This Is How We Do It!

THIS IS HOW WE DO IT, this is how we do it. It's Friday night and I feel all right. The party's here on the west side....

This is also where you forget I just wrote that song in here, it's in my head and it's not that old.....only 16 years...no big deal. I'm sure some day my kids will read this and think how uncool I am, but I have a feeling by that time they are already going to have opinions on how uncool both mom and dad are. Oh well, deal with it kids!

Okay so back to the post, thanks for taking that little side rant with me. I just posted about Gini and Mike's weekend a couple days ago and that was the start of my 10 day vacation. On Monday I flew to IN with Chris for work, our good friends Ben and Amber said they could put us up for a couple nights, plus they just had their second baby, an adorable new little girl, named Amelia.

Look at all that hair!






Tuesday morning I went with Amber to the start of Amelia's film career. Amber was approached by her work who had just remodeled their OB floor to have her baby in the promotional commercial for the hospital. It was fun to see the behind the scenes of making a commercial, but also fun for me to see the newly remodeled OB floor since that's what I do for a living. What was weird though was seeing the commercials "Mom and Dad" in a hospital bed ooo-ing and ahh-ing over little Amelia as if she was theirs. Weird.

Here is the talent agent and future reality TV Hollywood hot mama on set!



The boys escorted me to dinner Tuesday night while Amber stayed home with the kids. They went to get dressed and both came back wearing company logo shirts, such dedication to their work. We had a wonderful Italian dinner at Matteo's where Matteo makes his own Limoncello dessert drink. It was great, but boy was it strong! One of those and I was ready for bed!



Wednesday we left to go home but not without a quick site visit for Chris. I stayed in the car and when his clients heard I was out there they came out to meet me. Chris had to head down to Beloit right after getting home, no rest for the wicked. I of course got to rest though, because I'm not wicked! ;)

Lastly, we ended the week golfing in the Annual Assumption Golf Outing. It was a great day filled with lots of laughs, dance moves and entertainment by our own famous pregnant rap star Sarah Casey! You have some sweet moves! It was also a great year for the golf, the Casey men took first place for the Men's A-Flight and us women took first place for the Women's Flight! The first time we've swept the outing. Other highlights, Bobby Ilk's prime rib, it's not worth ordering a prime rib at any other restaurant unless it tastes like Bob's! Amazing! Also, BBQ almost knocked in a hole-in-one, she was four inches short! We almost all pee'd our pants!

It was a great week! I could get use to this whole stay-at-home mom thing, Lola counts as a baby right!?!

The Men's A-Flight First Place Winners!



The Women's First Place Winners!

Meet Virginia!

Is she not just the most beautiful bride!?!

I had the pleasure of standing up in my high school bestie, Gini's wedding this past weekend. It was way too much fun. When the groom, Mike, said on Friday at the rehearsal dinner... "Tomorrow should be nothing short of epic!" ...you know it's going to be a great time!


Mrs. Gini Schulist and me!








The girls. Chris did such a great job snapping pictures throughout the day. Thanks Love!









My dapper husband! Doesn't he look great!? Love him!



Lastly, as promised, I'm so excited to finally be able to post these pictures of Gini's bridal hair piece. She had a little daisy thing going on for the wedding so I decided to play off of that and create a more sparkly version! It sparkled like crazy during her first dance. It made me smile :)

The Small Things

I will warn you now, this is pretty sad how happy this made me!

I have been working on a new hair piece for my high school bestie, Gini. Her wedding is in a few weeks and I just had the pleasure of attending her bridal shower and bachelorette party. Here are the pieces I made for us bridesmaids and of course the bride.





I got a little surprise when we went to pick Gini up for the party, she had a gift for me! As a thank you for making her hair piece she got me a new little something something for budding hobby! I have always had a little sewing kit for the tools I need and lately the material has been mudding that kit up. So Gin got me one of these....



Am I a nerd for loving this so much!?

Oh well, I don't care, it's definitely the small things in life that bring us joy. Thank you Gini for the new case! I can't wait to stand up with you on your big day, I love you!

Stay tuned in the next few weeks for the finished product of Gini's hair piece!

So Much for Summer

Where did June go?! This summer is has been crazy, crazy busy, crazy cold weather and crazy fast. Most of May Chris was on the road for work and work for me was through the roof busy, so as far as we were concerned May never existed. It looks like June is following right in suit with May. Chris has been home most of June which has been wonderful, I can't tell you how good of a feeling it is to come home from a long day of work and have Chris at the door to welcome me home, I love my husband!

My best night of the summer yet was after a long day at work I came home to dinner on the table, glass of wine already poured, music playing and all of the above was outside relaxing in our lounge chairs with my two favorites loves.

Other things keeping us busy so far this June, golf (<-duh), unfortunately both of us having colds...I'd like to thank Chris for mine and he would like to thank all the rainy golf outings for his. I've also been busy making another hair piece, this time for my high school bestie Gini. I had the pleasure this weekend of attending her bridal shower and bachelorette party. I had a blast...in the beginning...then my head cold got the best of me and by the end of the night my head was pounding and my nose would not stop running. I got to be the first to wish my wonderful father a Happy Father's Day at 12:30a when I called him to come pick me up so I could sleep in my own bed. I heart my Daddy! After shoveling my car out of a snow drift in Racine earlier this year and now driving down to Milwaukee at 12:30a in the morning to pick me up he's certainly pushing for the Father of the Year Award!

Here is a few pics of the lovely Gini and her girls at the shower...

Mother's Day in Chicago

Have I mentioned two of my sister-in-law's are pregnant right now! Ya, double the fun! They are due two days apart. With that said I had the fabulous opportunity to spoil my own mother and mother-to-be Miss Jacki down in Chicago for mother's day :) I ordered a new print for our living room and "to save on shipping" thought it would be fun to go down to Chicago to pick it up and my mom and sister came along with me, kicking and screaming and so mad they were going of course! We shopped quite literally until we dropped! By the time we got to dinner we didn't care where we went, we hardly said a word to each other, stared at our food and all nearly fell asleep at the table!

Our real treat though was lunch at The Purple Pig- Cheese, Swine & Wine. It was a real cool concept, almost tapa's style. You all order a bunch of smaller dishes and share among everyone. The real interesting part is that you can order all at once or order as you go. As the chef makes the dishes they get brought out to the table, so everything comes in shifts. You spend as little or as much time there as you want. It was a ton of fun. Here is a sampling of our tastings. The asparagus salad was AMAZING!


Salt Roasted Beets with Whipped Goat Cheese and Prosciutto Vinaigrette


Braised baby Artichokes, Fingerling Potatoes, Asiago and Salami Toscana


Asparagus and Hazelnuts with Arugula and Treviso


Prosciutto Bread Balls


Eggplant Caponata and Goat Cheese


Milk Braised Pork Shoulder and Mashed Potatoes

A Moment in History

Where were you when.....

For our parents generation it was "Where were you when President Kennedy was shot?" or "Where were you when Princess Diana died?" Now I could answer that question for my parents because they were at home and I was asleep in bed. I can remember my mom walking me up to tell me Princess Di was in a car crash and then a short while later coming to tell me she had passed away. I was pretty young then so I didn't know much of who Princess Diana was or why we should care, but I remember.

It was a busy weekend for history...

Friday, April 29th - 2011
Princess Diana's eldest son and second heir to the thong of England married his long time girlfriend, a commoner, Kate Middleton. I think the fact she was a commoner created such overwhelming hype about the wedding. It's just like the fairy tails you read to the children. I on the other hand could give a ripe if she's a commoner or not, I'm just obsessed with weddings and this was for sure a biggy! I ask Chris all the time if I can get married again, much to my dismay, he tells me I can not. Bummer! When I was looking for my own wedding dress I had visions of Princess Grace Kelly dancing in my head. Unfortunately there were not many dresses out there that gave that look and feeling. Then of course Kate Middleton steps out of her Rolls Royce and BAM...Grace Kelly. The jealousy consumed me! Oh well.....maybe when I marry my second husband ;)

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge - Prince William and Princess Catherine on their wedding day
Check out the similarities to Princess Grace's wedding dress....



So lastly....

Sunday, May 1st - 2011
Osama Bin Laden the mastermind behind the World Trade Centers attack was captured and killed by US Forces.

Where were we when the World Trade centers were attacked? I (Ashlee) was in my junior year of high school. I remember walking to physics class hearing a lot of buzz around the hallways. By the the time I got in class the teacher had the tv on and we are all watched in shock as the image below came up on the screen.



We were watching live as the second plane hit the second tower. The rest of the day was very somber and it seemed in every class the TV was on and that's all that was on the lesson plans that day, watch the news. I remember hearing reports that all major cities with prominent buildings should be on high alert and although I don't think Milwaukee was high enough on the list, it was enough to allow fear in our hearts.

Chris remembers living in his college home and getting ready for class that day. He passed through the living room and a friend told him their has been a plane crash in New York. He didn't think much of it until details started to unfold. He then remembers the fear everyone had that gas prices were going to rise over $12.00/gallon. Lines formed for blocks at every gas station. The raise in price never came, but the fear did.

President Bush declared a war on terrorism and no one will ever forget where they were and the hysteria the attacks caused. September 11th, 2001 the New York skyline was forever changed, a permanent reminder of the fear we had that day.




The man hunt and war on terrorism has continued now for 10 years. The capture and death of Osama Bin Laden has finally put to rest the soles of the over 3000 lost on 9/11 and of the many soldiers who went to war for this country to ensure that we are safe and never have to feel the fear we did that day.

Bin Laden's death is not the end of the story, but merely the end of a chapter.

Easter Weekend

Easter weekend was wonderful and much needed! Let me give you a run down of a few of my favorite things....Mama Mia's garlic bread, Cookie Dough Ice Cream, sleeping in, chick flick movies with Dad, grilling out, Brewer's games, sleeping in, shopping, shopping, shopping, fantastic museum exhibits, everything Frank Lloyd Wright, and plenty of family time. What's even better than all of the above....all of the above happening in one rock star weekend!



Yeah, it was a wonderful and much needed Easter weekend!