Can you hear me now?

We are in the middle of a minor renovation of the downstairs portion of our home. We have torn out all of the beautimous teal green carpet that was there. Now we are replacing it with a laminate wood flooring. Being the oh-so-very-loyal Cingular or "The New AT&T" (or whatever the company is calling itself now) customers that we are, we couldn't help but notice that this project looks very much like a commercial we have seen recently. "More bars in more places!"

Momma Mia!

The highlight of our February was a visit from Joe's mom. It was such joy to spend time with her. She may be a senior citizen, but she was running circles around Joe and I. The three of us definitely never had a dull moment, we were always on the go.

Most of the things that we did were just little things, but memorable. The first weekend Ma was in town, she and I spent the whole day in the car driving around, getting our other car fixed and then taking a few beautiful scenic drives. There was our trip to Old Town Temecula which is a popular biker hangout on the weekends. She has lost a lot of weight lately and she was dressed in a Harley shirt from Joe's work that day. There was more than one biker who slowed down to take a second look at Ma. Ma was in town for Valentine's Day. Lucky Joe got to take out two beautiful women that night. At dinner, I gave him an Irish Wedding Bell. (Irish tradition says that every couple should receive a bell as a wedding gift. It is placed in a prominent place in the home. Any time there is a fight, one of the couple can ring the bell to end the fight and call a truce without having to admit blame or fault.) Joe took it out of the box and attempted to ring it. The packaging prevented it from ringing at first, but it only took a few shakes before it fell out. The bell began ringing, LOUDLY!!! The packed restaurant went silent as all eyes turned in our direction. Had Joe been aware of how loudly the bell had rung, he probably would have stood up and given a speech. Luckily for us, he seemed oblivious to what had just happened, and everyone else quickly went back to eating and chatting.

We did a few things that Ma loves to do. One of them was go to a car show. It may be a little known fact about her, but she LOVES a good car show and SoCal has plenty of them. And of course, everytime Ma comes to visit, we have to go to Chinatown and spend some time in Los Angeles. While we were there, we took her to eat one of her favorite foods, hot dogs, at the most famous hot dog joint in LA--Pinks.

But, by far the most memorable event during Ma's trip was the day she became a TV star. We had tickets for the finale of the TV show "Dance War: Bruno vs. Carrie Ann." Ma and I spent many hours the Saturday before looking for the perfect "TV outfits." I am glad it paid off for one of us. Ma had a good close up of her face on TV. Joe and I were sitting right next to her at the time, but were our faces there? NNNNOOOOOH! I guess we just have faces that were made for radio. ; ) At the time of this posting, you can still go to ABC's website and watch the show. We were on the "Week 7" episode. You will see Ma's face about 20 minutes into the show, right after the big opening number with Drew Lachey. Here is a picture of Joe and Ma outside the studio right after the show finished taping.

We love having Ma here and wish she could have stayed even longer. When she returned home to Massachusetts and the snow, she wished the same. = ) We hope that next time she comes she will stay much longer. In fact, we bought our house with her in mind. One of our bedrooms has already been dubbed "Ma's room." Even with Ma having her own room, we still have plenty of space for the rest of you to come and visit. We love having family and friends around. See the beauty you are missing?

This is a picture I took of the LA skyline at sunset during Ma's visit.

The Science Fair

As most of you know, I am an 8th grade science teacher. Being the "mean, awful" teacher I am, I made my honors science class enter the science fair, while I made the fair extra credit for all of my other classes. Our school science fair was during the last week of January and guess whose students won all of the awards for the 8th grade students? That's right, I am very proud of my students for sweeping the school science fair. I think every teacher needs a moment just like that to validate them as a teacher. It seems like you give and you give and you give, but you don't always receive gratitude or see the results of all your work. It is nice to have a great moment like that to know that you are doing something right. So well done my young Wells Warriors!!! Thanks for making your teacher proud.

Finally, the Butlers have come back to the blog

Okay, every time something has happened during the last month, we have said "Let's post that." We had all the best intentions of posting, but we all know what path good intentions pave. So please forgive us if we all of a sudden have a "blog diarrhea" and post several updates in a short period of time.

Happy Birthday Dan-Man!

I just want to say Happy Birthday Daniel!!! I know you are still on you mission and won't be able to see this for another month and a half, but you were being thought about on your birthday. I hope you enjoyed the last birthday of your mission. We can't wait to see you. You have served with honor and blessed the lives of many.

Our first Christmas in our new house

This last Christmas was a memorable one for a couple of reasons. First of all it was the first Christmas of many that we will spend in our new house! We have a chimney for Santa to come down, complete with stockings by the fireplace. We also had our first real Christmas tree. We have a really high ceiling in our living room, so our tree was at least 8' tall. We also continued one of our traditions of helping a family in need. That meant more to us than any of the presents under the tree. Another tradition is having a wonderful Christmas feast. Even though it was just the two of us this year, that did not stop us from baking all day long and stuffing our faces. Just look at the pictures and you'll see what I mean. We hope to be able to spend next Christmas with more of you.

Welcome to The Butler Times

Hello Friends and Family,
So many of you have invited us to view your blogs that we decided it was about time that we had one too. We caught the fever!!! Blogging has turned out to be a great way to keep in touch with all of you who are so many miles away. So, we hope you will all become regular readers of "The Butler Times." Don't miss the next edition!