Suzanne McGrath Photography

Six on Sunday

Hello.  Are you staying warm and dry?  I'm loving this storm outside.  It's so pretty.

 

1.  Did you have a nice Thanksgiving?  We sure did.  The weather was pretty much perfect and we had a house full of family.

As per tradition, we started the morning off with the Thanksgiving 5k.  Seriously, the weather gorgeous and I was dressed perfectly - not too hot and not too cold.  I love that!

 

While waiting for dinner, we feasted on snacks and especially these, deviled eggs are my favorite and Jason makes them every year!

 

We also had to measure to see who was taller.  #2 finally beat out aunt Erin!

 

Are you wondering if the deep fried turkey worked?  It did!  It was not exactly pretty and the wings were too done to eat but the rest was delish!  It took a bit of manpower to get it done, but I think that's half the fun, no?

From left to right, Patrick's brother-in-law, Chris, Patrick, my brother-in-law, Jason, and Patrick's brother, Sean.

 

 

 

We fit everyone at three tables we pushed together.  I love having a big table rather than several small ones or a kids' table.  I remember sitting at the kids' table and I despised it.  I promised never to do that to my girls if possible.  It's a tight fit but I love it!

 

We finished the night off with a fire in the fire pit.  The kids, and Patrick's sister and her husband, and I all played ghost in the graveyard.  A delightful evening.  

It wasn't all perfect, though.  My mom's special friend, Jim, tripped the night before and ended up breaking his ankle.  In fact, he didn't even know he broke it until he got home and went to the ER on Friday.  So his day was spent with his foot elevated on ice.  That's a major bummer and I'm hoping it doesn't keep him from his golf game for too long!

 

2.  Friday was spent watching football, shopping, and decorating for Christmas.  We took it a little slower this year and I was good with that.  We didn't wrap up the decorating until yesterday.  We all headed over to my sister's house Friday night to enjoy some ribs Sean brought to town.  I won't lie, I'm over football, though.  I think it has been on one TV or another pretty much non-stop since Thursday afternoon.  That's way too much for me! 

 

3.  Yesterday's weather was absolutely beautiful!  I think it got up to 60* in the afternoon.  It could not have worked out better because I had two family photo sessions - one in the morning down at the WWI Memorial and one in the afternoon at PrairieFire.  I need to get those photos edited ASAP this week!  

We were also able to squeeze in a fun lunch down in the Crossroads area (17th and McGee) at a place called Tapcade KC.  For $5 you can play all the OG video games you want!  It's perfect for kids.  The food and service was terrific, too.  Patrick's family was supposed to leave today but due to the storm they all ended up rolling out of town after lunch yesterday so was our last hurrah together. 

 

4.  While driving over to my sister's house on Friday was car started beeping at us and flashing a sign that the oil pressure was low.  Just great.  After a bunch of research we're not really sure if it's the oil pump or a sensor, but whatever it is I am annoyed.  Thankfully we were able to drive it out to our mechanic today with the hopes he can look at it tomorrow.  My fingers are crossed that it's not the pump (again - that was Thanksgiving 2011) and just a sensor.

 

5.  The storm didn't roll in until about 11am today.  Of course I didn't even leave to go to the grocery store until about 11:30am and it was NUTS!  Everyone was stocking up for this huge "blizzard".  I doubt we get more than a few inches.  Regardless, I really enjoyed the view while I was cooking up a storm in the kitchen!

 

I managed to make a double batch of chili, beef stew, Senegalese stew, and I prepped white bean chicken chili for the crockpot tomorrow.  Plus, I prepped a few things for our turkey pot pies tonight.  I feel so accomplished!

 

6.  I was really feeling like soups and stews, so that's our menu for the week:

Sunday:  Turkey and wild rice pot pies + roasted broccoli

Monday:  Chili two ways:  Normal and white chicken chili + salad + corn chips

Tuesday:  Beef stew + roasted asparagus  

Wednesday:  Senegalese soup + roasted squash

Thursday:  Tacos with fruit 

Friday:  Pizza (carry out)

All right, that's all I've got for tonight.  Have a great week and stay safe! 
 

 

Six on Sunday

It's almost Thanksgiving!  We're all really excited for a short work/school work.  That means I only have to get up at 5am three days this week.  Bonus!!

 

1.  We had a birthday this week.  This girl turned 12!

Her requested dinner was shrimp, risotto, and roasted asparagus.  Yum!  Now that is a dinner I can get behind.  (Yes, I wrapped her present in Christmas paper because that was all I had.  Better wrapped than not!)

She was definitely spoiled on Thursday.  Her friend picked her up at 7am and took her to Starbucks for breakfast!

 

She had another friend bring her a pastry from Starbucks, too.  So sweet.  I know middle school can be full of turmoil and just Ugh, but it can also be full of kids learning to think beyond themselves and showing their thoughtfulness!

After dinner she unwrapped her gift from us and my mom - a tumble track, and a gift from her other grandparents - a Lulu backpack.  She loved both!  She also received a card in the mail from her aunt and uncle with Chick Fil A gift cards and that made her day.  (She stalked the mail box for a week!  No joke.)  She had soccer but took homemade Rice Krispie treats so I think the night was salvaged.  Anyway, it was a good day.

 

2.  We did not have ANYTHING this weekend.  No soccer.  No volleyball.  No swim meet.  It was fabulous!  I felt so free.  I know that sounds weird, but it's so true.  I loved it and made the most of my weekend.  I recovered the ottoman in our family room with black and white fabric.  We all love it.  And now that room is officially black/white which means we can add any accent color we want.  Right now we've chosen blush pink and I love it.  I made a grocery store run and a Target run.  Today I made it to 7:30am yoga and kicked off my day nice and early.  

 

3.  I am one Target run and one Amazon order away from being finished with my Christmas shopping.  I outsourced four things to the hubby so I won't be officially done until he comes through, but I feel like I am pretty much done.  #2 helped me finish shopping for her sisters today and I think we hit 10 stores in a few hours and knocked out about 15 gifts.  I love that a lot of stores had Black Friday deals this weekend so I could avoid the crowds next weekend.  Total win in my book!

I even have a bunch of things wrapped.  No tags yet, but wrapping is the hard part, anyway.

 

4.  I finished editing my last photo session tonight.  I had so much fun this fall!  Here's a couple pics that I loved from the session I edited tonight:

 

5.  I downloaded Pride and Prejudice on my iPhone because it was free.  I figured it was a novel I should have read by now so why not read it if it was free.  I am enjoying it but the reading is going so SLOW.  Since it was written so long ago, I have to really take my time and digest the words to figure out what is happening.  Not to mention there are so many different Mr. and Mrs. that I have to think hard how the various characters relate to each other.  I'm hoping I have a bit more time over the break to jump into it and make some real progress.  Please tell me it's worth it!

 

6.  Podcasts.  I listen to them nearly every day on my commute.  Here's a few I've been enjoying lately:

• The Daily by the New York Times.  The show on Friday regarding Facebook was fascinating.  And not in a good way!  Just like it says, this podcast focuses on one specific issue each day and dives into it.  
• Slow Burn by Slate.  The last season was all about the impeachment of Bill Clinton.  I looked forward to each new episode which came out once per week.  I remember this time in history well and enjoyed learning more about it. 
• Standoff by Slate.  These episodes are new and just coming out.  There's only two episodes so far.  This podcast is all about Ruby Ridge.  
• Majority 54 by Jason Kander.  I love Jason.  I read his book and followed him in his Senate race and then here in KC.  This podcast focuses on all kinds of issues from Hate Crime to LGBTQ rights, to how to solve the opiod epidemic.  The podcast is very well produced and it has educated me on all kinds of different issues.

 

All right, that's all I've got tonight.  I hope you enjoy a wonderful Thanksgiving on Thursday!

 

Six on Sunday

Hello!  How was your weekend?  Ours was great!

 

1.  Last week I ran out of time to "talk" about a couple things, so I'm going to catch up here.  First, #1 was inducted into National Honor Society.  Most kids apply for it their junior year but she was just swamped last year and didn't have the time to apply.  I was really impressed that she took the time to apply this year!I knew nothing about it, she just asked me if I wanted to come to her induction.  Uh, yes!  It was really well done and I was impressed with the time everyone took to make it a special night for the kids.  

 

2.  My friend, Christi, and I stopped at Lulu's Thai Noodle Shop after we went thrift shopping last Sunday.  It was FANTASTIC!  If you are ever down in the Crossroads Arts District, I highly recommend it.  Delish!

 

3.  I managed to read two books on our trip to Hawaii and really liked them both.  Both were perfect beach reads.  Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan was so fun and it kept me entertained the whole way through.  Plus, now I want to see the movie.  I also picked up a book at the airport - literally the ONLY book they had in the entire store.  One Day in December by Josie Silver.  I literally finished it in less than 8 hours so it's a really easy read.  But it, too, kept me entertained which was great because I had 7 hours to go from San Francisco to KC due to our extended layover.    

 

4.  I downloaded a sleep cycle app and it's so much fun!  #1 had to download it for her psych class and was telling me about it so I decided to try it.  While it isn't changing any of my habits, it's really fun to look at my sleep cycle every morning when I wake up.  Ideally, it is supposed to wake you within 30 minutes of your alarm.  It might wake you up early if you are coming out of a Deep Sleep so you don't have time to fall back into another deep sleep.  But let's be real - there is no way I want to be woken up at 4:40am just because that would be ideal.  Uh-uh, no way!  I do not want to be woken up a minute before 5:10am so I don't take advantage of that feature.

Anyway, here are two of my charts, side by side:

You can see the chart on the left is typical of me.  I fall asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow.  I'm talking if I lay there more than 5 minutes, I wonder what's wrong.  The chart on the right is what happens when the hubby goes to bed at the same time.  He tosses and turns FOREVER before he falls asleep.  And the app can't really tell what is going on, so it charts his tossing and turning as if it were me.  I think once he's asleep, it does a better job of charting my sleep pattern vs. his.  Still, I get a kick out of this because he always says I fall asleep fast.  I thought he was exaggerating before and now I know he's not!

 

5.  So tonight I tested 3 new recipes for Thanksgiving.  The major bummer?  I have a cold and couldn't taste ANYTHING!!  I had to rely on my family because I had no clue if these recipes were winners or not.  Well, they tested 2 of the 3 and all agreed they were winners.  The third one was for brussels sprouts and they all refused to try them.  I am making an executive decision and making them.  

Also, the hubby is hell bent on deep frying a turkey this year.  Mind you, we have never deep fried even so much as a drumstick but he thinks he can do an entire turkey.  So, he wants to test it out on all of us.  While I'm not thrilled (what if he messes it up?  a very likely chance given his kitchen skillz), I told him to go for it.  IF he can find a deep fryer because I refuse to buy one for one day a year.  Wish us luck!

Meanwhile, the sides will be epic!  We're going with these buttery herbed mashed potatoes and these flaky pull-apart dinner rolls from Half Baked Harvest.  Both were winners tonight. Of course we'll have chestnut apple stuffing (a combination of a few different recipes I have on hand), roasted sweet potatoes, roasted beets with goat cheese, and these parmesan baked brussels sprouts from A Beautiful Mess.  Of course, I have no idea how to do gravy without turkey drippings, so I will have to wing that part.  Oh well.  It will all work itself out.  In the end, we could probably skip the dinner and go straight to the desserts anyway!

All that to say, I'm excited to spend a day or two in the kitchen in less than two weeks.  Also, we'll be able to start decorating for Christmas in less than two weeks, too!

 

6.  Remember last week when I said I took the big girls and friends downtown for more senior pictures?  Well, I was helping #1 pick out a few pictures of herself from that session because pictures are due for the yearbook this week.  While we were culling through images, I saw this one.  I love it!

 

Well, that's all I've got tonight.  I need to wrap a few presents and finish folding some laundry before I can hit the hay.  Have a great week!

P.S.  I would be remiss if I didn't mention that I know today is Veterans Day.  As the daughter of an Army veteran who served in Vietnam, my thanks go out to all who have served, past and present and especially to those families who have paid the ultimate sacrifice.  Thank you. 

Six on Sunday

 

Hello!  I'm back after my week hiatus while I was in Hawaii.  It was awesome.  But more about it later.  I am feeling chatty tonight so this could be a long one.  Let's get rollin'...

 

1.  Yesterday I took #1 and her best friend, Megan, plus their sisters and we did some fall senior pictures downtown.  We had so much fun!  The girls are really so funny and I learned some new  words from the Urban Dictionary.  For instance, I now know if I look stuntin' or I'm flexin'.  Plus, I know how to spot an Insta Baddie.  (They are so sorry they taught me those words.  I love it!)

After we were finished, the hubby and the littles met us down there so we could shoot our family pictures.  Of course as luck would have it, it started misting and then sprinkling right when we started shooting.  Oy!  I think I took about 5 pictures of our family and cranked out a few pics of each of the girls before I had to get my camera covered up.  Oh well.  We tried.  Not sure if they turned out or not?  I haven't had time to upload them just yet.  But the night was salvaged.  We tried eating at Parlor but they were closed this weekend so we ended up at Mission Taco, instead.  I highly recommend it.  The food was awesome, my margarita was killer, and the service was fantastic!  

 

2.  This morning I spent two hours in the kitchen doing meal prep for the week.  I am really excited about the menu, so I'm going to share it with you all.

Sunday:  Stuffed Spaghetti Squash 4-Cheese Pesto Lasagna (the littles had butter noodles - can't please 'em all)

Monday:  Slow Cooker Herbed Chicken and Rice Pilaf + Roasted Asparagus

Tuesday:  Cheddar Apple Butternut Squash Soup with Cinnamon Pecan Crumble + Roasted Broccoli + Baguette  (hint:  I made it this morning and it's delish)

Wednesday:  Crockpot Potato Soup + Salad + Baguette  (an oldie but goodie - but not the healthiest I've ever made.  Cream cheese.  Yum.)

Thursday:  Sheet Pan Sticky Pomegranate Chicken and Honey Roasted Squash with Rice (I'll do cauliflower rice.  The fam will do brown rice)

Friday:  Carry-out pizza due to a 5:55pm soccer game

 

3.  Speaking of meal prep, I still make my kids's lunches.  I know they are all fully capable of doing it.  But you know what?  I like the feeling I get when I make their lunch.  Do I like making their lunches?  Not exactly.  But I like knowing what they are eating and if it's healthy.  Plus, this year I instituted "Mom Doesn't Make Friday Lunch" and it's the best thing EVER.  I know they appreciate what I do Monday through Thursday so much more when they have to make their lunch once a week!

 

4.  I was listening to Jordin Silver and Friends one morning this week on the way to work.  (96.5 the Buzz)  Anyway, Jordin said something about her Top 5 All-Time Favorite Songs.  It got me thinking about it and we discussed it as a family (and played music REALLY LOUD on our way home from dinner last night).  I can come up with four songs but the pressure to name the 5th is really, really hard.  (Also, #1 and #2 wholeheartedly agree with my first two picks but weren't familiar with the last two.)  And I don't think I've landed on the final song just yet.  So here are my first four, in no particular order:

U2 - With or Without You

The Killers - Mr. Brightside

The Samples - Feel Us Shaking

Eric Clapton (the 24 Nights version) Wonderful Tonight

 

I'd love to know what you consider your Top 5 Faves?!

 

5.  The Littles thoroughly enjoyed Halloween this year!  #3 was a Skittle with a bunch of girls from middle school and #4 was a chef.  They each went trick-or-treating with friends and the rest of us had a quiet night at home.  (I don't know if we even had 15 trick-or-treaters!)

 

6.  We promptly took down Halloween decorations on Thursday.  They had been up the entire month and I was ready to be done with them.  We don't really do much for Thanksgiving but I did arrange the mantle:

We are hosting Thanksgiving again this year and I need to get working on the menu.  I feel like I might add one or two new sides this year.  And I'm thinking of making a signature cocktail for the afternoon!

BONUS #7!  Hawaii recap time.  Short version:  She loves the University of Hawaii - Manoa and is dying to go.  Long version:  

We flew out at 6am Thursday morning the 25th.  It was really smooth - we flew through Seattle and landed in Honolulu at 1pm.  We couldn't find an Uber so we took a taxi to our hotel and changed our clothes and dropped off our luggage and made our way directly to the beach.  We were only 3 blocks to the beach and it was awesome!

This is Waikiki and it ALWAYS full of surfers.  No joke.  They are up in the water by 6am.

 

We didn't feel like showering and getting ready so we just picked up Poke Bowls and Sashimi from this little hole-in-the-wall place called Mauro Brothers and it was THE BEST!  We just ate it on our balcony and for dessert we had chocolate covered macadamia nuts.  

 

This was my view while drinking my coffee Friday morning.  If you look closely, you can see the ocean in between the buildings:

 

This is the view looking down the street the other way:

 

We spent the whole day Friday on campus.  We did the tour and talked with the Dean of the Spanish department.  Sadly, we couldn't make it work to talk with someone in the Interdisciplinary Studies department.  Fun fact:  there are so many varieties of plants and trees that the campus itself is actually an arboretum!  While I found the campus a bit dated, #1 absolutely fell in love.  

If you look hard, you can tell it's raining in that picture above.  It rained about 500 times on Friday!  OK, maybe not 500 but still, a LOT!  

 

This is the original building when the school was founded in 1907.  It really was beautiful.

 

 

This is a room in the freshman dorm.  They all look the same.  There are four towers of freshman dorms.  They do not have A/C.  I think that would be a show-stopper for me but she could care less.  Also, this room looks eerily similar to my dorm.  In 1992!!!  Told you - not exactly updated.  

 

This is a view from the roof of one of the freshmen towers:

 

That round building in the bottom left of the frame is one of the freshman towers.

 

After the tours we shopped at the bookstore (pretty small compared to Nebraska) and headed back to the hotel to change.  We grabbed dinner at a fun little Italian restaurant before taking the bus back to the campus to watch the volleyball game.  The matches were excellent but we found it hard to keep our eyes open.  After all, while it was only 8p in Honolulu, it was 1am back in KC!

Saturday was our total beach day.  We surfed in the morning, had lunch, and then she went snorkeling.  (Hint:  It's not good snorkeling unless you take a boat further out from shore.)  We both loved surfing as much as we remembered from our trip to Maui two Christmases ago!  And we both agree that the waves in Waikiki were bigger than the waves in Lahaina on Maui.  Bigger waves mean bigger wipe-outs but also bigger highs!

 

We ate dinner at a delicious sushi place that night and it did not disappoint.  Doraku Sushi was a winner!

 

We loved surfing so much we went back for more on Sunday morning.  We got to the beach shortly after 7am since that's when the surfboard rental place opened.  We were hoping it wouldn't be as busy but it was still pretty crowded.  However, we learned where to go to find the best little waves and stay out of the way of the better surfers.  I didn't mind the crowd but #1 hated it.  She is determined to find the spots away from the crowds if she goes to school there.  

 

This is an alley where locals pay to store their boards.  That way they don't have to cart them around town.  I think this is genius! 

 

After we finished surfing we were starving and #1 wanted to hit up The Sunrise Shack.  It did not disappoint.  Their bullet coffee was awesome and we both loved our breakfasts!

 

Since we had to check out of the hotel by noon, we headed back and showered and got ready.  We stored our bags with the Bell Hop and went exploring.  We ended up walking to and then hiking up Diamond Head.  It's a really easy hike but the views or simply gorgeous!

After our hike we headed back down and found a cute cafe for lunch.  We shopped around and walked on the beach one last time before heading to the airport.  Our plane took off at 10:30pm and we landed back in KC at 5pm.  That's a long day!

 

As for the trip, I'm glad we went.  It is definitely her first choice.  However, she will need to get some scholarship money if she wants to go.  Their out of state tuition is exactly 3 times their in-state tuition!  Not to mention just getting back and forth is much more pricey than a plane ride to say, Denver.  I'm really glad I took her because I wasn't sure if she would change her mind after experiencing the travel and the campus in general.  Plus, we really can't wait until we find if she gets scholarship money because that won't be until mid-March.  I imagine finding plane tickets to Hawaii in a week's notice would not be very cheap!  Right now these are her choices, in order:

First - Hawaii

Second - University of Utah

Third is a tie - University of Wyoming or University of Nebraska-Lincoln.  

So, only time will tell.  She probably won't know where she is heading to college until next March!  Yikes.  I was hoping to have it nailed down by December.  But it's all good.  I know it will all work for the best in the end.  We just need to have some patience.

 

Phew!  I'm beat and it's 10pm.  Time for me to go to bed!