The birthdays come "Marching" in

Let's get this party started, and I'm not talking about St. Patrick's Day either.  March and August are our big birthday months in our family, so we began with Curt's whose actual birthday is today.  Happy birthday, Curt!  We celebrated yesterday with dinner, dessert and gift cards and added a game of Tripoli.  I have to admit that it was one of our best Sundays at the Simmons!  We sure had a lot of laughs!  Of course, between Brad and Gramma, you never know how things will roll, but it's impossible to keep from laughing (at) them.  Gramma never quite caught on to the game, but kept saying things like, "Do you need more cards?  I've got scads of them. (This game is played with just one deck) or right in the middle of the game when everyone was talking, she'd blurt out,"who has the 3 of clubs?"  Then there was Brad who called a quarter a "deck", and consistently lost track of what was going on, but won game after game!

 

 While our big card game was going on, the kids (all seven of them) played downstairs. Not sure what they were doing, but they were getting along!  We were happy to have Elijah join us this week, having not seen him for several Sundays.  I swear he grew 6" since we last saw him!

In other news this week, (guess snow isn't all that newsworthy) we, in Greeley, have had much less snow than the rest of the state, and although they still have 8-10" on the ground in Denver, we have none left here, just lots of cold and windy days, with more ahead.

Friday morning my new vacuum arrived via FedEx and I was in a hurry to try it out.  Unfortunately, the main unit in the garage sustained the damage from Brad's attempt to fix it last week, so now I have to wait for THAT to get here.   Meanwhile, Spencer and Curt came to help install a new "dustpan" on the end of the dishwasher cabinet.  After a few attempts, they were successful in getting that done.  Brad decided that he could fix the main unit in the garage, so that I could use the vacuum. I don't think his "fix" (note the switch on the top of the canister) would pass inspection and could be a fire hazard, but hey!, I did get the house vacuumed! 

On Friday, I was able to attend my brain tumor support group held monthly in Loveland.  On arrival back home, I met Carrie and the kids at the Fun Plex (they were out of school for conferences) and watched them play for a couple of hours.  They were worn out after that!

 Sophie had her last basketball game on Saturday morning, where her other Grandpa (Roger) came to watch.  This weekend, my two newest seamstresses, Gabi an Carrie, spent time making quilts. I'm proud of their efforts! (Sorry I couldn't get a picture of Gabi's quilt.  She wondered what she would do with it, and suggested giving it to baby Stella, my co-workers, new baby!)

 Happy Monday everyone!