AM~Erica is So Late in Updating These Highlights

So anyway...

It has been quite a year, this whole 2012 thing. It's had it's ups & downs...and I realized that I did keep up one of my undocumented resolutions for the year: blogging. I wanted & hoped to blog more. As it turns out...I'm almost at 100 posts for this year, alone! That's WAY more than all the other years combined. I started, modestly, in 2007...and fell off & jumped back on...but this was my big year, y'all.

Then I realized something...I have some unpublished posts! Why? Because I was working on my vacation series & was going to release it all at once. Ummm...I did pretty well with putting most of it together...but...life happened & I didn't get to do it the way I'd hoped to have it set up. So, I want to keep going back to set it up how I'd originally hoped, but hope you enjoy it here:

Some of you remember that I brought up going to Seattle this summer. It totally gave me the idea for MY INSPIRED BUCKET LIST. But there's so much more involved in what we enjoyed seeing. So I want to be the annoying person sharing their slide show with you! But I won't make you go thru it, but it is pretty impressive, if I do say so myself.

Day 1:

FLYING TO SEATTLE



Day 2:

HITTING THE BEACH

CHECKING OUT FT. LEWIS

SEAFOOD AND A VIEW


Day 3:

WANTS COFFEE & THROWN FISH

MOD BY THE NEEDLE

GEEKING & FREAKING OUT TO SCI-FI ICONS

OH THE HORROR

EXPERIENCES THE MUSIC


That was most of our time. We of course had some family time there, too.

Also...please take a moment to enjoy a few of the pics that did not make it into the blog series, but are still post worthy:

That's right...we saw a Men in Kilts truck. We were very entertained.

Teen Girl in her best Doctor stance, with makeshift sonic screwdriver in hand...

It was quite a trip, everyone. And we are dying to go back! We loved it!! LOVED IT!!

Hope you enjoyed our experience the best you could, too.

Stay tuned...

God Bless, AM~Erica

AM~Erica Experiences the Music Project

So anyway...

We have been having quite the day, so far. Can you tell? And loving every minute of it so far!

But we are actually going to move into checking out what the whole museum actually is...it's about the music!

Welcome to the EMP Museum (Experience Music Project). This is a place where you can see & hear music that began in Seattle.

You know...like...

Jimi Hendrix:

We also got to go thru a whole exhibit based on AC/DC! Check out some of Angus Young's costumery on display:

With hubby & I being prodigies of the 80's, seeing Eddie Van Halen's iconic guitar was so exciting!!

We also took a moment to get a cheesy photo opp of pretending we were on the AC/DC stage! And we rocked it:

Hubby hitting his best hot guitarist pose

Lil Guy rocks it out

Teen Boy has appropriately hit a grunge pose without realizing it...
As close to the Nirvana scene as this post will get.
(bad Gen X'r parents)

Teen Girl bustin' out her own tunes

I, of course, had to hit my ultimate rocker pose!

Plus we formed a family rock group & did a rock group experience thing. There's a video of our group, Leave Me Out of It (it's a phrase that Teen Girl gave while trying to get out of doing this activity...Bwah-hahahaha!), as we "performed" Joan Jett's "I Love Rock & Roll". Plus there's a poster of us wandering around...but it mysteriously disappeared. Which is fine, y'all. But it was still fun!

There was also a place in there where you could test out all kinds of percussion sounds & do some recording studio type stuff!

Teen Girl testing out her song skills. That was so much fun to watch her.
I think it's definitely in her future...

Lil Guy getting to beat on some drums & work off some energy & boredom *face palm*

Also...I, of course, had to get a picture of one of the sounds you could test:

"I've got a fever..." and you all know this is the only prescription:

LOL!!! Teen Girl found it above the exit of the room. Loved it!

The last exhibit we went thru had to do with the movie "Avatar"...yes the blue people from Na'vi. Not many pictures due to lighting...but here's some of the plants & concept heads used:

It was a full day just being there. Wish we had more time to do stuff that day. But had been an exhausting & fun-filled day, for sure!

Stay tuned...

God Bless, AM~Erica

AM~Erica Finds the Horror in the Music

So anyway...

(<<< == Like the different pic for this post?)

As we were having an amazing time at the EMP museum, and totally geeked & freaked in the Icons of Science Fiction exhibit, it moved right into a very creepy exhibit...it was all about horror flicks...

It was dark & set up kind of like being lost in a forest. Many pics that I got didn't really turn out due to the extra low lighting throughout. However, there was some pretty cool stuff.

And, I would like to point out that I am very happy there were no birds anywhere in there. I might have died of a heart attack, landing in an ugly puddle of something. So...we all survived!

Teen Girl with the mask & machete of Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th movies

The ax used by Jack Nicholson in "The Shining"

The glove of Freddy Krueger in the "Nightmare on Elm Street" movie series
and the gloves of Edward Scissorhands
(no...I have no idea why the scissorhands were in this exhibit, but they were Johnny Depp's...so...what)

One of the iconic costumes used on one of the zombies of the Thriller mini-movie

Hubby & the kiddos doing the Thriller dance (kind of) with the Thriller zombie costume

A movie being shown on the floor, so Teen Girl played dead in it.
Hey, it's about the horror of it, right?

This screen was SO cool! This is the kids in front of a projector that would give their silhouettes
extra hair, eyes, birds, strange bubbles, etc. on this shadow wall. It was AWESOME!

One of the most awesome parts of the exhibit was doing the "Scream Booth". It was like a photo booth that would record pictures of you screaming. You had to pick being either "fight" or "flight" (otherwise choosing predator or victim).

Teen Girl screaming

Teen Boy screaming

Lil Guy screaming

And once you picked which screaming picture was best, it was added to the ongoing digital display while the horror exhibit was there. All three kids showed up together...

Hubby took a turn...

...and he was SCARY!!

My turn inside the scream booth

My pic in the scream digital exhibit with Teen Boy
(look familiar? See my opening photo.)

This exhibit was kind of weird, kind of creepy, but still kind of cool. It was a traveling exhibit that left the EMP at the beginning of September.

But the museum continues...time to check out some Seattle music...

Stay tuned...

God Bless, AM~Erica