From all of us at the Party House,
a very Happy New Year to you all.
May 2013 be a wonderful year for you.
May all of your dreams come true.
May all of your wishes be fulfilled.
May your star shine bright,
May every happiness be yours.
Happy and Healthy 2013, my friends.
Cheers!
Today is New Year’s Eve, and tomorrow will start the beginning of a New Year, 2013. This is the time of year I love to reflect back on everything that has transpired at the Party House in the course of just one, short year.
We have had numerous birthday parties for the family members who live here locally.
Had a great family event in April at Angels Stadium. Almost everyone in the family was able to make it to an Angels game together. I honestly cannot remember if the Angels won or lost that day, but we had a great time.
Hosted a great dinner party when my sister and her husband were here from Montana in May. Laura showed us how to make her red sauce enchiladas.
A special birthday was celebrated for our baby boy in July. He turned 21.
We actually got to celebrate Travel Man’s birthday on his actual birthday this year. That was a fun, fun time.
October brought us the baby shower celebration for my daughter, Naomi. We had such girly fun that day!!
November brought the arrival of Miss Madison Kay, our second grandchild. What a delight she is. I know I’ve said that before, but I’ll say it again, because I’m her Grandma.
And of course we celebrated Thanksgiving together, and for the first time in a long time my sister, Laura, was able to join us at the dinner table.
Christmas Day was celebrated here with the family. We were delighted to have our nephew, Jim, here for the days festivities. It’s always a little more casual on Christmas Day for us. Dinner was buffet style, with tons and tons of goodies and cookies. A wonderful party ending to 2012.
My parents with almost all of their grandkids!
We are always grateful to be able to host the family events. It’s always a wonder that we can get so many of the kids and their significant others together in the same place at the same time for the same event.
Every year I am equally amazed that even though my husband (aka Travel Man) is on the road for a good amount of time during the year, we are still able to sneak in as many short trips as we do. And before I get to the trips – do you know that my Travel Guy was in the air for well over 160,000 air miles this year? I could not believe that number, I’m still in shock as I am writing this. That’s a lot of travel. I am ever so grateful that he takes such good care of us, and always keep us laughing with his travel stories.
Our trips together this year included-
A trip to the Reagan Library.
A trip to Reno to visit my parents while my Dad was going through some chemo treatments.
A trip to Las Vegas in June (this was the second time), so my daughters and I could attend a Celine Dion concert. Travel man drove us there and home.
A trip to New York in August to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary.
And a trip to Montana to visit my sister and her husband.
More trips than I could have imagined we would could possibly take this year. Thank you Travel Man. You never cease to amaze me.
And finally, I would like to give a standing ovation to my Dad. My Dad is battling lung cancer (actually he’s kicking it in the butt!). He was told in January of this year, that there were no additional, conventional methods of chemotherapy or radiation available to him that would be helpful in diminishing his tumors. My Dad, he’s a fighter, and he never, ever gives up. He got on the computer, researched some alternative therapies, found a doctor first in Reno, and then in Carlsbad, and never gave up on living. My Mom keeps telling us that since my Dad was an engineer in his working life he just has the mentality that this problem he has needs to be solved, and he’s going to solve it. And by the way my Mom, she’s a rock star. She definitely deserves the “Stand By Your Man Award” for 2012. The love and compassion she shows for my Dad is a priceless gem.
I am completely elated, overjoyed and ecstatic to tell you that because of my Dad’s hard work, perseverance, and his never give up attitude in this year of 2012, his tumors have diminished over 40%!! It is hard to express in words what a wonderful feeling it is that my Dad has seen such a tremendous improvement. It’s happiness, relief, joy, and a great big WHEW! This man, my Dad, has redefined the word perseverance.
It reminds me of my favorite Winston Churchill quote: “Never, never, never, give up.”
From the Party House to yours, wishing each and every one of you a very Happy New Year, and may all good things come to you and yours in 2013.
My crafting, crocheting fest this year continued with another great pattern I found, but this time on the Lion Brand Yarn website.
My Mom told me about this website, and they have tons and tons and tons of free patterns for both crocheting and knitting. And the patterns are for all skill levels.
The pattern that I used for quite a few homemade gifts was called Family of Beanies. It allows you to make many sizes from one easy pattern. The yarn that I used for this beanie pattern was a soft, thick yarn, Hometown USA. A great, soft yarn.
I made beanies for the Montana family, beanies for my son and his girlfriend, beanies for my son-in-law and grandson. beanies, beanies, beanies
Then Travel Man said, “Where’s my beanie? You know sometimes my travel takes me to the cold weather.” So I’m off to the store tomorrow to get some gray yarn. Travel Man’s favorite color. I guess you know what I’ll be doing for New Year’s.
Evans beanie turned out so cute I made him a scarf to go with it.
Photo credit to Elaine Zee.
Such a ham for the camera. He’s was pretending he was cold and freezing, totally set up this pose himself. His ensemble was blue and orange for the Chicago Bears, of course .
Then the football rivals in the house got scarves in the Green Bay Packers colors. This was some great yarn, variegated with the team colors. No switching colors required. The surprise here was my daughter had no idea I had been working on this gift. You see I did most of the work in the car while Travel Man was driving us around doing our errands.
All in all I got everything finished that I set out to make before Christmas Day arrived. It’s always fun finding projects to work on that will be given as gifts. And I’m discovering it’s great to find a pattern that is universal that can be given as a gift to the girls or the boys. Maybe next year I’ll make everyone some socks or mittens. Stay tuned for Christmas Crafts 2013.
This year for some of the Christmas gifts and doo-dads I was giving I got totally hooked on crocheting. I have never gotten into knitting, just a crochet girl at heart.
I found the pattern for this little beauty on Red Heart yarn’s website, and it was soooo easy to make I could hardly contain myself.
Every time I sat down to watch tv I was making a snow flake. Each one only took 15 minutes or so, and then I was on to the next one.
When my sister was here visiting in November I sent her home with a dozen little flakes to make a garland to string across her front window.
Then for Christmas day I taped an ornament to each person’s gift. I loved sharing my little flakes with everyone.
Funny thing though, when you do a project like that you never make any for yourself. I’m thinking I need a garland for my front window for next year.
I’m off to crochet. Happy trails everyone.
So, are you a knitting or a crochet person?
This recipe was posted over the summer months, and it has been the most popular post on my site for this year. If you missed out on the taco yumminess you may want to give this one a try. It’s definitely a great recipe for anytime of the year. Enjoy!
Taco Salad for a Crowd – Originally posted in May 2012
For the past two or three days it has been over 90 degrees here in So Cal, just a hint of summertime coming our way. The hot weather calls for some lighter and yummy dinners. Tonight I made the gang a Taco Salad. I called my Mom to find out the origin of this recipe, and we came to the conclusion that I was a recipe that was passed around the neighborhood when we were growing up. However, I have put my own twist on the recipe, with the help of my daughter Naomi.
Ingredients:
Directions:
For the salad assembly:
Variations:
This is truly a yummy recipe, and so easy to throw together. Oh and I like using the shredded cabbage because it does not get soggy at all. I put out the cabbage when we have just plain old tacos in the shell too. For this twenty-something household, this salad makes a great big meal and is great for staying on budget. If you’ve never made this before it’s a real treat. If you haven’t made it in a while you’ve been missing out like me. I’m definitely mixing this recipe in with my weekly summertime meal planning.
