Christmas 2010

We had a great Christmas this year. Ava is finally old enough to run around and be excited about opening presents. She had the prettiest Christmas dress.  Too bad I didn’t get a good picture of it, I’m sure her mom did (hopefully).

It was nice this year to have my mom and step-dad in Iowa to celebrate with us.  Since the kids are older now, we haven’t been able to spend Christmas day with them for several years. It was great to have them here, and I hope they had fun. Even though they did have to do the driving this year, they didn’t have bad roads, which was a blessing. It was a little strange to not be in Wyoming over the Holidays, though we will be out a couple times this year I’m sure to see everyone else.

None of my pictures turned out great, so here are just some of the day:

Even though the “kids” are all older now, I still make sure they have “toys” in their stocking.  This year Matt also got into doing the same thing, giving something fun to play with. I’m not sure who this was to, but it was fun for a little while at least. It’s like the football game that everyone plays in school. The football even looks like it was made out of lined paper.

(Morgan was playing against Joe. Do you think she was a little worried how hard he would hit it?)

Sarah is due to have another baby (BOY!) in April and Joe & Sarah compared bellies. I think Joe wins!

Nice, Al.

I have no idea…..but it was funny!

On Christmas Eve we had a big storm. Waterloo officially had 9.5” but I swear it was more. It made for a picture perfect morning.

But it also made for some very slick roads, as evidenced by the Big Monster being towed to the body shop after it slid off of the roads (in the park, no less) into a tree. Bumper, hood, fender, both doors and front end totaling around $6,700.

That’s a bummer, Al!

Thanksgiving

Since Joe & Lauren and Sarah & Craig had plans for Thanksgiving, we went to Des Moines to spend the day with Matt.  For those of you that know he’s doing the “no shave November”, here is a picture of the status. The beard looks okay, I’m not sure about the cheesy grin, though.

We decided to have dinner (lunch for those of you who don’t call the noon meal dinner!) at The Machine Shed. They usually have decent food, and we thought it would be a good Thanksgiving meal. When we got there it was packed and they said it would be an hour wait, so we headed to the bar area for a Bloody Mary to wait. They mentioned that we wouldn’t get a bill brought to the table, we would take care of it on the way out. We thought that was a little strange, but whatever. When we were taken to our table, we were informed it was a fund raiser for a local equine ranch that helps dis-advantaged kids and it was a free-will donation for the meal.  It was actually very good food, all served and cooked by volunteers.

There was a light display that I wanted to see that didn’t start until dark, so we decided to go to a movie. We saw “Due Date”. It was very funny.

The light display was sponsored by Hy-Vee for the Make a Wish Foundation and was in a park near downtown Des Moines. It went on and on with lots of neat light displays. I’m a sucker for lights at Christmas, so I enjoyed it.

It was an enjoyable day and I’m glad we went.

Saturday afternoon we went to watch the UNI volleyball team win the MVC championship (yeah!!). Ava just loved the music and the mascot. She was up on Al’s lap dancing to the music and clapping. She even got a quick shot on TV. That mark between her eyes is where they had to glue her forehead back together after she fell last week. I’m sure it will be the first of many. Hopefully it won’t scar, though.  UNI made it to the NCAA tournament and are hosting the first round at UNI, so we will be cheering them on again Friday & Saturday.

On Sunday we had Thanksgiving with all the kids at our house and had the usual (except sweet potatoes!). As always, it was all too good and we were all super stuffed.

So we had to sit around, rest our tummies and watch the Broncos play (although they didn’t play very well, sorry Joe). Joe has always been a huge fan of the Broncos. I think he wants to make Ava one as well. He found his old jersey in a box of stuff I was sending home with him.

I hope you all had a great weekend, we did!

A “traditional” Thanksgiving….

This year will be the first year that we haven’t had Thanksgiving on Thanksgiving Day. Maybe there were a couple years when I was real young that weren’t on Thursday, but I don’t remember them. But the kids get older, get married and you can’t all get together on the same day, so this year we are having it on Sunday. Which I’m actually fine with. (Although we will be celebrating Thanksgiving with my Christmas trees up….because I ALWAYS put them up on the Friday after Thanksgiving and I’m not going to budge on that one.)

As I sat down today to make a grocery list for dinner, I got to thinking that maybe we don’t have to always have the same thing, does everyone still like what I fix? Or is there something else we should have?

I won’t budge on the stuffing. If we have turkey, we will always have stuffing. I like mine with sage, celery and white or wheat bread and that’s it. There will not be cornbread or apples or anything else in my stuffing. I can remember years and years ago when my aunts or mom would try to change it up and grandpa and I were adamant about the same one. Some things have to stay the same! (I know, I’m being a little hypocritical here, but it’s my privilege, I’m cooking!).

I sent an email to my three kids to see if they were expecting a certain dish or not. In the email I said that we were going to have turkey, gravy, and stuffing, but that the sweet potatoes, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, pretzel salad, 7 layer salad and pumpkin pie were going to be made based on their answers. It was funny to see the different responses. 

Joe wants 7 layer salad, stuffing and “that pretzel thingy” and stuffing and cranberries. (Joe was always my human garbage can)

Matt wants green bean casserole and mashed potatoes. (Matt is my meat & potatoes guy)

Sarah wants pumpkin pie, stuffing & pretzel salad.

Lauren wants potatoes, gravy & pie.

So….I guess we are having everything we normally have except sweet potatoes! I’m fine with it really. It’s easy because you don’t have to think about any of it because you have done it so many times.

I’m curious, though….What are your “must haves” for Thanksgiving dinner? Do you always have the same thing? Or do you mix it up?  Is there one thing that you cannot do without?

Whatever you are fixing at your house, I hope you have a great Thanksgiving!

Red sky in morning….

It was a beautiful sunrise this morning

Red sky in morning, sailors take warning.

Red sky at night, sailors delight.

We’ve all heard this old saying. But is it true?

Here is a quick link to a weather site that says that this might not just be an old wives tale. It does say that if you have a nice red sky in the morning, that rain may be on the way. And we just happen to have rain in the forecast for today.

http://www.loc.gov/rr/scitech/mysteries/weather-sailor.html

While I was looking for this, I found a Wiki that lists all kinds of weather old wives tales:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather_lore

That’s your lesson for today!

Seafood boil (or whatever you call it)

Every year when we go to Texas we stop at a certain restaurant and have their Seafood Boil. Of course there it's $25.00 per person or something like that.  I have seen it on the internet as Frogmore Stew in the Southeast, and just plain ole Shrimp boil elsewhere. Whatever you call it, it's wonderful!

After we came back a couple years ago, we did one for the kids and everyone loved it. Morgan has been wanting to do it again this year and we finally were able to get everyone together today to do it again.

You basically put potatoes, corn, sausage, shrimp and whatever else all in a pot with spices, pour it out on the table and chow down. No plates or forks, just your fingers. We put crab claws in it this year, and they were only so-so (we used the knives on the table to crack the crab claws....have to invest in some crab crackers for next time). I would like to do it next time when we can get crawdads (which is hard to do in Iowa, but you do see them sometimes). We had enough to feed all eight of us and enough left over for a couple more people, and it was wonderful! Even Ava had plenty to eat and Matt took some home for lunch this week.

Here are a couple other pics and videos of the day:

Joe being Joe:

Morgan and Al in a gun fight:

Ok....although I understand that this may be viewed by some as maybe inappropriate I'm going to post it anyway. Al has his next hunter in mind.....I do think you need to teach them early how to correctly and safely handle a gun, even though it is just a Nerf gun.

Several years ago Al went back to Iowa to hunt antelope with a friend and had it mounted. Every time Ava comes in the house she has to go see the antelope on the wall. She just loves it. I keep trying to get a video of it because it's so cute. This one isn't great but you get the idea.

Oktoberfest (a little late)

We have made it a tradition (3rd annual!) to go to Amana camping and to Oktoberfest. It's a quaint little town that has a lot of history. It's a nice celebration, very laid back but nice to go each year. It's great people watching! It was super cold last year but this year the weather was perfect.

I have been getting flack for not posting pics so here you go. Warning: there are lots of pictures, and a couple videos. For those of you in the country....might take a bit to load!

This is the "Beirmeister" and his wife. This is his first year, the last one retired. The funny thing about him was that he didn't drink the locally made beer.....he drank Bud Light!

"Blessing the beer"

I was a little camera crazy. Matt doesn't look too happy with me! Back at ya baby!

Craig surprised Sarah with a day trip to Amana. They didn't realize that we were down there too, until that morning. It was nice to have them there for a bit. Ava enjoyed the parade and all the people, and the candy.

The keg toss. Last year Al placed 2nd place. He didn't place this year but......the old man did beat Matt & Craig!

Matt and Al decided since they didn't win the Keg Toss, they might as well try the log sawing. They had the best time at 26 seconds for a long time, but someone came in at 14 seconds and they were done. Better luck next year, guys!

Matt before the Brat Eating Contest. He placed 3rd!  Hey...it was a free lunch!

 

Here is the first part of the contest. I ran out of memory card, so Sarah got the ending. You can see it on her Facebook.  The best part of this one is the lady next to Matt......