Tag: family

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Family/Travel

Easter weekend {part 1}

Both my grandparents & {just within the last few months} Jason’s parents, live close to Myrtle Beach. One set north & the other south. We decided to take an extra day off {Monday} & split up our Easter weekend visiting both.

Since I took over 200 photos within the four days, I figured this weekend’s wrap up is definitely going to encompass at least two posts. It all started with a pack list {I make one before all trips}. As the first beach trip of the year, I packed all my new Lilly favorites! {I grossly over-packed!}

We left Friday morning and got down in time for a chilly rainy day of shopping with Mom & Nana {successful as Mom bought the dress for my brother’s wedding!}.

Followed by shrimp appetizers, pork bbq along with roasted rosemary potatoes. Dessert was from a recent church bake sale: homemade chocolate cake & cheesecake with farmer’s market fresh raspberries, blackberries & strawberries.

Mom borrowed my Allora necklace. I love it with her yellow cardigan!

We ended the evening on the couch watching Morning Glory {even cuter than we expected}.

Saturday was beautiful. The beach was breezy so mid-afternoon we headed to the back porch lounges for naps, reading {I finished Black Heels to Tractor Wheels!} & more sun!

Bocce proved to be a willing model though Nana & I couldn’t get him to jump again. How awesome is the view from their back deck & Nana’s flowers?!

We had easy peasy chips & salsa for appetizers. Dinner Saturday night was fresh off the boat baked blackened grouper with farmer’s market corn on the cob, cucumber & tomato salad, & green beans.

Pawpaw, Bocce, Suz self-portrait, food & Easter baskets!

Easter weekend isn’t complete without dying eggs. Mom & I were the most excited about this tradition. I welded the craynon {though some names showed up better than others} while Mom was hands on with blue & pink finger tips at the end to prove it. Dad wanted an ugly dipped-in-all-the-colors egg. Instead he ended up with the prettiest deep purple one!

We redbox’d & watched The Social Network then part of Due Date {before the DVD player messed up & I fell asleep}.

We woke up to Easter baskets with candy & coin filled eggs {since we were leaving after church Nana skipped the usual hunt & hide them inside at the bottoms of our candy filled baskets}. Sadly, I left my phone on the charger so no photos of the 5000 person beach church service from Easter morning. I never feel the Spirit closer than on the beach. Hope you & your family had a happy Easter!

{part two coming tomorrow}

Categories
Family/Travel Food

Family Saturday Night

After the SPCA Dog Walk, Mom & I ran a few errands. We stopped at Costco for last few ingredients for that nights dinner. We also picked up lunch for four of us for $8 {can’t beat that right?!}.

My parents had offered to host my brother’s future in laws & family to dinner last Saturday. There was a total of 12 of us. So after errands we rushed home to prepare. Mom had made a shrimp & crab pasta casserole the night before {it was awesome! I will be sure to post the recipe when she sends it to me}. We put together a salad with greens, strawberries, mandarin oranges, & mushrooms. We snapped the asparagus so it was ready to throw in the oven while the casserole was baking.

Mom had planned some great appetizers too. We made her famous meatballs {Jason had almost half of them!}. I also put together a recipe she’d told me about last time I was there since she know I love hummus. Crazy enough I saw it posted on one of the cooking blogs I follow this week. {I don’t remember which one but she called it her friend’s famous recipe!} I think her copy of the ripped-off-the-back-of-hummus-container recipe called it 5-Layer Greek Dip.
Ingredients
1 pkg hummus (we used larger size of roasted red pepper)
1 pkg crumbled feta cheese
1/2 c chopped tomatoes {we used quartered cherry}
1/4 c chopped cucumbers
2 T chopped kalamata olives {we omitted because we forgot to buy!}
Spread hummus on the bottom of a 9 inch pie plate. Cover with the remaining ingredients. We refrigerated for a couple hours then served with pita chips.

Top photo taken in the frig 🙂

Beth’s brother Chris’ wife Emily is quite the cook. Like I’m in awe of cook. She brought a veggie pizza & a made from scratch lavender blueberry pie {see what I mean!}. Since my Dad’s birthday was Tuesday, we had also picked up a Cotco cake for dessert.

 

Emily & Chris have two awesome children. Marley is 4 and Miles is 2. They were so well behaved even though Miles wasn’t feeling so hot. Mom was a little worried what we’d do to entertain two young children in their not-childproofed-house. She decorated for Easter last Friday & got excited when she found Easter eggs. Y’all, while the guys played pool & watched basketball in the basement, Emily, Mom, Beth, Janie, Marley, Miles & I hid & found eggs for probably two hours!

Marley is quite the ham. Emily has a DSLR, so she’s used to being photographed & loved it while I pulled out mine. I’d show her a photo I’d taken, & she’d say “ok. another one”. {She’s a much more willing model than Moekitty & Jason!}

With upcoming wedding events this summer & fall, it was so nice to have a low key night to get to know everyone better! Can’t wait to hang out with the fam & my brother’s soon-to-be family again soon!

After everyone left the four of us were all smiles over how much fun we had together. Also how cool & bright was the moon that night?!

Categories
Family/Travel

Richmond SPCA Dog Walk

This past Saturday, my mom, future-sister-in-law Beth, her step-mom Janie & I participated in the Richmond SPCA‘s 5k & Dog Walk. Beth had signed up a while ago & after giving a donation Mom & I decided we wanted to do even more. This weekend worked out well to go up to VA and have a meet-the-future-family get together!

Janie, Mom, Beth & I posed before the 5k. Admittedly, we walked & chatted & definitely brought up the back of the pack. But we had a great time getting to know Janie & catching up with each other.

We had about 45 mintues in between the 5k and the 1 mile dog walk. We decided to check out the SPCA & the dogs & cats. I’ve never been inside another SPCA, but I’d image this is one of the nicer ones. The cats photo’d belong were in two different cat condos. They big rooms filled floor to ceiling with cat favorite things: ramps, drawers pulled out as beds, cubby holes, beds, & Saturday, lots of visitors to impress. That little black & white cat stole my heart.

My brother, Steven, & his future-father-in-law Rob joined us with my “niece” Quin for the walk. She was one of the smaller of the dogs out there among Great Dane, a Irish Wolfhound {probably one of the coolest dogs I’ve ever seen}, English Mastiff, lots of labs, goldens, & muts. There were a few tiny dogs, including the one the lady was holding below who was wearing glasses! I was happily surprised how quiet & well behaved they all were. Quin was so happy & excited & she definitely was leading our family pack. Beth & Steven said she was spent though & slept the rest of the day!

The Richmond SPCA has continued it’s donation efforts for the next couple of days. If you like what you saw here & want to help out this awesome no-kill SPCA, please feel free to visit my page “Quin’s Family” to make a donation.

Categories
Family/Travel

Happy Birthday Ma

Today would have been a day of celebration.  Phone calls from family, friends stopping by, a candle in her cake & ice cream with lunch & maybe dinner too.  Weekends before & after with family & flowers & gifts.
 
 
Instead, I’m sitting here today thinking about Ma & thankful for the 85 years of celebration we had. 86 would have been fun.  Instead we’re left remembering the fun times of the past, thankful that we have digital photos {happily rediscovered recently} from our trips to Vegas, Williamsburg, Hilton Head & Ocean Isle; graduations, weddings & showers in GA, NC & VA.
 

We love you Ma!  Happy birthday.  Hope Jesus & passed on family & friends are throwing you an awesome birthday party in Heaven.
Categories
Family/Travel Photography

Our New Years Weekend aka picture overload

We had opened spouse gifts going oldest to youngest order (I was last), so we did family gifts youngest to oldest (I was third). My brother opened a video game, golf club & Santa gave Steven & Beth a wine frig. Thanks to Beth’s Amazon & Crate & Barrel registries, she received a lot of things she really wanted. Mom & Nana both opened more Pandora charms as well as a few clothes & nick nacks.
Dad’s big gifts were a Tassamo coffee maker from the kids & $$ towards building a computer from Nana & Pawpaw. Jason & I’s BIG gift was the Nikon D5000 {I saved it for the last gift opened!}. We also received a NCSU welcome sign that I want to frame, an owl ornament, a Lilly agenda, lip glosses, Amazon gift cards, a polo, scarf, pj pants. Everyone received OIB Floatilla long sleeve Ts!


So from now on {actually you saw a few preview photos in my last 2 posts}, expect to see a lot of photos! Hopefully they are much better than the ones I’ve take myself on our old Sony point & shoot, or worse my 3 year old cell phone, or borrowed {read stolen} from friends picasa/facebook/blogs. I look forward to looking at my first days pictures in a year or two from know and being even better.

So, thanks to picnik, here’s a few collages of photos from New Years Day & then once I returned home last Sunday. ps- dogs are much better models for trying out the Pet Portraits than cats. Oh and my parent’s old bird Nick & his cage were tough models too.
I stayed on AUTO for most, but ventured on the SCENE mode for pets, party mode, candlelight & even made my brother try out his new golf club so I could use the sports mode. 🙂 I watched the how-to DVDs Sunday afternoon. I’m no where near brave enough to go to the P, M, A or S modes yet, but I plan to take enough photos this year that I hopefully get comfortable with them sooner than later.

Jason & I came back early Sunday so he could watch the Falcons at home. We also HAD to take down our tree. After being gone 10 days & it receiving little water during that time, it was beyond looking rough. Thanks to the dead tree shedding so much & Moe puking up a bag Jason left out, our carpets also got cleaned & vacuumed Sunday.


I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Saturday & Sundays meals. In case you missed it on my twitter feed, I tweeted the Pioneer Woman {remember we’re friends since we met last June} & asked her what we should pare with her mashed potatoes & a beef tenderloin. She said {AHH that’s right, she wrote me back!} her burgundy mushrooms so we went with them as well as my mom’s broccoli casserole. Mom & Nana traditionally do something different with the meat, but since we were kinda having a PW meal already, we tried her roasted beef tenderloin recipe from her cookbook which is pretty much this recipe.


Since I don’t eat pork/beef, I didn’t try it, but even as he ate it Sunday night for the second night in a row, Jason continued to oooh & ahhhh over it! Guess that’s something we’ll repeat for next year.