Wednesday, June 1, 2016

New Blog--Come See Me!





Hello to my few faithful readers!  :)  Since we are now retired and living in Dallas, I decided to start a new blog instead of continuing this one.  Thanks for reading,  and I hope you will join me at Postcards from Retirement.  I'd love to hear from you!

Friday, January 8, 2016

New Year's in Clyde

We loaded up and drove to Clyde on New Year's Eve to spend a few days with Susan, Corey and kids.  Susan and Corey had previously made plans to get together with friends so we were going to keep the grandkids. When we arrived, Corey said they weren't going out after all because he was going to have to work, but he had time to go to dinner with all of us and Karen first.

 Karen and me
 Susan and Aidan
 Corey and Susan
Ally and Grandpa

As it turned out, Corey's job got cancelled so the kids went out after dinner and we went back to the house with the grandkids to enjoy reading books out loud, playing many games of "Sorry," "Jenga," and "Connect Four" and chatting about life. Rich also found a cool puzzle game for his iPad called "Monument Valley" and the kids loved working on it.  Aidan and Ally are both super sweet and fun to be with, and  they still don't mind hanging out with their grandparents, thankfully!  We managed to stay up for the ball drop in NYC and just like that, it's 2016!

 "Sorry!"
"Monument Valley"

The next day we hung out at the house for the most part and then drove into Abilene in the early evening to take the kids to see the Chipmunk movie, not my first choice, but there weren't too many kid friendly movies showing. Imagine our surprise when we arrived and found it to be sold out!  Aidan and Ally weren't that upset but, oh my goodness, you should have seen the other little kids sobbing when their parents told them they wouldn't be able to go!  It was sad and funny all at the same time.  :)

So we went to get something to eat, wandered the mall briefly, and on the way out stopped at Books a Million to see if we could find a different board game.  I'd meant to bring our "Mexican Train" game with us but had forgotten it at Sarah's so I was going to look for it but the store didn't have any.  We settled on one called "Rack-o," which I'd never heard of, but the box said it was "family fun for the last 50 years!" and Rich recalled that they had the game when he was a kid.  Stopped at the store for ice cream and made our way back home for a fun night of snacks and "Rack-o," which the kids ended up loving and wanting to play over and over.  Oh, yeah, while we were at the theater we'd gone ahead and bought tickets for the following morning's showing of the Chipmunk movie.

"Rack-o"
 Ally and me
Susan bundled up!

Susan had to work Saturday morning so we took the kids and met her at the theater after her shift.  I can't say I was especially enthralled with the Chipmunks but the kids seemed to enjoy it and laughed throughout, so that made it worthwhile.  Plus I got to have popcorn.

At the movie

As we were getting into the car, my friend Jim texted to see what we were up to and said he'd just made a pitcher of tea if we wanted to come by.  Susan and Corey ran some errands and went home while we took  Aidan and Ally with us to visit Jim.  I failed to get a pic but we had a nice visit getting filled in on the latest news.

Back home for more games, then out to dinner with Karen.  We had a full weekend and a very quick trip, leaving Sunday morning to drive back to Dallas.  I'm glad we now live close enough that we can pop in and visit when we want!

 Early morning snuggles before we went home.  Love and miss these sweeties!




Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Christmas!

We made gingerbread houses.  Don't believe the instructions on the box that tell you how easy and quick it is!  Sarah and I had a terrible time getting the houses to stay together and it was a good thing she'd brought extra frosting because that canned stuff sure did work a lot better than what they put in the kit!  But we did it, and the kids had a lot of fun decorating!
Sarah and I took Elle to see the Texas Ballet Theater's production of "The Nutcracker" in Fort Worth. Miles' mom and grandmother met us there.  It was beautiful and Elle loved it. I couldn't help but think of all those years my girls were in dance and participated in this show as well as many others. Sarah was the Sugarplum Fairy at one time and I asked her if she could believe she danced that role as a teenager!  I may be biased but I think she did *almost* as well as these professionals.  :)  It was a lovely day for all of us.
All of us after the show

We went to Sarah and Miles' for Christmas Eve, had dinner and exchanged gifts amongst ourselves.  Such fun!
 




 Christmas Day we went back over and joined all of Miles' family for brunch.
It was so warm we sat outside for awhile and enjoyed the sunshine





We all walked to the park to let the kids play for awhile


We were going to go to Abilene to visit Susan, Corey and kids on the 27th but the weather was bad so we have postponed it.  Can't wait to see them and then later to see Bonnie and David and kids, too.  Wish they all lived in the same town so we could spend more time together!

Arboretum

Beck is  out of school so we spent one morning at the Children's Garden at the Arboretum with Sarah and the boys. Something for everyone!