Ham Dinner

My Husband and my Twin love ham dinners.
Sharen had a 7lb. ham in her freezer (a gift from Dup) and has been teasing Mike with a home cooked ham dinner since Christmas.

St. Patty's Day - perfect time to cook that bad boy.
Sharen, at the last minute, realized that 7lbs is a lot of ham, and invited Linda and Deanna for dinner too, and we all sat around our OLD dining room table and remembered.

Growing up Mom would take a cheap cut of ham and cook us all a boiled dinner, one of Dad's favorites. Ham butt, potatoes, cabbage, and carrots, cooked in an enormous pot,  and we would sit around this same table.

Sharen cooked Lugan cabbage, a recipe from her Mother-in-law. She made some mean dinner rolls and a debate happen on who loves bread the most. Linda and Deanna voted Mom. Mike chose me. I admitted to my love for all breads, but Dup can keep up with me (we each had 3 rolls). Sharen agreed that my love for bread goes unmatched, until Dup brought up Dave, their son-in-law. He seems to be the clear winner. I hear he can put away multiple rolls in one sitting.

Linda brought a delicious wine to share. Turns out just Dup and I shared the bottle. Thanks Linda, It was yummy!
It was a nice spontaneous dinner party. Something I think we should do more often.

Get This Off Me

When out I went out to get the paper and yesterday's mail this morning I thought I heard a noise that sounded like crying.

It was very faint, but I am pretty sure I heard something.

When I walked out onto the front porch when Linda was leaving I heard it again.
I finally figured it out.

It was my daffodils and tulips screaming to get out from under all the snow. It was time for blooming.
It was way past time for blooming - they wanted out.

So being the thoughtful, conscientious gardener that I am. I went and got the shovel out and reverse shoveled the driveway.

Yes, I took the snow off my front flower garden and threw it into the driveway.

With the weather in the 60's it didn't take long for it to melt and now my flowers can feel the warmth and make an appearance soon.

Family Game Night

I once told my nephew to grab every moment with his kids and spend as much time with them as he could, because life does go by so, so fast, and things change so quickly.

What kinda person would I be if I didn't follow my own advise?

So when Mike and I both got texts messages from Stacy to join her and the kids for family game night I told her Yes.

Mike wasn't feeling so good and wasn't up for it, but that shouldn't stop me - Right?
I got to spend the day with the Flory grandkids and thought what better way to cap off my day than to spend the night with the Kribs grandkids.

I grab a bucket of KFC chicken and head out to Genoa.
Here we are deciding on just what game to start with. Logan just got back from baseball practice so yes he does NOT have a shirt on for dinner.
We had to wait for Brian to show up so our first game (decided on by Kaylyn) was Apples to Apples. Grandma won!
We started game 2 (Name 5) with teams of Me and Logan against Stacy, Dylan and Kaylyn. Logan and Grandma were in the lead when Brian showed up. Game halted.

We partnered up for a cut throat game of personal preference. Mike and I found this game way back when and we played it whenever we went camping with our kids. Told you time flys! The kids all loved it, but it got so outdated.
For Christmas this year Mike and I updated it with 2014 version of people, food, activities and phrases and gave it to Stacy. Now it's a favorite again.

Team Brian and Kaylyn

Team Logan and Stacy

Team Grandma and Dylan

 It's Saturday night and Dylan had plans. He's 15 and wants to hang with his friends. He agreed to just one more game as long as he could be my partner. So sweet! We didn't win though, Stacy and Logan were victorious on that  game.

Dylan is gone and on to Kids vs Parents!
Yeah, the team of Brian, Stacy and Grandma won!
Kaylyn said "No offense Grandma, but you're old and you should know more than me"  That got me laughing - I couldn't disagree with her at all. But truth be told, Brian and Stacy were answering most of the questions.

Team Kids

My teammates

I had such a great time!
Yeah, I am so glad I took my own advise. I got to see all my grandkids that day and spend some quality time with them all. Lucky Me!

On Your Mark. Get Set. Go!

Linda has been supplying me and Sharen with puzzles these last few weeks and we both are enjoying, fixing, and sharing them.

One of the boxes had a piece of paper in it with a website that you could go to and comment on that puzzle. That got me searching the web about all things puzzles.

One website caught my eye.
Jigsaw puzzle fixing competitions.
Wow there is really something like that out there? Could Sharen and I be good enough to compete?
We have been fixing puzzles together since we were toddlers.

There is only one way to find out.
We asked Dup to pick out one of the 500 piece puzzles that Linda had given us, so we wouldn't be biased on what it looked like. We decided to time ourselves, like in a race, to see just how fast we can get it together.
We worked pretty good together (I know, no surprise there).
We both turned pieces over, then Sharen got started on the frame while I separate all the colors into piles.
She likes to work on one big object and then fill in around it. Me I like to start at the corners and work in, so we think we have a good strategy figured out. She does the bird I work on the background.

Sharen fixing the bird in the center while I sorted the pieces.

If we felt stuck or like we were slowing down we switched places at the table.

We are having so much fun

When we were done we both admitted to being a bit nervous and anxious.
We finished the first puzzle in 1 hour, 28 minutes. Both of us were disappointed in our time. We knew we could do better, so we decided to try again the next day.

 

puzzle #1



We only had a few 500 piece puzzles to choose from. Our second attempt, that Dup chose, also was of a bird. The pieces were shaped the same as the first puzzle, so we knew we had a slight advantage with this second one.

Puzzle #2

Same routine as the first one. We both turned the pieces over - I separated the colors and Sharen got busy on the birds. I did the flowers and frame. We both filled in the green background. This time we talked a little more and helped each. My favorite part (and I'm sure Sharen's too) is when we get a piece surrounded and both raced to find it. We cut 15 minutes off our time. 1hour and 13 minutes.

Maybe we do have what it takes to compete.

Just to be sure - we changed locations - we did this last one at my house. We changed puzzle designs in both picture and pieces.
While the boys went to the movies, Sharen and I got together for puzzle #3. Here is the last one we raced to finished.

Puzzle #3

 I had just finished a puzzle with these funky pieces so I was lovin' this. Sharen wasn't too keen on the cut, but she likes to fix by color so she did the face and beard, and presents while I worked on the greens and burgundy. Together we did the fruits and holly.

Funky puzzle pieces

Time was 1 hour 20 minutes.
This was so much fun. Spending an afternoon with my twin and fixing puzzles, just like when we were little.
I think we need to try a 1000 piece puzzle next time. Stay tuned!

Luke turned 2

Such a sweet happy boy, who likes to watch TV from behind the sofa.

 

 Loves himself some spaghetti. I got the privilege of sitting next to this bundle of joy, so my sleeve was his napkin. His paper napkin was used to wipe the inside of his mouth. Where do 2 yr. olds come up with this stuff? That turned into a game of pull the napkin outa my mouth and get the giggles. His lost fork was found in my pocket.

 Younger brother Owen! He is celebrating his 4 month old birthday today!

 Luke's monkey cake.

 

Roger helped with the blowing out of the candles and of course he got to lick the bottoms. Luke is just happy for everybody to sing to him. That boy loves to sing and dance.

 

 I found this cute stuffed monkey and I sang the "Animal Fair" song at least 30 times.

"I went to the animal fair. The birds and the bees were there.

The old baboon, by the light of the moon, was combing his auburn hair.

The funniest was the monk, he climbed the elephant trunk.

The elephant sneezed and fell on his knees.

and what became of the monk, the monk, the monk...."

I would hide the monkey and he had to go find it - all the time I am repeating the monk, the monk, the monk....Most of the time I just threw it behind me on the couch and he would climb up and get it.

 

 Roger was also a big help in opening the presents, too. He would open them - show them to Luke and Luke would run around hugging and thanking everyone.



 Then the best, special bath, of all time.
Yup, he got to take a bath in his own bathroom upstairs for the first time.

Happy Birthday, Luke!!

Oh, Shute

Roger and Luke have this game that you mount slides on a board with Velcro and roll a ball down them. At the bottom is a lever that shoots a rubber pig into the air.
Sometimes it hold up and the ball will get to the bottom.  Both boys get frustrated with it. My thinking is it's too little a space.

When changing my paper towel I got this great idea - take the empty tube and save some toilet paper tubes and make a big shute. We can tape it to the wall with Mary's permission of course. Now my imagination has taken over and I see everything as a possible piece of "The Shute" toothpaste boxes (both sample size and big size). Wax paper tube, my box from my fireplace matches, and Roger's favorite, bathroom cups. I think he liked the cups the best because he had to cut a hole in the bottom of each.

So with materials in hand I visit Newburg St. and Roger and I set out to build "The Shute"!
While Luke shot hoops with Papa, Roger and I got to work.
We started at the bottom of their basement stairs with the idea that I would bring stuff  with on every visit to eventually make it to the top. I know wishful thinking on my part, but you never know.

Roger decided he wanted 3 cups at the bottom.

 Roger cutting the bottoms out of the cups and me taping them up.

 It took us a few adjustments to get the ball rolling.

BUT WE DID IT!!!!
I must warn you Bryan's butt crack appear in this video.

Snow Angels

It's finally snowing. A whole bunch. It's a whiteout, windy, beautiful blizzard....
Enough that it's building up on satellite dishes.

Sharen calls to find out if we had a signal. Dup was headed out to clear off his dish, pretty sure that's the problem. He wasn't getting the golf channel to watch the golf. Our is good!

Dup decides to play in the white stuff and Sharen posts a picture on Facebook of him making a snow angel. I can bet he is laughing telling her to hurry with the picture this stuff is cold.

45 minutes later Mike is getting his coat on - the hockey channel is not coming in - Time to clear our dish.

 And, according to Dup, after you clean your dish you're supposed make a snow angel....

Mike falls into the front yard snow and makes a snow angel.

Silly boys.