After all of the grumbling I’ve done about getting the Hanukkah decorations up and how I just couldn’t manage to get it done in a timely manner—and before the holiday actually started, even—because a whole chain of events had to take place first, like dusting and vacuuming, getting my work done, blogging, laundry, coloring my hair, grocery shopping, and procrastinating in every other way possible, I had a revelation. Granted, I didn’t see the light until we were in the midst of placing each of the menorahs of our family collection in their own special places around the house, but I saw it. Jim had driven to Wisconsin to retrieve…
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California Dreaming
I just returned from a long weekend, a glorious weekend, in southern California. The reason for my visit was my cousin’s wedding on Saturday, but I flew out there (alone) early Thursday morning so I could see a couple of friends and spend some time “doing my own thing”. I had an amazing time. I mean, truly amazing. I felt so purely happy for the duration of the trip: I loved it. So many good things. (I have since decided that I need to figure out a way to travel regularly. Really.) Though the four days were chock full of goodness, here are some of my favorite things about the…
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Cousins
I have a smaller family than most people I know. I have one sister–as you know–and our parents each only have one sibling. Between our uncle on mom’s side and our aunt on dad’s side, we have six cousins. When we were kids, we all lived in the Chicago area and we saw a lot of the four cousins on our mom’s side. Some of my favorite childhood memories include those four boys. When we were at Grandma and Grandpa’s house together, we rode bikes and messed around in the yard, and we also played with the cases full of Matchbox and Hot Wheels cars that were kept there for…
- Confessions, Do I Really Want My Readers To Know This?, Family Fun, Food, My Kid Has Mad Skillz, Too Funny To Ignore
It Runs In The Family
The big birthday celebration on Sunday was pretty awesome: J had a really great day overall, which makes me happy. The one thing that didn’t go as planned was that Jim didn’t join us for lunch due to the fact that he was really sick. It was not only a bummer because it was J’s eighteenth, but also because we had reservations at our favorite, only-eat-there-on-special-occasions Brazilian steakhouse. For those of you who aren’t familiar, what makes this kind of restaurant unique is that there is no menu; rather everyone gets to enjoy the “salad bar” first, which is huge and actually has very little salad on it. It’s got…
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Disney Magical Moments
I went to see “Disney On Ice” with my sister over the weekend. The advantage of attending a show like that without bringing children along–besides the lack of pressure to buy overpriced souvenirs and being among the first people out of the parking lot when it’s over because you don’t have to worry about getting anybody into a carseat–is that it’s the perfect environment for people-watching and taking in the magical moments of total strangers. We saw countless little girls dressed as Disney princesses, all sparkly from head to toe and brimming with excitement over, well, everything. Two sisters, about four and six years old, were leaning on the guardrail…