McDonald's Drive-Thru and a Drunk Man on a Horse

I just had to share this story with you all. I'm from this particular small town...a town so small that we got our first McDonald's after I moved to college. I will say that when I was living in good ole' Broken Bow these kinds of things never happened. It wasn't because the local folk didn't drink-and-ride back in the day...only because we didn't have a McDonald's then.

Here is the comical story found on newsok.com:

Woes mount after clash with Broken Bow police
AARON CRESPO AND MATT DINGER
Published: February 27, 2009

BROKEN BOW— A man displaying a different kind of horsepower was corralled by police after fleeing a McDonald’s drive-through Saturday night.

"He was drunk,” said McDonald’s employee Clay Toon said.

"I’ve never seen a person so drunk they couldn’t stay on the horse.”

John Cody Brantley, 32, of Broken Bow was charged Monday with assault, obstructing a police officer and public intoxication, officials said.

A Broken Bow police officer was unable to get the man off his horse and administer a field sobriety test, authorities said. When backup arrived, the rider and horse charged, coming within a foot of the officers, according to a sworn affidavit.

Police said they used pepper spray before he rode away. It took two other men on horseback to pull the rider from the horse, police said.

Officers sprayed him with pepper spray again and struck him with batons before the man ran into the woods, where he was arrested, according to police records.

Toon said one of the officers chased the horse on foot as it galloped away from the commotion.
Officers later found the suspect’s horse, which was not injured, police said.

Where are the Canadian Mounties when you need them?

You can't tell me that story didn't make your day!

xoxo,
Steph

I Don't Want to Eat Dinner, Every Dinner is Yucky, I Only Want a Popsicle

What can one do with a three-year-old who thinks dinner is yucky? How can dinner be yucky? Now, I will admit that some dinners are yucky, but dinner in general is not yucky. The dinners I cook are certainly not yucky. We don't feed him sardines or force him to take shots of pea soup. We've yet to make him eat raw onions or a giant slab of meat (which he opposes).

We pick out kid-friendly foods and often cater to his vegetarian ways, but still I'm at a loss. Every night is a battle. Every night I am "da bad guy" and am told "dinner is yucky and only for yucky people." I can't reason with that kind of logic. Instructions for dealing with the tantrums, that come with mere mention of the word dinner, did not come in his instruction manual. Is it possible there was a reprint and I wasn't notified?

I'm off to eat my dinner because I'm apparently of the 'yucky people' guild.

Cooking Night

Nick and I recently started 'Cooking Night' every Saturday. Our tradition was to go out for dinner as a family every Friday night, but his working hours changed not too long ago and we were finding ourselves missing the together time.

So, we decided to carve out some time for ourselves on the weekend and wanted to incorporate two things we love: good food and good beer. On Saturday nights we get Mason to bed and start our festivities. It's been fun hunting for not-so-common dishes and cooking them together. We turn off the TV and spend the quiet time catching up and talking about life.

We decided to document our nights on the blog and share our recipes (if they are good). Past dishes have included herb-stuffed salmon, fondue and surf & turf. Last night we tried our hand at Blackened Catfish, served on a bed of lemon-flavored rice with a side of herb-infused broccoli. The result was quite tasty!



Here is our recipe:

Blackened Catfish
Nonstick cooking spray
2 tablespoons yellow cornmeal
2 tablespoons paprika
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Coarse salt and ground pepper
4 (about 1/5 pounds) catfish fillets
Lemon wedges, for serving (optional)

Directions:
1. Heat broiler; coat the rack of a broiler pan with cooking spray. In a shallow bowl, stir together cornmeal, paprika, thyme, cayenne, 1tablespoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon ground pepper.
2. Dredge fillets in cornmeal mixture, turning to coat. Shake off excess, and place on prepared rack: broil until opaque throughout and blackened on the outside, 10 to 12 minutes. Serve immediately, with lemon wedges, if desired.

**We ended up cooking ours a little longer than suggested because we had a few thick pieces.



In other (and not at all related) news I sewed myself a passport cover and iPhone case today!


xoxo,
Steph

You're Invited!

Hello everyone!!

I'm proud to announce the official opening of Steph's Design Factory!! The store features makeup bags, cloth napkins, coasters and trivets. I hope to add more to my list as time goes on. These items are fun, contemporary, inexpensive and also make great gifts!!!

To see what I have stocked click the link below:
Steph's Design Factory

Thanks for stopping by and feel free to forward the address to anyone you think might be interested. Make sure to bookmark the link and check back often!

If you missed the story behind my diaper store closing look here.

xoxo,

Steph

Happy V-Day!

Mase has his Valentine party at school today and we're happy to announce that there were no tears! :) Much of an improvement over the Thanksgiving and Christmas parties of '08.

Here are the treats he took for his friends.


Mase with his favorite mama.

Enjoying a treat.

Uh oh. Ice cream? Much like his father, Mase is a slave to ice cream. The minute he saw the little tub of goodness it was over for the rest of the treats. Everything was abandoned, a spoon was demanded and he didn't look up until he licked the tub clean.

This is very serious business.

Almost there.

xoxo,

Steph

More storm photos

OK, so these aren't as dramatic as the pics Steph posted below, but thought I would just put up a couple that I took when I got to the house and found it still in tact.

Here's some hail that collected on our front walkway:



Here is a closer look at the size of the hail:



And here are the dogs, who apparently were tired because they missed out on their naps earlier when our house was getting pounded with hail:

Early Start to the Storm Season

For all concerned friends/family, please know that we (and our house) are safe!!

We got an early start to the storm season yesterday as a tornado swept dangerously close to our house. A tornado in February? Apparently it's not unheard of in Oklahoma, but certainly storms of this size are not the norm for February (and it's even early in the month). We have had an unusually mild winter - will that lead to a more rowdy spring?

I will admit to being a weather nerd. I secretly find it exciting when severe weather coverage preempts a TV show and love to watch it minute-by-minute. Growing up in Oklahoma you learn tornado safety precautions right along with your ABCs and words like 'rain-wrapped' and 'hook echo' don't seem out of the ordinary.

However, yesterday the storm was too close for comfort, even for me. The Edmond tornado first hit one street east of our house. It's hard to tell, while watching the live TV coverage, exactly where it is and where the most damage has occurred. My stomach sank when they kept calling out street intersections that were SO CLOSE to our house. EEK! Nick left work and braved the storm/hail to check on our house. Thankfully all is well and the dogs were still in the backyard. Nick thinks they might have enjoyed the excitement, I'm not so sure.

It took Mason and I 1.5 hours to get home due to weather conditions, debris in the roadways, streets being blocked off, etc. It was nice to get home though. Mase told me that they had a "tornado dwill" at school and "it was fun 'cause we got to watch movies" - I wish Nick and my experience had been that entertaining! Mason was upset last night that continued coverage kept interrupting his Charlie Brown Valentine special, "dat storm is back, tell it to stop!!".

So, early preparations for tornado season will start at our house this weekend. New batteries for the flashlights, packing food in a bag by the back door and most importantly cleaning any dead spiders/mice out of the storm shelter. BLECH! (I know, I know...that's nasty. ICK! That shelter is a trap for mice, doesn't help that we live right next to a field either.)

Here are a few pictures of our area.

I took this one with my iPhone (so excuse how bad of a picture it is) as Mason and I were headed home. It was one of many lowerings of the day. This photo is looking northwest toward our house.


This is another bad picture from my iPhone. I took it this morning on my way to work. This was taken at Coffee Creek/Santa Fe for those of you that know the area. This is literally right by our house, it's the main route we use to go to work.


These photos look better because they are not mine. :) I snagged them from a couple local sites - newsok.com and koco.com (I'm not using them for commercial use so I'm assuming it's ok?)

This photo was taken on Penn. This is the route we normally would take to get home in the afternoons.


We had several bad hail cores with the storm as well.


The tornado.

Thank you to everyone that checked in with us, you are all so very sweet and thoughtful!!!!

My heart goes out to the family and friends of those that lost their lives in Lone Grove last night.

Here's wishing this is the only tornado of the season.

xoxo,

Steph

Vegas and Grand Canyon

Nick here. I was invited out to Vegas by some old high school buddies from Toronto last month, so I took them up on the offer and we spent a few days in Sin City, plus took a day trip to the west rim of the Grand Canyon. Vegas was fun; I didn't lose too much money. The Grand Canyon trip, that was a whole other story. Getting to the G.C. from Vegas is like traveling through the land that time forgot. Just a deserted bizarro-land. Anyway, to get to the west rim, you have to take a 20-mile trip down a really rough dirt road at the end. The rental car we had got a flat just as we were pulling into the park. Much to our surprise and dismay, there car had no jack in it. Thanks Dollar-Rent-a-Car. Anyway, some really nice guys with the maintenance crew at the G.C. helped put the spare on -- which was old and cracked and worthless -- and then patch the flat -- which we found out had already been patched once before. Again, thanks Dollar-Rent-a-Car, for nothing. But, in the end, it was worth it because the views of the G.C. were great. Here are some photos:

The Rocky Mountains seen from the plane just after leaving Denver on my connecting flight:

The Vegas strip from the plane:

Some pics of the Grand Canyon West Rim:

And a shot of my buddy Ken and his girlfriend, Meg:

A kick in the face.

We got word last week that Mason's school will be closing for good, effective July.

We are heartbroken to say the least. Mase loves his school, he loves his teachers and the friends that he's been with since he was three months old. We've grown as a family with the center and it kills me to have to leave. It's upsetting that the teachers are losing their jobs and that the kids are losing their stable place.

Mason's first day at school was also his first Halloween, he went as a pea. I took bags of breast milk and frozen cubes of baby food in to them. They've been with us through his sicknesses and his first steps. His temper tantrums and his learning. We know and love all the teachers there and trust them to take care of our baby. We feel like we've been kicked in the face.

The details behind the closing are cloudy and suspect. Rumors have been flying and secrets have been kept, but since the center is associated with Nick's workplace I'm going to leave the drama out of this post.

Now we're having to fight with 20 other parents for a spot on the waiting lists at top-rated schools, quickly form relationship with new directors/teachers. It's survival of the fittest for sure and such a sad and emotional scene. Sadly, no place feels like home as much as his school did.

I'm too emotional to write any more.

xoxo,
Steph