Spontaneous Family Day

While Sundays usually have some family time involved, we thought our day was going to look a bit different than it did. But it was one of those serendipitous moments when the plans changed and we had the day wide open before us, with pretty much nowhere to go and nothing to do (well, nothing urgent or planned). So we had a family day.

Actually, we squeezed in a couple of haircuts before the fun and games began. Poor John - it's been super windy around here and having his hair all in his face has been rather frustrating while trying to work. He wasn't fond of my bandana idea, either. Now he can see and work without all that hair interference.

We played Clue, which I know I haven't played in probably 8-9 years. The boys have probably played a little more recently, but not sure that it's been within the past 4-5 years. It was a blast! Interestingly, the murderous Mrs. White was guilty three out of four times! She's a treacherous one, that Mrs. White.

We also played a couple games of Yahtzee. It's been awhile since I've played that one, too. We made a run to the frozen yogurt joint in between games, though, which cooled the dice off significantly. Our second game was quite underwhelming. Fun with sad scores.






Oh yeah, John & I made a quick run over to the grocery store, where we were greeted in the checkstand line with this!

Yikes!

Since we had yogurt at around dinner time, no one was terribly hungry, so we watched a few episodes of Numb3rs on Netflix and snacked as the need arose.

All in all, a spontaneously wonderful day.

Too many options!

Starbucks and the Fisheye Lens

Not sure that was a great title. It sounds like a story. It's really just some pictures of our morning at Starbucks. Pictures shot with a fisheye lens.

You can lean back, Caleb, but you can't escape this lens!


My niece


My niece, up close


Stretched out cup



It's a lot easier to get in the picture with your sister when your lens is this wide.

New Year's Eve - 2012

We often have more people over on New Year's Eve, but due to sickness and the potential for slippery roads, it was the four of us and my parents. We still had a wonderful time. I made homemade fettuccine Alfredo for dinner (just the sauce, not the noodles). We had salad and focaccia bread as well.

Then the boys headed downstairs to play their games and we got the cards out for a game of Oh Hell and a couple games of Liverpool Rummy.

We had a relatively new deck for Oh Hell, so handling, shuffling, and dealing was a little challenging.

A different perspective.

Some delicious chocolate!

In case you missed it on Facebook, my mom has a chip on her shoulder. A very tasty chip from Senor Manuel's, specifically.

I've been having some fun with this fisheye lens over the holidays! Although I can't get a shot that's a full circle because my camera has a crop sensor. But it's still fun to play with!

Merry Munchstaches

There's always one in the crowd:

Thanksgiving Day

We had such a nice Thanksgiving day this year. Not that there was anything outstanding or spectacular, but it was just a good day. Splitting the meal preparation amongst Mom, my sister, and me is nice because no one person has to do everything. Although I think Mom gets the bulk of the work, being the pie queen and all.

Side note: every year around Thanksgiving and Christmas, Schwan's and Village Inn try like crazy to convince us to buy holiday pies. What they don't understand is that the best pie baker on the planet just happens to be my very own mother. So there's just no need for their pie sales and such. Not that their pies are bad or anything, but they'll never compare to Mom's. Ever. Sorry, fellas, you'll get no pie sales in my family!

I almost always buy the turkey. The biggest one I can find since everyone wants plenty of leftovers. And that's where my dear hubby is awesome. He knows how squeamish I am about raw meat and turkey innards, so he's happy to take the bird out of its package, pull out all that stuff, clean it up, and pop it in the roaster. And then I take it from there. I can handle brushing it with buttery olive oil and sprinkling it with Pampered Chef's yummy Rosemary Herb seasoning. I'm also very capable of putting it in the oven and checking its temperature later in the day.

This turned out to be an exceptionally amazingly good turkey this year. Very moist and very delicious!

The guys were engaged in some auto repairs that were a little more challenging than they should have been.

Something about a very stuck ball joint, I believe.

With the unseasonally warm temperatures, Zach got in a little leaf blowing.

When Mom & Dad showed up, Mom had a very nice gift for both Susan and me.

Mine is the one on the right. Mom made these on her rigid heddle loom. I think she did a fantastic job!

Mom usually makes the gravy. She's very good at that, too. Unfortunately, she didn't have a good method for keeping the entire spoon out of the pan, though.

A rousing game of Pente is always a good way to keep out of the way of the cooking.

Or maybe a little DS. In pink, thankyouverymuch.

After all that hard work in the garage, they got to relax with a good movie.

I always write at the top of our white board "I am thankful for..." and let everyone add their thoughts to the board. My niece decided to make her own version. She's so creative.

And we've come full circle. John gets to carve the turkey when it's done. He loves the turkey. If I left him to do this job unattended, he'd be pretty full before it ever made it to the table. Fortunately, it was a 24 pound turkey, so there was enough for him to snack on, eat at dinner, and still have leftovers for everyone.

Photographic evidence that I was there. Sans makeup and all, but there, nonetheless.

After dinner, we played a game of Loaded Questions, ate pie, and then played Taboo. It was a really wonderful day. What about you? How was your Thanksgiving?

Pre-Thanksgiving

Usually when the week of Thanksgiving rolls around, I think that I'll have the boys do some school during those first two or three days. And then that usually doesn't happen. So this year, I just told them they had the week off. Done deal. No guilt over what we didn't do. No stress over the lack. This was a good decision.

Monday morning, some of The Girls* met at Starbucks. We had a blast. We had so much fun that we seemed to annoy certain other people. Obviously those people needed to gain a sense of humor. Whatever.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Tuesday morning, some of The Girls* met at Starbucks. We had a blast. I don't think we irritated any other Starbucks patrons this time. Since it's the store where my sister works, we don't get severely out of hand or anything, just laughing at silly stuff and having some fun. We wouldn't want to tarnish her good name, after all.

* The Girls - consists of my mom, my sister, some dear friends, and me. On rare occasions, we actually ALL get together at the same time. Alas, it wasn't to be this time. Thus the need for two days at Starbucks. But we still didn't get everyone. We'll keep trying, of course.

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I did a little cleaning earlier in the week and wrapped up shopping for Thanksgiving dinner food items. I had no desire to be in the grocery store come Wednesday.

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On Wednesday, I felt the need to photograph someone and Caleb is my go-to subject. It's so nice to have one cooperative son when it come to photography. Well, for Zach, he's just happy to assist behind the scenes. Which is also nice. Everyone has their part to play, right?

Color?

or B&W?

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Okay, rather than one very long post, I'll split this one into a couple. So the rest of the week will show up sometime soon.

Manitou - the Penny Arcade

After lunch, we dropped by the Penny Arcade and YES, the photo booth was in working order! John and I have taken pictures in there a couple of times in years past, so this was very exciting to me. Of course, we inserted our three dollars in quarters so that we could have the little strip of paper with four dark, slightly fuzzy photos of ourselves.

John exchanged some green money for quarters and we hit the games. There's just about anything and everything at the Penny Arcade - rides, racing games, Ms Pac Man, and even the original Donkey Kong. You can shoot pool, play air hockey, look at yourself in warped mirrors, and earn tickets playing Skeeball. And then there's the room with the antique games. Like English Football, peep shows, love meters, shooting games, and pinball.

My personal favorite - the slimming, hipless mirror.

We also picked up some Patsy's Saltwater Taffy. They've been there long since before I remember and it's always a treat to have some of the best taffy around.

If you jumped in this story in the middle, here are the other two parts:

Pizza at Marilyn's

Mr Rockey