Tanja Lasagna: After mom's visit

Mom's visit with us has come to an end; she's with my older brother and his family for her last week and a half before returning to Germany. We packed in as much as we could while she was here.

First, a fish update. Gone. All of them. Not to be replaced until after the holidays and our trip to Disney. And this time we're going to try tropical fish. After spending over an hour cleaning out the aquarium, I don't want to do any more goldfish, which are almost universally viewed as "yucky", "nasty" or "dirty" when you do research on them on the internet.

Mom played nearly every game we own with the kids while she was here... and even brought a couple with her from Germany - a colors version game of Suduko and Knuller (better known as Yahtzee here in the States). Here's a few pictures of her playing with the kids.

And then she played "free style" pretty often, too. Below, she and Allison played with Polly Pockets and Allison's dollhouse.

Mom, Allison and I went to Christmas Connection at the Civic Center and shopped one day. We all loaded the van and went to Bristol Motor Speedway one night to see Speedway in Lights. We went to our church's annual Thankful Feast another night. We also had lunch at the Moodys one Sunday as well.

Clay also got his report card during mom's visit, and because he did so well, Bruce decided to treat him for something special. I was thinking we'd go to the new ice cream place down town, where robots make your ice cream. However, Clay - being the daddy's boy that he is - picked doughnuts at Krispy Kreme instead.

And then one day mom went up to Clay's school to join him in the cafeteria for lunch. His buddy Nathan was all smiles as usual.

I had my first chance this year to go have lunch with Clay while mom stayed home with Spencer and Allison. I deliberately picked pizza day, because Clay says his school has the best pizza. Obviously we haven't ordered enough Domino's or Pizza Plus recently, because he has forgotten how real pizza tastes. His school's was good, but it was no comparison. Still, he went back for seconds.

I got into the habit of leaving Spencer and Allison with mom while I took Clay to school each morning as well. Today the twins were not too happy to be dragged back into the whole car line thing.

We spent a little time one evening checking out the Moody's new puppy.

And we cooked like crazy. Every day. Sometimes things she wanted to eat that she can't get in Germany, and sometimes things she brought that I can't get here, and sometimes stuff for Thanksgiving to take with us to grandpa's house when the whole Mitchell crew was going to be visiting.

Clay took this picture below, which I do not like, but he's proud of it, and it's not his fault my hair looks stupid. So I post this for my boy! Mom and I were making German potato dumplings, which I love. Of course, nobody else in the family does. Crazy people, these folks I live with.