Karolyn "Zuzu Bailey" Grimes

On Saturday, December 17th Dan took me to see It's a Wonderful Life and to meet Karolyn Grimes - who played little Zuzu Bailey in the holiday film. It was certainly a fun Christmas date!

When we first arrived at the Hollywood Palms Cimema we weren't sure what kind of a line to expect. However, we were quite surprised when we found ourselves to be the second couple in line and no Karolyn Grimes in sight. Then, as Dan made a quick run out to his car, he spotted a limo as it pulled up right behind his car. The lovely Karolyn Grimes stepped out and made her way into the theater.

We stood in the little line (that nearly doubled in size about 15 minutes later) and we watched Karolyn get set up and ready to meet her fans. Just before 2:00 p.m. she was all smiles and ready for her meet and greet to begin. By this point there were about 20 people in line to meet her.

Karolyn had a lot of various photo prints to choose from. We found a lovely image that featured a large group of cast members, so we purchased it for her to sign.

I'm a nerd, I know, but I was excited to tell her that my first name was the exact same as hers! She was so cute when I told her too. "You're kidding! With a K?" She went on to say that in all her life she has met very few Karolyn's with a K - I felt special.

Just before 3:00 p.m. we went into our theater to watch the movie. Karolyn came in and introduced the film. She shared some fun stories, a few fun facts, and even took a few questions from the very-packed theater. Here are some things that she shared...

1. Before filming It's a Wonderful Life, snow in Hollywood was made out of corn flakes, painted white. However, the loud crunch of the "snow" caused a lot of audio problems, so the creators of It's a Wonderful Life wanted some new "snow." So they created "snow" out of the foam that was used in fire extinguishers and ivory soap. So if you watch carefully, sometimes you'll see suds on the cars and dripping down lights, clothes, and buildings.

2. In the scene where George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart) guides tipsy Uncle Billy (Thomas Mitchell) towards his home, Uncle Billy stumbles off camera and you hear a loud bang and crash. Shortly after, Uncle Billy calls out, "I'm all right!" Well, it turns out, a crew member dropped a bunch of props and Thomas Mitchell was simply improving the scene. Instead of getting fired, like the crew member expected, he got a "big fat" $10 bonus!

3. Karolyn Grimes' favorite scene is when George Bailey is back on the bridge, praying, begging to live again... and just as he mentions "God" the snow starts to fall. Karolyn believes in faith, love, family, and miracles.

4. When George Bailey goes into Martini's for a drink, there is a young lady with a flower in her hair, sitting behind him, singing. Listen carefully! She was the original Snow White!

5. Jimmy Stewart's favorite scene from the movie was when George Bailey first prays to God in Martini's bar.

6. Jimmy Stewart was a war vet and it was placed in his movie contract that they couldn't use his military experience to promote the movie. Karolyn explains, he was a humble man and didn't want the special attention for his service.

7. Tommy Bailey (Jimmy Hwakins) burped a lot!

8. Karolyn Grimes grew up in California, so she was very excited about seeing "snow" on the set.

9. The film was made in 1946, Karolyn was six. "Save your fingers," Karolyn playfully instructed, "I'm 71."

10. Jimmy the Crow, is the same crow that flies into the scene where Dorothy meets the Scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz. Apparently Jimmy the Crow was a high-demand crow actor.

After the movie was over and we made our way to the exit, we noticed that Karolyn's meet and greet line had certainly grown in size. There were at least 50+ guests of all ages waiting in line to meet her and get her autograph.

It was a wonderful experience! Especially with Christmas right around the corner.

Neighborhood Christmas Party

I just realized that I never wrote about our neighborhood's annual Christmas party! Oops!

On Saturday, December 10th Dan and I have discovered that we have been blessed with some wonderful and festive neighbors! Every year the neighborhood asks 3-4 families to open up their home and be a host house for the Christmas party. Each host family is asked to provide a few h'orderves and desserts. For everyone else it is BYOB (bring your own beverage), however, each house still had a variety of drinks available. Including a creative and elaborate hot chocolate bar - an idea that I plan on using in the future. In the long run, each house had lots of food - including coconut shrimp, large spring rolls, and mini burgers, to name a few. Good thing we skipped dinner that evening. We traveled from house to house (as a group) and certainly got our fill of good food and good company.

Dan and I had a great time getting to know our neighbors during the festive Christmas party. About 30 people were in attendance. You had to be at least 18 to attend the party, but 30 was still a good majority of our neighborhood. There are a lot of new families in the neighborhood this year, so we weren't the only ones who were new to the party.

That evening we discovered that our neighbors...

1. Love to hug!
2. Enjoy a good party.
3. Look out for each other.
4. Are very friendly and easy to talk to.
5. Enjoy bargain shopping.

I think that Dan and I are really going to enjoy our little neighborhood. We are so blessed!

Unfortunately, while a lot of photos were taken that evening, none were taken by me. So here is a photo of our Christmas card wreath. It is really starting to fill up!

Exhausted...

Ever since the week of Thanksgiving I have been working more hours than usual at Williams-Sonoma - mostly closing hours. Don't get me wrong, before I go any further, I am very grateful for the hours and the extra income. Also, I enjoy working at Williams-Sonoma. I adore the folks that I work with and I've had some lovely chats with with friendly shoppers. I'm just getting to a point where I am physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted.

During the week I usually have about two days in which I work a full day at job numero uno, then travel to Williams-Sonoma to work another 4 or 5+ hours. Plus, I usually have a lengthy shift on Sunday. Once again, I would like to praise God for the hours and the income, but Lord, please give me the strength that I need in order to fully appreciate your blessings.

Thanksgiving Weekend 2011

I had been looking forward to Thanksgiving for some time! I was guaranteed three days in a row of no work! No obligations! Time to be with family, friends... and time to rest and relax!

Thursday, November 24th was Thanksgiving! Dan and I set an alarm so that we didn't sleep too late that morning. Casually, we got up and got ready for the day. After a light breakfast we gathered our desserts to take over to my parent's house. Dan baked a pumpkin pie and I made some pumpkin ice cream cookies (I made the ice cream and the cookies) and some pumpkin dessert squares (using pumpkin butter from Williams-Sonoma).

We arrived at my parent's house later that morning. Dad had the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade on TV and Mom had the turkey in the roaster. I love the sounds and smells of Thanksgiving!

Dad and Dan worked on some Christmas lights outside while my mom and I watched some specials on TV - and I did a little web surfing. That afternoon we were joined by Dan's parents as well as the rest of the Koval family (minus Kathleen and Brad, who were in Minnesota).

As dinner rapidly approached, things got super busy in the kitchen - just as expected. My dad took on the task of peeling all of the potatoes so that we could have mashed potatoes. He was quite the trooper and did a wonderful job! The Tamie brought some fresh fruit and other goodies for everyone to snack on. It was delightful! I love fruit!

After dinner (which was at 3:00 pm) we gathered for our usual sorting through the Black Friday ads tradition. We sipped coffee and enjoyed dessert and we went through ads and Skyped with Kathleen and Brad - it really felt like they were there! We even managed to take care of our Secret Santa drawing. The whole evening was a blast!

On Friday, November 25th we set an alarm so that we could do some light Black Friday shopping. No, we didn't get up in the middle of the night to begin our Christmas shopping. I think that we set our alarm for 8:00 am. Our main reason for shopping "early" was so Dan could get back at a reasonable hour to work on our outdoor Christmas lights.

We picked up some chairs for our kitchen island at JCPenny and replaced our broken wine decanter with a new one (on sale) at Williams-Sonoma. We also picked up a few sale items from Williams-Sonoma as well.

Later that day, Dan and I started decorating our house for it's first Christmas! While Dan was bringing up the Christmas decorations from the basement he managed to slip in a surprise gift for me - what a sweetheart! Dan had gotten me a new building for my Disney Christmas Village!

The weather wasn't too cold, so Dan spent most of the day hanging up Christmas lights. Me on the other hand, I desperately needed a nap! So I layed in bed and watched a few movies on Dan's laptop. When I woke up it was dark and time for me to start getting ready to go out.

That evening we went out to dinner with my dad's extended family at Hua Ting Restaurant - a new holiday tradition. As usual, the food was delicious and the company was wonderful. Certainly an evening well spent!

My Great Aunt Lorraine and Great Uncle Bill gave us a "little something" for our tree. We opened the gifts when we got home. Since there were two gifts, we each got to open one. Inside the lovely wrapping paper were two "first home" ornaments! A lovely addition for our Christmas tree!

That night, Dan and I finished putting together our island chairs and then put up our Christmas tree. We decorated it while watching The Original Christmas Classics DVD series. It was a beautiful way to end the evening.

Saturday, November 26th we finally slept in - for real! We didn't have any real plans for Saturday, so it was a perfect day for more decorating and relaxing.

Sunday, November 27th I lead the worship music at our church with Tim. That afternoon I went to work at Williams-Sonoma. Honestly, I love helping guests find Christmas presents for their loved ones. You can't go wrong with Williams-Sonoma!

We I got home from work Dan had successfully hidden the pickle ornament on our Christmas tree. This is a fun tradition that we take turns doing each year. This year it was my turn!

After I located the pickle, Dan brought me a little bonus gift for me to open. It was some new figures for my Disney Christmas Village! What a fun surprise!

All in all, Thanksgiving weekend was a wonderful holiday break. In fact, I woke up Monday, well-rested and ready for work!

Working in Sales

With Holiday shopping already underway (despite the fact that Thanksgiving hasn't even taken place yet), I thought that I would fill you in on some fun facts about working in retail. Through sharing these fun, random facts I hope that you'll show some significant consideration to those sales employees who are truly doing their best to be helpful.

I worked in clothing retail from 2005 - 2006 and I've worked in kitchen-ware retail since 2006. Here is what I have learned...

1. You have a LOT of mechanise to try and memorize. Not just style, type and price. Nope! There are lot of details that shoppers often ask. Questions like, "Where was this made?" "Is it safe in the dishwasher?" "What is the highest temperature I can heat this up to?" Please don't get frustrated if I don't have an exact answer for you right off the top of my head. Trust me, if it is really important for you to know, I will find out. I try to memorize a lot of details but just about every time I work I get asked a new question - the answer will then be memorized for future use, if needed.

2. Looking "in back" can be quite the challenge. There are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of items in the back. Sometimes it even requires climbing a very tall ladder to reach items. Once in a while items can be difficult to find because the space got rearranged when I wasn't there. While I'm looking, please stay where we last spoke. I'll find you that much faster - especially on a crowded day.

3. One thing that can be super fun, when working in retail, is when you've got yummy samples to hand out to shoppers. Who doesn't love a yummy treat - for free! Well, apparently some people don't. If you're offered a sample, please don't look at it with disgust and say, "Yuck! I don't think so. I hate yada-yada!" I know that not everyone likes chocolate or peppermint, but please don't make an issue out of it. This minor feeling of rejection can be a little hurtful. A simple, "No thank you," is perfectly okay.

4. Sometimes samples are a huge hit! That can be both good and bad. If you're in a store that appears to be out of samples on their little display and you notice that every employee is busy with another shopper, please do not go up to the register and call out, "Excuse me! I'd like a sample!" A cashier will likely reply with a gentle, "Yes, one of us will be with you when there is a free moment." Please remain patient and do not proceed to go behind the counter and help yourself.

5. On unexpected busy shopping days things can get a little overwhelming - especially if you are short-staffed. When lines get long, do not call out, "This is taking forever!" It doesn't help and it can be a little hurtful. The cashiers are trying their best to keep the line moving as quickly as possible.

6. Gift wrapping is sometimes offered as a free service. Be sure to ask if it is available the next time you shop this holiday season, but I will warn you, sometimes the wait can be very long. I've worked in retail where we hired folks just to do gift wrapping in the back. On an extra busy day the wait for free wrapping can get up to two hours! Please, don't get mad if the wait is too long for you. It is a free service. If you can't wait that long simply ask for the wrapping supplies yourself. The store will very likely pass them on to you.

7. The greeter at the front of the store is usually not allowed to leave the front of the store - especially on a busy day. If you need an employee to show you something at the back of the store, let the greeter know and he/she can use his/her walkie talkie to have another employee meet you elsewhere and assist you.

8. Another tip about the greeter... he/she is not your personal shopper. He/She is not there to greet you and begin following you around the store while you shop. Again, he/she must stay at the front of the store. If you need further assistance beyond the front of the store refer to the above statement (#7).

9. Smile and say "thank you" to all employees who assist you or ring you up at the register. It'll be a friendly mood booster for the employee!

10. If you ask for a good gift idea, don't reply with an aggressive, "No! Not that. Something else," after I make a suggestion. I don't know your mother/father/brother/sister/cousin personally, so after I ask a few quick questions to get to know them a little, I'll try and make an educated suggestion. An abrupt "No!" can be really discouraging.

I'm not going to defend the actions of all sales employees, but working in retail can be very stressful - especially around the holidays. So this holiday season, please try to remain patient and polite. If you're polite and the sales employee is rude, stay calm and politely locate a manager to share your findings. Use the above information to gain a little compassion for the busy bees of retail. A friendly shopper is greatly appreciated and, who knows, maybe an appreciative employee will have an extra sample with your name on it.

Weekend with Family in Minnesota

Friday, November 11th (11-11-11) was Veterans Day and I was blessed to have the day off from work. It had been a busy week for me, so I wasn't terribly surprised when I slept in until 10:30 a.m. Once I was up and awake I got right to work on a few projects - cleaning, editing and packing.

This weekend Dan and I were all set to join my parents for a weekend getaway in the twin cities to visit Kathleen and Brad. Unfortunately, Dan did not have the day off from work, but we were all set to go so that once he got home we would be ready to leave.

My parents arrived at our house at about 3:30 that Friday afternoon. Dan got home around 4:30 and we were in the car and on our way by about 4:50. Minnesota, here we come!

The drive wasn't bad. We hit some traffic on I-90, but once we got close to the state line traffic eased up and we were smooth sailing.

We stopped twice. Once for dinner (at Arby's) and once for gas. We got to our Double Tree hotel just before midnight. Kathleen and Brad were already there - sleeping. With some playful teasing, we woke them up once we got to our adjoined rooms. Naturally, we stayed up to visit before going straight to bed.

Saturday, November 12th we were all up by 8:30 a.m. and out the door just after 9:00 a.m. Our destination: The Mall of America! The mall was rather close to our hotel, so it was a nice, easy drive.

Once we arrived at the mall we had a nice, easy-going breakfast at McDonald's. Stores didn't open until 10:00, so we had some time to chill before we got our shop on. At about 10:00 a.m. we devised a minor shopping plan and went on our merry way. While casually riding the escalator down to the 2nd level, Kathleen pointed out, "Isn't that the McKenzies?" I caught a brief glimpse of our family friends and started to call out to them. They heard my calls and turned back to see us. We knew that they were in the area but we had no idea that they were at the Mall of America! Seriously, in such a huge mall, what are the odds that we could run into someone that we know - on accident! It was awesome!

We walked the mall, attempting to do some early Christmas shopping, and took a break for lunch at about 2:00 pm. We enjoyed a lovely lunch at Twin Cities Grill in the Mall of America. It was delicious!

Just after 5:00 pm we ventured to another nearby mall to stop at Pottery Barn and Pottery Barn Kids. We ventured back to the hotel at about 6:45 so that we could meet up with Lauren, Kathleen's former college and post-college roommate. Once Lauren arrived at our hotel we all got back on the road and made our way to The Old Spaghetti Factory for dinner.

The Old Spaghetti Factory was extremely packed and our wait was expected to be about 45 minutes to an hour. Fortunately, we were able to snag a table in the spacious bar area. While we waited for our group to be called we enjoyed some drinks and appetizers. We also watched as the newly engaged, Lauren, opened a gift from my parents. Below is a typical Lauren-style smile - she's a blast!

Once our name was called (about an hour later) we sat down for a delicious dinner filled with good food, good friends and lots of good laughs! Everyone got a kick out of Dad's spot at the table. We all agreed that he looked like The Godfather sitting at the head of the table with the light shinning down on him. Even our waiter suggested it when he took our group photo - and he made that call without any help from us. Super funny!

And here is a photo of the Godfather, himself - looking rather tough.

After dinner we went back to the hotel and said our good byes to Lauren. The rest of us stayed up a while longer looking at various photos that others had brought to share. At around midnight, we all made our way to our beds and called it a night.

On Sunday, November 13th we got up and got ready to leave the hotel. Brad snuck out to pick up some Starbucks coffee (for me, Kathleen, Mom and himself) and some orange juice for the non-coffee drinkers (Dan and Dad). What a great surprise!

Once we were all packed and ready to go, we made our way to Keys Cafe and Bakery. Breakfast at Keys is almost always on our schedule when visiting Minnesota. There was a pretty lengthy wait for a table but Dad and Brad made the most of our wait by stepping out to fill the cars with gas. They made it back with plenty of time to spare so they stepped into a nearby Ace Hardware with Dan. When our group was finally called we sat in a cozy booth and enjoyed a yummy breakfast!

After breakfast we went to Stillwater, Minnesota to do some light shopping in this beautiful, historic city - which is certainly not short on delightful antique shops. No one was hungry for lunch so we all just sorta skipped it.

We stayed much later than we originally planned, but we still managed to drag out our good byes by venturing up to the Stillwater scenic outlook before leaving. After taking in the view and a number of hugs, we parted ways and headed home in opposite directions.

The drive home was fine - Dad did all of the driving, just like the drive up. Dan and I both offered to take the wheel but Dad politely declined and drove all of us home safely. We stopped once in the Wisconsin Dells to eat dinner at Culver's and gas up our vehicle. During our drive home Dan and I even managed to catch a few Z's in the back seat.

We pulled into mine and Dan's driveway at about 10:15 p.m. After we got our items unloaded from my parent's car we said some more good byes and my parents went on to finish their remaining venture home.

Dan and I got ready for bed almost immediately. We laid in bed and watched two episodes of The Wonder Years on Netflix before we fell asleep.

The weekend came and went too fast - as usual. Thankfully, we'll be seeing Brad and Kathleen in about a month for Christmas! Can't wait!

Freshly Baked Carmel Apple Pie

Yesterday, Dan decided he wanted to (finally) make an apple pie. This is a plan he has had for quite a while and yesterday he felt the calling to bake. So, with the Bears game in full view from our kitchen, we worked on his apple pie. We used apples that we had personally picked while in Michigan and our apple pie recipe came from our dear friend (and fellow blogger), Jessica. On her blog we snagged her yummy Carmel Apple Pie recipe.

This was mainly Dan's special project, but I did help by slicing up the apples to his liking - he did the pealing.

We diced up more than enough apples, but that's okay, they made a great evening snack!

Here is Dan's Carmel Apple Pie before it was baked...

Here is Dan's Carmel Apple Pie fresh out of the oven...

Once the pie was all finished we enjoyed it ala mode with some vanilla ice cream. The pie was still warm and it was very delicious! A little time consuming but certainly worth the effort!

Oh, by the way, Bears beat the Eagles! Go Bears!

Easy Going Weekend

This weekend was a fun and relaxing weekend - so wonderful!

Friday, November 4th we had Thai with friends, Jeff and Jen, followed by Scrabble Fireside Spice wine (warmed) and my banana-flavored Sprinkles cupcakes at mine and Dan's house. It was a delightful evening.

Saturday, November 5th Dan went the Men's Breakfast at our church and then took my car to get the oil changed - how sweet! He found out that a belt needed to be replaced, so he bought the part and took to Jason's house so that he could install it. The kind gesture saved us mucho dollars, so Dan picked up a special treat for our friend, the handyman, to say thank you.

I woke up around 8:30 am and stayed in bed catching up on Grey's Anatomy and other shows/movies until Dan came home - which was about 1:00 pm. Not gonna lie... it was awesome staying in bed and doing "nothing" virtually all morning.

That afternoon we joined everyone and their mother at the mall. Did I miss something? Is tomorrow Christmas? Nope. Apparently nice weather in November means go to the mall in the Chicagoland area. Anyway, we are really in need of some curtains, so this free Saturday was a great opportunity to take care of this special project. We managed to get a few items scratched of our list, but some of those items are being mailed, so we'll have to wait a bit longer for some of our curtains to go up.

That evening I made yummy taco salads and we watched Silence of the Lambs on TV - there wasn't really anything else good on.

After Silence of the Lambs, we put in Iron Man. During the majority of the movie I organized my childhood cedar chest. I thought I was going to end up making room in the cedar chest once I was done, but in the end I still don't have much room inside. Oh well, at least it is organized and items are much easier to find!

Sunday, November 6th we enjoyed an extra hour of sleep before heading to church for worship practice - it was mine and Dan's turn to volunteer on A/V. Unfortunately, I didn't get to stay for the whole service since I had to go to work at Williams-Sonoma. Thankfully another A/V team member was able to step up and cover for me. Thanks Derek!

Work at Williams-Sonoma was very busy! The tech class had a lot of people in attendance and the phones just seem to be ringing off the hook! It was still a pretty good day. I got to have some delicious white meat turkey and pumpkin ice cream cookies that leftover from the tech class.

That afternoon Dan went to volleyball and I made an attempt to do some editing for my dad. However, some of the files were not working out (long story) so my dad came over so that we could recapture some footage as well as his remaining footage. We got done just after 10:00 pm.

Now its back to work! It'll be a four-day week for me. Thanks to our country's Veterans! Thank you, Veterans, for your service and dedication! God Bless!

Our First Halloween (In Our New House)

I got home from work just before 4:30 pm - and by then trick-or-treating was half over. No matter, Dan and I had a bunch of candy to hand out and I was ready to do so. Dan came home not too long after I did and I had yet to experience one trick-or-treater.

Dan noticed that a few houses had a similar "BOO" sign on their front door and we became worried that we missed some sort of neighborhood memo. Where the kids skipping our house because we didn't have the sign? Ding, Dong! I guess not. Dan went to the door and handed out candy to a little boy and his even littler sister - they were so cute!

Trick-or-Treating went until 6:00 pm, but of course we had a few steady trick-or-treaters well up to 6:30. We didn't mind. We still had a lot of candy to give away. Our last trick-or-treaters surprised us when our doorbell rang well after 7:00 pm - I'll admit that I jumped when the doorbell rang. Dan went to the door and still gave them candy.

The rest of the evening was spent watching the latest episode of House and then watching Scream - which we both didn't finish and fell asleep.

Our first Halloween in our new house was sweet and simple. Now it is time to remove what little Halloween decorations we have - only leaving up anything that looks "harvesty."