MEMORIAL DAY

Today we celebrated Memorial Day with a BBQ and were pleasantly surprised by a visit from Mason's bro Alfred, his wife, Frankie and one of his sons, Leon and his wife.  I had never met Frankie before today and it was so good to finally put a face to the name.  Nanny came over as did Phillip, Catherine, Kaleigh and Troy.  Brianna had to work but showed up with her dad after work.  We also had our neighbors, the Solis family, over to eat as well.  Our menu was BBQ brisket, hot dogs, ribs, macaroni salad, nacho cheese, Chili beans, pickled beets guacamole, salsa, chips, cherry pie, watermelon, sweet and unsweetened tea, sodas, beer and wine.  It was a good day for eating.  We remembered our soldiers who have died and those that are still serving to protect our country and keep America safe.

Memorial Day weekend

I can't believe May is almost gone.  We are going to have Nanny to eat BBQ on Monday.  We are babysitting the little ones and she loves to see "her chilin" and they like her too.  Kaleigh loves Aunt Hattie but especially Rebekah.  Our neighbors are also coming over for bbq brisket.  I think I'll make hot green beans, corn on the cob, hot dogs and chips and salsa too.  And of course, I have to make some apple pie.  I want to make sure we remember all our service people who have made our life and country safer.  I am especially remembering my dad who was a great hero.  He saved his whole battalion in WWII by moving a truck filled with explosives out of the way of some bombs - no one else would do it and a few seconds after he moved it, a bomb hit the spot where the amunition truck was parked - it would have killed everyone.  He should have received the Metal of Honor for his action but didn't - that was my dad.  In his last years he was in God's Army trying to save as many souls for the Lord by tell them of God's love and gift of salvation.

NJ WEEKEND

This last weekend we went to Southern NJ to visit with my son Mark and his family.  We went to Long Island Beach and played in the sand and went to see a lighthouse.  We had a great time.  This was the first time they had met Mason and they both seemed to enjoy each other.  We made Sopaipillas, Carne Adovada in Beef and Chicken, Green Chili Stew, Chicken Vegetable Soup, and 2 types of danish w/ homemade puff pastry-this is what they asked me to make - we also had beans, BBQ beef, pancakes, pizza-thats alot considering we were only there 2 1/2 days and we went to the beach 2 afternoons of those.  We also bought fudge and clam chowder at the beach.    Sure glad God talks about eating in heaven "gathering at the supper of the Lord," etc. coz we sure do like to eat here.

Phillip's Birthday

Today is my 4th son's 33rd birthday and we celebrated it here at our home with Catfish, Onion rings, coleslaw, baked potato salad, shrimp, fresh corn off the cob, hushpuppies, sweet mint tea, and topped off with cheesecake and fresh coffee.  It was a glorious rainy day.  God knew Phil and I love rain and He blessed our socks off because it flooded rain all day - best weather in the world!!!!!!!!!!!!!Thank you Jesus!  Catherine, 5th child, was able to join us and it was perfect.  She doesn't eat fish so we had chicken fingers for her.

NCL 14 day transatlantic cruise to Venice

Well, we are back from our 14 day transatlantic cruise.  What a whirlwind!  We decided to take advantage of a deal we could not afford not to take on Monday; called the pass bureau to see if we could get the passes to come back in one day and they said yes.  We had commited to babysitting that day so on Tues we flew to Dallas and bought tickets from Venice to London and London to Chicago.  After coming home we started the calls.  We had to try to find a way to LaGuardia in NY where the ship would leave from.  The flights were all full due to the final 4 womens conference but we were determined.  We found a hotel in NY close to the airport on Fri and a hotel in Venice for 2 nites where we would end up.  We had 2 days to do this, pack, find a house sitter, stop the paper,mail, pay up all our bills for April and send off birthday cards and gifts for 6 family members.  Thursday afternoon Catherine calls us and tells us there is no way we can get out of San Antonio, even with her positive space passes so she offered to come over after work (1130pm), sleep at our house and take us to Austin the next morning at 3am.  So off we are on our way to Chicago where we would chg planes and arrive LaGuardia about 1pm - this is just the preparation to go.  We were so tired, we ate some pizza at a nearby restaurant and went to bed at the hotel till the next morning.  We saw none of NY city.

Day one - we arrived at the dock by taxi and had lunch on the ship.  It is the NCL Gem

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               We left NY about 530pm and were at sea.  That night we ate dinner at the restaurant on board and saw a comedy act.  We got to meet several couples that would become our dear friends the rest of the trip.

Days 2,3.4 and 5 were at sea.  We did so much!  We went to Karaoke (Sylvia sang) went to ballroom dancing, did adult disco till 2am and went to late dinner till 4pm, slept in late every morning, saw lots of shows which included Sylvia getting hypnotized, comedians, juggler, magicians, the gem dancers and singers(broadway style shows) an opera singer-Edmondo Rahme -the tenor, classical concert n 4strings quartet, a piano virtioso Vladimir Zaitsev,  etc. We were on the "newly and not so newly-wed game"  We also went to late nite shows, matinees, movies, bingo, trivia, took line dance lessons and salsa lessons, and much more.  We washed our clothes and hung them in our room and Mason took so many pictures I cannot post them allThis is Mason taking a picture of the waves out of our window with the laundry hanging to dry. More pictures and the rest of the story to follow................