Interstellar Christmas

It was a very Merry Christmas Eve and Christmas Day at the Interstellar Casa. Elle and Zed got dropped off at their dad’s house. Fortunately my Ex’s family celebrates on Christmas Eve and my family celebrates on Christmas Day, so we don’t have a ‘conflict’ as to which house the kid’s celebrate. Two days, two celebrations, we’re all good. Nick’s brother (he calls him Bubba &#8212 this is Texas after all ya’ll) Bubba drove up Saturday morning and arrived at our house. We chatted for a bit, went and ate some lunch, and then came on a tour of my company’s offices. We have a lot of war memorabilia and things donated to our company. Bubba was in the military, but was actually discharged when it was discovered he had a ‘lazy eye’. His step-daughter, son-in-law and step-son are all in the military, and the man has a penchant for the good ‘ol US of A, so this tour and seeing all the artifacts my company owns was a big deal for him.

Then we went home and I started cooking. Turkey, dressing, jalepeno cranberry sauce, ham, green beans, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, and dinner rolls, accompanied by a couple of bottles of wine. We were happy campers. Nick’s special request for the night was the sweet potatoes with marshmallows, so I put a bit of extra effort into them. With butter, cinnamon and nutmeg, they were delicious.

The dinner table was set, and we enjoyed our meal.

We then played an exciting (and long) game of Mexican Train dominoes. Bubba won (he’s the master), I came in second, and Nick was last. I only beat him by one point. I ended up with the double tweleve in my hand more times than I would have liked. But oh well. It was such fun! Elle and Zed got back home about 11. We put them to be shortly before midnight, and we continued playing dominoes until almost 1 am. Then Bubba went to Nick’s, I wrapped a few more presents, and of course, had to present evidence that Santa had indeed come and left presents for the kids.

We ate a fantastic breakfast cooked by yours truly. The hollandaise turned out perfectly. The waffles were fluffy, the strawberries were fresh, and the whipped cream was whippy. With our bellies sufficiently stuffed and the dishes done, we all then turned to the gifts. We decided that as we opened presents, we would all take turns wearing the Santa hat.

Yep, even I wore the Santa hat. Everyone did!

Nick’s favorite present came from my sister.

I got a nice photo of my mom and grandmother together.

My grandma spent a lot of time on the presents she gave to all of us. I got my scarf for my birthday, but my cousin, my sisters and mom my got theirs for Christmas. They were all so excited!

We all had a fantastic Christmas. It was warm and cheery, everyone got nice presents, and our family was all together. Well, mostly together. My sister Nikki was sick. Flu, fever, blah. Poor thing. I didn’t get to see her. 😦 My brother and his family stayed home and did their own quiet thing, so I didn’t get to see him, or my niece. I was a little bummed about that.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Christmas Past

Whew! It’s all over. People were fed, presents were opened, kids were happy. I’ll have a better update with silly Santa hat photos and all later. I hope you all had wonderful Christmases. I hope that Santa brought you all the gifts you wanted, maybe a few you didn’t think of for yourselves, and that you all spent the day surrounded by love and peace.

Merry Christmas Eve!

Christmas Eve is upon us! Merry Christmas Everyone! I’ve been keeping busy getting the house ready for visitors. Nick’s brother is coming this afternoon. We’re going to take him on a tour of my office building. Exciting you say? Well, yes it is. Let’s just say I work for a large company headed by a very important person, and my office building has a mueseum-esqe quality to it.

Last night I baked two pies for dinner tonight. It’s just me, Nick & his brother, but I like my pies! It was my first time to make the blueberry, so I’ll have to let you know after dinner tonight how it was. I was proud of how it looked. I’m not too good at crusts just yet, but I did OK with these. I hope they came out flakey and not chewy.

My mincemeat pie. I need some pie cutters so I can make pretty pie crusts. Christmas list for next year I guess.

I also got a nice surprise. My new trail shoes came in! I picked them up yesterday. Don’t they look fabulous!?!?

And, finally, I leave you with a picture of Miss Elle and Nick. Elle and Zed spent the night with my grandparents Thursday, and Elle called several times (10) and left messages for us all night Thursday and all day Friday. Excerpts from her messages: “I love you! I miss you! Ho Ho Ho! Merry Christmas! And tell Nick I love him too! I miss him too!” My little sweetie makes my heart melt! Actually, both of them do!

Thursday Thirteen, XI

Thirteen Things on the mind of Interstellar Lass 1. *blush* It seems quite a few people have nakedness on the brain. I think I laughed at them all! 2. I still have several more presents to buy. But the mall is scaring me at this point. Especially the mall I want to go to. It’s very new and very big and very popular. And it will have lots of soccer moms. Yikes! 3. Nick’s brother is coming up Christmas Eve. He’ll stay for Christmas Day too. So, we’ll have Nick’s family and my family all together. 4. I’m very excited to be sharing my first Christmas with Nick! I love you baby! 5. I’m 14-0-1 in Fantasy Football now. I won my playoff game last week. I hope my playoff win streak continues! This week is for all the marbles! 6. I haven’t seen any of the holiday movies yet. I mean the new ones. I really want to go see Narnia. My Ex took Elle and Zed to see it already though. 7. He does that all the time. My Ex that is. I took my kids to see one movie this year because they had already seen them all with their dad. 8. I’m going to make a small Christmas Eve dinner for me, Nick & his brother. 9. I’m going to make a large Christmas Day brunch for the rest of my family. 10. Brunch will include waffles, strawberries, whipped cream, homemade syrup, Eggs Benedict with homemade Hollandaise, sausage, bacon, scrambled eggs, milk, juice, and coffee. 11. I’m going to make two pies for Christmas Eve dinner. Mincemeat (no, it doesn’t have meat…it’s pears, raisins and spices) and blueberry. 12. My foot is feeling better. No stress fracture, but it’s still a bit twingy here and there. I thought about running last night, but it was still sore, so I decided not to push it. Maybe tomorrow. 13. I hope you all have a Very Merry Christmas, a Happy Hanukkah, a Happy Kwanzaa, a Happy Winter Solstice (that’s actually today!), a Happy Festivus, or a Happy WhateverYouCelebrate. I hope your hearts have lots of of love, your arms get lots of hugs, you get everything you wanted on your Christmas list, and most of all, that you remember that it’s our friends and our loved ones that are our true gifts at this time of year. Bonus: I think I’m going to watch Love Actually tonight or tomorrow. This is such a wonderful movie. It makes me laugh and cry. To me, it shows the many ways we can love, and that “Love is all around us”. Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. (leave your link in comments, I’ll add you here!)

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!

The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

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Remember When???

I’ve seen this on a couple of blogs, so I’m going to take the cheap way out of a post today and use this. I think I know who will shock me and who will make me laugh, so let’s see if you can prove me right or wrong. 🙂

If you read this, and you happen to have a few seconds and a dollop of creativity to spare, please post a comment with a completely made up (read: FICTIONAL) memory of you and me. It can be anything you want – good or bad – but it has to be fake.

When you’re finished, post this little paragraph on your blog and be surprised (or mortified) about what people don’t actually remember about you. Try it, it’s fun!

‘Tis the Season

As promised, here are photos from White Rock.

This was the race that didn’t end.
Yes it went on and on my friends.
Lass started running it not knowing that it would
continue on forever and forever and forever…

Well, I lost the rhyme, but you get the idea.

Me and my little sis and my mom. My sis navigated Nick around. She did a great job according to Nick. And my mom ran a couple of miles with me when the going got tough. Helped me up the last big climb before the final 10K of the race.

Nick, as always, was a doll. He and my mom and my sister were at all the ‘points’ I highlighted for them. Between points they stopped by Target (hey! no fair shopping there without me!) and made me some inspirational signage.

As you can see, for Christmas I need some lessons in Photoshopping techniques along with a Photoshop license. OK, so image editing isn’t my forte. 😛

This weekend was busy! I slept in on Saturday, then took the kids to breakfast. Elle had a birthday part from 1-3, so I took that time to go shoe shopping. Nick and Zed hung out and did guy stuff while I sipped coffee at Starbucks and did the crossword. Then Elle and I went to the autoparts shop where I couldn’t figure out how for the life of me to get the headlight out on my Jetta. So, I got the tail light like I knew I could.

When Nick got back, I had him look at it. Turns out the genious engineers at Volkswagen want you to take your car to the dealership to get your head lamp replaced! We had to take the battery out of the car! And not just the battery, but we had to figure out how to get the battery out of it’s Fort Knox-esque casing and unbolted from the battery platform! Even then it was tricky getting the headlamp out. Then off to the autoparts store to find a match. We also noticed that my other tail light had gone out since I last looked, so we had to get a spare of that as well.

Let’s just say it was dark by the time we got my car put back together! Again. I am thankful for a handy-dandy fiancee like Nick! He looked super-sexy with grime all over his hands and shirt! 😉

We finally got the lights up on the house today. Nick did the aerial work while I focused on the terrestrial aspect. I think we did quite well, don’t you?

Tequila Christmas Cake

I thought I’d share another favorite recipe of mine. 😉 *wink, wink*

1 cup butter&#160                        1 tsp. baking soda
1 cup sugar                         1 tsp. salt
1 cup of brown sugar         Lemon juice
4 large eggs                        Nuts
1 bottle tequila                     2 cups dried fruit

Sample the tequila to check quality. To be sure it is of the highest quality, pour one level cup and drink. Repeat.
Turn on the electric mixer. Beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl.
Add one teaspoon of sugar. Beat again.
At this point its best to make sure the tequila is still OK. Try another cup…just in case. Turn off the mixerer thingy.
Break 2 leggs and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit. Pick the frigging fruit up off the floor. Mix on the turner.
If the fried druit gets stuck in the beaterers just pry it loose with a drewscriver. Sample the tequila to check for tonsisticity.
Next, sift two cups of salt. Or something. Check the tequila.
Now shift the lemon juice and strain your nuts. Add one table.
Add a spoon of sugar, or somefink. Whatever you can find.
Greash the oven. Turn the cake tin 360 degrees and try not to fall over. Don’t forget to beat off the turner.
Finally, throw the bowl in the shtink. Finish the tequila and wipe counter with the cat.

All Clear, So Far

Have I ever mentioned that I hate needles? I hate them. They’re nasty things. And I had an IV put in this morning. Yeowch! He only had to stick me once though, so I was happy about that. Then, he took the biggest syringe I’ve ever seen, full of radioactive stuff, and shot it into my arm. I had to lay on this long skinny table hooked to this giant circular camera thing and then the table moved me, well, just my feet, into the camera view. Had to check the flow.

Then they let me go to work for three hours. Radioactive and all. Oh, and be sure to drink, a lot. And I mean a lot. I peed three times in three hours. Not TMI, right?

Then I went back to the hospital. Fortunately it’s 5 minutes from where I work. This time I was in the room next door, where the machine was different. Instead of feeding me into the camera, the camera went from head to toe down to my feet. This time they were scanning the bones. Ten minutes on my back, ten minutes on my side. All done.

I waited another ten minutes, then the tech came out and said it all looked good. The radiologist was going to review them and send a final report to my doctor on Monday, but so far, it looks to just be ‘inflammed’ and not fractured.

Bandera, here I come! Woo Hoo!

Thursday Thirteen, X

Thirteen Things about Interstellar Lass 1. Woo Hoo! It’s my Tenth Thursday Thirteen! 2. I met my Ex’s new girlfriend on Sunday. Three words. Skinny, blond, dingy. He traded down. 3. And of course he has me meet her after I’d run my marathon, taken a two hour nap, hadn’t bothered to put on makeup, barely had my hair done, and was in sweats. Bastard. 4. I need to visit the automotive repair shop. No, not because I ran over the skinny, dingy, blond and need to smooth out that dent in my bumper. I have three lights out on my car. Headlight, tail-light, brakelight. 5. This weekend I’ll be putting up my outside Christmas lights. Zed is about to have a coronary if we don’t get them up. “There’s only one more week till Christmas mom!” “What about the lights?” “We’re going to put up the lights this weekend, right?!” 6. Elle and Zed both went to the dentist last week. Another clear report! No cavities. Here guys, have some Christmas cookies… 7. Zed tore is second pair of contacts. So, it’s been one month since he’s had them and he’s on his third pair. I’m making him wear his glasses for a week. 8. Zed and Elle also lost their jackets. Elle found hers. Zed didn’t. His dad said he’d buy him a new one. That’s good, because I wasn’t going to. Not after the contacts. 9. I am 13-0-1 in my Fantasy Football league. I’ve won 11 straight. This is starting to get boring. I know I shouldn’t complain. I don’t want to lose. But it makes it kinda not exciting. 10. I didn’t do as well in my Pick ‘Em last week. Oh well. New weekend, new picks. We’ll see how I do. 11. I’m starving. I’ve been starving since Sunday night. 12. I’m nervous about being injected with radioactive substances. That doesn’t sound like fun and I hate needles. 13. I’ve got to get to work! I’ve been slammed! If you leave me your link I swear I’ll link it later tonight. I thought the end of December was supposed to be slow! Links to other Thursday Thirteens! Leave me your link and I’ll put you here!

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!

The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

What we don’t know…

…is whether I have a stress fracture or an inflammed 5th metatarsal joint. The x-rays look clear. Which isn’t really surprising. Diagnosing a stress fracture is difficult. Another test is needed. So, for a short while on Friday, I will no longer be known as Interstellar Lass. I will be…

drumroll…

RADIOACTIVE LASS

echo…

Then, I still won’t know at least until Monday or Tuesday what the final diagnosis is. Until then, I can only wear my running shoes. That’ll look great with my business suits. The difference between the two diagnoses will be how long I have to lay off the running. Keep your fingers crossed.