Too Much Fun

What a weekend.

Busy. Fun. Full of giggles and laughs.

Family. Friends. Church. 

What a weekend.

M and I started out early, early, early Saturday morning to catch some we're-almost-at-the-end-of-the-tag-sale-season sales. We only had a few hours in the morning since I had a family reunion to get to for noon. It's amazing how much you can accomplish in a few hours.

The best sale of the morning was an estate sale in our own hometown. We marveled at the fact that we've driven by this house umpteen billion times and never noticed it. An old home, with a huge garage attached to it and several outbuildings surrounding it, it housed lots and lots of antiques and vintage items. We ran into my friend D and her husband. They were way ahead of us - D was already in the house, looking around, while M and I were waiting in line to get in.

I picked up a small typewriter that works wonderfully well, It's probably a portable one since it's so small. 

I love it so.

Ever since I was a young girl, I've been in love with typewriters. I couldn't wait to learn how to type when I got to high school. I still like to type. I volunteer to type things at the library for patrons that don't know how to type or don't type very well. They think I'm very kind to do this. I'm not.

I just like to type.

The Man texted me when we were halfway through our morning to let me know that the reunion party had been delayed an hour or so and I could shop till I dropped.

That made M and I very happy. We had a whole extra hour to shop.

We found ourselves in a neighboring city, right in the neighborhood where you can get the most delicious salami, cheese, and pepper grinders ever. 

Ever.

There's this Italian bakery on the corner of the street with a little old Italian guy who makes his own roasted green peppers and then puts them on homemade grinder rolls layered with thick layers of salami and cheese, wraps them up, and leaves them on the counter to ferment. 

That's my version of how the grinders get made anyway.

We bought enough to take home to our husbands and kids and restrained ourselves from chowing down on our own grinders.

The afternoon was spent at Sissy's house, getting together with some of my Mom's family - my aunt and uncle, one of their sons and his wife and daughter, other Sissy and her family. It was a great afternoon spent with people I love and don't get to see too often.

J, K, and MR were fantastic with the smaller ones. They played "Sea Monster" which was basically tag on a playscape. Once you got tagged, you got to go down the slide and transform into a sea monster. And then you could tag people, too.

Lots of squealing. And giggles.

At one point, my cousin's daughter convinced J to skip with her through the grass.

J. 

My twenty-one year old son. Skipping through the grass with a four year old. I'm still smiling thinking about it.

Sissy caught it on film. You can see a picture here.

I loved watching my cousin with his daughter. He's such a great dad. Patient, easy-going, full of praise. I still picture him as the little cousin, who used to trail after us bigger kids when we would all get together. He always was the nicest guy.

I'm glad to say he still is.

~~~~~~~~~~

Seeing this picture reminds me of how many moments I miss now that my two are grown up. Those little moments of "Swing me, mommy," and "One more time. pleeeeease!" I'd like a few of those back every now and then.

M and I decided to go apple picking on Sunday afternoon, after church got out.

We brought two of our kids - K and M's son, J.

J was mocking me as I was shooting some photos. He posed for the requisite, cheesy reaching-for-the-highest-apples-on-the-tree shot.

He made me take the photo.

 

Since I was being forced to take such a shot, I told him he better polish the apples so I could at least get a decent apple close-up.

Being the good sport he is, he lifted his shirt and polished away. All while eating an apple.

Multi-talented guy.

Look at the sass I had to deal with.

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M told me a funny story while we were out tagging on Saturday morning. 

She has an iPhone and decided to download IOS 6,  the mobile operating system that was just released. She doesn't know what happened but somehow during the upgrade she lost everything. All her photos. All her messages. All her contacts. 

Everything.

She was heartbroken. Her husband, the Hammer, told her to buck up, little buckaroo, there's nothing you can do about it. And he's right. As they often are, whether we like to admit it or not.

So all day Friday she had a useless phone with no information on it. Later that night, she was out with the Hammer and left her phone at home with J. He was going to look at it and see what he could do.

The Hammer got a message from J after a bit. Not good news. He couldn't recover any of her information.

"Tell Mom I couldn't get back any of her contacts. Or pictures. Or messages. And tell her don't try to upgrade her phone ever again. I'll do it."

The torch has been passed. Oy vey.