“S’no” fun here in the Midwest…

  So….We have had a grand total of 27” of snow here in the greater Chicago area and suburbs since Jan.31st…Seems like the minute we crossed the border into Illinois, the snow gods said, “OK, it’s good now..The Cave Dwellers have returned to the dreaded armpit of the nation….LET ‘EM PAY FOR IT!!!”….and hence came the white stuff…

  Last Tuesday, when we got our 8-9” of a skier's dream, I decided I would take a walk to Walgreens…Hey, McGyver was out driving around in the stuff with our 4 wheel drive and I hadn’t had my walk yet…I struck out, along sidewalks that had not yet been shoveled…(I had just finished shoveling our deck and front sidewalk…did I need more exercise?NO!)

Our neighbor across the street was out shoveling too….Right pic, looking East down our street toward town…no shovelers here!

  I know ….it is beautiful in photos….But I much prefer the sunny thermal rays of  sun pouring down on me…preferably in Florida..

Those snowflakes were huge and wet…The Hiker looked pretty forlorn, being ignored in our back yard..

As you can see, not much going on here, except some sporatic shoveling, lots of whining, and many evenings by the fireplace…

There will be some excitement in the middle of April….Our son-in-law, John Wolff, qualified to run in the Boston Marathon on April 15th…I dug up a few photos of our Boston Marathon runner from the Cave archives…

….makes a mother-in-law proud !! John obviously fits nicely into the Crazy Cave family!

Aside from having a wonderful sense of humor, John is an accomplished runner…having run about 4 marathons and MANY half marathons…

He even ran 12 miles last weekend just for practice when they were here in Sandwich for the Cave-a-Palooza….and it was only 10 degrees!!!

Here he is after he got back from his run…He was almost steaming when he came in our warm living room!

Dennis and I are watching their boys for 4 nights while John and Chris hop a flight out of Midway Airport for the long weekend in Boston…Those Wolff “cubs” will keep us on our toes, and we cannot wait to spoil them rotten and then send them home!!

I need to welcome a new follower to the Cave pack…so everyone who has been sitting in the GMC, playing driver,…slide over!! Let Wendy climb aboard…Wendy lives in Florida and has a blog with some great photos…I sure hope she isn’t expecting us to haul-arse back to Florida anytime soon…..Maybe we can all take a short trip this summer…HOW ABOUT THAT, KIDS????

“What on earth would I do if four bears came into my camp? Why, I would die of course. Literally shit myself lifeless.”
― Bill Bryson, A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail

Our First Cave-a-Palooza of 2013…WHEW!!

  This weekend was our first of many Cave-a-Paloozas this year…As usual, it was a huge party…a conflagration of kids, adults acting like kids, beverages , Pull-Ups, pacifiers(for some of us), fire pits, dueling remote helicopters, homemade donuts and pizza, grilled chicken….and a gazillion toys…It looked like a toy box threw up on our living room floor…

Kelly brought his newest toys (even though he is 42 years old)…remote control dueling helicopters….He and Peyton had a “dogfight” in our dining room with them….

You might notice my vase of silk flowers on the dining room table in the middle bottom photo of the above collage….I seems Kelly’s helicopter got a little too close to one of those flowers…

….it is now just one of the “casualties of war” in our dining room….clipped right off at the stem…….  . I am setting up a meeting with the helicopter crew…They might be “grounded” as a disciplinary action from the Chief Command.., which is MOI!!!

Here are a few more pics from the weekend…

Yes, I realize this blog is mostly pictures…but sometimes one picture (or in this case, 38) is worth a trillion words…I do believe this is one of those times…

After a fun and busy weekend, one where, at times, I felt like I had been run over by a Mack truck…(could it have been that I was “over-served”??), McGyver and I are heading up to Montgomery tomorrow morning to take Uncle Jr. to another Physical Therapy appointment…You might know they are predicting snow starting tomorrow night…4-8 “ of the stuff.  We should be safely tucked in at home before it begins…I plan on stopping and picking up a Papa John’s pizza on the way home…NO COOKING TOMORROW!!!!…NADA, ZIP, ZILCH, ZERO …ME NO LIKEY, ME NO DO!!!

Uncle Jr., riding his “bike” at P.T….Tomorrow he is definitely getting his hair cut…I’m putting on my “hairdresser” cap…and sprucing him up!! Thanks for checking in…Remember that you were forewarned about all of those Cave family mug shots….There is NOTHING like a family get together to make one appreciate just how lucky we are!!

“This packrat has learned that what the next generation will value most is not what we owned, but the evidence of who we were and the tales of how we loved. In the end, it’s the family stories that are worth the storage.”” ~Ellen Goodman

Sure glad we have 4 wheel drive!!

  This morning McGyver and I left here about 8:15AM to drive to Montgomery, IL…Uncle Clarence had his first physical therapy appointment and evaluation in Oswego at 9:45.  After watching the weather we opted for the GMC instead of ‘ol blue, our 1989 Silverado…no 4 wheel drive ..AND the tires aren’t as good treadwise…They were predicting freezing rain followed by 3-6 inches of snow…just great.  It hadn’t started any kind of precip when we arrived and we loaded up Uncle Jr. (Clarence) and Aunt Jeanette and headed the 5 miles to Oswego in their Caddy…We can’t take them in our GMC, it is just too high of a step for either one of them without a step ladder, and they are much more comfy in their ‘86 Caddy…

  After about an hour of consultation and assessment of Jr’s condition, we scheduled 4 weeks of twice a week therapy for him.  The therapist also gave him some things he could do from his chair to exercise his legs…Jeanette made me laugh when she revealed her age of 97 years to the therapist and decided she should to those “at home” excersises with him…FYI, her age totally shocked that therapist.!  Well, when we got ready to leave we saw it had been snowing while we were in the office..Just for the record, Uncle Jr. is NOT very mobile and has a very hard time getting around.  He does have one of those walkers with wheels and a seat, Thank God, that they got for him at Hines Veteran’s Hospital…We made a drive through Walgreens for his prescription and then I took his grocery list and ran into Aldis …It was just too slippery for either one of them to get out, and McGyver stayed in the car with them…

After unloading elders, groceries, prescriptions and walkers from the car and into their house, we didn’t linger long…The weather and roads were looking pretty bad, and we had about 25 miles of back roads to drive…I took some photos on the way home and made a pretty big collage of it…(By that I didn’t mean “pretty” as in lovely!!)

The traffic was creeping along on the way out of Montgomery, and we saw a few cars in the ditch on the way home…

McGyver was all business behind the wheel…The snow was so blinding he had to put on his very stylish Oakley sunglasses…(either that or he was just trying to look cool…)

Florida now seems like just a distant dream that I had….It isn’t that I hate snow, it’s pretty to look at …if only you didn’t have to drive in it or shovel it..

Once inside, I realized I couldn’t even see out our screen porch in the front of our house….

Yes, home gamers, that is ICE on our front screens….I know now why those roads were soooooo scary to drive on…As Dennis says “4 wheel drive is absolutely worthless on ice”…I hate it when he’s right.  I guess it we have had a cold snap all over the nation….The golf tournament in Arizona had the pros in their stocking caps and gloves yesterday…

I don’t think these are the caps they had in mind when they signed on for this golf outing..

OK, enough about the snow…I need to end this little ditty on a “breath of Spring”…

This is Aunt Jeanette’s Amaryllis that she has growing inside…I never realized how beautiful they are..By gosh, I do believe I’m gonna get me one next year…(They are a Xmastime inside plant…Poinsettias and I just do not get along, this would do much better for me).  Thanks for checking in..Oh, one more thing….We have another Cave-a-palooza sheduled for this weekend..The Wolff family, the Caves (both families) and the Heisers will all be here for a fest of food, family and fun…Yep, you’re gonna be bored yet again by my family photos….GET OVER IT!!!!!

“The problem with the designated driver program, it's not a desirable job. But if you ever get sucked into doing it, have fun with it. At the end of the night, drop them off at the wrong house.”
-- Jeff Foxworthy