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Archive for Holidays

Top Ten Things I am Thankful for in 2012

Posted on November 21, 2012 by Renee Spindle

This year has been a busy and amazing year

for myself and my family. Since it’s

Thanksgiving, and since my family will be

together celebrating, I wanted to take the

time to share my thankful thoughts for this year.

1) My Dad’s continued improvement with his cancer treatments. He never, never, never gives up. The word perseverance has a whole new meaning for me.

2) Our family tree has expanded. We welcomed our granddaughter into the family almost two weeks ago. She is a beautiful, bouncing baby girl with a proud big brother.

3) The family members that are cancer survivors, and continue to remain in good health. My Grandpa, my Mom, and my baby boy.

4) So glad I got to escape to New York City with Travel Man for our vacation this year. We had a great time. I got to see the Statue of Liberty!! Crossed that one-off of my bucket list.

5) Getting to spend quality time with Evan this past summer. We had a great times at Camp Grandma. Lots of fun times, and good memories.

6) Seeing my sister three times this year. That’s really a great treat as she’s a mountain girl from Montana. Love spending time with her and chatting for hours on end.

7) Ever so thankful that my grandparents are on Skype. I love getting to see them and chat with them. My brother has graciously arranged a few group family calls. These are the treasured family times.

8) So glad that my Travel Man survived his boogie boarding accident with no serious injuries. Seeing him hurt made my stomach churn, and I don’t want to have any repeats. No more boogie boarding for that guy!

9) Watching all of my kids become responsible, hard-working, compassionate, and caring adults. This makes you feel so great as a parent.

10) There is a great amount of thankfulness that we are “The Party House” for our family. We love hosting the birthdays, summer cookouts, holiday dinners. It is such a treat to have everyone gathered for fun times, and good memories. No better place to be.

Wishing you and yours an absolutely wonderful Thanksgiving together. If you are cooking and bustling about the kitchen tomorrow be sure and stop, and listen and take in the sights and sounds of your family and friends all around you. It’s a wonderful thing.

4 comments Posted in Around the House, Family, Holidays, Travel Man

We had a Lovely, Positively Pink Day

Posted on November 1, 2012 by Renee Spindle

A few weeks ago, on a Saturday, my daughter, Hilary and I hosted a baby shower for Hilary’s big sister, Naomi. We were surrounded by family and friends, all of them ladies at this shin-dig, except for Evan and his cousin. It was a wonderful, sunny Saturday, and the planning paid off tremendously. Of course, all of us Grandma’s, Grammie’s, and Nana’s in the crowd were especially excited. For me there is nothing more heart-warming or meaningful than knowing that the family tree will soon be expanding.

We had lovely tissue paper flowers, a diaper cake, lots of pink tulle and ribbons, and even a crown for the guest of honor.

And we had the food! Deli sandwiches, chips, dips, watermelon salad (more on this later), pink lemonade punch, and a beautiful coconut cake.

We passed around a journal for everyone to write their thoughts and good wishes to Naomi and her family. It was a lot of fun, and will be a great keepsake for the new arrival.

Hilary headed up the game co-ordination, and I think we had the most fun with “The Purse Game”. In our game, we used a points system which made it a lot of fun to find out what treasures all of the ladies had in their purses.

One of the highlights of the day was Evan opening his “Diaper Dude Junior” tool belt. I saw this idea on Pinterest, and had to make them for Evan and his Dad. Both of the tool belts had a diaper, baby wipes, goggles, plastic gloves. All set for diaper duty. Evan was a great sport and thought this was a very fun gift. I’m sure once his baby sister has arrived he will try to put his diaper tools to good use.

My daughter and her family received a plethora of wonderful, amazing gifts. They will be ready for anything when the baby sister arrives.

This is all of the grandma’s that live in the area with the “mom-to-be”. We are blessed to have so many family members close by. The only thing that would have made this a positively more perfectly, pink day is if my Sister and my Grandma could have joined us.

We had a wonderful afternoon together, and are counting the days/hours Until Evan’s baby sister arrives. Travel Man and I are sponsoring a guess the baby date prize for the family. It’s turning out to be a lot of fun. We’ll keep you all posted on the arrival.

What’s your most recent and favorite family moment?

No comments Posted in Around the House, Family, Holidays

Halloween’s Past

Posted on October 31, 2012 by Renee Spindle

This being the last day of October, and Halloween I thought I would reminisce just a little with a few photos from the past. My kids have always loved costuming up for Halloween, and now Evan continues that tradition.

This is just a little mix of pictures from the past few years and beyond of our Halloween good times.

Evan loves to dress up and Halloween for him is such a treat. Here’s a few pictures of him from the past few years.

And some of the kids famous pumpkin carvings:

Some of my guys in their costumes:

And my favorite fall picture taken by my Travel Man a few years ago:

For me, Halloween is the first real signal of fall, which leads us to Thanksgiving, and of course the Christmas holiday season. To all of the ghouls and goblins out there have a fun Halloween evening.

No comments Posted in Around the House, Family, Holidays

A New Birthday Tradition

Posted on June 10, 2012 by Renee Spindle

This year I wanted to have a way to put up remembrances of the birthday parties we host here at the Party House. I am working on getting all of the birthday cakes, with the guests of honor printed out so I can make a cool board to pin them up on in our family room. It will be a great conversation piece for the next party here.

Since this is the beginning of June I thought it would be fun to share the birthday pictures with everyone from this year so far.

In January, we have my younger brother, Jim. He’s almost 50! Can’t wait until next January so we can surprise him with something!

Also in January is my niece, Mary and my Mom on February 3rd. They usually celebrate with a combo party. This cake was a lovely Butter Pecan cake, extremely yummy.

In March it’s our youngest daughter, Hilary’s, birthday. She just turned 25, man I’m getting old!

This was the no-bake lemon cheesecake. This recipe was posted a few weeks ago. Yum, yum.

In April, I celebrated my birthday along with my son-in-law Brad. I’m not going to post our ages. You can see the candles loud and clear.

We had the good fortune to attend an Angels game on our Birthday weekend. So of course we had to have this cake! It has a yummy whip cream frosting, so much better than buttercream anytime.

In May, we celebrated my Dad’s birthday with some no-bake cheesecake and berries. Quite a light summer dessert treat.

Evan gave his great-grandpa the sweetest, most heartfelt hug right before we sang. We all went, “Awwwwwwwwwww”.

I love this picture of my Dad singing to himself. We had a great day, lots of fun family times.

We are surrounded by an amazing family group. There’s just so much love, caring, and compassion. It’s the most comforting feeling to know that you can count on your family for anything. A rousing Happy Birthday to all of the family who have celebrated so far this year. As soon as my board is complete I will post an update on how it turns out.

Are there any new traditions started in your family this year?

p.s. photo credits in this post go to Elaine, Erica, and my Mom. Thanks ladies for making sure we don’t miss out on any great memories.

No comments Posted in Around the House, Family, Holidays

A Little Green Jello Salad.. aka Christmas Salad

Posted on June 8, 2012 by Renee Spindle

My family has this strange obsession with my green jello salad. They have been known to go gaga for it. It’s a yummy concoction of jello, cream cheese and pears. The flavor melding is to die for!! This started out as Christmas Dinner jello. Then it progressed to making it for people’s birthdays. I have been know to make this in a 13×9″ pan, stick in some candles, and sing a rousing Happy Birthday to the guest of honor. It’s been around for a long time, and is one of those family favorites that will go down in the history books.

Ingredients:

(2)- 9 oz. cans pear slices, undrained
(2) – 3 oz. packages lime flavor jello
(4) – 3 oz packages of cream cheese, softened
2 c. whipping cream
1 c. maraschino cherries (chopped & drained)
½ c. chopped walnuts

Directions:

Drain the pears, reserving the juice.
Pour the juice into a measuring cup and add enough water to make 2 cups of liquid.
Pour this into a small saucepan and bring to a boil.
Add the lime jello and stir to dissolve.
Chill the mixture in the pan until slightly thickened, but not set.
While waiting for the jello to set- whip the whipping cream and keep it chilled in the fridge.
Chop the maraschino cherries and drain.
Chop the walnuts.
Once the jello mixture is set, pour it into your favorite mixing bowl, and it should be quite a deep bowl.
Now beat this mixture until frothy.
Add the softened cream cheese and pear slices, and beat until smooth.
Fold in the whip cream, cherries and nuts. If you have any extra cherries you can garnish with these once the salad is slightly set.
Pour the entire contents of the bowl into an oiled 12 cup mold or a 13 x 9″ pan.
Chill until firm, about 2 hours, or overnight.
To serve, unmold the salad or cut it into squares and enjoy.

This recipe is great for your potluck parties, family gatherings, any occasion where you will be feeding a crowd. It’s been a very popular recipe here at the Party House, and I look forward to passing the recipe along to the generations to come. Also, I just realized this is a great summer jello salad, because all of the flavors together are just so yummy. Hard to describe in words alone, you really must try it.

What’s your favorite jello salad?