Happy Thanksgiving

R.A.O.K.

Random Act of Kindness



In the generous, good-natured, caring spirit of my dad, Bree and I made 2x4 Turkeys and dropped them off to Rainbow Oncology for the patients this week.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Gettysburg Trip - Good Eats

I'm going to be blogging into the New Year about our Gettysburg trip if I don't get on it so lets cover some of the really importantly parts of the trip, shall we?

Where'd you eat while in Gettysburg?

We ate here:

(Notice those holes in the bricks?  Those are battle wounds the building suffered during the war)

My favorite ice cream of all time is Peanut Butter Cup.  Not vanilla ice cream with peanut butter cups in it but chocolate ice cream with large slabs of peanut butter in there.  Its not an easy flavor to find, but find it I did. 

Here at Mr.G's. 

Good old Mr. G. 

While we were waiting for our ice cream to be scooped we had the pleasure of meeting Mr. G himself.  He asked about our trip, where we were from, gave us some pointers on places to go see and told us the history of the building that was now his ice cream shoppe.  Of course the only piece of information I have retained in these six weeks that have passed is that the building is 192 years old.  So I tried to do a little research of my own to spark some recollection of historical information that he told us when I ran across something very, very interesting.

The 'G' in Mr. G's stands for....

Glatfelter.

I'm sure you were all hoping to be more amazed by that news but what you need to understand is that my grandmothers maiden name is 'Gladfelter.'  My dad said that all 'Gladfelters' and 'Glatfelters' are related.  So I drove 7 hours from home to stand in the same room with a relative and eat his ice cream without even realizing it. 

 How cool is that?!?! 

I'm really regretting that I didn't get our picture taken with him.

Relation aside, he did make really really good ice cream.  So good in fact that my darling, wonderful husband Jim requested to go back there.  And for any of you who know that husband of mine, will have to know just how good of ice cream that is for him to request a second helping of sweets. 

Did I mention that my husband is a little strange too?

 

See that tree in the background? 

That's one of two trees left standing from the civil war era.  A third one was standing until a few years ago when a storm knocked it down.  When they went to cut the tree into pieces for easy removal, the blade kept sparking from hitting bullet after bullet lodged in the trunk.

We also ate here:

Cute little joint.  You walk in, place your order, carry it to your table and clean up your own mess.  The system works pretty well there and that helps keep the prices cheap which is always a plus when you're on vacation.

How to turn '4' Dominique style

Friday, November 11th

Celebration #1

I watch a lot of Food Network. 

Too much Food Network. 

Extreme Cake Challenges are my favorite.

  However it works out to Bree's benefit that I'm one of those watch and learn kind of people 'cause look at this cake that I made which was also the theme of her party:

Disney's Tangled

Bree had the honor this year of sharing her 4th birthday party with cousin "Baby Guin" who turned 1.

Jacob was not so happy that he didn't get to open any presents.

You can barely see it but I borrowed a movie projector and we showed the movie Tangled on the living room wall.

Friday, November 18th AM

Celebration #2

Bree's birthday fell on a school day this year.  And it just so happened the teacher wasn't going to be there so I was asked to help in her classroom that day.

Bree getting her birthday hugs from Ms. Kelly

Bree as the line leader for the day.

And eating her special birthday snack at school.

Not only did Bree's birthday fall on a school day AND I got to volunteer in her class AND she got to be line leader AND she got to bring in a special treat but it was also show and tell day too.  They were asked to bring in something that they are thankful for and Bree took the Dominique family picture.  You may have to turn your volume up all the way but even then you may not be able to hear her correctly naming everyone.  But I think my favorite part of the video is her class's reaction to her picture (about the 53 second mark).

Friday, November 18th PM

Celebration #3

We decided to take Bree somewhere special, just her and us (no brother), to celebrate her birthday.  And that someplace special was a night away at Splash Bay, a hotel with water park.

First we checked into our room and tested out the bed.

Then we headed down to check out the water park.

The "Toilet Bowl"

The "Lazy River"

The "Splash Zone"

Then it was back up to the room for a bit of dinner (7pm).

Then back down to the pool for some more water fun (8pm).

Back up to the room to re-enact a scene from Tangled (9pm).

Some late night snacks (10pm).

Some late night channel surfing (10:30pm).

Fighting off sleep (10:45pm).

A bit more channel surfing (11pm).

Some quality bonding time with Daddy (11:30pm).

And finally slipping off into a peaceful nights sleep while watching some more TV (time unknown).

Then back up and at 'em bright eyed and bushy tailed by 8:30am. 

Sorry for the bed head I've got going on.

And that's how you turn 4 years old in this Dominique family.

"And next year when I turn this many (holding up 5 fingers) we'll do that again, right Momma?"

Will he be...

a gymnast of sorts

OR

a 1950's short order cook?