Not sure why, but last night I had a dream about Grandpa Milo. I have so many great memories of him, but it seems like everyone of them was when he was operating in one of two modes: 1) Working and organizing and 2) sitting in his BarcaLounger recliner reading his Bible, a novel, or a magazine. There was no other. Even when he came to visit us he worked on the lawn, organized and cooked dinners and parties, or worked on whatever creative project that would make our house better. Lorena loved to work with him. They would plan, shop, and then work together on whatever caught their fancy. It is amazing that Lorena is so much like him in character.
We moved Kelly’s things down to Centralia from Seattle yesterday. The coarse culture and poor planning that are the hallmarks of that city elevated the hassle of the move by a good margin. Nevertheless, we had great help to get the big stuff out of the second floor apartment and into the U-Haul. We got it all unloaded from the truck in about an hour after we got here. It is amazing how much easier it is to move stuff when you do not have to go up or down a narrow set of stairs. Lorena and Kelly made pasta with shrimp and we all went to bed early. Fortunately, when everything settles out, her new company will pay for the move to whatever new digs she finds. That is four or five months from now, so we get to have her here in the state for a little while longer.
Well, the process was quite nice. The end product was just OK, but the planning, baking, constructing and decorating was lots and lots of fun. So the plan is to take a more structured approach next year by starting earlier, then getting Mom, the queen of arts and crafts in this household, involved both for her cooking and her decorating prowess. We (that is the royal we in this case, because I have been relegate to staying out of the way) have all ready started to plan for next year. We WILL make something that is not just edible, but art if we are all still around!
We had a truly amazing Sunday morning meeting this morning. After meeting, Kelly cooked up some foo-foo scrambled eggs with fancy mushrooms and smelly, old cheese. I am not admitting it to anyone, but it was really pretty good. Then the kids went back to work on their gingerbread house project. It looks to be somewhat more complicated than I would have expected. Lots of design work and planning, lots of intricate little pieces, lots of process steps, AND it has to taste good, too. It really did look like a good time doing the thing. I have to admit I was very skeptical, but the stencils worked great and the little pieces, which I thought were impossible were a little bit tedious, but came together just fine. After they finished their intricate English Country Home, the kids made enough walls and roofs for Mom to do her own little cottage on the side.
The bottom picture is of Kelly cutting out the windows and door for the front wall of the house. The little pieces of white paper at the bottom of the image are stencil pieces for the parts that make up the dormer and window shutters and other assorted “gingerbread” for the house. They even made some long slivers of gingerbread to fill in cracks. After this, Kelly made caramel to serve as glue to put the pieces altogether. They are so involved in the process, I don’t want to break their concentration to ask about the different colors they want to put on the house. I assume it will be frosting, but I guess I will just have to wait and see.
This endless refrain has been taking up again that it is time to start the fight against the waistline. Lorena bought me several packages of vegetable mixes compatible with the 1200-ish calorie per day intake I need to take my weight down at a reasonable rate. Jon and I are back in the fight. We opened the spreadsheet back up and are recording our weight, steps, and, for me, calories. Right before Christmas is a really rough time to take up such an enterprise, but “if not now, when?” I cannot believe I am not only saying it, but I actually embrace the fact that I enjoy this kind of a diet and tend to get more exercise and more work-work and project work done when I am on this kind of a program because I have to stay pretty regimented to be able to handle it.
Lorena and Christian told me about a restaurant in Phoenix, Arizona they thought was a favorite in the 
Our Thanksgiving this year came together very nicely even though our Thanksgiving was wildly disorganized and we did not even expect to be here before it all started. We are very grateful to our guests (Jack N., Dan T. Warren B., Aaron L., and Charlotte D., not to mention Kelly and Christian) because they all fit in nicely to a fairly chaotic but enjoyable Thanksgiving weekend. Most of us were able to attend a special, Spanish language church service on Friday which very much put the right kind of emphasis on the whole affair.
When we lived in Raleigh and the kids were going to Wake Technical Community College and North Carolina State University, Christian did most of his studying at the bar in the kitchen while Lorena worked there. They loved that. It is really nice for both of them to get the chance to do that again. Lorena absolutely loves to cook and even more so when she can do it for the kids. Now, though, she has to study herself. The Astronomy class she is taking at Centralia College is a lot tougher than we imagined. One thing she has been trying to figure out is how to get the 10 extra credit points given for visiting a big telescope. 
There is one that qualifies not too far from our house in Olympia, but there is an amazing one–one of the best in the world in Arizona, the 
Kelly is coming home this afternoon for a few hours to wash some clothes and get some work done. Lorena made up some quiche out of leftovers from the party. We are planning to do nothing but get stuff done today–we will see if that plan actually works. Hopefully the plan will include a practice run on a new way to cook tri-tip. Well, it is new to us. I think everybody and their grandmother has done what we are going to try, but Lorena thinks she is really bad at stuff that she has not tried before. With respect to cooking, that is almost certainly 100% wrong these days. If it was ever true before, it is certainly not true now.
We had quite a nice party of mostly twenty-somethings over the weekend. The shoes and purses were piled up much higher than this at the peak of the party. We cooked hamburgers and hot dogs with very spicy guacamole on Sunday evening and and then quiche with Lorena’s special, extra spicy salsa on Monday morning. I do not think people got a whole lot of sleep, but the “kids” all seemed to have a nice time. We inaugurated or new fire pit and made gallons and gallons of coffee. We were thankful to have an extremely nice Canadian contingent (maybe that statement is a little bit redundant) and a strong showing from the very polished California young urban professional crowd. We are looking forward to doing it again next year.