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Archive for Family

An Eye Opening , “Power-less” Day.

Posted on October 28, 2013 by Renee Spindle

Transformer repair – lots of trucks and equipment.
Photo courtesy of tspindigital.com

Today is Saturday, October 26. It’s 3 o’clock in the afternoon, and we’ve been a neighborhood with no power since 5 am this morning. It’s not our entire area just our little block of a neighborhood. Weird huh? When I called Southern California Edison to report the outage the customer service rep says, “Are you sure your power is out Ma’am? I’m not showing any outages in your area.” I was the first one to call in. And then she proceeded to ask me if we had checked the breaker box. Ha!

I have to admit I was not planning on spending today with no power to the house. It’s somewhat inconvenient, much quieter, and really making me want to take a nap, and I am not a napper by trade.

We are hosting a birthday dinner/party tonight for our oldest daughter. My Mom will be handing out flashlights when everyone walks in the door. It will be an adventure!!

In light of this change in our Saturday plans I have compiled a list of ten things I have been enjoying or will be enjoying with no power today.

What’s that you say, no laundry can be done today? Whoopee , no problem there.
Can’t run the dishwasher, that’s ok, we have lots of paper plates in the pantry.
No TV during the power outage- that’s fine, I probably watch too many home improvement shows as it is. However, I would like the power to be back on for the World Series game tonight.
What? I can’t be on the wireless internet either? That’s fine I probably spend too much time on the computer.
No baking or cooking (my stove requires electronic ignition) . Honey, let’s go to Olive Garden for lunch? Yum.
Birthday dinner will require paper plates and plastic cups! Easy cleanup! No problem.
Watching our two cats interact with one another. They have this love-hate relationship going on. The older cat is always growling and hissing at the younger guy. Even when he is doing absolutely nothing.
I’m noticing that having a technology free day is not a bad thing! Maybe I should do this once a week.
Maybe The Party House needs to “disable” the wi-fi for family gatherings. Hmmm?? What would the twenty-something crowd do with themselves??
Having Travel Man home today to start-up the generator -priceless. He loves going into “survival” mode. It’s a guy thing.

An interesting side note to this day- the power did not get turned back on until 9 pm on Saturday night. We strung a few lights in the house via my Mom’s RV generator for the birthday dinner. The conversation was great, not a lot of cell phone surfing going on. Oh, and my kind brother and Travel Man hooked up the TV so we could see the last few innings of the World Series game. My family is so great. Happy Monday everyone!

No comments Posted in Around the House, Birthdays, Family

Setting the Bar High

Posted on October 23, 2013 by Renee Spindle

The definition of a goal is; the object of a person’s ambition or effort; an aim or desired result.

My daughter, Hilary, set the bar high for herself, and achieved an awesome personal goal last month. In January of this year Hilary boldly signed up to run in the Disneyland half-marathon at the beginning of September. This was Labor Day weekend by the way. No end of summer parties for this gal.

The starting line for the marathon.

Get going Hilary – it’s only mile 4!!

She joined a gym, changed her eating habits, and set the course for herself to run 13 miles start to finish. It makes me tired just typing that. As the date loomed closer Hilary became more determined than ever to get to the marathon, and get it done. She had every confidence in herself that she could do it, her mother of course was totally worried about her. That’s what I do. And by the way, she wasn’t running with friends or any of her sorority sisters, she did this solo, start to finish. No buddies to run with, and no family members by her side. Just herself and the pack of other runners determined to do what she was doing, and finish what she was finishing. Hilary’s cousin, Mary, made sure she got to the race venue on time, and was probably her biggest cheerleader for this event. The excitement and cousin love between the girls just warmed my heart.

During the marathon, Hilary had to be able to stay within a 16-minute mile in order to stay in the race. She set a goal for herself to run a 13-minute mile and she did it, all the way through the marathon. We were able to track her time, and milestones through an amazing system Disney had set-up for marathon day. My Mom and I were in awe of what she was doing.

During the race we were able to scope out a spot in Angels Stadium parking lot to cheer her on. It seemed like we were waiting a lifetime for her to come around the corner and through an archway that was set up for the event. Thankfully we finally spotted her, and she stopped momentarily to take pictures with us, and then was on her way. I’m pretty sure I got a tear in my eye at this moment in time.

Hilary’s cousin, Mary, and her brother, Bryan raced to the finish line to get a picture of her. Many, many thanks to Mary for sprinting through the race venue to get this shot.

This picture captures all of the emotion of I set my goal, and I met it. My first hug with Hilary after she finished her race was filled with such happiness for her. As a parent, there is no greater joy than watching your kids set their sights on something, going for it, and making it happen.

You set the bar high for this family dear Hilary. Congratulations to my daughter for stepping out there (no pun intended), and getting this done. Wow, there’s no other word to describe this, just wow!!

2 comments Posted in Family, Kidstuff

A Lovely Backyard Wedding

Posted on October 19, 2013 by Renee Spindle

What does it take to throw a backyard wedding? First and foremost is a big backyard, which we have. Check that one-off of the list. Then the bride and groom have to be willing to pitch in and get the backyard ready for a wedding. Check, we have that. Then we limit the guests to no more than 70 people. How do we know this is a good number you ask? We’ve had lots of parties and lots of people in our backyard, and this is the number that works and is controllable.

The remaining major supplies to get our backyard ready for a wedding went like this- Over 20 strings of white lights, 350 ft. of speaker wire for the PA system and the music, around 20 poles for the lights to be strung up on (this was for the Mama Mia effect!), an amazing misting system (put together by our favorite uncle), a newly painted deck for dancing the night away on, rented tables, chairs, and table clothes, lovely centerpieces crafted by the bride, lots of big bags of ice, and lots of helpers to get it all set up on time. Plus we were really hopeful the weather would cooperate, which it did.

Our youngest son got married in our backyard towards the end of August, and due to the nature of our “stressful” summer there were a lot of plans that just ended up being put together at the last-minute. This was a 5pm wedding, and my son’s vision was to have the backyard lit up with white lights for a truly memorable evening, once the sun went down, and I think we pulled it off. We had around 65 guests (that’s my closest guesstimate), in our backyard. A party this size has not happened since the ladies of ZTA (Kappa Theta chapter of Zeta Tau Alpha) graced our backyard, as we were the host of their annual Bid Day (there were around 70 giggly, gaggling girls in attendance that day!).

The weather was not too hot, which we were all thankful for. The temps stayed somewhere in the 90’s, and cooled off quickly after the sun went down. The California summer heat swooped in the weekend after the wedding. I think it was around 105, the Saturday after!

The wedding ceremony was performed flawlessly, everyone looked so wonderful, and then it was time to party. We had an amazing caterer who brought in Mexican food, some of which was cooked on the grill right before our very eyes. This was a great set-up and the food was spectacular. Drinks were kept simple; just soda, beer and wine. A cake was brought in by a friend of the bride (it was delicious!).

And then it was time for the dancing. My most memorable moments from the dancing were watching my baby boy (he won’t like that I called him that) dance with his Grandma, and seeing the daughters dancing with their dads. Of course, the first dance by the bride and groom was memorable too. Such a cute couple. My favorite dance of the night was our deck filled with party-goers dancing to “The Macarena”!! That was fun!

This was definitely a ceremony/party to remember. One for the ages so to speak. I loved the toasts that were given from the heart. I loved the fact that almost all of our family got to be here with us to celebrate this special occasion. I loved the fact that all of my kids were so helpful on “The Day”, and made everything fall into place for their baby brother. And our backyard wedding would not have been complete without this amazing ring-bearer. He carried the rings in his pants pocket, and was so grown-up and handsome when it came time to pass the rings to the groom. He made his Grandma’s proud.

Congratulations to Brookelynne and Zachary. May all of your dreams come true.

Picture credits for this post go to: Erica B., Elaine Z., Naomi D., Hilary J., and Mary W. – Thanks Ladies!!

2 comments Posted in Around the House, Family

Summer’s Already Gone?

Posted on September 27, 2013 by Renee Spindle

This is the first summer in a long, long, long time that I can remember that we never did make it to the beach. No sand between the toes, no salty ocean water, and no frozen chocolate malt cup with one of those little wooden spoons. It’s a little bit of a bummer since we are less than an hour from the ocean’s shore. But, things happen and life rolls on. There will be many more summer’s at the beach.

This is me pouting a little, and stomping my feet a couple of times. I have such great memories of going to the beach with all of my kids, and their cousins. For a few summers we would go to the beach once a week. We’d leave right after lunch and get to the ocean’s shore around 2pm. We’d take dinner with us. Cold chicken legs, watermelon, and an assortment of chips and what not’s. We’d swim and watch the sunset, and would not leave until it got dark. Such good times and such great memories. Sometimes I would have 5 or 6 kids in the car with me, along with all of the boogie boards, towels, lots of sunscreen, and food. My Momster van would be stuffed to the brim.

For quite a few years we had an annual family picnic at the beach. We would set the date so everyone could be together for a day of fun in the sun. There would be tons of food, a few e-z ups for shade, lots of chairs, and a wagon to haul it all in. Then there is a certain Travel Guy in the family who would get to the beach extremely early, I’m talking like 6 or 7 am. He would stake out a fire ring, take a grill with him to cook on, and get a spot all staked out for the day. I’m sure I remember him taking some parking cones to help him stake out our “party zone” for the day. He’d usually have a few helpers with him, who’d get treated to a breakfast cooked beachside.

Family members would trickle into the “party zone” throughout the day. There would be lots of eating and swimming, swimming and eating, Frisbees, a few baseball gloves and a ball for the kids to play pickle, and maybe a kite or two.

By dinnertime we’d have a fire roaring in the ring. Hot dogs and hamburgers roasting, salads galore, and all of the kids just chomping at the bit to roast marshmallows for their s’mores. Of course it wouldn’t be a proper marshmallow fest without a game of chubby bunny first.

We’d roast lots and lots of mallows, eat s’mores, laugh and kibbutz about all things family. The day would end when the beach closed, around 10pm, and then it was the long, tired trek home. Such great memories and such good times.

It’s been a few years since we’ve gotten all of the gang together for a family beach day. It gets harder and harder every year with all of the kids moving along in their own directions. It was a fun family tradition that hopefully we can revive again soon.

Now fall is upon us. Here in Southern California we look forward to the cooler days and nights. Many, many cooler nights. We still can get to the beach a time or two, it’s just not the same as during the hot days of summer.

Does your family have a favorite summertime get together?

4 comments Posted in Family, Travels

It’s Been Too Long

Posted on September 17, 2013 by Renee Spindle

It’s high time I got back to my writing. It’s been a long time coming, too long as a matter of fact. This summer’s been somewhat different here at the Party House. It’s been unusual, eventful, sad, happy, and all of the emotions in between. Let’s see, we’ve been dealing with the loss of my Dad, helping my Mom to keep putting one foot in front of the other, flying back and forth across country, driving across country, planning a backyard wedding, throwing a backyard wedding (quite successfully I might add), and moving my parents RV to our house. Whew!! We have definitely had a busy couple of months.

My writing got put up on the shelf for a bit just because I could not find a way to put the words onto paper (or should I say type them on the computer). The loss of my Dad was unexpected and devastating. I just did not have the mind power to extend my thoughts and words to writing. I will admit though that I have missed my writing, and story sharing. So it’s good to be back here in the blog-o-sphere.

There are numerous new tales to tell, and stories to share. I’m looking forward to telling you all our summer tales, and sharing our ups and downs. This summer will definitely go into the family history books as a summer to remember.

And now, already, fall is right around the corner. I’m amazed that my Ash tree in the backyard already has a few yellow leaves. Wasn’t it just June, and the 4^th of July? I blinked and now it’s September. We’re looking forward to some special , grandkiddies birthday celebrations, and having it cool off enough to actually do some baking, finally. I have missed my baking, but it’s just been too hot and humid the past few weeks to turn anything associated with heat on inside the house.

So, it will be back to my writing, back to my baking (soon I hope) and sewing, and onward to my favorite time of year, Fall. Wishing you all a Terrific Tuesday.