‘Spring’ Break

…or lack thereof.

My view this morning:

vs Gretchen’s view this morning:

I have nothing to say about this.

I Am Thankful For Jill

My family traveled to Maryland for Thanksgiving this year, to visit with my Nana and Papa, as well as some other family members.  It was quite fun, and highly amusing at times.  Here are the highlights:

– My Nana goes a little crazy with the cheese whenever she has visitors:
There are 12 varieties shown in this picture, and I’m pretty sure you can’t even see all of it.  Insanity.

– My nana gave my sister a Ukelele.  Angels may play harps in heaven, but I’ve determined that the devil must be constantly learning to play the ukelele in hell, because I can’t really think of a worse instrument to have to listen to someone learn to play.  (sorry sis, but it’s true.)

My feelings for the Uke are summed up pretty perfectly by the following picture:

– On Wednesday night I asked my Nana who was coming over the next day for dinner.  She listed all the usual suspects- aunts, uncles, and cousins- and then added, ‘Oh… and my personal trainer… Jill.’  Wait… WHAT?  My initial thought was “What 82 year old invites their personal trainer to Thanksgiving?” Immediately followed by, “Actually, what 82 year old HAS a personal trainer????”  Yes ladies and gentlemen, my 82 year old Nana’s PERSONAL TRAINER joined us for Thanksgiving dinner.

Here she is enjoying a piece of pie with my Nana (ironic, no?):

But, here’s the thing… Jill jumped right in with the family; she even did the dishes, so she’s A-okay in my book.  Also, she played along with our family game and did not even flinch when I started yelling at her/the rest of our team (our family games get a little intense…)

Oh, and she did a darn good seal impression, which leads me to my last point…

– My sister managed to get our family to make complete fools of ourselves by doing crane and seal impressions as part of her made up game.  Here’s the picture evidence:
(note that Jill is still very much into her impression, even while the rest of us have collapsed into fits of giggles.  CHAMPION RIGHT THERE.)

So yes… there are the highlights of a very interesting Thanksgiving.  Here’s to hoping Jill will join us again next year.  Mostly because I don’t want to do dishes.

Thanksgiving Break

So, while Gretchen and I suffer extreme separation anxiety (this break is the longest we’ve been apart in almost 3 months… I get panic-y when we’re apart for 2 days… what are we going to do for 10?!) you should check this blog out.  It’s definitely funnier than anything we could think up to post while we’re apart.

I’m going to mentally prepare myself now… have a  FANTASTIC Thanksgiving!

Oops

Not even a week has passed since we have returned from fall break, so I’m going to tell you a little bit about a lesson I learned while it’s still fresh… As fresh as wet paint. My journey home takes me through a variety of small towns (at least 10). The town names range from ‘Enterprise’ to  ‘Dempsytown’ and past signs for a Rainbow Bowman Club and even a street sign with the name ‘Jesus is the Way’.  It’s always an interesting trip and there is no cell phone service. I feel like Sacagawea every time I begin my journey. Anyways, when approaching ‘Cherry Tree’ (quite an average town) I stopped at the stop sign. Typical. To my chagrin, I found myself waiting, and waiting, and waiting for a construction vehicle with a huge line of cars to pass so that I could turn behind them. When it was finally my time, I whipped behind the last car doing a nice little diagonal across the road. When I’m by myself I tend to drive on the wild side… After falling into line, I glanced up to the scrolling words of large sign on the back of the construction vehicle, “Freshly painted lines. Do not cross the yellow line. Keep away from the center Yellow line. Freshly painted lines. Do not cross the yellow line…” Maybe you’ve seen one of these. Well, glancing in my rearview mirror, I realized I had seen it too late. My CRV had decided to make its own fancy, yellow lines right across the road. “Oops”. My guilt at ruining the fresh paint job kept building as I followed the line of cars at a snail’s pace facing the flashing reminder. At this point, I pulled out my sunglasses to hide my identity, just in case someone in the boonies wanted to judge me.  When the fresh lines ended, I was finally released from the weight of my guilt and transferred it to the gas pedal, making up for lost time. When I pulled into my driveway, I had already forgotten about the incident and just enjoyed being home. Later that evening though, when I told my dad about the little mistake, he voiced his concern that I may have not only decorated the road but also the CRV. Honestly, I have yet to examine it. Silver with Yellow speckles doesn’t sound so bad anyways. At least I didn’t do this: