Tristan Met Medusa

Tristan had a run-in with a medusa jellyfish today while swimming in Cannes. The jellyfish wrapped itself around Tristan's arm and also stung his back and stomach. He said it was pretty gruesome looking and that his classmates were concerned that it might have been a Man-O-War. A trip to the pharmacy confirmed that it was just a common jellyfish and they sent him on his way with benadryl and some cream.

Tristan called me today and said that it looks pretty cool now...the damage is around his entire arm and it looks like he has been branded.

Nice.

Annecy

Have you ever seen such beautiful water? Tristan and the rest of the crew spent the day in Annecy on Saturday.


I am so jealous!

Goodbye to the Frenchies

Crazy Americans

The kids went to Chamonix and to the top of Mont Blanc.

There was lots of snow and the temperature was 0 degrees celcius.

My son and his friends stripped down to their boxers. (Tristan is the second one from the left)

I am so proud.

Sunset Cruise

We have been on vacation in Isle of Palms, South Carolina since Saturday. On Monday night, we took a sunset cruise through the intercoastal waterway. This pelican was diving right in front of our boat.

Beak first into the water. For some beautiful pelican pictures and some pelican facts, go here.

We went out to Capers Island. There is a lot of driftwood on the island that has been bleached by the sun over time so that it looks like whale bones. There were many beautiful shells on the island and the twins most of their time collecting them.The day that we went out, the tide was the highest that it gets all year. (something about the new moon) Anyway, we had a limited amount of time on the island because the island was quickly becoming covered with water.

Allie took this picture of the two of us.

After exploring the island, we got back on the boat in search of dolphins. We saw many and they were showing off for us.Kellen and Ammy looking for dolphins off the side of the boat. I love how he has his arm around her.

The sunset.

When we got back, some of the streets were flooded because of the high tide. Yes, we drove through this...this picture was taken from the inside of a van on the way back to the hotel.

Hike In the Mountains

Tristan with friends from McDonogh.

Climbing up the mountain.

Still climbing.

Still climbing.

The group at the top of the mountain.

Another shot of the view. (Tristan is not in this picture)

A group shot of McDonogh students in a village.

See if you can figure out why I included this picture...Leave a comment if you get it!

Music Festival in Geneva

Facebook is a wonderful thing! These photos were posted yesterday when Tristan and his "frenchie", Julien, went to Geneva for a music festival.
Hanging out with Julien and other frenchies.

I think these are Tristan's French Parents.

Life is rough, don't you think?

Welcome To My Laundry Room

Kelly is hosting Show Us Where You Live Friday and today's topic is laundry rooms/bonus rooms/toyrooms. Welcome to my laundry room. It used to be downstairs prior to the kitchen renovation two years ago. When we redid the kitchen, we moved the laundry room upstairs in my office. The office was once a mother-in-law suite: It had a kitchen, big walk in closet and a bathroom. The laundry room is now where the closet used to be.

This is the view from the office into the laundry room. You can see the framed artwork above the washer and dryer. Each year, my kids participate in the Square One art fundraiser and this is their original artwork. In the bins up on the shelf, I have a bunch of scrapbooking stuff: punches, stamps, etc.

This is the view from the bathroom. I have three bins for clothes that are dirty: whites, darks and towels/linens. Usually, they are over flowing, but I've done a lot of laundry in the last 2 days.

This is the view from the hallway into the laundry room. This door was added during the renovation-a wall used to be here and you had to walk into the office to get to the closet. The door inside the laundry room leads to the bathroom where we hold our fish funerals. You will note that the guestbook is still on the door.

And this is reality. This is how my laundry room looks all the time... baskets of ironing waiting to be done, clothes hanging on the bar that are hang drying, a load of laundry in the dryer and a sock basket on top of the washer. My laundry nightmare NEVER ends!

Now go check out other laundry rooms here.

Ristorante Italiano de Formaggio

Last Friday, the youth group at our church prepared everything for the annual congregational dinner. As a member of the Youth and Family Ministry committee, I was there to oversee all the preparations. The dinner was held in the Great Hall which must be the ugliest space ever. We were able to totally transform the room in about 8 hours. The kids decided that we would have an Italian themed dinner and named the Great Hall, Ristorante de Fromaggio (They looked up cheesey Italian restaurant and this is the translation they found.)

We were going for an outdoorsy/patio feel so the first thing that the kids did was to make flowers out of tissue paper. They stuffed lattice with the flowers and then added green tissue paper for the leaves.There are a lot of things on the walls in the Great Hall so we decided to cover all of the walls. We used black plastic table coverings that we bought in huge rolls. We cut them to the correct size and then we added grommets to the top. We bought 3m hooks and placed them around the top of the room . Then they hung the plastic on the hooks. The plastic draped and pooled on the floor. When the lights were off, the plastic looked like curtains. It was really an awesome way to cover up the walls without spending a ton of money.

We added christmas lights and red and white checked tablecloths.

Each table had an empty wine bottle with a candle as a centerpiece.

Allie and her friends made Pizelles.

Some of the kids had chef hats and moustaches! Ammy couldn't wait to have a moustache.

We had kids as bartenders serving soda and pellegrino water.

One of the kids was the head chef. He came up with some of the recipes and oversaw the workers in the kitchen.

Some of the kids were greeters.

Some of the kids passed appetizers. We had cantaloupe, mozzarella and prosciutto skewers.

We also passed these kalamata olive and ricotta spread on toasted baguettes appetizers.

The kids plated the courses. The first course was caesar salad, followed by baked ziti and garlic bread. Dessert was Rita's Italian Ice or Pizelles with a cannoli dip.

In between the courses, the youth provided entertainment. Some kids played the piano, sang or played the violin. There was also a slide show that had pictures of all of the youth events from the past year.

And finally, the kids cleaned up everything!

It was a great night!