Wow! We just enjoyed another exciting Ravens Sunday football game with our neighbors-exciting because the Ravens beat the Patriots today. Last Sunday we watched the Ravens win as our neighbors joined us here at home for dinner and Good Luck brownies. The brownies seemed to be doing the trick. We borrowed the idea of the Good Luck brownies from Mark Seitz. Today we enjoyed Cincinnati chili/Detroit Koegel vienna hot dogs and of course, had good luck brownies again for dessert. So far the Good Luck brownies have been working for the Ravens along with the Colts! So next weekend the Ravens will be visiting Indy and playing against the Colts. How ironic is that! Guess both families will have to go all out on the brownies!
We managed to enjoy the game in between dropping off and picking up the dog from the Petco Groomers. She was beginning to look like a small sheep, so we took her in for a shearing. I couldn't keep up with cutting out the mats. So she got a whole body shave and she has just 16lbs left on her. She hasn't been cut since the end of August, so there was a whole lot of fur there! I hope she doesn't freeze now!
We also had an early morning start to the day since Allison served mass. She had two newbies serving with her and she did a great job directing the brothers on what do. And our neighbor's daughter was presented with a certificate and gift card during mass for winning a Knights of Columbus Christmas poster contest along with two other school aged children.
It made for a long Sunday since we were up late Saturday night having an adults only dinner with several neighbors. Our neighbors originally from Columbia South America wanted to have several of us over for a sit down formal South American meal. They hired a babysitter for the little ones, and we divided the girls and boys up with pizza at two other houses, then headed for dinner at the third house. Augustus made us beef tenderloin wrapped in salt and cloth soaked in water and cooked it over the hot coals in the fireplace for 30 mins. We also had a South American rice and potatoe dish-a little like a quiche. We brought hot, spicy appetizers to share including a favorite-jalapeno hot pepper poppers that I grill in a special pepper rack that I bought when we visited Dan and Sheila in Texas. As a matter of fact, the rack is in the shape of Texas! You have to clean out the jalapeno peppers, and then stuff them with cheddar cheese mixed with garlic and cream cheese and top the whole thing off with a slab of bacon. They are definitely spicy! Dessert was vanilla ice cream with coconut sprinkled on top and a tangerine/yogurt pie with crushed cloves. Overall a very enjoyable dinner and fun catching up with the neighbors on their holiday vacations.
In case you didn't know, it is still pretty cold in most of the US. We had a quick snow storm blow through on Thursday night so school was delayed for 2 hours Friday morning to clean up the 3 inches of snow on the roads. I had to take Allison and Scott in late while Tom headed off for a meeting at work. I also had to shovel the driveway and sidewalk before I dropped Scott off, but afterwards it wasn't too cold outside so I put away a few of the outdoor Christmas decorations as well as my fall flowers that I never had a chance to move after Thanksgiving weekend.
Scott's whole school week schedule was off since the kids missed their Christmas parties and Holiday concert before Christmas. They were supposed to do all of this before Christmas, but because of the 2 feet of snow, everything was cancelled and the kids missed 3 days of school. So they were spending the day on Weds this week making it up. I just wish Tom or myself could have seen the Holiday concert since Scott was singing with the choir. Tom had planned on attending before Christmas. Every class in school, from Pre K to 8th grade performs and the music teacher has really done a great job in the past with getting all the kids involved and teaching them how to sing a song or play an instrumental piece. And the 8th grade always reinacts the nativity scene. Guess I will just have to catch next year's performance. I wish they would start videotaping the programs.
Weds night I had my GS Leadership meeting. Our Service Unit manager is trying to recruit me for her position since she will be retiring next year. My girls will be done in a few years too though so I am not quite as interested. I was busy signing them up for a couple of upcoming activities scheduled at the end of the month including rollerblading and a orientation for our Gold Award.
At work my boss has me helping to redesign some seated exercise groups for the nursing home residents. Thanks for the chair exercise DVD Mom. Looks like the staff may be able to use it. I also picked up lots of info on the internet for other chair exercise groups. It is amazing what you can do in a chair-sounds good to me!
And Tom was busy this weekend helping Scott design his Pinewood Derby Cub Scout car. The Cub Scouts have races with small cars they design and build with their dads. Scott and Tom have won 1st, 2nd and 3rd place so far. Scott was going for a Lego design which he made and it looked wonderful, however, I found Tom and Scott a book on car designs at Michael's Arts and Crafts store, so they scrapped that idea and decided to go for a speedy car instead. The race has been moved up to this coming Saturday this year. For the past 3 yrs it has been held in March, so it does not give them much time to mess around. I also had to register the two of them for the Klondike derby- an outdoor winter course filled with different stations for scout tasks including reading a compass, tying knots, building shelters, and this year the boys get to race a sled! They have to get in their requirements to move up from a Webelos 1 to Webelos 2 before their Blue and Gold banquet this February. And the boy scouts are celebrating their 100th anniversary, so there is a lot happening.
Allison and I helped out the GS choir on Saturday morning at a singing workshop for leaders. We had 3 hours of fun singing a lot of crazy campfire songs. I can't remember all those crazy songs! But it was fun trying!

I am happy to report that my Uncle Joe Borg, Mom Bozyk's brother, had successful open heart surgery this past Monday at Henry Ford hospital in Detroit and headed home on Friday. Fortunately he did not need a valve replacement, but did have an aneurysm forming in the cardiac artery that was repaired. Just to keep an eye on things, I have scheduled an echocardiagram this Friday for myself since this seems to be running in the family. And I have also been diagnosed with a heart murmur in the past when I was pregnant, so it is probably good to have it checked out. But we are all happy to hear Uncle Joe is recovering nicely.

Well, I am off to work on next week's schedule. Try to stay warm! I hear it is getting so cold in Florida, the iguanas are going into hibernation and falling out of the trees! Think warm thoughts! Kathleen and family