Mother's Day 2025

"Ann is a nosy sort." he said lovingly. She really cannot help herself; her penchant for prying is deeply encoded in her DNA. She will not take polite hints to mind her own business, either. Thus, it is nearly impossible to surprise her.

Quixotic fool that I am, I set out to do just that for Mother's Day, a day which, for reasons that need not be discussed here, has been an emotional day in the past. I figured she could use some friends to help her celebrate and so I invited Rob and Dyce to come over on Sunday afternoon.

Mother's Day Brunch

Hoping for beautiful weather as we had been having for a week, I came up with a menu of light eats to be enjoyed on the patio with crisp white wine. Naturally, the weather did not cooperate and we ended up eating inside at the island. Quoting Stevie Winwood, "You just roll with it, baby!"

I am kicking myself now for not having taken any pictures of Rob and Dyce. I was too caught up in talking and pouring Champagne around. They brought the most beautiful flowers for Ann. And did a wonderful job of acting all week as if nothing were happening on the weekend.

Rob and Dyce Brought This Exquisite Arrangement

The Surprised Guest of Honor

Ann, true to form, did her best to ruin the surprise. The three of us guys put the plan together a week in advance. Shortly thereafter, Ann asked me to take her to the local wine bar and out for brunch somewhere. I confessed my plan for a special brunch at home. Her immediate response was, "Can we invite Rob and Dyce?" At this point, I had to lie, saying that I preferred to have a more intimate tête-à-tête chez nous.

Sunday afternoon, while Ann was watching TV upstairs, I excused myself to go downstairs to prep brunch. Just as I had plated everything, the doorbell rang and Ann was surprised. She was even a good sport about not being dressed or having her game face on!

Camarones in Escabeche with Cilantro Aïoli

Crab Guacamole
Dungeness Crab Mixed with Cilantro-Lime Vinaigrette

Jalapeño Quesadillas with Chipotle Crema

Super Bowl Dip

After many years of cord cutting, we're finally able to watch the Super Bowl at home for the first time in ages. When we realized this, of course, we had to have some food to go along with the game. Pretty much immediately, I thought of the quasi-traditional 7-layer dip that so many people serve. And I asked myself, "How can it make it tastier and more fun?"

Ready to Watch the Super Bowl

I spent a little time thinking about what might comprise the layers in the dip and started making a list of things that individually would be really good with nacho chips.

You can see what I came up with from bottom to top in the photo above:

• Chipotle-Garlic-Bacon Frijoles Refritos. I debated the longest time about what kind of beans to use for the refritos, finally settling on pintos rather than either black beans or mayocobas. Traditionally, beans are refried in lard which I don't have on hand. Rather, I fried up a few slices of bacon and put the cooked pintos, a couple finely chopped chipotles, and rather a large amount of minced garlic into the bacon grease. After I mashed the beans to smooth and cooked them until they separated from the edge of the pan, I chopped the bacon and added it to the beans before seasoning them.

• Salsa Fresca. My fresh salsa is easy to make and delicious, consisting of finely chopped grape tomatoes (in lieu of large tomatoes in the late summer), white onion, cilantro, a finely minced jalapeño, with lime juice and salt to taste.

• Tinga de Pollo. I haven't made this delightful taco filling in a few months and I don't know why as it couldn't be simpler. To prepare it, I place slabs of onion in the bottom of a roasting pan, then layer on a bunch of chicken thighs lightly dusted with a spice mix of New Mexican ground chile, cumin, granulated garlic, salt, and Mexican oregano. The thighs roast until they are done and ready to come off the bone. After they cool, I pick the meat off the bones and add it to half the onion slabs that I have roughly chopped. The other half of the onions goes into the blender with a couple of chipotles en adobo and a small can of tomatoes. After I blitz the sauce, I pour it over the chicken and onion mixture and cook it down until most of the liquid is evaporated to make a delicious taco filling.

• Queso Fundido. Who doesn't like a gooey queso with chips? There are all kinds of ways to make queso fundido (melted cheese) but honestly, the easiest is just to throw some Velveeta and a little milk into the microwave. I added pickled jalapenos and chopped pickled nopalitos to the queso to give it a bit of zing.

• Chorizo. Mexican chorizo may be my favorite taco filling, especially when mixed with eggs. No eggs in this batch of chorizo, however, that I made from pork shoulder, ground Chimayo chile, cumin, garlic, salt, Mexican oregano, and a touch of red wine vinegar for acidity.

• Guacamole. It wouldn't be a Super Bowl dip at all without guacamole. The avocados are tiny now and hard as bricks, so I bought a bunch of them and kept them on the counter for a week to ripen. I made the simplest guacamole ever from avocados, salt, and lime juice, just looking for a nice citrus flavor to lift the rest of the heavy ingredients.

• Cotija Cheese. Grated cotija serves the same role in Mexican cuisine as pecorino does in Italian. I wanted it not only for its white color to serve as a backdrop for the top garnishes, but also to add a bit of saltiness to the dip.

• Top Garnish. The point of gilding this particular lily was to bring to freshness to the rest of the ingredients. On the top, I spooned on the remainder of the salsa fresca and scattered over some sliced green onions. Before topping the whole with a little bouquet of whole cilantro leaves, I used a squeeze bottle to drizzle on a crisscross of thinned chipotle sour cream.

Quick Summer Lunches

I'm in uncharted territory these days: lunch at home is not a meal that I am really familiar with. Back in the restaurant days, I had one day a week off and lunch was more likely than not something leftover from dinner service the night before, a meal out at a restaurant, or when we were hiking, quick trail food taken sitting on a rock or log somewhere. Lunch at home has been a meal that I have never cooked or put any thought whatsoever into.

Post-restaurant, it has been pretty much the same story. Even though my weekends doubled to two days a week off, it was rare that we would eat lunch at home. We would invariably get something while we were out and about.

Now in the middle of this pandemic, we're pretty well confined to the house, except for critical outings (to the store, doctor). Suddenly, for the first time in my life, I'm having to put some effort and thought into lunches. There are days when I don't make lunch and each of us fends for ourselves, but more often than not, I throw something together early afternoon for the two of us. This has required a total change of mindset on my part.

While I was working, I would make a cold cut sandwich to take to work to eat at my desk and in the first weeks after I lost my job, our home lunches were a continuation of work: cold cut sandwiches. Not only are cold cuts highly processed foods (something new to my diet since going to work at the winery), but they are wicked expensive, and having sandwich bread in the house has not helped with our quarantine-aided waistline expansions.

The instant reduction in our cashflow was the impetus to stop buying all that expensive and highly processed deli meat, while the pounds adding up from the boredom and depression of quarantine were the impetus to move back to more complex carbs.

These days, with forays to the grocery store every other week or so, we tend to plan our dinners in advance. Before I head out to the store, Ann and I make a list of dinners that we'd like to have in the next couple of weeks, and I make sure that we have all the necessary ingredients on hand for those meals. The meals aren't fixed and we deviate from the "plan" at will, but at least some thought has gone into dinner in advance.

Lunches do not get any significant amount of forethought. Sometimes when I am planning a dinner, I will plan for leftovers that may become lunch the following day. But more likely than not, I don't have a plan for lunch and that has led to some "What are we going to eat?" questions. 

I am evolving a strategy for lunch: keep plenty of dry goods in the pantry as well as a ready supply of vegetables in the fridge, items that can go into a quick lunch. My aim is to not spend time in the middle of the day cooking and to put tasty lunches on the table in under 10 minutes. 

While we have been eating a lot of eggs for lunches (frittatas, scrambles, huevos con chorizo, poached, etc.), during these summer weeks, I am focusing on fresh and quick vegetable dishes that come together with no forethought and little effort, one bowl vegetable salads essentially. For example, a couple weeks ago, I diced some leftover grilled vegetables and reheated them with a couple of cans of cannellini beans, a bit of fresh oregano, and a couple hands full of baby spinach leaves. A dollop of tzatziki on top gave us a delicious warm white bean salad.

Below are four recent cold vegetable dishes in the same mold:

Black Bean, Avocado, Corn, Tomato, and Lime Juice

Guacamole: Avocado, Tomato, Red Onion, Cilantro, Chile, Lime

Corn, Black Bean, Orange Pepper, Tomato, Cilantro, Lime

Roasted Filet Bean, Tomato, Corn, Cucumber, Pesto

So while I am still new to doing lunch at home, I think I am evolving a strategy for quick, delicious, healthy, and satisfying summer lunches. How that will evolve in the fall when fresh vegetables from the farmers market are scarce, I don't have a clue. I like to think that we'll be able to run out to a bar for a beer and a burger every now and again, but that doesn't seem very realistic, does it?

Recycling

Let's face it. Cooking can be strenuous especially at the end of the day when you're tired and don't have the enthusiasm to spend a lot of time in the kitchen. Even I, a retired professional chef, have days when I don't want to do something complicated or think a lot about dinner. For me, the most strenuous part is deciding what to eat. Executing it is pretty easy after that.

Something that really helps me is planning for leftovers from the major meals that I cook. When you've got leftovers, it really limits the scope of deciding what's for dinner, rephrasing the question as "How can I recycle these leftovers into a new meal?" For me, it's much easier to come up with ideas when I have constraints, such as using up leftovers, versus trying to come with a plan given a blank slate.

Cannellini-Piquillo Ersatz "Rouille"

Cannellini-Piquillo Ersatz "Rouille"

Here's an example from last week, shot over a four-day period. It starts with a lower-fat and lower-calorie ersatz rouille, a type of aïoli from Provence made with red peppers. Rouille is the classic garnish to bouillabaise. We're watching what we eat, now about three months into quarantine with rampant boredom and scant exercise. We don't want to give up flavor, but we do want to give up fat and calories where possible.

Enter this rouille. Rather than start from a base of egg yolk and olive oil, I substituted white beans. I put two pounds (1 kg) of cannellini and half a pound (250g) of piquillo peppers into the food processor along with 8 cloves of minced red hard neck garlic. When all was smoothed out, I drizzled in 2 tablespoons (30 ml) of extra virgin olive oil and then seasoned to taste. Not rouille, but not bad either, especially with that spicy red skin garlic!

While the sauce was destined to be eaten with a massive head of roasted cauliflower for dinner, I made 2-1/2 pounds, a processor bowl full, because I wanted to have the sauce on hand to use in other ways. After dinner, the remaining sauce went into the fridge to be incorporated into other dishes during the course of the week.

Arroz con Pollo Italiano

Likewise, when I make chicken or basically any other protein, I make enough for at least two meals. Having leftover meat in the refrigerator guarantees at least one follow-on quick taco meal. Last week, I was in the mood for something similar to chicken cacciatore, but I wanted to incorporate rice. It struck me that I could make arroz con pollo with Italian flavors to satisfy my craving.

Arroz con pollo was a frequent and favorite staff meal at the restaurant. We'd prep a hotel pan in the afternoon and leave it in the walk-in until about an hour before close, about 90 minutes before we would sit down to eat. Then it would go into the slow oven and would be ready, piping hot, once customers left the building.

Arroz con Pollo Ready for the Oven

Outside, I heated a cast-iron frying pan in my grill and browned six chicken thighs in olive oil until they were crisply brown on both sides, about 20 minutes. In decent weather, I do it outside to avoid setting off the f*cking smoke detector in the kitchen. It keeps the kitchen cooler as well.

Meanwhile, I prepped the vegetables: onion, carrot, celery, and lots of garlic. I then assembled spices (red pepper flakes, saffron, salt, and pepper) and a bouquet garni of oregano, sage, and lots of rosemary.  Out of the refrigerator came about a cup of olives and a half a cup of pickled capers. I drained a 28-ounce can of chopped tomatoes into a large measure and added chicken stock to the tomato juice up to the one quart line. Finally, I measured out 2 cups of long grain rice.

When the chicken was browned, I removed it to a plate and sautéed the vegetables in the cast iron pan on the grill, adding the spices and the bouquet towards the end. When the vegetables were translucent, I mixed them with the tomatoes, olives, capers, and rice and added the mix to the bottom of the roasting pan with the chicken on top. I poured the broth over, covered the roasting pan with foil, and put it in a slow oven (350F) for 90 minutes.

Out of the Oven, Ready to Eat

This recipe scales fairly nicely: just make sure that you use about two cups of broth to every one cup of rice.

Arroz con Pollo Italiano

Poached Eggs over Rice 

One of the dishes that Ann liked the best for brunch on our Sundays together back in the restaurant days was a poached egg over a loose risotto-like pile of Israeli couscous, inflected with piquillo peppers and topped with a pimentón (smoked paprika) aïoli.

Poached Eggs over Rice

I aimed to recreate the feel of that dish using some of the leftover rice and the cannellini-piquillo "rouille." In the span of ten minutes, I rewarmed the rice with a bit of chicken stock, mixed some of the "rouille" half and half with mayo and a little water to thin it, and poached some eggs. I added mayo and water to the white bean-red pepper sauce because I wanted the texture to approximate a true aïoli more closely.

Brunch just doesn't get any easier than that.

Tacos de Pollo

As I mentioned above, I like to have leftover proteins in the refrigerator to facilitate putting a taco dinner on the table in next to no time.

I first made a quick salsa fresca from tomatoes, onions, cilantro, chile peppers, lime juice, and salt. Then I took the leftover 50-50 rouille-aïoli from the day before and mashed it with a super ripe avocado and lime juice for some quick guacamole.

I picked the chicken off a couple of thighs leftover from the arroz con pollo and seared it quickly in a pan. After that, I gave a little more of the leftover rice a quick sauté to crisp it slightly.

Taco Fixings: Guacamole, Salsa Fresca, Rice, Pulled Chicken, Cotija

This is about a simple as dinner gets. The most strenuous thing was picking the meat off a couple of chicken thighs, mere child's play.

Tacos de Pollo

Recycling

In the course of a single week, I made a fake "rouille" from white beans and piquillo peppers and a big pan of arroz con pollo, both in quantities guaranteeing leftovers. From the remains of these two dishes, we had a very easy egg dish for brunch and a simple taco dish for dinner. Recycling leftovers is a great way to minimize the effort of putting food on the table and a great way to help answer the age-old question, "What's for dinner?"

July 4th Weekend

Friday night July 3rd was about as brutal as it gets at the restaurant. Most of the time in the restaurant business we wish for more customers, but not so Friday night. The entire crew was wishing that not another person would come through the front door. I don't remember getting home or showering or falling asleep, that's how tired I was. Ann says she put my phone on the charger and turned off the light. I have no recollection of this. Not a good way to start a weekend and a surefire indicator that I will be a zombie come Sunday.

Fortunately, Saturday night July 4th was a lot easier and after sleeping like a dead thing on Friday night, I actually had some steam left on Saturday night to watch the fireworks in our neighborhood with Ann.

Neighborhood Fireworks

One of the (very few) benefits of living in a neighborhood of upwardly mobile rednecks is that with their disposable income and pyromaniacal tendencies, the fireworks shows are pretty damned awesome as they all try to outdo each other! The poor dogs, on the other hand, did not have a good night.

Come Sunday, after a decent night's rest on Saturday night, I was somewhat refreshed. Nothing like ten years ago or even five, but all things considered, I was a lot more functional on Sunday than I imagined I would be, even though I got up long before I wanted to. The dogs have no concept of sleeping in or any idea how tired I might be and my lovely bride has the amazing ability to keep on sleeping even through a hurricane, where the slightest noise will awaken me.

At 7:15am, the brown dog decided enough was enough and came and rousted me out of the bed. Her usual MO after she decides that I am ignoring her stomping and huffing about is to paw me like she is digging for China and lick me until I relent and take her out and feed her. So while Ann slept, I ticked several yard work items off my list and was relaxing on the patio when she joined me about quarter to ten, coffee for the both of us in hand, bless her.

After a half an hour or more of chit chat, she went inside and returned with a cookbook, Deb Perelman's Smitten Kitchen Cookbook, one of her favorites. She sat down to browse and was soon enthusing loudly about certain dishes. Yes, food really is a primary topic of conversation at our house. When she said, "I really would love some latkes right now!" I told her I would be right back and returned with a plate of red onion and chive latkes made from red potatoes with the skins still on.

Red Onion and Chive Latkes

By this time, Carter was awake and joined us on the patio. I made a dozen latkes; he ate six and would have eaten more. Latkes are old hat for me: we used to make them every morning for our lunch menu at the restaurant. And I have made them from all manner of vegetables: potatoes, sweet potatoes, butternut squash, turnips, daikon, carrots, and parsnips. I am sure I missed a few.

In the afternoon, it had gotten a bit too warm to be outside so we had gone in to watch a bit of television. Once again, and apparently apropos of nothing, Ann said, "I wish I had some guacamole!" so I went up to the store and scored four beautifully ripe avocados. Once it cooled down outside, I made guacamole and Ann opened a bottle of Vinho Verde and we took both out on the patio to relax. Although we had different plans for dinner, neither of us were hungry post guacamole.

Guacamole

Vinho Verde Seems Just Right for Guacamole

While we were out on the patio talking, looking at our gardens, and watching the birds on the feeders, we saw this big buck rabbit who kept trying to line up a doe (right on the tree line). I assume that he was ultimately successful. She wasn't cooperating, but she wasn't protesting either.

Rabbits, Acting like, um, Rabbits

The whole time we were outside, I kept thinking how wonderful it was to be sitting outside in the late afternoon in July, especially given how brutally hot our summer has already been.

Crab Guacamole

Life is Good! Crab Guacamole and Pacíficos

It was a busy day in our backyard yesterday. Baby rabbit was hopping in and out of the brush line behind the house and all the birds were making various runs at the feeder to secure food for their babies. Barn swallows were constantly winging the backyard trying to nab bugs on the go. The chickadees kept ferrying loads of suet from the feeder back to their babies in the nest box around the corner of the house. Swarms of goldfinches flitted from the feeders to the treetops and back-and-forth and all over, serenading us non-stop.

Meanwhile, the mockingbirds chased off anything to get anywhere near their little cedar tree where they must have a nest. Poor squirrel had most of the fur on his back plucked by the time he could get away from the angry mockingbird. The robins patrolled the grass and caught lots of worms and then stealthily worked their way around us to the nest right overhead in the pergola as red winged blackbird proclaimed one of the feeders his very own, flashing his epaulets and making his "chack chack" call. It was a very busy day in our backyard. And a great day to be alive and sharing it with Annie.

Ann asked me to make crab guacamole, so we grabbed a can of jumbo lump and some cilantro from the walk-in and stopped by the supermercado for a couple avocados, a couple limes, and a six of (I want to say cheap at this point, but $10 is not cheap) Mexican beer. I rarely drink beer and I never buy it at retail, so I kind of had sticker shock. I'm not advocating Pacífico as a good beer: it isn't. But as a vehicle for a wedge of lime on a warm day outside, it hit the spot!

Food Porn! Chipotle-Garlic Guacamole, Cilantro-Lime Crab, Tobiko

I make crab guac from time-to-time in the summer at the restaurant as an appetizer, and as something to munch on outside on the deck, it is hard to beat and couldn't be any simpler to put together. At the restaurant, we make big batches of cilantro-lime vinaigrette with which to dress the crab and we plate it in a ring mold so that you can see the layers better. But at home, who cares?

Cilantro-Lime Crab

1 pound jumbo lump crab
2 tablespoons very finely minced cilantro stems
zest of one lime
juice of half a lime
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
salt to taste

Mix all the ingredients well and season to taste. Let stand to marinate while you assemble the guacamole.

Chipotle-Garlic Guacamole

I kind of feel stupid giving a recipe for guacamole. Basically, you throw in anything you want with mashed avocados.

2 avocados
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
2 chipotles in adobo, finely minced
1/2 cup finely minced cilantro
3/4 cup diced tomato
lime juice, to taste
salt, to taste

Put all the ingredients in a bowl and mash together with a fork. I like my guac with a little texture. You can make yours as smooth or as chunky as you like. I like a little spice in my guac and I like the smoky flavor of chipotle, so I put in one entire chipotle per avocado. You may not want that much. I would have put in some green onions, but I didn't have any. There are no rules. Make your guac how you want it.

For plate-up, ring mold discarded as too fancy for the back yard, spread the guac out over a plate and mound the crab on top. I like to throw a little tobiko and cilantro on top for garnish and I just so happened to have a tub of tobiko in my fridge from last week's summer rolls.

Enjoy with somebody you love!

Tacos de Carne Asada

Skirt Steak, Grilled Onions and Poblanos, Guac, Cheese, and Pico

Call them fajitas, tacos al carbón, tacos de carne asada, or anything else that pleases you. I just know that tender bits of grilled steak wrapped up in a tortilla with some freshly made guacamole, grilled poblanos and onions, and topped with queso para frijoles and pico de gallo is one of the great feeds of all time, especially for that very first time of the new year that it is nice enough to grill out.

And yesterday was that day!

Before (Note Chef Lube in Background)

Note the freaking awesome skirt steak from Bill and Holly at Martin's Angus Beef! I cannot say enough good about this meat. It is incredible, incredible as in the best I ever ate, and you need to run to a farmers market where they sell their beef and get you some. Do not stop, do not pass Go, do not collect $200! Hie thee to the market! You will not regret it.

After!

The Fixings

Above you see the red plate with the sliced beef, the peeled, seeded, and sliced poblanos, and the chopped onions. Above that, the pico de gallo: diced grape tomatoes, sliced green onions, garlic, minced jalapeño, cilantro, lime juice, and salt. Then the queso para frijoles in the middle: it's a little more rubbery and less salty than feta, but the idea is exactly the same. You could even use ricotta salata. And then on the right, the guacamole: avocado, minced jalapeño, crushed red pepper paste, lime juice, green onions, cilantro, and guaje seeds. And last, the flour tortillas. Me, I'm a big fan of corn tortillas, but the only one in the house and I'm not going to get a stack of fresh corn tortillas just for me.

Semillas Frescas de Guaje

Guaje seeds, come again? They're seeds from a pod of a locust-like tree from Southern Mexico that have a great green garlic flavor. I love them in guacamole: I don't add garlic to my guacamole when I add guaje seeds. I bought a bundle at the market and when the afternoon heat proved to be too much to be outside, I shelled them out while Ann and I sat in the sunroom under the ceiling fan, chewing the fat.

You'd be Smiling Too if You Were About to Feast!

Fourth of July

There's no point in having the restaurant open on July the 4th. Except for a handful of tourists, nobody wants to eat out on the 4th, so we close and take the day off. We decided to have just a small family grill-out, Ann, Carter, and me, but somehow as these things do, we ended up with a whole collection of people: Kelley and Mark, Tony, my daughters Lillie and Ellie, my niece Kali, and Lillie's boyfriend Jack.

Mark Does his "Evil" Face

Tony, what a Dork!

Jack, Lillie, Ellie, Kali

My Neck is Being Squoze

The menu was really simple. With the temperature in the high 90s and low 100s, it is so hot that I don't really feel like cooking at home especially after dealing with the heat and humidity of the restaurant kitchen. So simplicity was the order of the day: hot dogs, hamburgers, guacamole, and potato salad. Ann got into the spirit of things with a beautiful flag cake decorated with blueberries and red raspberries.

Burger Toppings

Cheese, Lettuce, Onion, Bacon, and Guac?!?

How Appropriate! Red, White, and Blue Potatoes

Killer Potato Salad: Bacon, Parsley, Green Onions, Chives, Sour Cream

Guac Mise

How Much Guac Do 12 Avos Make?

Proud Cake Maker

Beer and Sparklers!

Seís de Mayo

This is the first posting of four on our recent party on Seís de Mayo.

I'm not one to celebrate made-up holidays like Cinco de Mayo, that mostly American creation fueled largely by the beer companies, but I don't need an excuse to have a party! Ann decided a few weeks back to have a small party on the 6th of May so she could show off her delicious quinoa salad and try out new recipes for tequila sangria and margarita cupcakes.

Pre-Game Huevos con Chorizo

After a week off from work, I hadn't really cooked anything in days, so I was ready to do a little work. I hit the kitchen at 8am and worked steadily until shower time at 2. Ann joined me around 10 and we prepped and talked and pre-gamed it a little bit. I just love it when the two of us are messing around in the kitchen! Define "messing around" however you see fit. ;) Many people would be daunted by this much work in the kitchen, but I love it and don't get to do enough of it at work.

With all the chorizo, peppers, and onions laying around, who can blame us for having a big plate of huevos con chorizo at noon with some beer chasers?

Pre-Game Beers

Here's the menu:

   Fried Asparagus with Cilantro-Pimentón Aïoli
   Oven-Baked Tortilla Chips
   Mango-Tomatillo Salsa
   Guacamole
   Quinoa Salad with Black Beans, Avocado, and Lime-Cumin Dressing
   Quesadillas with Chorizo, Bison Skirt Steak, Poblanos, and Onions
   Margarita Cupcakes
   Tequila Sangria
   Beer

Joining us for the festivities were Kelly and Marco Due plus Neil and Patty. Neil is home on a break from his tour in Iraq and I haven't seen him since he deployed last fall.

Kelly and Marco Due being entertained by....

The One and Only Ann!

It's Good to be Stateside, Beer in Hand!

Patty always tries to hide from the camera

Grayce trying to prove she is a lap dog

This post is huge, so I have broken it down into several smaller pieces. Three more to come.