We Do Family Here

Hello!  I’ve missed you this past week.  I think this is the longest blogging break I’ve had in nearly 5 years!  But I have to say, being a week without internet was a good thing.  The only thing I was able to do on my phone was text Tony and talk to him at night.  And I survived!  Thanks though to the dozens of people who sent me emails telling me they missed reading my blog every day, I appreciate it!

I have to admit that I don’t really like flying all that much.  The turbulence scares the shit out of me, the noises the plane makes, and its worse when I fly by myself.  Tony dropped me off at the airport and then sent me a text that said “don’t be nervous but you will be flying on a small plane.”

I just read my People magazine (my flying guilty pleasure!) and ate some chips and salsa from Rick Bayless’s kiosk in the airport.

     

Actually both flights were just fine – not bumpy at all – I lucked out!

So it turns out I took 657 pictures in six days!!  I still wish my Dad would have lived long enough to experience digital photography – pretty sure if he did his number of photos would be 6,570!

I got to my Aunt’s lake house on Sunday night.  My daughter Hannah, my brother Charlie and his daughter Sarah, my Mom, my cousin Karen and her daughter Natalie, and my cousin Brian, his wife Lori and their son Maddison were already there.  My SIL and my other niece Rachel came Monday night.  And my Uncle’s brother Preston came on Thursday to stay for the weekend. It was a full house!  This magnet on my Aunt’s refrigerator says it all.

Monday was the best weather day – and I didn’t waste any time floating in the lake.  It was a bit chilly for about a minute (still not as cold as the outdoor pool here!) Hannah took this pic:

I wore a hat and lots of sunscreen – no sunburn for me!  Well, after Monday there was really no possible way I could have gotten sunburn because it rained.  And it rained.  And it rained.  Every time we thought it was about to let up, another wave came through. 

But what happens after its stormy, is that the lake gets really muddy, and when they opened the dam, debris and garbage gets stuck on the dock – and lots of trees and branches float by.  I will never understand how people think its okay to just throw shit in the lake!

And the current was so strong!

 

Even if the rain had let up, there was no way I was going to be floating in a lake with that current, I am just not that great of a swimmer.

So what did we do?  Play games!

    

Doesn’t everyone throw corn cobs off the hill?  Hannah won last year, but my cousin’s son Maddison in the middle won this year!

And we eat – there is never a shortage of food at the lake.  This years crack to me?  Salt and Pepper Virginia peanuts – gah, I couldn’t keep my hands out of that container!

I told myself after the first day that I was going to pick up a can of these to bring home.  Um, no – Tony wouldn’t touch these with a 10 foot pole, and I can see myself eating these every.single.day if I had them at home. 

I was happy that this week was the recovery week for Insanity.  I ended up doing pure cardio on Monday – my cousin Brian was impressed and Hannah and my nieces just sat and watched me – they couldn’t believe that the first 9 minutes was just the warm-up!

And then my cousin and her daughter photo bombed me!

The only other exercise I did was run hills with my niece Sarah.  We did 10 sets – walk down the hill and then run up the hill – that was one set.  Our goal was to get faster each time.  Our first time was 45 seconds running up the hill, and on round 10, we got to 35 seconds!  I was sweating buckets, but I didn’t even notice my niece breathing hard – ah to be 20 again!  Thanks for doing this with me Sarah!  And we did it in the rain too!

At first I was bummed about the weather but then I had to stop and think for a second.  I wasn’t at work.  I got to spend time with cousins and my Aunt that I normally only see once a year.  I got to spend lots of time with my brother and his family – he gave me some pointers on my camera too – he pretty much knows everything. 

He asked me a question “what is the best part about any real estate?” I answered “location, location, location.”  He said the best part about photography is “light, light, light.”

It’s embarrassing that I’ve had my deluxe camera for nearly 2.5 years and I am still trying to figure it out.  I have always kept the ISO on Auto, never really understood shutter speed, etc.  Hopefully you’ll see better pictures from me going forward!

I have two favorite pictures of my brother and his girls. 

My Mom basically said “FU” to a broken wrist – the only thing she couldn’t do was cut up her food!

And everyone made fun of me for not liking onions – which were abundantly present at each and every meal!

I made deep dish and thin crust pizza one night.  I made six pizzas and only two pieces of pizza were leftover.  I didn’t have the internet, so I guessed at the dough recipe – I ended up using 3.5 cups flour and .5 cup of cornmeal, and added both butter and olive oil to the recipe – I’ll write it over in a different post, but this was the flakiest crust I’ve ever made.

And I want to buy this knife – I took a picture of it so I could find out where to get it.  My Aunt bought it at a knife store in Tennessee!  Have you heard of it before?

Now here are just some random pics – I’ll probably show a few more each day next week – don’t worry, I won’t post all of them!  I like the one below – it is a puddle on the brick pavement, and the trees are reflecting in the puddle.

More family!

       

     

      

   

     

The dog Deacon – I loved this dog – total lap dog!!

     

I had several glasses of this:

And my favorite meal of the whole night was Thursday night.  I’ve talked about my grandpa’s North Carolina pulled pork sandwich before.  It’s a pork tenderloin that’s cooked in the crock pot all day with white vinegar, crushed red peppers and Tabasco.  Then you chop it up and then cook it with even more vinegar, crushed red pepper and Tabasco. 

My Aunt is the only one that is as close to my grandpa’s.  She also made potato salad on the side – here she is modeling it for you – it probably had fucking onions in it!

But I didn’t care – I will forgive her for the onions, because I got to eat this – plus another 1/2 sandwich after I ate this one!

Yep, with coleslaw on top.  Pure heaven on a sandwich.  Tony doesn’t get it.  He thinks its tasteless and a perfect way to ruin good meat, but I will always love this sandwich. #needtomakesomesoon!

It’s been a year since my Uncle died.  It was the first time I’ve been to the lake that he wasn’t there.  He collected eagles, and when I was walking the property taking pictures, since its on the market and my last trip there, I saw this eagle on a pole in the yard – and I imagined it was my Uncle watching over us.

So I was a bit worried to step on the scale today, but I am happy to report that I only gained .4 pounds.

I am starting the second month of Insanity today – I think the workouts are now going to be between 53 and 60 minutes, so I wanted to get a couple under my belt before the work week starts.

Also, I am starting Helen’s second DietBet on July 13.  For those of you who expressed interest in joining, expect an email from me over the weekend and I will forward you the link with instructions.  It’s not too late to join – just leave me a message in the comments or shoot me an email at mybizzykitchen@gmail.com.  I hope to have my start weight at 167 for this next round, so that means I’ll have to lose 6.6 pounds this time, which would get me really close to the 150s!

Can’t wait to catch up on all your blogs to see what you’ve been up to.  I hope you had a great 4th and enjoy the weekend!  I’ll see you on Monday!