Aunt Jean

My Aunt Jean is celebrating her 70th birthday this month. I would have to say she is the aunt my mom really grew up with. Their birthdays were only days apart and they got married on the same day, just different locations. I want to say Mom only went out with my Dad because Aunt Jean didn't want to go on a date alone. I wish I could confirm this story with my Mom, but that is the one I remember.
Growing up, we were at my Aunt Jean and Uncle Ray's house a lot. We rode horses, okay, everyone else rode and I was thrown and dragged by various horses and ponies. Uncle Ray in the summer could be counted on to take you to the lake every day when he got home. I remember buggy rides and an assortment of dogs that would sleep in our beds and leave God only knows what in the sheets. (C'mon, we gotta shake the sheets, I can't sleep in this sand pit!)
One time Mom and Jean loaded 7 kids into a station wagon and we went to the big slide at K-Mart and then we headed to Hubbard Hill Museum in Elkhart where I saw a lamb with another lamb growing out the side of it and I can still see us racing through the orchards. That day I think they stopped and used their last 35 cents to buy gas.
Growing up my cousins were like extended family. We raced through our lives with the same faces next to us when we were young and then as teenagers. And in the background were our Moms. They both had incredible senses of humor and both rooted for the underdogs, every time. I can still see them sitting at the kitchen tables in our houses and just talking and laughing. (Why is it always the kitchen table?)
They taught us patience, love, how to laugh, how to have fun and always how to remember. And I do remember.
There is not much better than a sister. (Yeah, Sally that is a shout out to you!)
Happy Birthday to my Aunt Jean who was one of the best sisters ever.

22 years

Kenny & I will be married 22 years tomorrow.
Man, did that fly by.

And in this marriage there has always been a balancing act. Kenny has always been the fun one. When the girls were little and doing things I wouldn't let them I would hear him yell, "your mom is coming!" because he was right in there with them. He is calm, I am crazy. He does not let his emotions control him at all. He is steady.
He has been the best Dad ever and an equally good husband. He still makes me laugh. He still makes my heart hurt and that is how I decided I would marry him forever. He was replacing storm windows in his old house and I pulled into his driveway and man, I got this ache and thought...uh oh. I love this guy.
Any time someone has asked about some guy they were dating my first question is; Does he make your heart hurt? and if they say Yes I think it will work.

Yeah, God sent the right guy for the job. He lives with a house full of women and he still has a sense of humor. He always has the best Christmas costume for the pictures. He can cook and he even helps clean. He does all the yard work and pool chemicals. He can fix anything. He doesn't complain when he has to work on the girl's cars. He sat with Aubrey during chemo as much as I did. He comes up with the best and most unique presents. He makes my heart hurt still. Another 22 years? Yeah, I'm in.

Cheesy Potatoes

It is a holiday, my family will meet and do what we do best.. eat until we are stuffed. I want to fix cheesy potatoes but I gotta tell you.. I love them and will eat until my eyes look like potato spud eyes...creepy but true.
I love a good spud.. what can you do to screw them up? Baked, fried, boiled, thrown in with any food and they are tasty. Mashed..yummo! Breakfast, lunch or dinner and I could eat a tater.. I believe this is why we are so hostile to other ethnic groups.. they do not love their potatoes like us. Chines food? Mexican? They miss the whole starchy quest. Bob's 19th hole... they have twice baked that make you want to slap someone they are so good!
But, I am trying to eat better. (Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution? I get it) Since when is Nachos & goopy cheese a main dish for our kids at school? Thank you government food program, again you fail! And these nachos are only cheese, no lettuce, olives or tomatoes. And why do we not feed our kids food that is in season when it is? Corn in August, tomatoes in the fall.. clueless we are.
So, there will be no cheesy taters for me :( I need to learn how to eat real food. Healthy food, maybe a tater here and there but until I get this obsession with potatoes controlled I will have to wait.
Sigh.

Yard woes

About 7 years ago I went into Lowes and bought these very pathetic ornamental grasses. Maybe in 5" pots and dropped them into my yard. They grew. And grew. And grew.
Two of the plants are restrainable but they are now popping up baby grasses through the black plastic and the pea gravel.
The other plant has turned into a huge, straw like monstrosity that may be getting a dose of Round-up which I hear kills everything. In the fall it reaches my roof and every Spring we cut it back and we have a wheat field of hay from the thing. I think it has roots that go to China and back, there is not any way to pull them out.
And then, there are the adorable chipmunks that think my yard is the Disneyland of Chip & Dale life. They have been digging like there is no tomorrow and all ways to get rid of them are just wrong. (A plank set up over a bucket of water with 2" of sunflower seeds that they go to eat and meet their maker.. Ugh!) But, they really need to go.
I am not a gardener because I have OCD.. I want perfect so I just don't even bother... and weeding, what an endless task.
My pool will need a new liner this year and my plan is the usual plan, you can't see the mess when you are floating with your eyes closed.
And in the meantime, need some grass? I got plenty but you do the cutting!