Water under the bridge

Last week we traveled with some good friends to western New York where we rented a cottage on a small lake. The cottage was in the quaint town of Batavia located between Buffalo and Rochester and while you couldn't pay me enough money to live in that part of the country from December - March, it is absolutely a beautiful place to be in the summer.

We spent the week fishing and swimming in the lake as well as visiting some of the local attractions. Since we were only an hour away, Niagara Falls topped our list of places we felt we really needed to go see.

After doing a bit of research we decided that the Canadian side of the Falls was where we wanted to be, so we loaded up the mini-vans and headed for the Falls...and parked on the American side. Apparently our friend Kris had heard from one of his friends that it was easier to park in America and then walk across the bridge to Canada -- which according to this friend equated to a walk of about 2 city blocks.

So we paid our $10.00 to park & made our way to the Falls. It was a somewhat cool overcast day, but that didn't damper our spirits (much). After we got the viewing area we realized that while the walk across the bridge itself may have only been 2 city blocks long, getting from the American viewing area to the Canadian viewing area would have been a walk closer to 3 miles. This was something that neither family was willing to take on with 4 kids under the age of 8. So, since we already paid to park, we figured we'd make the most of the attractions on the American side.



After a short time gazing at the Falls from above, while Mr. Crackers continually asked me, "What's next?", we headed to buy our Maid of the Mist tickets. Note to self: DO NOT drive to the Grand Canyon with Mr. Crackers. A 3 day drive followed by a 5 minute viewing of the Canyon while Mr. Crackers peppers me with the question "What's next?" will make my head pop off.

While I had visited Niagara Falls a couple times in my past, I've never ridden on the Maid of the Mist & I was excited (and a little nervous) to get on the boat and see the Falls from the water.

So we put on our blue ponchos and prepared ourselves for the trip.

My family...a bunch of goofballs!

Little did we know that these would be the last moments of the morning where we would see a smile on my son's face. Apparently Mr. Crackers & I had both (conveniently) forgotten that while he loves to swim and jump in the water, C hates to be splashed in the face with water. I mean he really hates it. Oops.

We boarded and at the request of our son (who may have already started to realize that he was going to get more than a little wet) we stood back a bit from the front of the boat. This was the moment I realized that I was not going to be able to take very many pictures of the Falls while standing near the front of the boat because of all the water... you would have thought the ponchos would have clued me in earlier to this fact, but it wasn't until I got that first cold spray in the face that I stuck the camera back in my pocket.

I did manage to snap a couple of shots without ruining my camera. I wish it had been a clearer day, but I was still in awe of the power of all that water crashing down. The American side of the falls was cool, but the Canadian horseshoe portion of the falls was even better (that is unless you are my son C and don't like to be splashed in the face with water AT ALL, in which case you won't really like either one of the Falls, but you will especially HATE the Canadian side)

Here's the view of the Canadian Horseshoe Falls as seen from underneath the boat's canopy where I stood with my now irate son C who kept shouting "I hate this! We are getting too wet and we are too close to the those waterfalls! I just want this to be over!" Well, at least he can say he tried it. And even though I also got nervous a couple of times, I loved it. It was a terrific experience.

After we got off the boat, we asked the kids if they were up for climbing the path that went closer to the falls and we were met with these expressions that were mixed with equal parts of crankiness, hunger, exhaustion and incredulity.



Apparently, none of them cared that the sun had finally made an appearance and that the adults could get better pictures of Niagara now. Since we were also getting tired & hungry, we beat a hasty retreat to Buffalo so we could dine on the chicken wings from Anchor Bar that made the city famous. Mmm...

After lunch, our friends decided to head over to Canada to see the Falls from that side. Based on my own children's reaction to the American side, we opted out and headed back to the lake house.

Once there, we put on our own water show.

Where my three favorite people demonstrated how much they like water that wasn't rushing by in rapids and falling down into deep gorges with tremendous power.

Water that was cool and still and begging to be disturbed with a jump or a dive.

Updates here & there

Since I know you've all been on pins and needles waiting for me to do a little follow up on some previous posts, (said with a dose of heavy sarcasm) I thought I'd catch you up on things here around the House of Crackers:

Supper Gourmet Club
You'll be happy to know that the dinner we hosted for Supper Gourmet Club on Saturday was a success. Yea! I'm sorry to say that I have no pictures to share of the evening because I was a bit stressed out about frying up my first ever batch of chicken for a group of people with discriminating palettes. (of course it could also be said I was too also too busy sampling martinis...)

The chicken turned out both crispy and juicy (which it should have been considering it spent 24 hours brining in a salt water bath, followed by another 24 hours soaking in buttermilk). It was a fun night filled with delicious southern favorites and tasty martinis. I think the star of the evening was the Bourbon Glazed Bread Pudding served with brown sugar ice cream (Haagan-Daz, I will be soon be writing a love sonnet for your brown sugar ice cream). Sweet, sweet bourbon bread pudding, where have you been all my life?

Now I just have to figure out how to get the smell of fried chicken, bacon & lard out of my house. It smelled delicious as it was all cooking Saturday night, but 2 days of living in a place that smells like KFC is starting to bring me down a little. A friend of mine suggested leaving out bowls of white vinegar & that seems to have helped a bit. If I ever make another batch of fried chicken again, I'll do it in a warmer month so I can open all the windows to air the place out a bit.

If I can't get the smell out soon, Santa will be expecting a plate of fried chicken when he comes down the chimney instead of cookies.


The Dining Room Dilemma
As a follow up to my post about my complete lack of decorating prowess, I wanted to let you know that we decided to replace the curtains in the dining room. Since the "Harry Potter" red plaid curtains in the room seemed to make Mr. Crackers' a little anxious when paired with all of the other patterns in the room, we decided to replace them with solid green panels. Of course it was also considerably less expensive than option #2 which was replacing the area rug. We hoped the new curtains would help us tie the conflicting patterns of the newly covered chairs with the patterned area rug.



Here's the result:


And from another angle:


Did it work? Hmm, good question. I will tell you that these green curtains definitely work with all of the patterns in the room better than the plaid ones they are replacing, but I'll also tell you that I definitely shouldn't be allowed in a fabric store again anytime soon.

Misplaced priorities on my to-do list
And finally, just thought I'd share what I did while K was napping today. I'm sure you are thinking I was working on the normal things that keep us all busy this time of year: writing Christmas cards or Christmas shopping or even starting to pull together my son's 7th birthday party which will be here in just a few weeks...

Nope, I spent my "down" time this afternoon organizing my spices & putting little tiny labels on them so I could actually find them quickly without doing my usual 5 minute spicy scavenger hunt.



I am very excited about the labels, don't they make it so much easier to find the spice you're looking for (yes I know I am dork, we've discussed that before haven't we)? In my defense, I will tell you that my Mom was performing the same task today & put the idea in my head so I will shift the blame to her. I'm just saying that if your Christmas cards are late this year, now you know why. It's worth though isn't it?

Thanks for the idea Mom. Hope you got your cabinets done too!

I'll take the lard... with a side of bacon

This evening Mr. Crackers & I take our turn hosting Supper Gourmet Club. Supper Gourmet Club was the brainchild of a friend of ours who thought it would be fun to get together with a group of friends once a month every other month whenever we can find time on everyone's schedule, for a night of cocktails and fine dining WITHOUT CHILDREN. While I've always had trouble referring to the dinners as Gourmet Club (which definitely sounds a like something I would not get invited to under normal circumstances) the meals themselves have definitely warranted the title.

So far we've had delicious meals inspired by the cuisines of Italy, South America & Japan. All of them featured sumptuous food & tasty wines and cocktails. Truly, they have all been meals that rival the food found in some of the best restaurants around town.

So, tonight it's time for the House of Crackers to host the group. What is the theme, you ask? Well, Mr. Crackers and I picked Southern Cuisine. You see, one of the couples in the group (the couple whose idea it was to start the club in the first place and who are the "glue" that holds the rest of us together) will be deserting abandoning moving to Atlanta sometime in the next couple of months. Since we ourselves just moved from there a few years ago, it seemed a fitting theme.

But, this meal really won't be a true Gourmet Club event, at it's heart it going to be Supper Club. While there are a lot of innovative dishes that are part of the cuisine of the "New South" this dinner will be paying homage to traditional family-style southern recipes. I will be frying up my first ever batch of fried chicken. If you've never cooked fried chicken before, let me just tell you to go to KFC instead it seems like there is a lot that could go wrong....I am feeling more than a little pressure about this evening's dining experience. I know now why I prefer getting my fried chicken right from the Colonel himself (It only takes 5 minutes of waiting in line & it always tastes good). We'll also be having wilted salad, squash casserole and bourbon glazed bread pudding.
Mmm, I think my mouth is already watering.

I hope everyone has a great time tonight & that the food will live up to the high standards set by the meals we've had in the past. But perhaps I should lower my expectations a bit. Honestly, I will just be happy if no one keels over from clogged arteries by the end of the evening. The amount of butter, bacon, mayonnaise, and (lord, help me) lard that is being used tonight to prepare these dishes may have us all wishing this night of traditional Southern cooking never happened. It's a good thing we restocked the bar.

Bon Appetit Y'all!

Squeezing the last bit of fun out of summer...

As you no doubt have noticed, I took a nice long vacation from blogging. It was due only in part to my efforts at ousting the criminal element from Gotham City. Mostly, I was busy trying to keep the kids entertained in these last weeks of summer now that day camps and vacations have faded into memory.


With school starting in just 2 weeks, we've been busy squeezing the last bit of fun out of summer while trying to get ourselves back onto some kind of schedule. So far the fun still seems to be taking up more of our time than the actual schedule following...


We took our final road trip of the summer last weekend to visit some really good friends of ours who abandoned us, fled 8 hours away to escape the wackiness of our family, moved to Pennsylvania a couple of years ago. It's so hard to find a family with kids that are the same ages as your own & who all get along well together. It's nearly impossible to do that & find a couple who share the same interests you do & whom you like to drink with hang around with. Seriously, it's so hard that even if you move 8 hours away from us, we will find you in your new home & pay you a visit.





It was great to see that the kids still really love to spend time together. We had a great weekend that included a visit to a children's amusement park, bowling, outlet shopping, Amish barbecue (I can't say that can I recommend it), some video gaming and a couple of late night drinking binges Sequence tournaments (I'm proud to say that I think the ladies took the series).

It's good to know that friends are friends no matter how far apart you live. My two hooligans have already starting asking when we will see them again. When I asked them what their favorite part of the weekend was, they both told me "everything!" I agree.

Clean carpets + a bonus!

Mr. Crackers decided it was time to clean the family room carpet today & set out to find all of the pieces and parts to our carpet steamer. After searching for 30 minutes through the tangled mess of our basement crawl space, he reported that while he was not successful in finding all the parts he needed to get that job done, he did run across a folder full of pictures he wanted me see. I opened it up & realized that the folder contained the photos that used to hang on the walls of my cubicle when I was still a workin' gal.



This picture was taken on November 16, 1996. I know this because this was the date that Mr. Crackers proposed to me. We were staying at a cabin in the Tennessee woods for a long weekend with some of our friends. The weather was beautiful and we decided to go on a hike to a local waterfall. Our good friends J, who is on the far left in the photo, and KK who is taking the picture came with us. (I won't mention the person in the yellow sweatshirt since shortly after this picture was taken he and our good friend J split up & we all discovered that Mr. Yellow Sweatshirt was not the nice guy we thought he was...) Anyhoo, Mr. Crackers surprised me & all of our friends by dropping down on 1 knee and proposing marriage in front of the above mentioned waterfall. I can say with all sincerity that we were all completely surprised by that maneuver. That Mr. Crackers can sure keep a secret! This picture was taken right before we left on that fateful walk. I had no idea what was in store for me just 2 miles down the trail.







This shot was taken in 2000 at our then annual Halloween party. At this point, Mr. Crackers & I had been married for just over 3 years. For lack of any better ideas, we decided to dress up as Earl & Arlene of Earl & Arlene's Auto Body. Two completely fictional characters plucked right out of our demented psyches. We smeared black paint all over Mr. Crackers (to simulate motor oil) and he slicked his hair back. I was teetering on very high heels & had used an entire can of hairspray on my hair to fashion it into some kind of do (clearly I have no talent with hairstyling). I was also wearing more a lot of make-up (which is hard to see on my pasty skin in this picture) and Lee Press-On Nails in bright fire engine red. In hindsight I probably should have stuffed my bra. Something tells me that Earl would've like a woman with bigger bosoms...

Here is a picture from my cubicle that was taken there. It's a picture with my good friend KK (on the right) and M one of the best assistant buyers I ever had. KK was the woman behind the camera in the first photo and was one of 3 witnesses to Mr. Crackers' marriage proposal. I had a great time working with these two ladies. There were other pictures of co-workers hanging in my cube, but I will spare you the tedium associated with those pictures. You're welcome.

The obligatory baby shot. C as an infant - just about 4 months old. Man, I hated leaving him every day to go to work. Look at those cheeks, will ya'? I want to just reach into that picture and plant a big sloppy kiss on them.





Here's another picture of C - he's just about 10 months old. This was the most recent picture I had of him in my cube, even though he was 18 months old when I resigned & I got the heck out of Dodge (Atlanta) to head back home to Ohio.





These days, the size of my work space has increased. Instead of a cube, I've got the entire house as my working domain. You'll be happy to know I've updated the pictures.

Mr. Crackers never did find that part for our steamer, but you can't keep that man down for long. He went ahead to our local home improvement store and rented one for the day. Mr. Crackers, after 12 years of marriage you're still my hero!

The last time I went on a cruise W's Dad was our President.

As you've read in previous posts, the Cracker family is about to head southward for a Disney cruise with the rest of the extended Cracker clan. As the week goes by, I've gotten more excited about the trip. But, thinking about cruising brings up a fond memory of my first cruise. The year was 1990 and my best girlfriends from high school and I went on a 3 day cruise to Nassau.

We were just 20 years old at the time - just kids really. Check out those sunglasses will ya'? We were all attending different colleges, but had remained close and decided we should go away for a girl's weekend. It was a complete blast. I don't remember all the details (I probably have early onset Alzheimer's), but I do remember laughing a lot.

Oddly one of the only details I do remember isn't even something involving one of my friends. It was the fact that our waiter and our room steward were both named Juan. One was much taller than the other, so we referred to them as Big Juan and Little Juan. They were close to our age, and we had fun joking around with them while we were on the ship. By the end of our journey we just referred to them as a unit, the "Magic Juans."

Speaking of big and little, here are my 2 friends P & T. P is 6'3" tall, and hilarious! She kept us laughing all through high school. She was (and probably still is) an phenomenal basketball player. She played both in high school and college. T is just 4'11" and I've known her since we were in 1st grade together. These days she's a pediatrician & has 3 little kids of her own.

Here are our other 3 cruising partners - R, M and Kelly. R is a big wig muckity muck at a ginormous consumer products company. She's traveled the world, gotten an MBA at Wharton, participated in triathlons and marathons and was recently married. Despite all this, we still really like her. M went to college with me here in Ohio, then went to work for a major insurance company. She still works for them, but now she lives way out in Denver with her husband and 2 girls. Kelly, you may remember from previous posts. Kelly is one of my favorite people on the planet. She's funny and generous and has a beautiful 11 year old daughter who will hopefully babysit my own hooligans someday. She also shares my somewhat warped view of the world which makes me happy.

Looking back at these pictures I remember how fun it was to be 20 and single. I remember how wonderful it was to have such good friends to share fun times with. Lord knows I was not worried about any of them throwing a temper tantrum every evening at dinner. Seriously, there were no tears over the fact that Honey-Nut Cheerios wasn't on the menu. I also didn't have to pack a million books and diversions to avoid meltdowns. I might be digressing a bit here, but my point is I traveled much lighter in those days.

I am lucky to have such good friends and I'm happy to say that I still keep in touch with all of these girls to some degree.

I'm hoping that this week's cruise will be just as much fun as my last one! I'm also hoping I am better able to remember the details once I get home.

More kind of famous people I sort of know

Yesterday afternoon I was doing my most hated chore - the ironing. It is the bane of my existence. I refuse to even look at the ever growing pile of wrinkled clothes until it is taller than my youngest child. Once it reaches this height, I start working from the top and iron until the pile shrinks to about 8-12 inches tall and then I stop to take a rest. At this point, I run screaming out of the room my attention gets diverted from the few remaining items that need ironing and I set off to do something less futile and mind numbing else. There are probably items at the bottom of that basket that haven't seen the light of day in years. I should just clean it out & donate those bottom feeders to charity. At least then someone would get a chance to finally wear them.

Well honestly, what I really should do is just get my dryer fixed so that the clothes are actually dry when it stops running. About half of the time, my dryer stops working once everything is about 85% dry. It shuts itself down and the clothes sit in this giant, slightly damp pile for 15-20 minutes until I realize that I can no longer hear the dryer running. I hit the start button again, but by this point the damage has already been done. And this, my friends, is why I have such a crazy big pile of ironing to do. My dryer manages to set the deepest wrinkles I have ever seen into clothing that would normally never need to be pressed. But, I digress....

To make the time pass more quickly & help dull the pain of this dreaded task, I was watching a little HGTV. The show Designer's Challenge started up and about 30 seconds into the show, I heard a familiar voice. I looked up & there was my friend Chris -on TV! Holy Flashback! Chris & I worked together ages ago in Atlanta when I was a buyer. I haven't seen her in at least 6 years. She and her husband were on the show to have the great room in their beautiful lake home redecorated by a professional interior designer.

A flood of memories hit me when I saw her. I remembered that she was completely hilarious. She kept us all laughing even during the most stressful times at work (which were plentiful). I also remembered attending her wedding and shortly thereafter getting an invitation to the new home that she and her husband had just bought.

I was excited about the dinner because at the time Mr. Crackers & I didn't have any "couple" friends. We had a group of buddies who we hung out with, but they were mostly my single girl friends (I try not to take it personally that all of Mr. Cracker's male cohorts fled his side like rats on a sinking ship after we started dating seriously. Maybe it was just a coincidence that they all stopped returning his calls once they met me...). Mr. Crackers was a good sport about this, but I knew he needed a friendship that included a little more testosterone.

Anyway, I thought the evening was fraught with possibility. I had met Chris' husband several times & he was both funny and friendly. I thought that he and Mr. Crackers would get along swimmingly.

When we pulled up to their house, we noted right away that it was quite big, at least by the standards you'd expect of a couple in their 20's. It was in the suburbs, about a 35 minute drive north from our little bungalow in the city. We also noticed 2 new cars & a new boat in their driveway. It turns out that Chris' husband had gotten into the real estate market and was apparently doing very well for himself.

We collectively had one of those moments, where you get just a little bit jealous & start thinking "Hey, where's my boat? Where's my new car?" At the time, I was still driving my tampon mobile (see here) & Mr. Crackers was driving a car that had no radio or air conditioner. We loved our little house, but it was in an area euphemistically referred to as "in transition". We didn't necessarily live in the 'hood, but we lived right next door to it and were always expecting to get robbed on our way to the front door.

Still, we managed to rise above our envy and pettiness. I mean, if you can't have a boat yourself, the next best thing is a good friend with a boat. Right? Right?

Anyway, we headed inside for dinner and learned something important that evening. Just because you like two people & think they are funny, it does not guarantee that you will "click" as a couple. Nope, if memory serves it was an awkward dinner that never really got off the ground. It was filled with some lengthy silences and stiff smiles. After the meal, we thanked them for their hospitality and then beat a path back to the 'hood and our small cottage. I think we both knew that we wouldn't be getting another invitation.

Oh well, the years have passed and it looks like Chris and her husband still have a boat & a really, really big house (did I mention this one was on a lake?). The good news is that they were both also as nice and funny as I remember. It's nice that some things don't change.

This is why I don't have any famous friends.....

About 8 months ago my friend Kelly told me about the website Goodreads. Have you seen this site before? If you like to read, you really need to check it out. Goodreads allows each member to input the books they have read or would like to read. It also allows you to assign a rating for those books & to write a review if you'd like. Kelly & I are avid readers, and she pointed out it that it was a great way to learn about new books & to keep up with what we were both reading. I joined and quickly found out that she was right. It's a great resource for finding new reading material.



Before I found Goodreads, I had either gone to the library or book store & stared at the book covers until I found one that looked appealing. This was a fun way to pass the time before I had children. Now, however when I tried to look for new books this way I found that my 2 hooligans would often run wildy around the store or library screaming at the top of their lungs while other patrons and store/library personnel glared at me disapprovingly not stand still long enough for me to make my selection. So, I often found myself either re-reading the same books I already owned over & over again or waiting for my Mom to feed me her books once she was done reading them.

Once I signed up & joined the site, I spent the first few evenings updating my online reading library & included many books that I had read over the past few years (you knew I was a geek right? The fact that I not only took the time to do this, but also enjoyed doing it shouldn't really surprise you....). After that was accomplished I went ahead and gave them all a ranking from 1 to 5 stars. Because I had read a lot of the books more than once, it was a pretty easy task.


Since the spring, I've used the site a lot and have gotten many really good recommendations on both fiction and non-fiction. I have seen my virtual library of books read and my pile books to read grow pretty steadily. I have even written some of my own reviews on the site.


Now let's flash forward to yesterday. I checked my emails & there was a Goodreads friend request from someone named Charlotte Hughes. "Hmm'" I thought to myself, "that name sounds familiar." Then I realized why: Charlotte Hughes is an author. She has written several books in partnership with Janet Evanovich (one of my all-time favorite authors) and has also written many books on her own.

I had no idea, why she wanted to be my friend, but I approved her online friendship eagerly, especially once I saw that I was only one of 10 other friends she had on the site. I felt special...hand picked by a New York Times best selling author as her friend. OK, I realize she doesn't really know me & yes, I know that this does not mean we are friends in any real sense of the word. But still, it was pretty cool.


Then I went to my on-line library of books & typed in her name. I soon discovered that despite the fact I have read a few of her books, only one is listed on my virtual bookshelf. I clicked to see what book it was & I noticed that I had only given her book 3 out of 5 stars! Yikes - this did not bode well for our virtual friendship. Then I looked closer & saw that I had also reviewed her book.

Here is what I wrote about her novel What Looks Like Crazy:
"I read this book because I did enjoy the books Charlotte Hughes co-wrote with Janet Evanovich. I enjoyed the characters & the story, but I felt like it was a bit too short & left a lot of loose ends dangling. It looks like this is part of a series, but even knowing that, I felt like this book could have been developed more. It was ejoyable, but a little disappointing"



OMG!!!!

First of all, how many times can I use the words enjoy and book in a 4 sentence paragraph? Secondly, check out the way I misspell the only nice part of my review on this novel: It was ejoyable?!? Aaarrrggh! This woman is an author & I did a terrible job of writing a lukewarm review of one of her books. Seriously, I think my new virtual friendship is off to a bit of a rocky start (I also think I need to stop writing reviews on the site until I can improve my writing skills!).

I now feel compelled to read her entire library of books & give them all 5 stars to redeem myself. Do you think she'll sense my desperation? Would that come off as too needy? I think the pressure of our new friendship may be getting the better of me. I mean, if she truly wants to be my friend, she'll appreciate my honest opinions, no matter how poorly written they are, right?

I'm starting to think she was trying to delete my poorly written review & accidentally hit the wrong button. She probably got my acceptance email of our friendship online & has been trying to figure out how to break off the relationship ever since. Is there even a way to do that in Goodreads? Well, until she figures it out, I get to tell everyone that one of my friends has been on the New York Times best seller list.

Don't worry Kelly, I'm not replacing you as a friend. Clearly relationships with the famous & well written are just too much for me to handle! Charlotte can just go ahead and dump me whenever she wants. I'll stick with you (besides you have too much dirt on me from our days in high school together. You'd be far too dangerous to alienate!).

A few blasts from my (sister's) past

This afternoon I was cleaning up our guest room in anticipation of some friends who will be coming to stay with us for a few days right after Christmas. I was sorting through the myriad of crap stuff we've crammed placed in the room over the past year in order to clear some drawer space for our guests. I was desperately searching for a place to stash a couple of afghans when I remembered that the trunk currently serving as a TV stand in the room was empty.


Or so I thought... I opened the trunk & came upon a bunch of photos. Some were of a vacation that Mr. Crackers & I took before C was born, and some of them were of my sister Linda & I. In today's blog, I have chosen to humiliate my sister! Just kidding, Linda the pictures are very flattering. Seriously! (As you will see we look nothing alike, but trust me, we're sisters. We both have the same painful scars happy memories to prove it!) I told Linda I had come across some pictures of her that I was going to post & she seemed to get a little worried. Puh-lease! I don't think she's ever taken a bad picture in her life. See for yourself...

Egads! My best guess on this picture is somewhere circa 1989 or 1990. I am basing this on hair style, the color of my parent's carpeting (did we really have rust colored carpeting in the living room Mom? Somehow I must've have blocked that out) and the pets we are holding - that's Bandit the cat & Tibbs our beloved basset/beagle mix. Is it me or do those pointsettias need some water? And Linda, there are those pegged pants I was talking about! Nice!

I think this is a picture of her when she joined her sorority - so I am thinking maybe this was around 1990 or 1991? Am I right Linda? Anyway, she was worried I'd be mocking her big hair, but I gotta say it, I've always loved this picture of her. Isn't she beautiful? Seriously, I've always been jealous of her photogenicness (leave me alone, I know that is probably not a word, but you know what I mean). And look at that hair! Sure there's a lot of it, but it just works on her, darn it!



OK, I definitely know the year here....this is at my college graduation back in 1992. God, could I be any shorter? I promise you we share the same parents, but you just wouldn't guess it by looking at us would you? Don't even get me started about chest size -talk about differences! I think I was absent the day cleavage was being passed out...but that may be a blog for a different day (or then again maybe not!)

I'm going back to the guessing game here on the year. A little help here please? This was taken at my friend Kelly's wedding sometime in the early-mid nineties (Geez, my memory is getting really bad. Pretty soon I'll be forgetting my children's names!) That's Linda laughing & generally having a great time. I'm the one catching flies, or singing, or asking Linda to check my tonsils? Well, I really have no idea what I could be doing there.

I am one of those people who take horrid candid shots. Seriously, warn me before you take a picture. Give me a chance to compose myself for heaven's sakes. Most of the time I have some totally whacked expression on my face that just does not translate well on film. It's a good thing I have no acting talent, because I'd be all over the tabloids with the most unflattering pictures imaginable if I were famous (or talented).

I'm not trying to trick you, this is not my sister Linda, but I had to include this picture. That is my friend Kelly of the aforementioned wedding. A seriously beautiful bride, is she not?! The only thing that concerns me with this photo are the shoulder pads. Wowee! Those things are huge! The poor photographer could barely fit us & our shoulders in the picture together. But again, a lovely picture of my friend Kelly. What year was this anyway? A little help please!

And now I am off to finish off my cleaning project. Who knows what I will find next?
Be afraid, be very afraid..