New Year's Dinner

We went to Mimi and Papa's for New Year's Day dinner. Pork, sauerkraut and Papa's famous potato dumplings. The day was great...relaxing, football watching, Scrabble playing, moon dough making, CVS shopping, tea drinking, and lots of playing with Kiera. 

Here are our resolutions/goals for the 2012...

 Mimi resolves to be a nicer person (how's that possible?).

 Papa is looking forward to not paying tuition and using the money to reduce debt.

 Dave is hoping to buy a new truck and have his business name on put on it.

I am hoping to organize the attic and the craft/laundry room once and for all.

Kiera wants to make "pillow pets." (She does this by cutting foam into shapes of animals and taping them together...totally her own creation, other than the name, of course.)

Two funny Kiera-isms...

Dave: What should name should I put on my truck? 

(thinking she would say D. Paul Interiors, like she always does)

Kiera: D-A-D (she spelled it!)

While eating a pear to the core, she replied, "I ate this to the bone!"

Happy 93rd Birthday, Gram!

Gram turned 93 on January 3rd and we celebrated on Friday. Then, I put the birthday girl to work and we made stuffed cabbage casserole times three (one for each of us and Mimi). Dad and Gram surprised us by staying over for dinner (they usually leave at 4).  For her birthday, we got her two magazine subscriptions. Since she's had her lens replaced, she is a reading machine.

 Look at that face...she sure enjoyed her cake and hot cocoa!

Happy 19th to Ty!

We celebrated Ty's 19th birthday this week, fiesta style at  Ryan and Jason's favorite restaurant...Tres Portillos. No birthday celebration is complete without a sombrero! Tyler had the hots for the greeter at the restaurant. 

New Year's Eve

Dave worked all day while Kiera and I went grocery shopping and laid low because Kiera has a cold...so we are ringing in the new year at home. We had shrimp (and the beloved Al's sauce) and homemade chicken fingers for dinner. Kiera was thrilled because I let her drink Sprite which is the only good thing about being sick! Now we're going to watch a movie and eat popcorn. We wish you a happy, healthy, prosperous...

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Computer for Christmas

We got gram and dad a new toy for Christmas...a laptop. 

Kiera giving a computer "lesson."

Can't wait until they get Internet so they can read the blog!

New Toys

Kiera and I enjoyed a lazy day playing with our new toys :) 

Christmas Feast-ivities

1. We spent Christmas Eve at Mimi and Papa's house. We had our usual festive feast...fondue! Dessert was Cheesecake Factory red velvet cheesecake. 

 2.  Christmas morning was at our house. We had 3 out of 4 Kette kids at home on Christmas morning...that was the best present of all! Kiera was so patient. She woke up around 7:30 and we let her open one gift (a big tub full of Polly Pockets) while we waited for Ryan to come over.  Then we opened gifts and made monkey bread for Christmas Breakfast. 

 3.  Next stop on Christmas day was to Aunt Dorothy's house. Kiera enjoyed playing with her cousins, especially Karson who lovingly kept calling her "Sara." We managed to take a pretty good shot of Great Grandma Jean with her four great grandchildren. 

 4.  Final stop on Christmas Day was to  Jason's house. We had a fab-u-lous dinner of prime rib, asparagus with hollandaise sauce, garlic mashed potatoes. Jason has a great house which I'd gladly buy (it's for sale!) if it weren't in Wadsworth. Tyler's friend Erica joined us too. 

5.  The day after Christmas, we went to visit Grandma and Grandpa Kette's. We had another fabulous dinner...steak, mashed potatoes, salad and corn. Dessert was Grandma's famous rum fruit cake.

 6. Two days after Christmas, we had a farewell dinner for Emily before she heads back to Chicago. We ate Ryan's famous Italian wedding soup, spinach salad, bruschetta bread and apple walnut pie with cinnamon ice cream for dessert. I love when we have all of the college kids home.