Enjoying Cocktails with Friends

I have become close to a few of my neighbors.  They are my neighbors but I also consider them my friends. We have started a tradition of getting together for cocktails by the pool or the sun deck. We normally share a meal together and have a great time enjoying each other’s company. I am not a big drinker but I love to create and try new cocktails. I don't really like beer and I don't really drink wine. It's fun to occasionally get together with friends and have an adult beverage together. It is usually very spontaneous.  We like to talk about everything from our children to current events.

I am always looking for new drink recipes. Some I learn from friends but the best place is the Internet. You can have access to so many different places. My favorite liquor is coconut rum, so I love drinks with it in it. You can find out how to make Coconut rum here. I usually have some coconut rum in my home. I just read a great article on different cocktails. I think that the Bikini Brazilian cocktail recipe sounds amazingly good.  It has coconut rum and grapefruit juice in it.  I love how it also suggests alternative ideas in case you don't have or don't care for a certain thing.  Sometimes it is difficult to come up with an alternative ingredient that still tastes good. I have done some crazy experiments. They sounded good in theory.  Some concoctions I have made turned out great and others terrible. I’d like to try and make this crazy cocktail recipe which has coconut rum, pineapples, limes and raspberries. There are so many delicious recipes to try. I think it would be fun to start trying new cocktails every time we get together.

I can't wait to make it for our next get together. Living in Florida, ripe grapefruit is very easy to find too. I can definitely see my friends and me sipping these surrounded by palm trees.

What kinds of cocktails do you like to drink?

Clinch App Review

Noah is definitely a ham. He is just like his mama. I used to love being the center of attention on videos and in pictures. Noah is the same way. He loves when I make little videos of him on my phone or camera. He has his own camera that he produces episodes of The Noah Show on. It has a theme song and everything. I have so many little videos of Noah throughout the years; it is hard to know what to do with them all.  I recently learned about an app called Clinch. You can mix your photos and videos to make really awesome keepsakes and videos for loved ones. You can also mix them with your family or friend’s videos and photos.  I absolutely love this idea because when we have family get-togethers there are so many of us and it is hard to remember to send the photos or videos to 20 different people, this way it can be sent to just one of us, probably me, and I can email it or put it on Facebook for everyone to see.  Clinch is also really cool because, my sister and brother in law are horrible about sending me pictures and videos of Noah that they take when they are visiting.  I am hoping Clinch will give them more of an incentive.  I will include unseen footage of Noah too. The last video I received from them of Noah was from his third birthday, when they taught him how to beg for money. It was so cute and funny, until a police officer walked by. Thankfully he too thought it was funny, and didn’t say anything but smile and laugh. I think that Clinch would be great for wedding videos too.  Almost everyone has an iPhone or an iPod or an iPad to take video of the couple’s happy day during the reception or special toasts.

Here is some information from the developer:

Description

Clinch - My Video Butler. An automatic video editor that creates amazing short movies from all your best videos and photos. One of Clinch's coolest feature is that it helps you create a collaborative movie by mixing and editing your videos and photos with friends around you.

To make your movie even more stunning Clinch offers you to add the best related photos from Instagram, panoramic views from Google, nearby tweets and more cool stuff, all based on your location!

It all happens automatically:
Record or upload videos and photos from your camera roll. Add captions, choose a theme, a soundtrack and add more clips from your friends...

With a click of a button Clinch analyzes the best parts and adds more cool related stuff from around you. It then edits it all together (hands free…) with amazing transitions, filters and more.

Clinch is especially great when you and your friends go together to music concerts, sport events and parties… Capture it, and let Clinch do the rest. You can also explore movies by other users, see what’s trending around the world and what’s popular nearby. Follow other clinchers to add them to your movie feed and share movies on Twitter, Facebook and Email.

Features:
+ Automatic video editing (Everything is edited and stored in the cloud).
+ Clinch finds and combines all related videos and photos around you.
+ Choose how and who to mix your videos with.
+ You control the privacy of your content.
+ Unlimited uploads and storage!
+ Browse, Like and comment on friends and other clinchers’ movies.
+ Follow other users and get notifications when your video stars in other movies.
+ Explore popular and nearby movies.
+ Live feed of your friend’s best and favorite movies.
+ Instant movie sharing to Twitter, Facebook, and Email.
+ More cool stuff!

You can find Clinch in the iTunes Store for free. Great editing software for free!!

For more information and to download please visit Clinch

Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Requires iOS 5.0 or later. This app is optimized for iPhone 5.

Weekly Playdate with Friends

One thing I really look forward to each week is the weekly play date we have with one of Noah's friends from school. We both look forward to it for different reasons. Noah loves to go out and play with a friend and other children. He's an only child so he doesn't have the luxury of always having another child to play with.  Luckily this friend has many siblings and the park always has kids running around playing.  Noah really looks up to his friend's older sibling.

I really enjoy it because I get to talk to a grown up. Noah's friend's mom is really nice and really interesting. Both of us being first year transplants we don't know a ton of people here. Making local friends for me is a challenge since I work from home online. I have become friends with this mom. She is really a blessing to us and I am so happy to know her. She is interested in my blog too. She told me she spent hours looking at it. When she spends hours that is awesome because those are precious hours I am sure.   She is a great mom with an amazing heart.  I look forward to every week. I look at the weather and pray its not going to rain or be really cold, just so we can have the special park time with this family.

I Have Never Been Skiing

I have a confession, I have never been skiing.  I grew up in Indiana where there is a lot of snow in the winter. I know that Indiana is a pretty flat state, but there were some manmade ski resorts.  I had friends who would go skiing and my youth group went but I never went along.  As I have confessed before, I am not really athletic, so I don’t really have the desire to actually go skiing.  I would however love to go to a luxury catered ski chalet somewhere in the mountains. It would be so much fun to go with a group of friends and sit by the fire and sip hot chocolate and watch the snow fall.  I am sure there would be breathtaking views of the mountains. It would be a very romantic place to take someone you love.  I am not sure if I would be the only one by the fire or not but that would be fine with me. I could read or blog or just relax and not have to worry about being freezing cold or if I would break my arm or leg. Watching me ski would be like watching a cartoon character crash in to something. Cartoons don’t get hurt, me on the other hand, it would end badly.

   

I think it would be cool to ride the ski lift. I wouldn’t get off when the others do. I would just enjoy the scenery. It would be a great ride. I was planning on going to a chalet with my ex and another couple in the Smokey Mountains but we never fully planned it out so we didn’t end up doing it.  Someday I will gather a small group of people and actually go. I would fully disclose that there is no way I would actually try to ski, but I would be there to just hang out with my friends.

Do you like to ski?

Changing for the Worst

They say people are always changing. You are a little different every day. They also say that change is good.... I respectfully disagree.  I believe that not all changes are good; some changes are bad, especially when it comes to personality. If there is something you don't like about your personality you change it. Only you have the power to do so. What happens if you change for the worst? What if you change the good inside you? That is where change is definitely a bad thing.  I understand that people grow up and they change but what about the people who have been there from the beginning? I am not saying you should stay a ten year old forever but don't change so much that when you have seen someone it is like a pod person has taken over you.

 I had been best friends with a girl since she was born because our parents were best friends. So naturally we grew up together. We had great times together and some fights as all kids do. We always made up and never held a grudge. We would laugh about the fights later.  So when I went to visit her after we were adults it was very strange and awkward.  I thought who is this girl in my friend’s body? Was I living in the past? Was I crazy? I knew she wasn't going to be exactly the same and neither was I. I thought though she would be the same person inside. I obviously didn't think we would waddle around a pool talking about pancreases as we did before.  I wasn't ready for the shock that someone I had been best friends with for over eighteen years  that we would no longer have anything in common. It was weird and I didn't even wanna be there. I did but at the same time she just was so different that I didn't know what to do.

 I spent my days watching lifetime movies alone and my nights with her friends and boyfriend. She had to babysit an old neighbor who was in high school part of the time where there were like 40 high school kids getting drunk and doing drugs while they were partying. I stayed in the guest room wanting no part of that. I was stuck there. Afraid I would be held responsible because I was the oldest person in the house.     So naturally it broke my heart and all I had was the memories of the good old days of silver mints and float nights and jungle land and random silly pure insanity and I loved every moment of it.  I think in that time we both realized two decades of friendship was over.  It’s just merely a memory of each other.  It reminds me that sometimes when people change it can blindside you and you aren't ready for what will happen.