HANNER HOUSE: Stop! Don't enter that bathroom.......

Whew, I'm getting tooooooo old to not have coffee due to unsettled innards! Yep, that's been both David and I's plague the last week. Our maladies began last weekend in Chicago, first David and then I..........I'll not get graphic, but let's just say two old farts with diarrhea in a small house with one bathroom is NOT CONDUCIVE to winning popularity contests! Well, there was an upside to it, even the DOG refused to stay in the bathroom with me! Voila! Privacy. Also gave me an excuse to wear my britches unbuttoned! Ahh, comfort. We drove home on Wednesday and only had to make one essential quick (and I mean LITERALLY QUICK) stop. All well, all is well that ends well; I didn't even have to change my underwear; whoopee.

ENOUGH! I can just hear you saying, so onward and upward with this bog post. Today I actually got off the couch and had a marvelous day playing with our garden bounty. David was the trusty sidekick in this venture altho he is still experiencing some flashes of "to the pate'! We gathered squash, peppers, basil, beets and parsley from the garden early this morning. Proceeded to eat the beets with leftovers for lunch; wow were they sweet. I was amazed. Then we made a French bread to go with our fresh pesto. Decided we were "up" for making a new recipe for zucchini Parmesan bread, which we did. Of course we had to have an afternoon snack of the hot bread with some of the fresh basil and cheeses, garlic, and pine nuts. Yummy. Our last effort of the day was to grate 12 cups of zucchini and 4 onions to soak in salt water overnight for our relish tomorrow. It is now 8:30 p.m. and I'm passing on going to watch the sunset in order to do one of my favorite things: lay on the couch, listen to the game, and read a good book!

We had a wonderful time with our daughter and family, even taking the "issues" we had into consideration. Our littlest grandchild, Brian, celebrated his 2nd birthday Sunday......he had a party with family and friends of his parents and had a hi-o time. We think he's just the cutest, funniest, smartest, two year old in the world! Ha. His sister Sophie had her ballet recital on Saturday, the 16th. After that "stimulating" dress rehearsal the day before. the recital was a "piece of cake"! I must say she did an excellent job; they all did, I was very surprised how disciplined 4 and 5 year olds can be. Grandma was proud.

On the 20th, our 2nd grandchild celebrated his 15th birthday! I just cannot get over it.......I sure remember his birth. His Mama was soooo ill; they had to go ahead and take our "little man" via C-Section. He weighed 3'3oz. Today, he is thriving and is just a splendid young person, if I do say so. He is very committed to the Scouting program and just spent last week there. He is the Chaplain of his troop and takes his duties quite seriously; Grammy is, as you can obviously tell, quite proud. Our favorite thing to do is go to Barnes and Noble, pilfer through the stacks, settle on a couple of books, go to the cafe, order coffee and pizza and sit and look at our purchases. So, we are planning on doing just that in the next couple of days to celebrate his being 15. Fun for us both.

I apologize to those of you who, I know, get sick of hearing of people's grandchildren's escapades, however, I MUST bore you with one other.......our grandson, Christopher. He represented the Fredericktown American Legion at MO Boy's State this week, and was elected Senator! We are thrilled with the experiences he is having at Boys State; if any of your grandchildren have this opportunity please encourage them to go; it's quite an experience.

Well, the sun has set, the Cardinals are up by 8, my couch is available and I'm not pooping.........does it get any better?!?

Have a wonderful weekend. As always, Life is Good, hope yours is as well.