I had a wonderful Christmas!
My family and I, always celebrate on Christmas Eve.
This year was no different. My kids and best friend were here and we feasted on my family's traditional Christmas foods. Breaded Pork Cutlets, Homemade Pizza "Farone style" Potato salad,
Penne Pasta, Ham and of course Cresent cookies, because it would just not be Christmas without them!

It's been a long time!.....but I'm back!


I know I've been bad about posting on a regular basis. Life gets in the way.


Looking back on the last few months, I've been busy!


September....
my PSMWG buddies.... plus "I" & "E" ....
(I=Irene= Winnie's mom. E=Evelyn=Sheila's mom.) spent the weekend at the cottage at Madison-on-the-Lake! We were the "PSMWGIE's"..... it's the first time we ever let any other "letters" in our group!


The cottage, is one of the group of cottages, where we hold our annual YA YA. The cottage was a little smaller, and only had one bathroom, but we made do. It was so much fun doing NOTHING for 2 days! It was great having the moms with us. We wore our: "WHAT HAPPENS WITH THE GIRLFRIENDS, STAYS WITH THE GIRLFRIENDS" T-shirts, that Winnie got us. Sheila gave us "customized" necklines! We sat and watched the lake, that was only a few yards from our Cottage, A LOT.

I found really cool little frosted glasses at the thrift store and decided to decorated them to use for candle holders. I hand stamped them, with coffee cups, phrases like "cherish friends" and embellished them with tiny crystals. I added each PSMWG's name and dropped in a candle. They really liked them.


For the moms, I made them an "initial" necklace, complete with lots of glitter and bling!


I also passed out matching PJ's that I got from my work, for just a penny a pair!! what a deal!
Even the moms got cozy flannel loungers.
We played Jacks.. yes Jacks!.. and the moms kicked our butts!!!
We ate a lot, laughed a lot...it was such a great time and I can't wait till we do it again!

Just one month later, I was back again, for YA

YA! It was our 8Th annual. And as always it was
great to be together.


It was a beautiful Sunny day. Warm enough for the "Petites" to play on the beach.
The "little Petites" are really growing up. They love YA YA!









I made a little learning game for them, where I printed 5x7 photos of our (dearly departed) relatives. Each child picked a relative and had to go to each of the "Elders" (aka: my sisters, cousins and I) and "interview" them. Each elder would write a little something about the person in the picture, while telling the petite about them.
When they were done, They each got to tell everyone what they learned. Then, they got to hang (fun tack) the picture on the "YaYa wall of fame! It was a great learning experience for them.
They also worked on a cool "Dream Pillow" craft my sister Susan brought. Rita made the most awesome family calendars. It took her months to assemble.

Each page features family members photos on their birthday. As well as a collage for the month.

This year, sister Deb had a great idea to take our annual photo outdoors! we all piled on a picnic table lol..... but it held up.. thank Goodness!

We had our gift exchange. And feasted on our Traditional Tostada's and tons of other food, including Jamies Stromboli, and cute little Halloween baby cupcakes!

We discovered we had "neighbors" 2 guys staying in the other cottages. They were living there, while on the job at the Perry Nuclear Power plant nearby. One guy "Tom" had is amazing Silver "Viper" parked in the lot, that made my younger cousin drool! I'm not much into cars, but this was pretty impressive!

Tom's friend and co-worker "Greg" was also staying in one of the cottages. The were toting wood to the beach, and invited us (several times) to join them for a bonfire. When the sun was setting, I looked over and saw this gorgeous fire just a few yards from the lake. It was too hard to resist!

Several of us, decided to join them and they couldn't have been nicer. They were friendly and pleasant and engaging... OK.. and Greg was adorably cute. (oh!) And he thought our YA YA was the coolest thing, and thought it was funny that "no male of walking age" was allowed to attend! lol

Tom, took my "drooling" cousin to Kmart ... yes... in the amazing Viper. They picked up every kind of Marshmallows you could imagine. Big ones, small, flavored & coconut. He even bought us fancy-shmancy retractable marshmallow forks.

It was sooo wonderfully relaxing, just watching the fire, listening to the waves... and staring at the cute guy .. :D

We said thanks, with cupcakes and Tostada's.

And as hard as it was, I pulled my self away to go back to my YA YA party.

Finally, a couple weeks ago...

Patti, her sister Cindy, Winnie and I got to have lunch with our former Jr. high school English teacher/Cheer leading advisor, Mrs. Badger..

Patti coordinated the lunch, and it was so awesome to see her again.

Mrs. Badger is the teacher that everyone loved and always remembered.

She looked great! Her long dark "that Girl" hair, was now short, pure white and gorgeous.

She still had that twinkle.. (ya.. she really had a twinkle) in her eyes, and that charming way about her.
We poured over old years books, caught up on the past 38 years. We sat for 3 hours reminiscing, about those days.

It was such a great opportunity, to see her again.

Sooo..

All these pictures I posted, move as I type, and try as I may, I'm sure when I publish this, they'll still have huge gaps in between. I need to go to "Blog 101"... or learn more about HTML.

Oh well..

So.... now we're back to Standard time. And today it was dark when I left work. You know how I hate that!

This weekend, is another Sister birthday weekend. This time it's Susan's birthday we'll be celebrating. I can't believe Thanksgiving is just a couple weeks away! It's been said a ba-zillion times before... but time really does fly by. I'm already on Spring countdown!

the Saturday, I'll be (reluctantly) going to my 35th... High school reunion. I really have nooo desire to go... and I'm being dragged against my will. After our boring 20th, I swore I'd never go to another one. Seeing people I don't remember or care to. I know that sounds really bad. I love

seeing old friends, but at the 20th. These people who, were "hippie types" and oh so cool, had become "old" even telling the DJ to turn the music down!!!.......WHAT??.......

The people I love I already see.

Oh well... I guess I'll just suck it up and go.

So that's it, the highlights of my last 3 months

... you can resume your life, now that your caught up with mine :D

Have a great Thanksgiving, and I'll try to

post more often. I know how much you miss me..

... hello?... anyone out there?......... Twyla?... Lindsey?..

anybody??.

...hahahahahah!!! ............

ENJOY THE REST OF THE PICTURES BELOW

A TOURIST VIEW

(note: all text in bold caps is a link..having technical problems changing the link colors)


Have you ever taken a tour of your own city?
I did, and it was a blast!
With my daughter Jamie and my Sister Deb
We love our hometown of Cleveland, Ohio.
It's a beautiful city, with a great history and full of things to do and see. Including of course the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame, Great Lakes Science Center as well as great restaurants and shops.
Click on the links I provided, to learn more about some fun things in CLEVELAND!

Jamie, who recently started a new job in downtown Cleveland, and also became a volunteer for "Positively Cleveland" suggested going downtown and do the "tourist thing" It was so much fun!



With a nice early start, our first stop... Taking a
Rapid ride Downtown!..... believe it or not, it was my first Rapid ride... Jamie's too! The Rapid station was..... eh.... interesting. But the ride was really fun! In about 20 minutes we were at Tower City. Tower City, is the Major landmark of Downtown Cleveland. Originally referred to as The Terminal Tower, it was re-vamped and turned into a beautiful shopping mall complete with food court, dancing waters and of course the Rapid terminal. After a few quick pics of the gorgeous lobby and ornate ceiling We were on Public square. It was a gorgeous morning and perfect for touring. After a few pics on the Square,


we headed to 4th street,
4th. Street for coffee and a cab.
along with so many areas of downtown, was recently renovated, and it's gorgeous! Featuring cool little Bistro's, Pickwick n Frolic restaurant, House of Blues and Lola, owned by our own Iron Chef, Michael Symon.



We called for a cab, and by the time we got to the corner he was there! now that's service!

He was the friendliest cab driver ever.

He greeted us with a great big smile and "good morning ladies!"... put out a step stool and assisted each of us into the cab!


It was a short ride, down to Settler's landing, to begin our guided walking tour of the river, Where Cleveland's history begins. It was fun and interesting. they even had actors portraying historical characters. I was surprised how much I didn't know about the beginnings of Cleveland.

The 1 1/2 hour tour ended at Settler's landing, at the (replica) of Lorenzo Carter's log cabin. Carter was the first settler in the area. Our awesome tour guide dressed in period clothing, gave us a good idea of what life was like in those days.



We stopped for lunch in the historic Flat Iron Cafe and the food was awesome!

We decided to walk off our lunch, and headed up to the West 6th. street fair.
Great music from the steel drum band at one end of the street, and the Jazz music at the other end.

We called for another cab, and headed down to the Flats once again, to catch Lolly the Trolley for an hour long ride through Downtown. It was awesome too!
There were "real" tourists on the Trolley, but I think we were the ones acting like it and taking so many pictures! Our tour guide was great, he even

dropped everyone off at their desired locations, instead of the Flats, which saved us the cost of another cab!

We headed back to Tower City, to catch the Rapid back home. We got on and asked someone if this train went to 150th...... they said yep! Why is it you assume everyone else knows where they're going?..... well... each person that got on after us... asked the same thing lol..

We got home, worn out but happy!
It was a great day with my daughter and sister.

We want to do it again soon, next time we'll take the longer Lolly tour, and hopefully, the gorgeous, newly renovated Terminal observation deck will be open.

So enjoy this little cyber tour of my city, Cleveland, Ohio.
(the pics somehow got out of order.. but still fun!)

Take a tour of your city too!