Girls' Night out!

So, a while back I asked a certain little chickie out on a date.

She's my most favorite girl in the whole wide world.

And lucky for me, she said yes!

And yesterday was the special day.

(Yes, I realize it was a school night. We're kinda crazy like that sometimes.)

And she got all dolled up:

 And together, along with two cute boys, we enjoyed a nice dinner downtown.

But since it was supposed to be a girls' night, we ditched the boys.

But only after they paid for dinner ;)

And we went to the Orpheum to see this:

And right off the bat, we spent $15 on a set of Princess Fiona ears.

Ouch! She's an expensive date, this girl!

And we both wore them.

And we took some pictures.

OK, we took a bunch of pictures.

 

And then we headed upstairs to find our seats in the balcony.

And the anticipation of it all was killing us both!

And then we waited for the show to start.

And while we waited, she took over my camera and started shooting away.

Here's The Orpheum, as she sees it!

 

Beautiful, isn't it?

You all know how much I LOVE me some Broadway musicals.
Remember this post?
But in all honesty, even though Isabella has been to many
Disney-type productions in the past,
I was a bit concerned about how she would like a musical.
Being that it's a Broadway production, and all.

But I'm thrilled to report that we both thoroughly enjoyed it!

I love how they brought such a fun movie to life.

It followed the movie, yet it was quite different in many ways.

Does that make sense?

As always, they incorporated plenty of adult humor.

As well as plenty of farts and burps for the kids.

I mean, it is Shrek, after all.

I thought my favorite character would be Donkey,

since he's my favorite in the movie.

(source)
And even though he was very funny, 

unfortunately, he was no Eddie Murphy.

But in my humble opinion, Lord Farquaad stole the show.

 (source)

He was HILARIOUS!
I'm so glad they developed his character as much as they did.
He pretty much stole each and every scene he was in.

I'm so glad I was able to share such a nice evening with Isabella.
Next up... Beauty & the Beast in June.
Oh my goodness,... can you stand it?!?!

Girls Night Out ~ Pottery

This month our GNO entailed some painting, some eating, some drinking, and lots of talking and laughing. But then again, other than the painting part, I guess it's not much different than any of our other GNOs.

To change things up a bit, we decided to take our (rather large) group to Paint A Piece to paint some pottery. We had our own Dish, Dine, Paint and Wine party, where a teacher provided us with step-by-step directions on how to paint this oval polka dotted cross platter:

 

(Store Sample)

So we armed ourselves with their provided brushes and paints and our own wine and courage, and we tackled this platter like old pros. It was amazing to see how even though we all followed the exact same directions, everyone's looked a bit different and unique:

Personally, I decided I wasn't satisfied with the amount of dots the store's sample had, so I kept adding more and more dots to mine ~ brown dots all around the outline of the cross and white dots where the scallops meet. I also decided to add our last  name to my platter. And you know what,... it turned out really cute! So cute in fact, that many of the girls decided to go back and add more dots and their names to their own.

And so, without further ado, here's my creation:

Isn't it purty? I'm really happy with how it turned out. 

And even though there were some stressful moments (let's not forget my stress from Go Girl Art), I really enjoyed the entire process. We're even considering regrouping and going back in August to make this one:

Wanna come?

Girls Night Out ~ Dinner

Delectable dinner at J. Alexander's

Riveting conversation with friends

Delightful wine ~ Riesling 

Tonight was a good night!

Girls Night Out ~ Go Girl Art

I am truly blessed to have a group of really good girlfriends,... the best kind of girlfriends. The kind that are ALWAYS there for you. In good times and in bad. The kind that take really good care of you when you feel tired or sick or just plain overwhelmed. The kind that finish your sentences because more often than not you are so in sync. The kind that make you laugh to the point of tears. The kind that cry with you during the hard/sad times. The kind that you can be 100% yourself with knowing that you are loved and accepted and never judged. The kind that you feel totally at peace leaving your kids with because you know the type of Mommies they are.

These girls are those girlfriends to me:

Laura, Susan, Valerie, and Cora

We make it a point of getting together at least once every single month for a Girls Night. No husbands. No children. Just the girls. We usually take turns picking a restaurant and sit and eat and drink and talk for hours. Recently, Susan suggested we give a new concept called "Go Girl Paint" a try. Following is how it is described on their website:

Take a fun night out with friends, add a little wine…or a lot, throw in some music, paints and canvases and you just may end up with a masterpiece !! 2 ½ hours of step by step art instruction. You come with an open mind and an appetite. At the end of the evening, you have had a great time AND you go home with an original masterpiece that will be the envy of your friends! You may even get to know that inner artist that is in all of us!

We looked through the website and found a painting we all agreed on called Sunset at His House. So we signed up and had our first Go Girl Paint experience last night. Well, all of us except for Valerie who was home sick with a nasty stomach virus. We missed you, Girl!

Okay, so we brought in a pizza, some beverages, and some cupcakes and we were ready to go. Lisa, the artist and creator of this concept, provides all the supplies you need to make your masterpiece.

Now, there's something you must know about me. I consider myself to be a pretty crafty person. I can scrapbook. I can make invitations, cards, and other paper crafts. I can paint/spray paint the heck out of a piece of furniture. I can do some basic sewing. I can make some jewelry. I can even cross stitch. But the one thing I cannot do is paint. Placing me in front of a blank canvas, paint and some paint brushes will undoubtedly yield a very stressed out and anxious Liz. So having said this, yes I was a bit antsy about our painting party, but I was also very excited about doing it with the girls.

Lisa was phenomenal. She was super patient and helped us out tremendously. And by us I'm referring to the 25+ women who were in that room with us. I can honestly tell you we had a blast. We laughed at ourselves and at each other the entire time we were there.

We made so much fun of Laura and the fact that most of her painting was actually done by the instructor. We gave her the nickname Kielbasa, after she was repeatedly referring to herself as Picasso and ended up so tongue-twisted that what eventually came out was something along the lines of Kielbasa.

Laura concentrating on her painting. Pft! As if,... we all know Lisa did hers!

So as you can imagine, I'm about to post a picture of my creation, but let me first remind you that I am a BEGINNER and that, my dear friends, is the reason why my painting looks like a 5 year-old painted it.

Without further ado,.... here is my creation:

And a close-up:

Lisa said it's folk art so it's not supposed to be perfect. Personally, I think that's a great line to feed a bunch of women who have no idea what they're doing. But being that she said it, I think I might just use it going forward.

And finally, here we all are with our creations:

HA! Such a proud group of girls,..

So, is it the prettiest piece of art I have EVER seen? Nope, it sure isn't! But I conquered my fear of the blank canvas, paint and paint brushes and I made something with it all by myself. And the best part is that we had a great time together. So much so in fact, that we're looking into booking another Go Girl Paint session in the next few months. Now that should be interesting!

Lately I've been:

* Busy putting our Christmas tree up. I had to go through the unfortunate event of having to remove and re-strand some of the lights (which was an absolute nightmare, thank you very much!). When I was finally done my arms looked like I had gotten into a terrible scratching match with a cat ~ and the cat WON! But when it was all said and done it turned out beautiful. Amazing what a difference 300 additional lights can make.

I will forever remember the look on Sam's face when he first came downstairs and saw it finally decorated. It was priceless. It made the fact that I stayed up until close to 2:00am working on it totally worth it. Most of my Nativities are out on display, but I still have a little more sparkle to add before I officially call it a day on the Christmas decorating front.

* Hanging out with these amazing ladies:
Because of different pre-school schedules, Bible Study, dance lessons, etc, I'm not able to see them as often as I'd like. But now that Bible Study is over and school will soon be over, we've been able to do quite a bit of catching up,... and that's been so fun!

* Able to go see a few of the latest movies:
Oh yeah, baby! It's New Moon, the second movie in the Twilight saga! And it was AWESOME! So much better than Twilight (the first movie). And the good news is that they're not making me wait yet another year for Eclipse, the third movie and my favorite book in the series. Oh no, I'll get to enjoy that one in June of 2010. I like to think of it as Edward's birthday present to me.

Scott and I got to go see The Blind Side. It was such a wonderful movie. So very inspirational. Sandra Bullock was phenomenal. And I also loved the fact that it's based on a true story of a Memphis family.

On Sunday afternoon my dear friend Cora called me and invited me to hang out for a while, sans kids. Hmm, let me think about that,... YEAH! First we went to a local craft show and then went to a matinee showing of this:
All I can say is Oh. My. Goodness! In all honesty, Precious was a very difficult movie for me to sit through. The subject matter is extremely deep and disturbing and heart-breaking and it tugged at my heart (and stomach) in ways a movie hasn't done in a really long time. At one point I actually thought we might have to get up and leave, but we stuck with it and made it through. And we're really glad we did.

* Working on my paper strips for our cute Santa Advent Calendar, which will be displayed tomorrow. Yikes! Can you believe tomorrow is December already? I never did get the advent calendar I so loved from Pottery Barn, but that's OK. I found one I really like at Marshall's for a whole lot less. And at the end of the day well, they both do the same thing.

Some of our paper inserts/activities included in the calendar are:
~ Seeing Santa and giving him our list.
~ Going to Trinity Baptist Alpine Village (for the 5th year in a row).
~ Baking Christmas goodies.
~ Going to Starry Nights at Shelby Farms.
~ Watching a Christmas movie of their (read Isabella's) choice.
~ Reading the Christmas Story book before bed.
~ Make Gingerbread Houses.

Well, that's about it for now. Stay tuned for a sneak peek of the SNL class we'll be teaching this coming Saturday.

Like a kid in a candy shop

Tonight I'm going out with some girlfriends.

First, we're having dinner and drinks here:

Oh Spindini, how I love thee,...

Then we're going here:


To see:


Can I just tell you how excited I am?
I'm like a kid in a candy shop!