Eat one for me, please

To all my friends and readers in the good old USA ...
do you have a chick-fil-A restaurant near you? They are having a promotion today (July 11) that anyone who comes in dressed like a cow gets a free meal. Get moooooving girls and tape some black paper spots on your cutiepies and solve the dinner dilemna tonight. Enjoy one for me cause I am seriously craving a chick-fil-a right now.
http://www.chick-fil-a.com/#kidsandfamilyzone

Oh, and it would be really cute if you took pictures of all those adorable cow outfits to share with me. I´d really love to share your chicken sandwhich and waffle fries but since that isn´t possible I´ll have to be content with cute, calorie free photos.

Guess what today is?

This song was the way we kids always serenaded our parents every May 31. I can't believe I forgot to include it in the party for my parents last month. Oh well, I sang it to my hubby over the phone a few hours ago and then found the clip on youtube of the original version. Enjoy! I am praising the Lord for 21 years with the best husband in the world!

party time

I am having a great time visiting my parents and flitting from anniversary party to graduation party to birthday party. I still have some shopping (tomorrow the plan is to head to the outlets. yippee), visiting with friends and family, a ladies' retreat with my mom and father's day. Then I pack it all into 2 suitcases and head back home to my own family. My husband (did I mention I married the best guy on the planet?) is holding down the fort well and is especially glad that we have a vonage phone that allows him to call me several times a day with questions like "how do I add time to the cell phone?", "where do we keep the bag of extra batteries?" "How do I pay the credit card online?" etc. I get the feeling that I am going to be appreciated in a new way when I get home.
Web access is very limited for me as my parents only have dial up access (read SLOW) and I don't plan to spend much more of my limited time left at the public library where I am hiding out and enjoying the air conditioning today.

My parents, my siblings and myself get a long overdue family picture at the 50th anniversary party.


Mom and Dad cut the cake now .....

and 50 years ago.


The recent college grad. Congratulations to my beautiful niece.

At the 88th birthday party for a family friend, also named Alice. Actually at this little tea party there were FOUR of us named Alice. That was a first for me!

Wordless Wednesday: Allergy Skin Test (aka Fried Egg Arms)

#2 son was tested recently for allergies. 3 came up positive. We thought the positive results looked like fried eggs after the doctor drew the two crooked circles around the reaction sites to measure them.

I need your help.

Tackle it Tuesday this week needs your imput to help me make some wise shopping decisions in the next two weeks. Read on to see how you can help.

I am heading home to the states at the end of the week. I will be there for a little over two weeks. While I am there I hope to do some shopping. My wardrobe needs some help but with the horrible exchange rate and the difficulty I have just finding clothes that fit me well here (not to mention that the prices before the exchange are awful) I haven't bought much here. I know I can make my money work for me better back "home". I have been reading and listening to some advice on buying clothes that are flattering for your figure and I would like whatever I buy to really look good, not just be serviceable. So, this is where you come in .... I am trying to determining what colors I look best in and what "season" I am color-wise. Would you take a look at the slide show and leave a comment letting me know which colors you thought were the most flattering and which season you think I am (if you know anything about that.) As an incentive for commenters, I will use a random number generator to pick one of commenters (or maybe 2 if I get lots of response) and I will send you a little souvenir of Spain as a thank you for taking the time to look and comment.

Monday Meanderings: Today's one bite strategy -- SNARF

SNARF! That word comes from an old comic strip.... I think it was in a Garfield strip but I could be wrong. All I know is that once my good friend Anisha and I discovered the word we quickly took it for our own. Our families used to have Thanksgiving together and we would sit ourselves down at their little table, fairly groaning from the enormous spread and then smile at each other and say in unison "SNARF!" (We also used to use this often as we sat down to polish off a box of Entenmann's chocolate donuts between the two of us.) The idea was basically "Dig in! Eat your fill (and more)!" This has got to be my strategy for the next 4 days as I am in the final stretch to get ready for my trip Friday morning. I must attack with snarf-like gusto the bites before me.

Weekly goals/deadlines:
1. Finish compiling credit card statements and file my claim here.
2. Pack clothes, etc for Friday´s trip to the states.
3. Finish the "surprise" for Sunday's 50th anniversary party for my parents. (The reason for my upcoming trip)
4. Finish the schedule and meet with the friends who have volunteered to help pick up the elementary kids at the end of the school day and feed /watch them until my husband can pick them up after he gets off work at 2pm.

I just realized that today is Memorial Day in the states. I quickly decided to go with picnic food for lunch today so I will need to run over to the store for hamburger and buns. We will have a little bit of patriotism and americana at lunch today and I will play the song that I used to play each Memorial Day in chapel with the symphonic band when I was in college. I found a MIDI version online and I just LOVE this song. It has great memories for me and it lets my kids learn the tunes to all the theme songs of the US Armed Forces. The link is here. Just scroll down until you see the photo of the bald eagle and then go back up a bit until you see the medly section. The song is titled Armed Forces Salute. There are a ton of other patriotic songs at this site too if you happen to be looking for something else. I like having these kind of resources to share with my kids so they understand a bit of their american culture and heritage even though they are not living there right now.

This week's rough menu ideas --at least for the days until I leave. After that my husband will make all the things that he and the kids like but that I don´t like -- asparagus, fish, tuna casserole, etc etc etc. I will try to leave a couple of things in the freezer but I am confident that they will do fine without me. After all, the casserole and crockpot king will be here to feed the royal family. And they will all appreciate me all the more once I return. Ü


Monday -- burgers, chips, pasta salad, cream of zucchini soup
Tuesday -- 40 clove crock pot chicken, broccoli, potatoes
Wednesday -- oven beef stew
Thursday -- Tacos, or burritos, or taco salad (or one last chance at Mom´s homemade pizza if my packing is done ... ha ha ha)

Check out Tiany´s blog and Laura´s blog to see what others are planning for the week. Also check back here in the next few days as I have a post asking for your input to help me with a project I am planning during the time I am in the States.

Thursday nibbles

It is 5pm. What I have accomplished so far today:
Read my Bible, took the kids to school, was invited out for coffee with the other moms who worked so hard on the school play, got my hair cut and styled, culled the two boxes of strawberries for those berries that were still good and have washed and cut up about 1/3 of them, picked up the kids at school, cooked, served, and cleaned up after the mid-day meal, helped son with his homework, tried to teach Princess how to wipe down the table, dealt with the drama queen as she bemoaned having been asked to do a chore and then wailed over being corrected.

Things I want to do with the rest of my day: 1. read a fluff book, 2. Watch a MacGyver episode with the kids, finish the last two photo collage frames for Princess's room, 3. Forget about fixing supper and just eat junk food while watching tv.

Things I need to do in the rest of my day: 1. Finish dealing with the strawberries. 2 Distribute the clean laundry to rooms and make sure everyone has a clean outfit for tomorrow. 3. translate VBS 4. hug Princess and stop blogging to read her the book she just brought over.

Wonder which list I will follow ....