Tuesday, July 7, 2009

The Weekend Is Past!!!!






















Okay, I waited until I was over the weekend to post this so I could get my scrambled thoughts together.
The weather here in the eastern section of Pennsylvania was gorgeous on the 4th. Mid-70's, low humidity and NO BUGS!!! Yeah.

We put up the screened tent in the yard, borrowed a long table from the church, asked everyone to bring chairs and anything else they wanted to and prepare to have a good time. We only had two 'no's' to our invites. Hubby's eldest sister, the chiropractor/carnival worker (don't ask, too long and weird to explain) would be in Maine at a fair, but she at least sent regrets. His youngest brother and family, decided to go elsewhere, information I pried out of them on Friday night...Look people, I don't have a problem if you don't want to come to my party, I can put on my big girl panties and deal with that, all I ask is that you let me know enough in advance that I don't buy too much food..... which turns us to another subject.

Food. HE said, don't buy too much. We were having 20 people. I bought 40 pre-made burgers, 24 pre-made turkey burgers (we have a few chickatarians here) and 5 lbs. of Italian sausage (put in crockpot with peppers and onions), I made shish-ke-babs using 5 lbs of cubed beef interspaced with peppers, onions, mushrooms and tomatoes. 3 lbs. of popcorn shrimp (picture 1 is of shrimp on the grill - please don't look at hubby's tummy overhanging the grill) and 3 lbs. of jalapeno poppers (picture 3 is of the poppers recipe compliments of the Pioneer Woman's website thepioneerwoman.com), 10 lbs. of potato salad, 5 lbs. of spaghetti salad, devilled eggs made from 48 whole eggs and a vat of 'Mom-mom's pudding' (see this referenced in rec.food.cooking's archives for a full definition of Mom-mom's pudding). Hubby's baby sister brought a huge bread bowl filled with spinach dip, her middle daughter and fiance brought a tray of soft pretzels and dip, and his sister-in-law brought an apple cake. Eldest son, the TRAINED chef, brought a bowl of jello (don't get me started there). We had very few left overs.


Interesting tidbits:
Baby sister's eldest daughter brought her fiance for a first time meeting with the 'whole' clan. Since her dad died suddenly a few years ago, her two uncles in attendance decided they would have to 'check him out' to see if he was good enough for 'our little girl' (she's 26 working on a Masters). Stan and Ollie soon found out that Carlos was probably nuttier than they are and they informed darling niece that he would do.......her younger sister who also had a fiance in attendance was left to fend for herself, since fiance, my hub (her oldest uncle) and her Pop-pop had all been/or currently are firefighters so they bonded over telling war stories and how 'real' Rescue Me is...the rest of the nieces just terrorized my youngest son as he was the only 'boy' in attendance.


Eldest son came with his fiance and their little boy. His ex-wife came with their little boy and her other little boy. This way a very greedy gramma can get to see ALL her grandbabies and the family can ooooh and aaahhhhh over all of them. My eldest grandson has a vendetta against hubby's middle brother's baby girl....Ash is 16, Matt is 5, both had water guns and water balloons.....imagine the rest (photo 2 is Matt firing on Ash with help from his Daddy).

Games were played (softball with the migrating bases), food was devoured, kidlets played in the pool (picture #3 of all grandbabies and Uncle Josh), people got wet, it got late, they got tired.....everyone went their merry ways around dusk to their various destinations. Some to fireworks displays (the grandbabies), some home to sleep off their dining escapades (BIL and FIL) and the engaged nieces spent the rest of the evening with their respective intendeds. ;)

I crashed on the couch at 10 o'clock. No fireworks, no clean-up (that was for the next day). My holiday was complete however, when on Sunday night I called my widowed father-in-law to see that everyone from the lower end (Lower Bucks County to our Lower Lehigh County) got home okay. He said he went to church that morning and lit a candle of thanksgiving that we all came together with no sickness or death pulling us together and we had a safe and happy time. I was touched. I took that as a sign that I did have a great Fourth of July party.

And by the way, since there must be some indication of cheese and ooziness in this blog......the cheese didn't ooze from the poppers, but Carlos quite literally oozed home. I was told he still was full on Sunday! I take that to mean I did good.

Note: please pardon the placement and mismash of how the pictures are posted, I'm just getting the hang of this blog thingy.

1 comment:

  1. sounds like you had a grand ole time and enough food to feed a third world country-good for you!

    http://randommusingsfrommypov.com

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