulta.com. http://www.ulta.com/store/bare-escentuals/getstarted.html
For my $60 I got the products in the left box, two free Bare Minerals gifts (vitamin moisturizer and lip gloss) and five free samples. Plus free shipping.

And, if you're lucky, they'll forget to include the five samples you chose, so you can email a complaint and receive six free samples instead! That way your $60 gets you everything in both boxes. Bargain!

Laptop Love

This black bag is my new laptop case. Cute, huh? Kev volunteered to pick me up a case while he was running errands and I told him, NO Thanks!! He looked kinda surprised until I informed him I wanted a nice, girly bag and not a generic-manly-backpack-lunchbox case. When I found the above little beauty I asked Kevin, Kenny, Amen and the male sales clerk if they would enjoy carrying this bag around. They each said they wouldn't be caught dead with such a girly purse case. That's how I knew it was the one!! Now it just needs some cute little dangly, blingy charms to clip onto the zipper and it will be perfect. It also has other compartments and little zippered pouches just like a real girl bag.

The bag of course is so I can easily transport my new laptop. Didn't realize how much I would really love it.

Which nail polish dries fastest?

Ashley made it to the second round of the science fair with her nail polish science exhibit. She chose this project based on her interest in acquiring five new bottles of nail polish and taking pictures of her nails. I think this just goes to show if you choose something you're truly interested in, the science part will just come to you. Ash really did a great job putting together her presentation and trying to understand the chemistry behind watching nail polish dry. Way to go, Ash!

Oops--Easter!

These are our brightly dyed eggs.
We celebrated Easter. I forgot to get pictures of the girls in dresses before church and afterward they tossed those dresses aside before I was even in the door. Nobody would dress back up for me, so I told them we'd reenact the Easter dress scene the following Sunday--but I forgot.

Kev is helping Grace with her long-awaited "snapping mermaid" doll. It took the Easter Bunny a couple of stores to find it and when the Easter Bunny's teenage helper noticed it was ten dollars more than anticipated, the Easter Bunny was forced to bump everybody else's basket up by another ten dollars. Now that's the true spirit of Easter for ya.

Ashley with her lovely body butter.

Grace with her Bratz mermaid--that swims in the tub and has interchangeable snap-on fashions.

Cute easter baskets. Guess which one is Kourt's :)

Viva Las Vegas!

Last week's girls trip to Vegas was great! Thanks to Cynthia for wanting to get out of town before she has her baby and to Sunny for putting the whole thing in motion. 13 of us went and it felt like the entire weekend flew by. It was great to see Dianne, who flew up from California to meet us. Phantom was amazing--although it felt like it played in fast-forward because they shortened it and played around with the plot a little.

The weather was perfect, as was the 45 min. or so I spent out by the pool taking a little nap :) Shopping was fun. I dragged everyone to Sephora twice and ended up buying nothing--sorry, girls. The outlets, however yielded two cute shirts, a pair of shorts, a new little wallet and a cute pair of ballet flats!

The crepes, pastries and $3 bottles of Diet Coke were totally worth it; the Bellagio water shows at 11:30 at night were so much fun, especially because Cynthia loves them. I got some great shots of the water and some cute ones of the girls all staring at it. It felt very Oceans 11.
I also learned a few things on this trip:

• Allow sleeping Connies their own space.
• You can never out-last two pregnant sisters in Vegas no matter how hard you try.
• Make sure the makeup lady who watched you smudge the lipgloss and the eyeshadow has actually left for the day before you walk back into Sephora again.
• Cheesecake Factory salads are a whopping bowl of lettuce--enough for at least four people.
• Never wear your comfy heels for a two mile stroll down the strip; you'll end up buying flip-flops.
• Next time, make it a four-day trip so you can vege by the pool with all your girlfriends for a relaxing day.