A good time was had by all

Easter cometh and Easter goeth! The time between Friday night and Sunday morning flew by, as it always does on a holiday weekend. Here's a recap of some of the good times.

When there are little kids here, everyone makes time for stories.

 Lunch time and 'nack time roll around fairly often. It's always a good 

opportunity to catch up on the latest ways to goof around.

 Skype time with Cousin Hannah and Cousin Viv in North Carolina is a MUST. 

School buses play a big role in play time. Owen is showing his mommy 

a bus while she stretches after her long, long, long run.

Ethan likes some quiet time with his school bus.

Grandpappy and Weston enjoy a bit of snuggle time together.

With so much going on, Westy spends a lot of time 

keeping an eye on the bigger kids.

At the end of a long day of fun, these boys are ready for bath time.

After a soak in the tub, it's fun to have a little toga time. Westy is telling 

the bigger boys a wild story about fun times in the infant room at daycare. 

They can all relate, because they've been there...done that.

 It's important to have plenty of time for cousins to hang out 

(some more than others) on the couch.

This morning, it was Easter egg hunt time. The boys grabbed their

Easter baskets, put their bunny ears on, and hopped across the street 

to the church yard to look for shiny and sparkly eggs deposited earlier 

by two of Ralph the Bunny's able assistants.

This is all I can show you at this time, since the official egg hunt
photos are on Charlie's camera.

 Hannah and Viv, we miss you and we wish you'd been with us
this weekend for some quality cousin time!

McD's and me

Time to talk to myself for a while again. I've been thinking about my relationship with McDonald's, as in the "Golden Arches." A recent trip through the local McD's drive-through prompted memories of past experiences there.

McD's isn't on my list of favorite fast food restaurants, although I do like an Egg McMuffin with real/fake bacon now and then. There was a time when I looked forward to a  McD's cheeseburger, but it's been 20 years or more since I've eaten one. I can  still conjure up the smell and taste of the bun, burger, cheese, mustard, ketchup, onion, and pickles and even imagine myself trying Mayor McCheese's favorite burger again. I used to special order mine with mustard and pickles only, but rarely did the fry cook actually fix it that way. I'd discover that he or she had ignored my request when I took the second  or third bite, and then I'd curse under my breath at the unwelcome mingling of ketchup and onion with my preferred condiments. In fact, it was rare that ANY order, standard or "special" came through the drive-through window the way I ordered it.

This all started back in 1981 (is that right, Larry?), when our family returned from the year in Ohio that Larry/Dad/Paco was on a leave from Gustavus. Friends in St. Peter had kept us up to date with local news while we were gone, including the exciting arrival of a McDonald's restaurant on the north end of town. A few days after returning to Minnesota, we decided to take our family to the new hot spot in town and live it up with burgers, fries, and kids' meals. Our order had some mistakes, but we gave the McD's the benefit of the doubt because everything was so new.

However, a pattern of wrong items in our orders emerged on subsequent visits to the Golden Arches, and we patiently, at first and not so patiently later, went back to the counter to get the missing McNuggets or Coke or fries. No kidding--this happened EVERY TIME we went to McD's as a family for supper or ordered food in the drive-through. There were times that I ordered only a diet cola at the drive-through window and STILL got the wrong item!  Now I see it as a sign that we should have stayed at home and fixed our own food.

Fast forward to the present. Recently I've discovered the deliciousness of McD's chilled coffee drinks, and this has prompted me to give Mickey D one more chance. Things change. Or do they?

What a fool I was to think that I could order a skim (a.k.a. nonfat) iced latte with no flavoring added and actually get one! It doesn't seem to matter if I'm in St. Peter, Mankato, Rochester, or Owatonna. Here's what I've gotten instead, even after repeating the order two or three times, depending on the deafness level of the employee and/or having the employee repeat the order back to me incorrectly OR correctly:  hot coffee with cream; a hot latte; a hot latte with flavoring; a cold latte with hazelnut flavoring, which I'm allergic to;  and iced coffee with cream. Yesterday I was overjoyed to get what I actually ordered...an iced latte with no flavoring. Of course, the employee at the drive-through had to ask me three times and repeat it back twice incorrectly before she got it, and when the info popped up on the screen to tell me what I owed, it was the wrong size and therefore more expensive, but at least it came close to what I'd ordered. I drove up to pay at the window, then moved ahead to the pick-up window, grabbed the icy cup and drove off, stopping briefly to take a sip of what I'd been waiting for all day. It's SO GOOD. If you can get it.

There's more to yesterday's McD's drive-through story that has nothing to do with the coffee. When I got to the pick-up window I was greeted by a woman who appeared to be in her fifties and looked like the pictures you see of people on meth. Trying not to be judgmental and also trying to avoid staring at the space where four top teeth should have been, but weren't, I chirped, "Happy Easter!" She smiled her toothless smile and said, "Thanks, Jill, and Happy Easter to you, too." Yikes! Who was that woman?

Relatively speaking

Two blog entries in one day-- some kind of record for me, but today there is a bunch of relative news to report, starting with Uncle Don's visit (see previous entry).

We went to Rochester this afternoon for the 50th wedding anniversary celebration for my aunt and uncle, Mary Lou and Al Imm. Their wedding was in Winona on April 8, 1961, which happens to be my sister Mary Jo's birthday. She turned six that day, if I'm counting correctly. My dad, Mary Jo, Mark, and I went to the wedding, but Mom stayed at home, as she was pregnant and due any day. Dad devised a back-up plan for a friend to take Mom to the hospital if she went into labor, but Mike waited until the 18th-- he'll be 50 this year. OH MY! 

My aunt Marguerite was there, too, of course. The last time I saw Mary Lou and Marguerite was at Grandpa Charlie's funeral, so it was good to see them under different circumstances today. Marguerite is crazy about Miles, and so he and I talked to her while we enjoyed yummy cake that had a strawberry filling and really great sugary white icing. Marguerite finished her last bite, leaving a little mustache of icing on her upper lip. Miles promptly said to her, "Your face is messy!" That boy tells it like it is! We realized that Miles had an identical mustache on his lip, so I wiped it off. Marguerite noted that we'd stolen her napkin, so she couldn't clean her lip until Annie fetched another! We heard a few stories in the Marguerite tradition--part fantasy, part cop show--and all in all, we had a good time. Mary Lou seemed happy that we were there, and I was glad we were, too. It is sad not to see Grandpa Charlie when we go to family events, so it was nice to spend time thinking and talking about him today.

Here we are!

Miles and Marguerite, checking each other for messy faces

Annie, Westy, Mary Lou, Gma Jill, Miles

After a quick stop at the new Trader Joe's, we went back to Owatonna for a yummy dinner featuring various flavors of brats, grilled by Chef Tanner, and Annie's brownies with chocolate chips inside and  pink pig sprinkles on top.

Miles, trying out my necklace

 Westy chewing, chewing, chewing

Uncle Don was here...AGAIN

This is getting to be a habit...Uncle Don was here this morning. He stopped in for a cup of coffee and some b.s. on his way back to Montana. Here's the proof:

On this trip to MN, he and Janet hired a contractor to add a main floor bedroom addition to the home they bought in Forest Lake. Janet is staying another week to be with Kasey and Allie. Plans are to move to MN by Memorial Day!

Uncle Don WAS here

A tradition since 1973, when Elisabeth was born and Don became "Uncle Don", has been to mark certain family events by his presence, real or imaginary. For example, we know for sure that Don and Janet were in Minnesota the day that Miles J. Grimmius was born. So, on Miles' birthday, it might come up that Uncle Don was here. 

And there are some of us (me) who claim that Uncle Don was here on the Halloween night in the 1980's that Larry and the kids couldn't get VA Barnes to answer her door for tricks and treats. They knocked, then peered through a window and saw her lying motionless on the living room couch. They were convinced she had left this world to mingle with the Halloween spirits, but as luck would have it, she was only black cat napping. And Uncle Don was here! Maybe not, but I swear to it being so.

I could go on with more examples, but returning to the present...Uncle Don was indeed here on Saturday. I have no photographic evidence as proof, but he came through St. Peter in his truck, pulling the Scamp camper so he could leave it in MN to acclimate until he and Janet move to Forest Lake. He stayed for dinner (first burgers-on-the-grill of the season) and we caught up on their progress in getting ready for the big move.

Should anyone doubt the veracity of my claim that Uncle Don was here, get in touch with Annie, Tanner, Miles, or Weston. They stopped over after spending the day with Grandpa Dave and Grandma Doreen, arriving just in time for Uncle Don  to meet Westy for the first time before hitting the road to go see Kasey and Allie.

Uncle Don, if you or Janet happen to read this blog entry, I'd appreciate some support on the "Uncle Don was here" Halloween incident!

Here are Miles and Westy, in their pj's, getting ready to go home.

Hey, Diddle Diddle

What do Mike Potts, Kyle Buchholz, and Annie Potts Grimmius have in common? I can think of at least five things:

1. They all live in Minnesota.

2. I know the parents of all three.

3. They're all around 30 years old.

4. They all have new babies.

5. They all received the limited-edition cloth book (pictured below) as baby gifts.

Okay, so I had to stretch to get five, when it is #5 that is the story here. A number of weeks ago, Mike Potts texted me a photo of one of his little sweeties chewing on--"reading"--the book. Mike's comment was about having received the book from me as a baby gift, and that Janet had saved it and passed it along to Kasey and Allie.

That, of course, reminded me that I likely had the comparable book I'd made for Annie, and sure enough I did. I threw it in the washing machine and out it came, dust free and ready for Vivian and Weston to sink their teeth into....er.... to read.

And if those two incidents weren't enough to remind me that I made the books over 30 years ago, lo and behold, an email arrived last week from Kathy Buchholz, a friend I'd grown up with and who lives in the Twin Cities.  Other than receiving Christmas greetings, I hadn't communicated with Kathy since our 105th high school reunion a couple of years ago, so it was a nice surprise to get her note. Here is the pertinent part of her message:

"We celebrated Kyle's birthday tonight (our middle son with the new baby girl) and I took him some of his baby stuff.... One of the things I had kept was a cloth Hey Diddle Diddle book. I looked in his baby book and found out that it was from you. Did you make it? I'm sure you remember, as it was only 31 years ago.  Ha! Anyway, I washed it and it looked like new, and Lily was reading it tonight, or rather chewing on it. It was a gift that kept on giving."

I had materials to make 4 of those books--the nursery rhyme characters were actually supposed to be cut out and stuffed to make little dolls, but I saw literary potential, and made books. I have no idea if I ever made the 4th book, but I'm fairly certain I didn't get around to it.

Funny how the planets were aligned enough for all three of the  known-to-be-published books to make an appearance within a couple of months of each other. If #4 is out there somewhere, I hope its owner will feel the vibrations in the universe and get in touch, too!

Running circles around grandpappy

It doesn't take much to entertain a couple of little boys we know and love. Just plop a grandpa down on a rug, give the boys a bath, and turn 'em loose.