KateAndDally

Catching Up...Obnoxious Children and Chi-Town Pix

Having finally gotten around to downloading the accumulated pix from our trip to IL between Christmas and New Years...the Saturday before we left, we took the train into the Chicago and went to the acquarium, which I won't do again on a Saturday...and yes, it was cold....

First up: the Christmas pix:

That Offering Boy is one handsome kid!

Then there's that cutie pie TLO

!

and here's one of them both...

Then we drove to IL...where we encountered....WILSON!

As I said, on the Saturday before we started back to MD, we took the train into Chicago, where we took the trolley to the aquarium via the science museum on lovely Lake Michigan...this is Skyline 1:

This is Skyline2:

And this is two frozen kidlets:

(I told OB to bring his gloves, which I purchased just for this trip; but did he listen????)

Let It Snow, Let It Snow...

Good day all around.  GIppee continues to prove its value, directing us from one place to the next with an imperious caribbean accent.  My father looks good and seems to track well most of the time, although he is not at his best after dinner.  We had a great visit with Grandma Jean, Vickie, Mary Gay, Bella and Wilson, mentioned elsewhere in this blog; rather, Bella has been mentioned, apparently I left Wilson out all together...but here he is, in all his enthroned glory:

Yes, that's a big, big cat.  I have some other cute and un-felinelike Wilson pictures, but I'm waiting to see what he'll pay me not to post them here.

Anyway, tomorrow we're supposed to get snow.  Somewhere from 5-7", over by early afternoon.  The kids are delighted; the only thing that would make it better is if they got a snow day from school.  UO suggested we take them bowling before we leave so that, when others ask us what we did over the holidays, we can say we went to Illinois and went bowling.

I need to work on the manuscript...mostly I'm just relieved the trip is working.  We are making people happy by being here.  Good stuff all around.

Success!

We made it!  Nobody murdered each other!  14 hours in a car together and we're all still speaking to each other! Thank you, Jesus!

From Our House to Yours....

(LtoR)

Mrs. Offering, Kate, UO, Dally, Offering Boy and, down in front, The Littlest Offering

May you all have a peaceful and joyous holiday season!

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas...

You can tell it's Christmas at the Henleys because one of us has stomach flu.  It seized me in its ugly clutches around 3 a.m. and didn't let up until around 4:30.  I have bounced back, somewhat, so I am hoping the bug is short-lived because clearly UO and the kids are next in the lucky line.  Actually, as long as we burn this out of our systems by Christmas I can deal with it...two years ago we got sick the first day out of a two day drive to FL.  The Littlest Offering got sick two days before we left; Offering Boy hurled in Fredericksburg, VA on the day of (I have to say, I got very good at pulling a hard right from the speeding lane to the slow lane when he'd yell "NOW!"); UO and I got sick that night.  The next morning I lay over one of those little snack tables provided in the lobby of the motel for our petit de'jeuner and apologized to OB for dragging him off when he felt so crappy.  He was over it by then and bounced off to eat his fill of Cheerios and donuts.  I am gagging at the memory.

Dally has set her sights on TLO's gingerbread house, which is actually made from graham cracker pieces, cream cheese frosting and lots of gumdrops.   If I were a dog, I'd be all over it too.

Be well, and wash your hands and be grateful you're all better parents that Britney Spears.