Blogmas | Games for the Holidays!

Hello!

I don’t know about you, but my family has never been into games.

The one thing I wished my family did more of was play games. We had a couple of years where we did in fact play Just Dance and Taboo, but they didn’t end quite well, which is probably why we never kept at it afterwards!

Now that I have Nolan and Kimber, I would like to bring in some old school games that I certainly enjoyed as a child. Nolan is very infatuated with technology and understands what a PlayStation and XBOX are–thanks in part to his daddy! However, as I’ve found out recently, he has a knack for Hungry Hungry Hippoes, so I may be right in my thinking that introducing some of these games I will be talking about in this post, will be something he might enjoy too!

Unfortunately, Kimber isn’t old enough to actually play with us, but I’m hoping watching the two of us would give her something to look forward to in the future. So, here were some of the games that I thought could be really good contenders for the three of us and maybe possibly your family too to play during the holidays.

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Connect 4

Last September, while my sister was in the hospital, Nolan and I spent a good amount of time together and on Nickleodeon, they had some advertisements for the newest creation of the Connect 4 franchise; we were intrigued, Nolan especially, but I’ve always been more into the original setup, so I wasn’t too interested in this version.

I have many, many memories of playing this game in school. While I was in elementary, I took speech and every Friday we had a popcorn party, where we sat on the floor, ate popcorn, and played a different game (thus how this post came about!) each week. Connect 4 is a very easy game to understand as you have the structure itself and two different colored coins or chips, the objective is to not only block the other player, but you also have to connect four spots in a row in order to win.

Connect 4 is a lot like Bingo and Tic-Tac-Toe as you can go in many directions: diagonally, side to side, and up and down. As long as you win “fairly” then anyone at any age can be a master at the game itself.

Jenga

When I was in elementary school, I took Speech, and I would be in there for maybe 20-25 minutes a day and I specifically remember Fridays being the best day of the entire week because it was our party day. Our teacher was so sweet, and she would make popcorn for each class, and we’d play different games, but it was a ruse because we still had to do our lessons in between turns. She was a smart and sneaky like that! Anyways, I tried to rack my brain trying to figure out which ones we played, and I really hope that I can teach my nephew someday soon.

Jenga is very unique, it is made up of rectangle sticks and requires you to really think about the overall design, whenever it is your turn, you pick a stick from the very bottom of the build or a little higher. For most people, you rarely went from the bottom as you need good bones for everything to stay up and if you take one from that section and it turns out it was helping from breaking down the whole thing, you lose. My nephew has always enjoyed stacking things up and blocks in general, so toddlers would really love playing something like this because they’re always doing things with their toys.

Screamo

For this game, I learned it at the nursing home back in October. If these ladies ranging in age early 70’s to mid-80’s can play, anybody can do it. My nephew is four and he just loves playing this game anytime he comes over. It is usually the first thing he wants to do! What he doesn’t know is that he’s learning a bit of math too!

It is fairly simple once you figure out the steps. You have a paper with the numbers 1-12, two dice, and 12 chips or coins as my nephew prefers to call them. The main goal is to roll both of your dice and say it lands on a four and seven, this equals out to be seven but you’ve already covered up your seven with a previous play, so you have three options, that is if these other numbers are not already gone, you can lay down two coins on your four and three or exchange them with a five and two or six and one, which is even better because it is better to remove the number one as you can’t get a natural one with two dice.

UNO

I like a lot of card games, but my ultimate favorite–even if I’m not the best at it!–is UNO.

I have never been able to figure out how long I’ve loved UNO, but it had to come after middle school though. It doesn’t show up in my earlier memories and this kind of makes sense because I do remember playing an awful lot from 2005-2009 with my family and friends at slumber parties (do you remember those?!) and again, it is pretty easy to follow, but there are a few symbols that can be somewhat tricky, like the reverse and skip cards. These can be really annoying if you are playing with a large group of people and nobody really knows who is next in line, so to make things easier on yourself and the newcomers, I’d pick those guys out before you start the game entirely.

There is an episode of The Golden Girls where Dorothy is playing Gin Rummy with her mother Sophia, and she always loses the game and Sophia basically drives her completely insane after every round so she gives up and decides no more. By the end of the episode, you learn why Sophia chooses to play it with her daughter and they end up playing a round during the last few seconds of the show. I guess I’m the same way with UNO. I love playing it with my family the most, it’s where I have the most memories, and it doesn’t matter on the age because my nana was in her late 70’s when we taught her so it’s not all that difficult once you know what each card means while the game continues.

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In a way, I am like Sophia because I like the talk and watching everyone’s facial expressions as they arrange their cards and it’s one game that being an observer can have its advantages… As much as I’d like to win a round or two, I am fine with seeing someone get excited instead. This is what I hope to teach Nolan the most; it’s okay to allow someone to win but you never, ever tell them afterwards, because then they’ll think you forfeited the game and they’ll want a rematch and that attitude doesn’t make good challenges, especially if they lose against you.

What are your favorite games to play during the holidays? Which one do you hope to teach your child or family member someday?

Dear Papaw IV

Dear Papaw,

It is me again.

I decided to do this letter while I sat on the edge of my bed staring at my fairy lights hanging down around the only window in the room while listening to sad love songs. They’re bright like your spunk, and I miss it dearly. I’ve been looking for an endless supply of laugher as it has become the best form of medicine for me lately. I am also finally understanding why you liked to sit in the quiet. It’s hauntingly peaceful.

Lots have happened since I wrote to you last, and I’m sure you know everything. The new house. Dad’s watching basketball again. He watched majority of this season, going between Butler and IU. There were a few times that we both agreed you would be furious about, especially since each team had a good start but once the conference games began all heck broke loose. And then to top it off, the Coronavirius outbreak. We were furious but yet not surprised by the cancellation of all games–men and women! They even cancelled my NBA games! Last Thursday, we had a Butler game (which is how I found out about the NCAA announcement) earlier in the day and then I was suppose to have both Rockets and Lakers games. I hadn’t watched a game for about five days and the one time I was ready, this happens!

Emily has graduated and hoping to start her journey to get her master’s degree. And you were probably apart of the journey with Brittany to visit nana and everybody up north last fall. Thank goodness I did not throw up in her car! She probably wouldn’t let me back in that car again… I’m hoping you’ll be part of the mini adventure coming up too. No pressure or anything, because you know how loud we can get sometimes!

You would love to hang out with Nolan. He is fun but has a lot more energy than anybody else! He is interested in cars and trucks. We haven’t exactly introduced trains to me yet. He has his own sound effects that are absolutely adorable! He can say several words, I think the last count was over 40! Apparently trying to say “Meggie” or just plain Meghan is a little harder to do, but I am a naturally patient person so I will wait for the day he comes out of his mouth and when that day comes, I’ll probably cry right in front of him!

Another thing he loves is music. I don’t know whether or not you’d be proud of an almost two year old knowing all of the words to “Cool” by Jonas Brothers. I mean, they’re no Stan Kenton, but he does sound cute whenever he does the chorus. Oh, and the dancing too! He definitely has some rhythm in his bones, even if they like hurt every other day. I think you’d wonder why he has pains like an elderly person (this was as good as you’re going to get. I mean, I could have said someone in their 80’s, but I think nana would feel offended!) but also still feel bad for him. He’ll be the only one in his age group, who will know every time the weather changes.

Okay, I think I am done ranting about things. Although, I think you like hearing how things are going lately. If I can remember, maybe I’ll write to you again on your birthday. We’ll have to see how everything goes first. I wonder if you’ve become a patient person. It seems a bit weird saying that out loud, but I am a little curious.

I hope you’re doing very well wherever you are right now. Keep watching over everybody if you can. We love and miss you lots. Bye.

Your granddaughter,

Meg-han.

Baby Shower

Howdy!

As most of the world was obsessing over The Royal Wedding, we were celebrating the soon arrival of my little nephew with a shower! Both sides of the world was greeted with a beautiful day; even though that morning we had a small rain shower in which case made it very humid outside, but the sun shined brightly and it was just perfect.

The drive to Blondie and Brandon’s apartment gave me flashbacks to when we were driving to the church on their wedding day over a year ago! Some of the things that were different that we didn’t have to change out clothes at a certain time and my mom and I didn’t see those little boys fighting in the backyard as we drove by. We literally saw one threw a nice punch at the other kid! It was probably one of the funniest things and the highlights of the day!

The place that had the shower was at a clubhouse, which was a little villa, where residents of a nursing home eat and have fun together! They also rent it out for public gatherings, and since we were suppose to get less than twenty people there, it was actually the perfect setting for this sort of thing! My mom, Aunt Cindy, my dad’s cousin Mindy, and Blondie’s friend Raven brought food and helped decorate the fairly large space. We had balloons, confetti, and an “Oh Baby” streamer, it was all so cute! Mindy made a very beautiful cake, that was covered in various shades of blue, it had silver sprinkles in different sizes, as she says they were made of chocolate! One side of the cake was chocolate while the other was vanilla. And in the middle was a picture of the sonogram of little Nolan with his name at the top!

Once the guests started arriving, one of the things that they were supposed to do was mark their guess of when little man would show up. Blondie made up with a calendar of the days of June and the first two weeks of July, because “mom refuses to go on any longer” and I’m not quoting that for the hell of it, this was actually written on the bottom of the poster board!

The due date is July 2nd, but nobody believes she’s have him on that day. He’ll either come early, or be stubborn as hell and surpass the due date entirely! If the second option does happen, some of us will be laughing our butts off! I still think Nolan would could arrive on the 30th of June, I might be a little biased with that guess because it is Arthrogryposis Awareness Day! Our mom and dad think he’ll be born on July 1st, which is a special birthday on my dad’s side.

My sister wore a very pretty flow-y blue dress she found on Amazon, it was very long and I would be lying if I didn’t say I was very nervous everytime she went walked around the chairs! I thought she looked very beautiful as it suited her and growing belly! I think she only liked it because it had pockets, because whenever I saw her, that’s where her hands would be to try to keep them away from the food!

We played some games, but in the span of two hours, we didn’t get to play all of them! Poor mom spent a good hour trying to put together a homemade Baby Bingo. She and I kept getting into arguments because she could NOT understand that there isn’t 20 words of baby items for all five letters! The other game that my mom wanted to do was have everybody guess how much ribbon could cover her belly! I wasn’t that far off, but the fact that my dad used his waist in comparison to her belly was pretty hilarious! Mindy actually won that game, it was literally almost the exact same length, and everybody was in agreement!

Honestly, Brandon wanted to do the games, he found two that had a similar theme: poop! We did the infamous, “guess what kind of candy bar is inside the diaper” game. I have to say, they originally had 7 diapers, but Blondie burnt the Kit Kat and the plate so she had to throw it outside!

The other one has the same origins with “Stick The Tail On The Donkey” except it’s “Stick The Poo” I don’t know who drew the outline of the diaper, but it’s actually very good! The rules to the game, is everybody gets a paper turd, they put their name on it, their eyes are covered, they’re spun and place it on the board.

A lot of people were very close, we only had a few guests actually miss the diaper entirely, but there were like three who were like inches away from the middle, shockingly, we had one person basically place it just right. Don’t ask how I did, I didn’t play this one or the other. Anything to do with poop, kind of freaks me out! And what’s funny is that, I actually want to see if I can change Nolan’s diaper!

One of my favorites we did was a game they played at their baby class! It’s called “Sweet Child Of Mine” and they had a list of things where you had to guess a different piece of candy below, so like “girl’s name” could be Babe Ruth, Kit Kat, and Candy (as my dad put down!) and I have to say, I think dad had a lot more fun with this one! He and our family friend Russell literally stood in the kitchen area and were giggling as they were filling out the paper, we were excited and absolutely nervous about their answers!

And the last one we had time for, was “The Price Is Right”. Blondie has a special talent, she can create beautiful bubble lettering, everybody thought she had traced it, but nope, she did it all!

This game was a bit more difficult as it’s been an extremely long time since I’ve watched The Price Is Right so I was a little bit out of my element here. We were all given of the things listed on the poster board and we had to guess what the price is for each of the baby items, and mom just did it on her own and didn’t get a single one right! Everybody was either too high or low, only Raven was the one who actually got one right, so she got the prize.

At the last we ate cake and Blondie and Brandon opened presents. Now there were pictures of this, but where they sat, there is a huge glare directly behind them and the pictures themselves are very hard to see and I don’t have any way to fix it anymore!

They got a lot of diapers and wipes, one couple actually came with two large boxes of diapers! They have a swing, bottles, monitor, lotion, etc! Shockingly, only three people brought superhero themes onesies! Two were Batman themed, while the other is a full on Spider-Man outfit. People were also considerate to the mommy as well, as she was given facial masks, a necklace with the name “Nolan” on it, and even this little onesie that we now understand had to be left until last, because it made everybody cry! It says “hand-picked for Earth by my great-grandpa in Heaven” this would dedicated to our papaw, who died two years ago.

After that, one by one, people started to leave the party. The ones that helped build everything up, were there helping tear it down, except the layout of “Oh Baby” that pretty much came down on its own! For the ones who wanted to get last minute pictures with mommy-to-be, there was a stack of balloons on the far left side, because poor Raven was in the corner holding up the banners a little longer! I had to get a picture with my sister, and since she’s had contractions off and on after 34 weeks, I didn’t want her squatting down to get down at my level, and I literally told her she didn’t have to do that, but she did it anyways!

Blondie’s Bridal Shower!

Hello! 🙂

Three weekends ago, I mentioned on my outfit of the day post that I went to my sister’s bridal shower! It was exciting and a bit nerve-wrecking to say the least, because most of us waited until like the last minute to figure out what exactly we were going to do while there, like what kind of decorations and games we were going to play. Blondie and Brandon came up with some of the decorations months earlier, but I think a few things will be used for their reception at the actual wedding.

When we got there, we were greeted by their cat Samuel just chilling on a towel in front of the door. Thank god the door opens towards you otherwise he would have been hit. He’s kind of lucky he didn’t get run over either! A few of the bridesmaids Sam, Jayde, Skyela and Alli were there already. Sam and Blondie were in the little kitchenette cooking the beef and chicken for the Taco Bar. The cats kept trying to steal pieces of ice out of the bucket Brandon bought to keep the mini water bottles cold the entire time.

The shower was the first time my mom and I to finally meet some of Brandon’s family. I’ve actually been excited to meet his mom since probably last year. I know she’s not my mother-in-law but I still wanted to meet her! He had his mom, sisters, cousin, aunt and grandma there. I felt bad for him in ways, he basically stayed in his “man cave” through most of the shower playing his new video game; that part he probably wasn’t too sad about that! He did come out for one of the games though. When we played The Newlywed Game. I had asked him questions two days before so we could make signs and I realized that not only do I suck at bubble letters that I really need to invest on using my clipboard more since I now have green little dots all over my new cutting board. It’s for my blogging photography, don’t freak out on me too much!

His mom, brought down some very adorable pictures of when he was a baby and toddler for the party game “Guess What Age I Am” and don’t worry, mom found some very cute photos of Blondie when she was younger too! My dad and I had to glue them onto some paper and I wrote what age might’ve been in each one. I say “might’ve” because I had a hard time thinking back how old she really was for each year! I sat between both of my grandma’s, it was the first outing my nana has done since her whole health scare. She seemed to enjoy it since Otis basically flooped down into her lap when she first got into the apartment! Nana failed at guessing Blondie’s age in each picture, while my grandma (dad’s mom) and I won a fair amount on Brandon’s. I guess I can’t tell between a few months and a year old!

I was very proud of myself. I joined in on the fun with the games. When everybody was first showing up, they were asked to write out a memory of them and the bride-to-be and since I couldn’t figure out a single memory to share, I decided to say which one and have her guess which guest it is. Apparently I didn’t understand the rules very well, because as Blondie was failing to guess the right person, I thought it was only right to help her out but I kept getting yelled at by our mother because I was giving out hints. To the ones she couldn’t guess right, they were given prizes. It wasn’t until we were on our way home that I figured it that out and then I felt like a dumbass! Anyways, the memories were funny and I thought were better than what we both thought would happen. The last one was probably the “worst” out of all of them because it had to do with her drinking! Poor thing, three grandmothers in the room and she thought she was free from them hearing anything bad! Wrong!

Back in March Blondie and I had looked on Pinterest for different ones. I found quite a neat games, I kind of thought we could play a Disney related game since the theme of the wedding is half Disney princesses and half Batman, like no joke! Just look at their cake topper that Brandon found on Etsy at the picture above! I will link the different games we played here: The Newlywed Game and What’s In My Phone or use the alternative What’s In My Purse?

I definitely had a fun time! I was in a lot of pain by the time it was all over with though so that part sucked! Poor Chipper sent the weekend at the vet while his brothers were having the time of their lives with the guests. Gru and Otis crashed on a few laps, Samuel begged for taco meat from my mother, but little Tonif chilled out underneath the bed the whole time until she bravely went out into the living room and was stunned of the amount of people and did a U-turn back into the bedroom, she almost hit her back legs on the doorway! I’m thankful Blondie didn’t start crying when that happened! I went back over the Monday afterwards and she seemed more relaxed, even let me pet her which does not happen very much!

Hope you all enjoyed the post! Next will be about the Bachlorette Party!

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Family Weekend

Howdy!

This past weekend has been probably one of the longest weekends I’ve had in a while! I spent three days and two nights at my grandparent’s house! Blondie and Batman were still in Hawaii on their vacation and didn’t get back until Sunday evening! And our folks had one of their bike rallies going on this weekend too. Unfortunately, this rally has a bad terrain for my wheelchair, plus the fact that it stormed and got extremely hot so I’m glad I didn’t go because I probably would have been miserable! So as a backup, my nana would babysit me for a few hours until my Aunt Laurie, Uncle Mike and cousin Taylor came down from up north. They came down as a “summer surprise” as my nana called it!

I was alone with my grandparents for maybe three or four hours which is normal for us! We kept ourselves busy! Poor Papaw couldn’t decide if he wanted to be in the kitchen or in his bed.. so imagine trying to navigate in a somewhat small kitchen with three push wheelchairs. Not easy! My nana and I basically ate, chatted and baked a cake! She likes to get those cake mixes in a box, and usually she gets chocolate cake–she did have that but had a craving too! She had my mom get a Confetti cake this time around. My nana and I are trying to figure out more things for me to learn. I suggested maybe learning the measurements, like teaspoon and all that! Cooking stuff! I mean, I watch these food shows but they hardly show you what to use, you know? I took Home Ed in middle school but since I was in a wheelchair, I couldn’t reach countertops and so our teacher/aides had trouble showing us those types of things in class. So my nana showed me a bit!

Besides learning the equipment to use in the kitchen, I got to beat the batter in the bowl. My nana doesn’t have a stand mixer or anything, she does this by hand! In a way, she was happy to have an extra set of “feet” to help her out! I also helped put on the icing and sprinkles, she mostly did that though! She gave me an off set spatula and I did my best of spreading the icing like Ina Garten, even I was a little proud of myself! I didn’t make it all fancy, but it looked great! How this all started, why I got back into learning (and sometimes re-learning!) things was after my nana had the idea of maybe I could use her small vacuum cleaner. We figured out that I CAN use it! It hurts my toes but I manage! Laurie and Mike got their around 6:30pm and a half an hour after they arrived, I had Laurie get me out of the wheelchair. So I mainly on the floor, scouting on the carpet (in shorts!) the whole weekend! My hips handled it a lot better than I expected! My butt was another story!

Around 9pm, we were all basically bored out of our minds already! We weren’t exactly tired but getting close to it! I bought a deck of UNO cards with me and we played two games, plus a tournament! My nana and I actually won a couple of them too! I was very surprised at her, she was very exhausted that first day. My mom brought me over a little earlier than originally planned, so she didn’t get to have her nap in the afternoon before everybody came over! She still made up past 10pm so that’s impressive! I actually got better sleep than I thought I’d get on that couch. The next day, Taylor and I were the late sleepers, I got up at 10 something, which isn’t bad but my mom sent me a “good morning” text at 7:30 and I sent it back about three hours later! I was tired damnit! Leave me alone!

That morning was a little bit of a blur for me! All I remember of it was Laurie doing my nails for me. I brought my new collection of polishes to my nana’s. I used the green/teal on my toes and the very light pink on my fingers! My aunt was going to have Mike do her nails, but then I stopped her with “I can do them” I’ve done nana’s nails before! I’m not as clean as she was with me, but at least I didn’t spill it everywhere! She got the teal/pink on her hands. My Uncle Mike got pictures AND video of it all! If I could post it on here I would, but I can’t. After that, we had a couple of cinnamon rolls for breakfast and about an hour or so later the next batch of family came down from up north. My Uncle Rick and Aunt Linda came bearing KFC for lunch and it was so good! For the next hour, we sort of lounged in the living room. I had been on the floor since I got up that morning, my butt was already feeling sore from rubbing against the carpet about a hundred times! Ah, scouting! It was its good and bad points about it!

I think they stayed there for two hours. We all talked, both Rick and Linda helped nana with her laptop, and we showed off pictures! A little bit into the second hour, we had ourselves a surprise! My other uncle, David and Aunt Katt came down too. Apparently it was a long story and I wasn’t present in the telling of it! It was so much fun honestly having that many members together and it wasn’t a holiday get together! When Rick and Linda left everything becomes a blur once again. I was REALLY tired that afternoon! That evening we played UNO and Taboo. We finally figured out how to play Taboo thanks to Taylor for reading the directions and explaining it to a bunch of tired souls like us! It was a fun time, lots and lots of laughs! I was actually allowed to come home that night, my folks came back early from the rally and asked if I wanted to come home. I told them no, we still had to play a tournament! You remember the saying of “too much of a good thing?” Yeah, maybe I should have went home that night because I could not sleep in that house for the life of me!! I don’t know what happened, I was sleepy but my brain would not turn off! It was like past 1am when I went to sleep!

On Sunday, I got up at 8am, when I usually get up I stay up sometimes! That couch was starting to not be so comfortable anymore so I was more awake than I wanted to be! Mike placed their air mattress a few inches away from the couch, so I didn’t have my normal amount of room to truly get off the couch in a comfortable way, I just didn’t want to wake anybody up and I didn’t! I knew nana was up, because I could hear her doing the dishes in the kitchen. So I made my escape through papaw’s room on the opposite side of the living room. I went in there and found nana on her laptop instead. I got on my laptop and she managed to wake up Mike in the process, didn’t get to scare him. However, when Laurie got up she was surprised to see me on the floor leaning up against the chair! I couldn’t help but laugh! I used to be the master at this as a kid! I guess I still got it! Laurie made two different rolls this time around, regular and orange. I’ve never had those before and they were so good, but tasted like fruit loops! It has an orange glaze on it! My nana got a kick after calling it a “glaze” I watch too much of the cooking channel!

Do you remember a post I did last year about my great aunts’ collection of spoons? They went to different places in the Midwest and up in Canada to get these little guys? Well, they also collected teacups and saucers too! I’ve heard about these for years and I’ve been looking forward to Laurie coming down so I could see some of them and take pictures. Laurie took out quite a few and I had to be the one to take pictures. I used Laurie’s phone which was a disaster! It was too big for my feet/toes to figure out, the pictures I got were too close and blurry! It wasn’t all a bust though, I didn’t take 100 of them so that’s better than nothing! Majority of the ones she brought out were made in England, but a few were created in China and one we found said “made in Japan” so that was cool! The next time they come down, we’ll try to get more out of there and divide them up between Laurie and I because my nana is willing them to us! I’m hoping there’s an even number of them! I think I’m hoping a little too strongly here am I?

A little bit before my mom came over, family friend Brittany came over and visit with everybody for a little bit. She was up early mowing before it got too hot! Wish dad did that sometimes! My mom came over about a half hour after she said she would, which is becoming a normal thing in our family now! My dad’s an early person, and mom isn’t. The whole day we did nothing but play games, talk, eat, and laugh! Which is always great for us! We all pig out and have fun! Poor papaw thinks we’re going to disturb our neighbors everytime we get too loud but no police ever comes to the door so that’s good! My sister was supposed to be home around four in the afternoon, but she had a rough time with her plane that they didn’t make it home until like seven o’clock! Everybody decided to leave around six and when we drove up to the driveway, the cats greeted us! All of the babies were at my feet, literally! From what mom told us, when she and dad came home on the bike, when he turned off the motor they all came running up and I guess dad noticed it first and said, “look…. this is not right.” He can’t say it wasn’t sweet that they missed them though! When I got home, I basically got the same treatment! I was sooo happy to be back in my own bed again but I guess not happy enough that I could sleep like a baby! I couldn’t sleep that night at all!! I don’t know what the heck happened!

I’m still very sad that it’s all over. Blondie got to have a whole week vacation and I got three days. I should be happier and I know my grandparents are happy to have their house back to being nice and quiet without having all of us around now. Didn’t want to leave this post on a bad note, but I did anyways! My bad! That’s what happened on my weekend, how was yours?