Busy weekend in the kitchen

Lots of good stuff coming out of the oven this past weekend. With the cold weather, predicted storm, ice, rain, snow, wind it just seemed like a good idea to be ready to hunker down and stay home this holiday weekend. We did manage to get to a friend's house for New Year's Eve but it was dicy. Near white out conditions on the way there but better visibility on the way home. Had a good time and glad we went!

Scalloped potatoes and ham
Homemade chicken noodle soup - amazingly good!

Famous Dave's meatloaf - the best in the world!!

At the bottom of the recipe he says, "The best meatloaf you'll ever have and I don't care who your grandmother is" and I think he's right!!

My family

Siblings and spouses

Mary and Keith, Jennie and Curt, Sheila, John and I

Kids, grandkids, siblings, teens, adults, whatever

you call them they belong to us!

Mike hanging back from the highly competitive crowd.
Sheila, Megan, Amanda

Our official caller - John. Notice he takes his glasses off to read the numbers even though it's the senior edition and the numbers and cards are really, really big. :-)

Emily, Macy, Daniel

Jennie, Mike and Curt

Ratzlaff Christmas

Sunday, Decembe 26 brought us to Jennie and Curt's house for the Ratzlaff Christmas. Wonderful food, good laughs, fun times. We bring the Bingo game that I bought at the auction we had when our aunts passed away and it's nice to have the reminder of Edna and Lavina every Christmas. We also have prizes to give away to the Bingo winners but we usually have so many prizes that we just keep playing the same game without clearing our cards until everyone has won a prize for that game. Sundrop - a favorite prize.
A variety of other prizes

and more prizes - notice the summer sausage and pepperoni sticks from LaSalle meats. They were a hit and didn't stay on the table very long.

and to the right of the table those would be Schmidt buns. Also a hit and even got my nephew, Micheal, to play a game this year. Once he got his package of buns he went back down to the Bat cave to continue his video games. Aunt Shirley loves you, Mike!

Some excited faces, some not so excited and some just plain mad looking but she really wasn't mad. She was just mugging for the camera!

I think he's happy with his xBox....
This is the creepy smile that gets on my face when someone buys me a gift that's AWESOME!! My girls love me and know me well. They bought me the first two seasons of Dexter and I LOVE DEXTER!! If vigilante serial killers float your boat then give Dexter a look see. Hope blood and gore don't bother you too much...

Ok - a more normal smile, but still way excited!! DEXTER!!!

Emily telling me about the author that visited Briar Cliff and she bought two of his books for me and had them autographed. Awww.

Emily and her new tv.
Macy opening her new computer monitor. Note the smile....:-)

Daniel and the xBox he really, really, really wanted! Note the smile on him as well! I think Santa may have nailed it this year!

This is as close to a smile as we get from this guy. And no, he doesn't dress up for Christmas. Santa found a couple of seasons of M*A*S*H for him, an old tv show that he loves to watch but isn't on any channel right now. The kids told me not to wrap it because he hates unwrapping presents so we just handed it to him. He also always talks when I take a picture of him. Most annoying.

My excited kids on Christmas morning - ready to open presents!!
Macy and her pile.

Daniel and his pile. Ok - now he looks excited!

Emily and her pile - keeping warm under the heated blanket. Poor Em... always cold!