Dana Daily

This fun project is brought to you by one of my friends in Green Bay, WI. Well we're friends during football's off season, I should say. Anyway, she found this list on pinterest.com, I decided to participate, and then blog about each photo. I'm certainly not a photographer, but this should be fun and in some cases, challenging.

A concert, a duel, a snowball fight, ice cream (twice), bowling, softball, and a wedding, all in one short weekend. Sal invited me to the orchestra concert last Friday since he was playing as a guest musician. The kids make up the core of the orchestra and then a few guests round it out. We entered the school through the basement into the holding rooms under the stage where the kids were waiting until show time. It was complete chaos and just loud. The kids sure do love their Mr. Crano though, and one little girl hugged him fiercely as he pronounced him her best friend. Hmph. It’s no wonder my professions of undying love have little affect on him. He’s used to much younger and cuter women falling all over themselves to gain his attention. Anyway, the concert started with the first and second year student performing and ended with the high school students. My favorites were Viva La Vida and El Tango de Roxanne. We were invited to Pizza Hut afterwards, but Sal said he’d...

It's been 5 months now since Sal met the woman of his dreams and he's never been happier. That's her. Over there on the right. Every so often MSA publishes a "yearbook" of employees and this is the 2012 photo. Lovely, I know. Anyway, yes it's been 5 months and I can only speak for myself, but I have never been happier. Life is good.

We're taking a little step back in time with this blog entry since I'm about a week behind with it. Sal played in the orchestra for The Pirates of Penzance performed at the Jefferson County Christian School in Steubenville. Those kids were amazingly talented. I knew nothing about this show going in, but it was so much fun. I say that about most shows I see, huh? Anyway, because of the way the gym and the orchestra pit were set up, Sal was in my line of sight for most of the show. That was a treat because even though we couldn't watch the show together, we sort of did :-) Steubenville High School is planning a play for July and I cannot wait to find out what it is. I'm getting spoiled with all this theater lately. . .and I love it.

I mentioned in a previous post that Emily seemed to sail through the surgery and was well on her way to recovery within hours. It's now been over 2 weeks and she is doing great. The true test will be the next time she gets a cold - how quickly will she recover and / or whether or not she gets a sinus infection. Now that we're heading into summer hopefully it will be awhile before she comes in contact with any of those cold-causing germs. For everyone's sake, I'm glad she sailed through surgery and recovery. What a relief.

I submitted the final project for my class today and only have one course remaining. It doesn't start until June 27 so I have approximately 7 glorious weeks of freedom ahead of me. I'm sure the time will fly. If all goes according to plan, I'll receive my masters in August.

I really wanted to have professional pictures of the girls and I taken this year (number 22 on my birthday bucket list ). When my mom made the girls new dresses for summer, it was imperative we get pictures done soon. I mean how cute are they decked out in daisies? My coworker graciously allowed us to join him and his family for Easter pictures. A huge huge thank you to Bill Kreke for these images. We love them! Here are a few of my favorites:

My sister has hosted the family Easter shindig for the last 7 years or so. This year was no different. I packed Sarah and Emily up in the car and we headed south on I-79. We were the first to arrive and Sarah, Emily, and my nephew hit his playroom with tornadic force. They play together so well and William loves seeing "the cousins". The other guests arrived, my sister's in-laws, our parents, and Sal and his uncle. It was at that point Easter became a chaperoned affair. When everyone took their places at the table, Sal and I were not seated together. I was at one end of the table and he was at the other. . .with my parents. I knew he could handle it, but some part of me hoped he didn't feel as though I had thrown him to the wolves. At first I'll admit I was a little miffed about being separated, but then the more I thought about it, I really don't think anyone gave it any thought. I felt like we were straight out of a Jane Austen novel, and I'm ...



I opted to have the exterior of my car clear-coated and the interior treated with some kind of stain-proofing (I have a kid who gets car sick, do you blame me?), and finally got it in for service today. They gave me this wonderful loaner: It's a leather, fully-loaded Honda Odyssey. I'm just not the minivan type, whatever that means. I'll be glad to have my CR-V back tomorrow.

Emmy sailed through her adenoidectomy with flying colors. I hope her recovery continues to go well. Here she is before surgery, looking all cute: In a moment of mommy genius, I slid a book under the tissue paper on the exam table. I gave Emmy a pen from my purse and she traced the design from the cover onto the paper (which I kept to put in her baby book).  The surgery itself only took 13 minutes. She was moved to recovery and slept another 15 minutes (definitely shorter than most kids, but pretty much what I had expected). When I finally got to her room, a nurse was feeding her a red slushie. Now here's something you must know about Emmy - she loves slushies, popsicles, ice cream - anything cold. She asked for one popsicle after another and thought this was the bees knees when there seemed to be no end in sight. We were discharged from the hospital within two hours and had to stop at Giant Eagle to pick up her antibiotics. I think she was feeling at little wooz...

Steubenville High School's drama club performed "Cinderella" this past weekend, and of course Sal played in the orchestra. I went to the Saturday evening performance and also the Sunday matinee - front row seats for both. It was so much fun. Half the fun of going to these shows "alone" is seeing who I end up sitting with. There is no shortage of interesting people. My company on Saturday was an elderly woman who told me all about her late husband and what it was like growing up in Steubenville years ago. It was clear that while she manages to keep busy, she is very lonely. I loved her hot pink nails and zebra print handbag. She's just the kind of "old lady" I want to be someday. On Sunday, my row-mates were more interesting to observe than to talk to. The woman next to me was probably not much older than me, but tried to look years younger. She failed. With her were two girls who clearly attend Steubenville High School themselves. All three...

Sal and I were at Kroger's this morning, and as he lifted his box of Coke onto the self check-out register, the bottom split and cans rolled everywhere. A few sprung leaks when they hit the floor and sprayed every customer around us within a 10 foot radius. Happy April Fool's Day Krogers Customers. No one got it worse than he and I though, and I nearly died laughing. He was not so amused. Ahh, good times. good times.