Sunday Cookies & The Race

A day late for Valentines cookies but at least we got them done the same weekend. I actually made the dough on Saturday so technically they did start on Valentines Day. Declan was my assistant as usual-Grace is only interested in the final product.   

He helped with the cookie cutters and used the scraps to make little cookie people that we baked up too. Not sure if he plans on eating them or playing with them. 

     I threw in some stars too-really need to get some more cookie cutters. 
OK, so they are not the prettiest cookies but they taste better than they look. I was also supposed to make some half milk/half white chocolate chip cookies but there is no more room in the cookie jar right now. 

 Sunday night now also means its time for The Amazing Race again. We take it seriously at work. Pierre, one of our operating tech's, puts on a big party at the beginning so we can pick our teams and in the end there is a trophy and prizes for the winner. Every time, he has a more elaborate game worked out for picking your team and our editing equipment is put to good use. This time it was a series of plane logos cut with clips from Airplane. You had to identify the airline by the tail logo and then pick a travel brochure and your team was pasted onto the back page. I got the team I wanted-Mel and Mike-the actor son and gay father. Wish me luck. I have won this twice in the past. At the party thrown at the end of the race you get a trophy and everyone else who played has to give you a travel related gift. My team came in 4th tonight and seem like they aren't idiots so I think they might last a while but you never know. One bad taxi driver or flight and you are eliminated from the race. 

Early Valentines

I got surprise early Valentines Day flowers at work today. Always nice to be sent flowers and to have everyone at work see that you got flowers is also fun too.  Even the vase is fun. Everyone wanted to know what Tim did wrong but honestly they were just early flowers to surprise me. 

So nice to see some spring flowers too. Hopefully we'll have tulips around here in a few months. 40 degree today = a heat wave. I wish I could smell them but I seem to have come down with consumption again. They aren't arranged as nicely as they were when I got them because I had to take them apart to cut the ends. I couldn't quite recreate it but I did the best I could. 

Good to know that after knowing me for 19 years that he still wants to send me flowers. I should really send him some-some sort of manly bouquet to embarrass him at work. 

The Sounds Of News

I have had a love of special reports going all the way back to childhood. I remember watching Anwar Sadats assasination and Reagan being shot back when I was about 8 or 9. I should have known from this that I would end up working in news. I loved how you would be watching normal stuff and suddenly things would go to black and the ominous special report music would come on and you knew something big happened. It seems to me that most of the major happenings during the 1980's happened during my soap operas. For a while during Reagans second term, it seems there was one every week. One drawback to my job now is that I know ahead of time when the network is breaking in and there's no surprise to it.

Tired Of It

I think I am done with Winter. I have always liked having four distinct seasons but now I think I just like the idea of it more than experiencing it.

I am tired of my white car always being brown from all the sand and slush. And what's the point of washing it because it's just going to look like this again by the next day? 
I am tired of the fluffy white snow that turns into this hard crusty black snow that will take forever to melt once Spring comes. 
I am tired of the snow that has been trapped in my roof rack for weeks but comes crashing down the windshield once you are going 70 on the highway.  There was much more than is in this picture. 

I am tired of having to brace yourself before you go down stairs so you don't break a hip. 

I am tired of looking at the tree branch and crushed swingset in my backyard because we can't get at it until all this melts. I hope all that green grass we finally grew last summer is still under there. 

I am tired of gray skies all day long with just a little bit of blue appearing right before the sun sets. 
I just keep reminding myself that things will look like this in about 4 months if we are lucky. 

I mean, who am I kidding? I don't even like the beach but I would kill to be there right now. The fact that I don't own a bathing suit could be a bit of a problem though. 

Sunday Sledding

All this snow cannot go to waste and we are tired of being cooped up in the house except for running errands. So off we went to the Payson Park hill to spend a Sunday morning sledding. 

                                               Payson Park has the best view of the city. 

Grace and Declan took off right away. Our other tube sled popped so they had to take turns with the good one and the hard plastic one. After a few trips down on the plastic one, Grace declared they should be banned. 
I took a turn down on it with Declan and I have to say I agree with her. Note the red duct tape on Declans boot. His new ones should arrive this week. 

This was part of the dance Declan was doing while waiting for the sled his father took from him while he relived his childhood. 

                                          They were pretty worn out after only an hour. 

And we went home where I made hot chocolate that no one really drank after the marshmallows were gone.