Here's my pick for this season's American Idol.

Yep, I'm stepping out and predicting the winner before the show even really begins. This is Lakisha Jones from Flint Michigan. I LOVE THIS GIRL. She's a bank teller with a little 4 year old girl. They both cried and cried when she made it to Hollywood. She really wants to change her life and the fire in her belly is obvious as she sings.

Lakisha, girl, you can SANG!

FOG ON THE BLOG!

I snapped some cool fog shots on the way to work this morning.
Here are the best of the best.

Duane Petition

I know you've probably all read on Rosie's blog - the dog and is crew (including my future husband Leland) may have to go back to Mexico to stand trial. Here's a petition to sign from Dog's site. Let's try to keep the Dog free! Andrew Luster was the scum of the earth and deserves to be behind bars!!!

Sign Here to Free the Dog (and Leland too)

spray paint art.wmv

You won't believe this. What an amazing artist! It's long but so worth it. Check it out. Thanks MOM for sending it to me!

Here's our view outside "Livie and Manda's" bedroom window





















Our neighbors across the street

Old Man Winter.......Welcome to Indiana!!!!!

Looking out our back door

A Giant Drift at our Front Door

A drift on the East side of our house

The drift on the West side of our house

Hey, it's Old Man Winter at my front door!!!!
Brrrrrrrrrrrr!

Last night was "game night" at our house. We had Kellie and Brian come over and we played games all night. We started with a rousing tournament of Connect 4, then moved to basketball (one of those little b-ball goals that hooks on a door) then played 5 card stud poker, then name that tune, we moved on to our slot machine from there. It was a really fun night!!!

Here's a picture of our slot machine. We bought it from my boss. It takes quarters or tokens (it came with a huge amount of tokens).

Stop by and drop some dough in our slot machine some time!

This pretty much says it all........

The colts praying in Miami after winning the SuperBowl!!!!

TONY DUNGY
AND THE COLTS!!

We're proud of you!

How cute is he?????

Thanks for making us proud Tony! If there's a coach who deserves it more, I can't think of who it would be. Tony is such a cool, good guy!

It sure is fun living in Indy right now. The city is totally buzzing with excitement! I was downtown first thing this morning (Monday) and it was almost like a ghost town. So many people took the day off work to hang out and celebrate. It was cool seeing all the people and buildings decked out in blue and white and all the Colts signs all over town. At night, most of the buildings around here have had blue lights shining on them.

Finally! They did it!

Way to go Colts!

IT'S GAME DAY!

GO BEARS!!!!!

DA BEARS!!!!!!

Rich's Shrine to His Beloved Bears!!!

Update on Ivan:

Found this in an Philadelphia newspaper

The Camden children who broke America's heart on network television with a view into their desperate poverty and their dreams of a better life are being showered with gifts from across the country.

On ABC's 20/20 Friday night special "Waiting on the World to Change," Diane Sawyer introduced eight endearing children struggling in what has been called America's poorest city.

Viewer response to the program has been overwhelming, said leaders of two organizations featured in the special.

"It's astounding. The phones have been ringing off the hook," said Shannon Oberg, development coordinator at Urban Promise Ministries, a faith-based educational campus in East Camden, where several of the children attend programs.

Urban Promise is acting as coordinator for donations for the Camden children.

One of the featured children, a 4-year-old homeless boy named Ivan Stevens, told Sawyer that he wanted to be Superman so he could help his family.

On Monday, stacks of Superman comics - along with Superman pajamas and Superman blankets - began to arrive at the Urban Promise complex.

A 13-year-old girl in Massachusetts sent Ivan a note, along with $200 of her bat mitzvah money. A woman in Texas, writing on an ABC Internet message board, offered to adopt him.

A man offered Ivan and his family a house, said the Rev. Tony Evans, spokesman for the city of Camden. Unfortunately, the house was in Knoxville, Tenn., the man wasn't going to pay to move Ivan to Tennessee, and Ivan and his family have no intention of leaving New Jersey.

Yesterday, producers from 20/20 remained in Camden, helping Ivan's mother, Precious, look for a house.

"They want to make sure it gets handled right," Oberg said. "I'm sure by Friday he'll have a house. In the meantime, all his needs are being met.

Ivan was basking in all the attention Saturday at church, said his pastor, the Rev. David King.
"He was singing 'Down by the Riverside' at the top of his lungs in church on Saturday," King said.

"They're going to get a home. I'm just praying that other good things come out of this, too."
Urban Promise has received 3,500 donations and gotten 20,000 hits on its Web site, urbanpromiseusa.org, since the program aired.

Trust funds have been set up for the children and area lawyers have donated services to create them, Oberg said.

The outpouring of charity doesn't appear to be limited to just the eight children spotlighted on the Sawyer special.

Urban Promise has asked people to consider pairing with some of the 700 other Camden children their program serves. Many have complied.

The city yesterday announced its own Camden Youth Enrichment Fund to take donations for needy Camden children.

Thousands of e-mails have been received at ABC, said Claire Weinraub, who produced the show.

"I've been really impressed at the number of kids across America who saw the program and see it as a call to action," Weinraub said. "I was really touched by it."

A teenage girl in Orlando, Fla., wrote that she planned to start a club at her high school to draw attention to poverty in Camden, Weinraub said.

A boy in Monroe, N.Y., said he wanted to do whatever it takes so that any kid in Camden could be "a regular kid like me."

Here's a video causing quite a stir in Indianapolis today. Most people are offended. I think it's hysterical!

Deputy's 'hostage' video unfunny to some

Ivan in Camden, New Jersey

Camden, New Jersey - or Murder City as it's known - was featured tonight on 20/20. They profiled children growing up in poverty right here in the US. They followed several kids, but this little guy really broke my heart. So innocent and has no choice in where he lives -- or more like, doesn't live. Most of the time Ivan, his mother and little brother have no where to live and go all day without eating.

I want him to come live with me. If that can't happen, I'm at least going to help out by sending money to him through his church - which they also showed on the show.

Warning - the video is only part of what they showed about Ivan and it'll break your heart, but there is hope because we can all do something to help the poor children in our own country and community. I'm done thinking about it - and crying over TV shows. I'm going to help change someone's life and I'm going to start with Ivan Stevens in Camden, New Jersey.

http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=2816480

Everyone knows I'm a girl of the 80's - and I love, love, love some big hair.

This is ridiculous (and disgusting)!

Uncle Jesse called, he wants his Michelle back!

Mary Kate, what were you thinking???

We did a bunch of cleaning around here and I found this old notebook that dates back before I met Rich. I was dating a guy who had a cute teenage daughter named Mimi. She was so sweet but had such a rough life with a mom who couldn't function without a man - even if that man (or men) beat her to a pulp. She lived in a tent one whole summer - she confessed to me one time. Her dad was an alcoholic (ah, the reason I dumped him) so he was no help.

Mimi had few good influences in her life and I sure tried to be one of them. I wrote this with her in mind after I broke it off with her dad.

Last I heard from Mimi, she was in nursing school, paid for by her Aunt and Uncle. I hope her life is happy now.

A Poem for Mimi

Walking through a world
of confusion and chaos
Along a path scattered
with broken promises and hearts
I found a rose about to bloom
It's fragile petals so soft
and easily damaged
It's beauty hiding a soul
needing tenderness and care.
I loved that rose and protected it
Cradling it with my hands and heart.
Then with all my love and work inside it
I released my hands.
Just as the rose began to bloom
and a tear fell from my eye
to nourish it.

What's with the continued half mast thing? I'm all for honoring our Presidents when they move on to the "other side" but enough is enough already.

Is there some "fly the flag half mast for a month" rule or what?

I'm over it.

More Vegas pics for Jenny

The Eiffel Tower at the Paris Hotel

The Eiffel Tower from the INSIDE of the hotel. They make it look like the feet of the tower are extending down into the structure of the hotel...in the middle of the casino

A kiosk in Paris - that's Kellie's mom Patti and step dad Bill standing to the right of the sign.

Walking along a Parisian street

These are for Jenny....some of my
unpublished pictures from VEGAS baby!!

Here's a float as it enters the casino riding a track on the ceiling


A giant face float

The boat float

Another float with a bunch of dancers

Here's a picture outside the Paris hotel

More from the Paris Hotel
(you won't believe how realistic the sky is INSIDE this hotel)

Don't forget Grammy's birthday is January 11th!

The perfect boiled egg.

How many times have you boiled eggs only to end up struggling to get the shell off? Don't you hate the tiresome battle, picking off little pieces of shell.

Struggle no more! I have found the way to make a perfect boiled egg. It works like magic.

First, start with cold water. Put your eggs in cold water, bring the water to a boil. When it starts to boild, time it. Between 8-12 minutes will do it (shorter for softer yokes). Immediately remove the egg and place it in a bowl of ice water. Let them sit there a minute or two (not tooooo long).


The egg shrinks away from the shell and it's so easy to remove - most of the time the shell splits in half and you can slip each end off.

It's revolutionized eggs in my house....and there's nothing better than boiled eggs cut up with plenty of butter and salt!

Yummo!

I don't think I'll ever get tired of watching this......

It's official!

Rosie got her drivers licenses!

Way to go Rosie!

First there was this bare little Christmas tree:

Then...KA BANG!

This year Rich made me pinky swear that he could decorate the front of the house for Christmas. Normally I do it. I try to create a neat and organized, nice little display. Not sure what Rich might do, I double pinky sweared him not to make our house look like the redneck house down the street where they have a 1/2 dozen blow up things in their yard. He loves it. I, on the other hand......well, next year it's my turn again. :)

Here's Rich's Christmas light tree. He used the trunk of our tree out front, somehow attached the lights to the tree and the ground. The star on the tree is just a wadded up glob of lights. It's artistic, yet hideous.




As you can see, he strung lights up over the bushes on the left side of the window and ignored the bushes on the right side of the window. What? They don't deserve lights?

To top it all off, the lights are on some kind of psychedelic, LSD, seizure - esque flashing rotation. He starts out slow and gradually builds to a frantic flash pace. If you stare too long, you just might go blind.

It's Christmas time at the Connell's!!

Now I've got to start wrapping all the presents..........

Sorta like Cirque du Soliel....This is incredible! And to make it more awesome, none of these performers can hear. They are totally deaf. Wow!