Where Did Christmas Go So Fast???

Hi,
I know I know... I have been incommunicado, no postings. I feel like a heel.

Guess what else I did? I got my home phone turned off. No, not a lack of funds, a lack of brain. Knew it was due and it just flew out of my head. I had Dear & not to mention Sweet Hubby run to town today to pay it and they said yes, it doesn't work because (duh) you didn't pay the bill. sigh. I'm a mess. I have a pile 2 feet high of attorney, insurance, medical bills and my own bills to pay. I should get to it, eh? I paid the taxes today, do I get any points for that?

Today LJ had her wisdom teeth removed. All 4 of 'em. She is MY daughter so it is "wise" to get all 4 taken out at once so as not to risk the refusal of said daughter to return to the doc who did the deed if she had only 2 exttracted. sigh She's still zonked on the couch compliments of hydrocodone.

J and C and H and Baby Girl J left early this afternoon. It was Baby J's first Christmas!! (And friend Makenna's too! Hi Beth!) They had returned the day after Christmas and hung out for 2 days. We went to Chuck E Cheese and the mall and WallyWorld and wherever else we could think of. That's a lot of my distraction. I made a snowman sweatshirt for H and one for N too (shhh, she doesn't have hers yet).

And H LOOOOOOOVES to sit at my bedroom window
and look out at the geese! Can you see them too?

Nana and Baby Girl J

H among the presents

J's best bud and his wife and kids came over last night for supper. A thrown together concoction of Holiday leftovers including a chicken pot pie I put together at the last minute. It was YUMMY! And it's gone. So no photos.



We played Boggle until our eyes hurt. Si is shopping grad schools in philosophy of the doctoral kind and not only did his genius whoop us pretty good, but he found the word "roan" in almost every turn!!! Hmmmm. His wife K is just as brainy and gave us a run for our money (even tho' there were no bets in play) This afternoon we made Quiche Lorraine and the kids ate on the run as they were packing their car in readiness to run to C's Dad's 45th B-Day!!! Ha Ha Chief... another year!!!

And playing in to all this falderal has been my mom's continuation as a hospital inpatient since Thanksgiving. She gets better and then lands back in acute care. Not only has she been missing her glasses since a return trip to ER mid December, but she took yet another fall today as she got herself out of her lounge chair, staff found her in a heap on the floor... she cannot walk and forgets that minor detail.

In all of this we've made it to church and focused on the meaning of Christmas: we visited a little bitty country church for Christmas Eve Candlelight Service b/c ours was earlier in the evening (and I was still visiting Mom. ) Hmm, this missive seems a little distracted. Well, that about sums up everything about me lately!

So.. how was your Celebration of Our Savior's Birth, which is the beginning of the Road to Calvary (Easter's Comin') ?

Photos with kids!

On this snowy Saturday, I was going through photos to change the banner (which still isn't how I want it~~anyone wanna help?) I couldn't stop laughing when looking at the progression of photos when taking family photos for my son! Enjoy:

Baby, It's Cold Outside!

I just wanted to let everyone know, I LOVE ELECTRICITY!!!!! After losing power for 6½ days in January and now 2 days, I have a not so secret love affair going with everything electric right now! Don't worry, I'll calm down and start conserving again. Just lemme enjoy the warmth!
The tree branches were falling everywhere.

Look how close this branch came to my Honda! I moved it as soon as I moved the branches out of the way but LJ took it to the Post Office to get the mail and lost my keys for me. Oh Joy. She found them. After she was at work. In HER purse. A day later. I hope she put them back in my purse so I can drive to school this a.m.

STAY WARM!!! Hug your sweetie!

Cute as Pie!

J and C were here last weekend and I got most of my grandgirlee fix (1 is covered in snow in NY and I haven't seen her since August~ sniffle) I was included in a Nana shower at school. My friend Laura became a grandmother for the first time coincidentally on the same day that Baby J was born. Hers was an emergency C-sect. Anyhow, the teacher whose place I took is a Grandma Pro and gifted "me" with a big bucket of sidewalk chalk for H and me to play with. I have been lugging this stuff around since the shower in early November but circumstances (like weather) has not allowed us to participate.

So this Saturday, even tho' the wind could have thrown us in the lake, Nana and her girlee got to

P-L-A-Y!! BTW, she can name every one of those shapes. Yep, she's a genius!

Baby J supervised:

After dark Auntie LJ and H made cookies! YUMMY!Look! I keep telling ya she's PERFECT!

Okay, the pie part!! My students are making pies from scratch this week. A few used pie filling, they had the option. But the crusts are all from scratch.

Arent' they beautiful?

Apple pie from scratch. The "I heart U" cutouts are precious!

German Chocolate Pie!!! An update on this pie. It had wonderful anticipation. It was creamy and beautiful when cut. That first bite... hmmm. Something was amiss. Second bite: SALT! There was too much salt. If you eat anymore you will need an I.V. drip to rehydrate! Apparently in reading the recipe the 1/8 tsp of salt turned into 1/8 CUP, yes CUP. Hubby and I did the math last night and that comes out to 48X the salt called for in the recipe. YIKES!! Like I said before, it was pretty. Students are learning to pay more attention to directions!

Pumpkin!

I think this is Cinnamon apple. Beautiful! They are so creative! It had 1 Tbsp of cinnamon (Red HOTS) candies crushed up and sprinkled in. Very yummy and it was as gorgeous in person as here in the photo. However, when sprinkling sugar on top of the crust the student realized she grabbed the SALT and not the sugar. It was hilarious watching the whole lab group trying to blow that salt OFF the top of the crust. They then did sprinkle sugar and unless you knew about the added salt, you probably would not have noticed in the tasting. Wouldn't this be pretty for Christmas or save it as an idea for Valentine's Day (individual tarts in heart shaped pans?)

Blueberry

...and Blackberry

And finally strawberry rhubarb. I don't think any of them has ever had rhubarb before and you shoulda seen their faces when they sampled the frozen rhubarb before putting in the pie... HA! This was the pie with the most leftovers. The students did not really care for the taste and texture. Tried to pawn it off on other kitchen groups but no takers.


The students were aghast when I told them yesterday that I would need a little teensy 2-inch sample slice of each pie. They don't want to share. I "have" to taste it to grade it! I usually don't but this time... needless to say, I'm not taking any lunch today. I'm eatin' PIE!
The red is the update editing Saturday morning. I did indeed have pie for lunch. The rest of the teachers laughed at me in the lunch room but I enjoyed it. The pie slices from 7th hour Foods class I brought home to share with hubby. He helped me gobble them up. And it did help me score their projects.

Get ready, get set, the Holidays have begun!

We spent Thanksgiving up at son's with new Baby J in Columbia. It was a small gathering but nice and quiet too. They weren't too thrilled at my table decor. Sorry I didn't get a photo after the silverware and food was added, but you get the gist. Okay, it was a little "loud" but festive!

This is H's camera smile: Whadya think?

Nana brought her a donut from the hotel's continental breakfast. Mmmmmmm!

And then her comment was "Mess!"

Unfortuneatly, I received a call Thanksgiving morning that my mom's fall on Monday had indeed caused a fracture, of her pelvis. So while we were 250 miles away, she was transported to the hospital and admitted. Well her BP has gone sky high and she is dehydrated and confused so she was transferred to ICU and is still there this evening. Please pray. She does not care to discuss things of God so it is frustrating to consider how frightening this must be for her.

We had a light dusting of snow Saturday morning. Made for a cozy snuggle in.

Have a great week!

She's here!!!

Grandgirlee #3 arrived on Thursday! A new miracle from God. She is PERFECT!!!
I was there in the room for the birth. She was born on my father's birthday ~ ~ How cool is that? And, my close friend became a grandmother for the first time the SAME DAY! Oh, the wonderment... Nana is the best job in the world!!!

The Tale of a Dog!

(This is not a sad story, it has a happily ever after ending)

Romeo!!!

Named thus b/c LJ wanted to be able to stand out on the front porch and yell across the fields, "Romeo, Romeo, Wherefore art thou Romeo?"

Our Doofus Dog

I guess we rescued Romeo. Soon to be daughter-in-law C asked if we wanted another Golden. Romeo's siblings were apparently being mauled by the parents. Would we take a puppy? Of course LJ wanted him immediately!!! Of course. Always the soft touch for an animal. And who could resist a furball? I thought it would be a few week since the puppy was only about 4 or so weeks old, but because the pups were one by one being killed by the parents, Romeo arrived sooner than we thought. In fact, C's mom brought Romeo to the bridal shower!!! Surprise!!! He was a little unsure of course. Looks sad huh?

We already had Charlie! I don't think he knew what to make of Romeo... usurper?But they got along great... Charlie kept watch over Romeo and Romeo gave Charlie lots of company. We DID notice that Charlie started turning gray.... The young'll do that to ya!

Poor Charlie!

Romeo grew and grew...

Always finding trouble of some sort:

But SOOOOO loveable!!!Romeo loved it at our house. 100's of acres to roam. Ooooo yeah, cows to chase. Romeo LOVES cow tails. He is mesmerized by them. He'd go out in the field and stand behind a cow trying to catch the tail. Cows got annoyed but that never stopped Romeo!

He also liked cars... not chasing cars, but running in FRONT of them. Um, he lost... T was driving, er trying to drive, and Romeo got in front of the car and T ran over him. sigh. Broken leg, pelvis, hip, and TAIL!!!
He has stopped running in front of cars.

But no matter what kind of trouble Romeo got in, LJ and C fought over whose end was what, depending upon which end did the deed.

When we knew we were going to move to this new house, we were warned that unpenned dogs are frowned upon. Romeo never learned many manners, so we were concerned with bringing him here. He is still a wild child. We worried and worried and asked many people if they knew of anyone who would have a good home for Romeo.

The whole point of this post is that Romeo found his boy...

Our Youth Pastor's son helped us move and he was introduced to Romeo. He begged his parents for a few weeks to adopt Romeo and they relented and said yes, so Romeo now has a new home.

Best of all, he is getting much more attention than we were ever able to afford him. He has gone hunting with Phil, the Youth Pastor, even sleeping IN Phil's sleeping bag! And last weekend the Youth had a Paint Ball War out at the church property. Romeo yelped and howled as the kids pelted him with paintballs, never leaving Phil's side. I think he gave up Phil's hiding place. We drive by from time to time and see Romeo playing outside. He is a good dog.

We miss you Romeo!!! But we're glad you found yourself a boy and a new family!