Happy Day After Thanksgiving!

I am sorry it has been so long since my last post ~ it has been busy here. The girl's have been fighting something that just wont go away. They have bad colds and coughs but despite we had a wonderfully blessed Thanksgiving yesterday. My parents, best friend and her son came over to our house and we had a delicious early Thanksgiving dinner. Jason had to work that afternoon and evening so we ate at 1pm so he could have a Thanksgiving meal before work. We had Turkey and Ham, Mashed Potato, Sweet Potato, Stuffing, Green Bean Casserole, Rolls, and Cranberry Sauce. For dessert we had my mom's homemade Cream Cheese jello, Pumpkin Pie, French Silk Pie, and Mini Eclairs. We watched the annual parade which the kids love to watch, the kid's played, we joked, laughed and ended the night relaxing in front of the fire with a nice warm cup of coffee and Baileys. I am sorry I do not have any pictures to share with you, I was too busy cooking and didn't take any pictures. I hope you all had a wonderful holiday yesterday!

A Recipe to Share...

Here is one of my families favorite dinner's I make...

Italian Sausage, Peppers and Pasta

2 – 3 cups Penne Pasta (you can use any pasta you have)
1 pound uncooked Italian sausage links
½ cup beef broth
½ green pepper cut into strips (I use a full green pepper)
½ red pepper cut into strips (I use a full red pepper)
½ yellow pepper cut into strips (I use a full yellow pepper)
2 Romano Tomatoes sliced and then cut into four pieces
½ onion or 1 small onion diced
2 tablespoons olive or vegetable oil
4 tablespoons basil
Salt – to taste


1 - Cook and drain pasta as directed on package
2 - Cut Sausage links crosswise into ¼ inch slices. Spray non stick skillet with cooking spray; heat over medium high heat. Add sausage, cook sausage until brown and no longer pink in the middle. Stir in beef broth. Cover and cook over medium heat 5 minutes.
3 – Add diced onion, tomatoes, peppers and 2 tablespoons basil. (I also add 1 or 2 cloves fresh garlic) Stir and heat to boiling; reduce heat. Cover and simmer 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.
4 – In a mixing bowl, toss pasta with 2 tablespoons oil and 2 tablespoons basil. Divide pasta among bowls and top with sausage mixture.

Blessings in Times of Sadness

Yesterday was a very emotionally hard day for me. My cat whom I got as a 4 week old kitten died yesterday morning, she was 8 yrs old. Despite the day's circumstances, I kept my plans to go visit my grandmother yesterday afternoon. While I went to visit Bushia, the girl's spent a few hours at Papa and Grandma's house. (Bushia mean's grandmother in Polish, and that's what we call her most of the time). Bushia lives in an assisted living home. She was very surprised and very happy to see me. She hasn't been her happy self for the past 5 day's due to some hearing loss from ear wax (she is getting drops to loosen the wax which causes her to not be able to hear normally, but that will be all taken care of at her dr appt tomorrow). Usually she keeps busy going to play Bingo and to Art and Music Class and to different meetings they have there, but because of the hearing loss she just stayed in her room. Bushia is 94 yrs old and we have always been very close. Even though she is up in age she is still very smart, funny and so with it. Her mind is like a 70 yr old, no kidding, and she does not look her age! I am so blessed to have special time with her, even though it is not as often as it use to be. I usually visit her 2 - 3 times a month. While I was visiting, we talked and did some cross word puzzles. She was laughing at how much easier it was for me to find those words that she was so sure were NOT in that puzzle. She would say "You are kidding me, you found it!?!" Since I was there at her dinner time, we had dinner together in the main dining room which was so nice, and good food! After dinner, we visited more and then it was time for me to leave. She continued to thank me for coming to visit her and told me how happy it made her. It's a blessing for me to have that time with her and in return we blessed each other by being together. Here are some pictures of my dear grandmother.

At my parents house celebrating Easter - 2000

Grandma and I (again at my parents house) - 2003

At a family wedding in 2006. She still always has her sense of humor. That is her making funny faces with my cousins! Before that picture was taken we were dancing with her while she was in her wheel chair.

Grandma and I outside in front of her home - 2008

In Memory of Midnight

Midnight was such a beautiful cat and very loving, she always wanted to be in the same room as you were in. Goodbye Midnight, we will miss you...

Veteran's Day

To My Husband on Veteran's Day...

You are my best friend, the love of my life, and my hero. It takes a strong man to do what you did when you were in The Marines. You were surrounded by many difficult circumstances, danger and war, which all tested your faith, strength and ability to continue. Thank you for all the sacrifices you made for our country, I am so proud of you. I'll never forget how worried about you I was when you were in Kosovo. I was so scared for your safety. I was in church on my knee's praying God would keep you safe and bring you back home, and He did. I love you so much and am so very very proud of you!

Saturday Morning Breakfast

Jason rarely can spend weekends with us because of his work schedule, so he always makes us wonderful fun breakfast's on Saturday morning's.

He makes several variation's of his Fun Face French Toast...

Apple Cinnamon Pancakes (so yummy)...

He makes many other things too, one of the girl's favorite's is Princess Pancakes! Every once and awhile he will surprise the girl's with a Prince next to the Princess.

Shopping at The Mall

When I said it would be getting cold very soon, boy was I right, not even a week has passed since it was in the 70's and it is now in the 40's during the day and in the 20's and 30's at night! Burrrrrr! Needless to say, we are now spending our day's indoors where it is warm. This weekend our friend's came over and we had a fun day shopping at the mall with the kids.

(Don't you just love Kylie's shirt!)

Fun Fall Day's

Last week we had some incredibly beautiful weather, it was in the 70's and that is not normal for November in Chicago! We knew that it would not last for long and soon it would be very cold so we took advantage of the beautiful weather and spent most of our time outside. While Miranda was at school Kylie and I had fun raking the leaves...

playing in the leaves...

and being cute...

At one point she decided to grab handfuls of leaves and run towards mommy and throw them at me. We had so much fun!

Once big sister came home from school, we had more fun!