Happy Fat Tuesday!

Today is Fat Tuesday and a wonderful day to eat paczkis. Macri's bakery makes some amazing ones. They don't make them quite like the traditional ones, but these are even better. They essentially take the doughnut, cut it in half, put a layer of heavy whipped cream on the bottom half, add starberries and strawbery goo, add the top half, and make sure both sides get a coating of powdered sugar. Each one has about 800 calories. Absolutely freakin' amazing!!!

My mom had brought me some paczkis from Martins last night. Unfortunately, they weren't all that great. Don't get me wrong, they tasted pretty good as far as a regular custard filled powdered sugar doughnut tastes, but nothing close to the ones from Macri's. So I had decided to take a mid-afternoon stroll up to Peds to visit with the nurses. While up there, the nurse tech mentioned that Lori had brought in some of the paczkis from Macri's. My eyes got huge and I'm fairly sure I started drooling. She was then kind enough to offer one to me. And she brought it out in all of it's powdered sugary, strawberry, whipped cream deliciousness! I gave Lori a big hug and ran downstairs to devour it :-)

As I skipped into my room, I noticed a box from Macri's on my bedside table. I quickly ran over to it with breathless anticipation. And YES, there was ANOTHER strawberry paczki from Macri's!!!! "Holy crap, this is my lucky day," I thought excitedly. But there was no name on the box, just the word "Enjoy!" I quickly called several potential benefactors trying to figure out who I needed to thank with no such luck. I'm still not positive, but I'm fairly certain it was from the nurse in charge of my clinic. She's so sweet.

So I had a custard one from Martins last night, a lemon one from Martins with breakfast, a wonderful strawberry one from Macri's with dinner, and will eat the last one tomorrow morning. Tis a very merry Fat Tuesday!

Luke

It's been all over the news last night and today that John Travolta's son passed away yesterday. He apparently had a seizure and hit his head. As I heard the story, all I could think about was Luke. He was one of my brother's friends when I was younger and went to church with us. Luke was probably 3 years older than me and he was a senior my freshman year at Riley HS. About a year after graduating, Luke passed away...in an eerily similar manner to Jett Travolta.

Since Luke was my brother's friend, we never really hung out together, but he always seemed like such a great guy. He was always so easy going, happy, and laid back. There's a picture in my yearbook of him wearing a giant sombrero and his red & white striped soccer shirt with a huge grin on his face. I was able to go on one of our youth group's New York trips with my brother, Luke, and their friends. Luke was never an arrogant guy, he just wanted to make everybody smile.

Whenever I go to church, I'm reminded of him. A local artist put together a banner with the help of Luke's parents and friends. It's called "From Mourning Into Dancing" and is a beautiful piece of artwork. I was able to find a picture of it online, but it hardly does it justice. http://jeannelogan.com/public_space_ps30.html The banner is over 20 feet long and is filled with different colors swirling the length of it. Some of the cloth used in it was from some of Luke's favorite clothes or from those of a friend. The darker colors are present throughout, but it's the light blue I prefer to focus on. Whether it represents Luke's favorite creek or just a happier color, it seems symbolic of hope. Hope that things will get better and hope that there will be a happy ending.

Here's to hope in a New Year.

A lazy day after Christmas

So I was thinking about starting my blog again. I've usually been pretty bad about updating, but enjoy reading other peoples' blogs. Then I feel guilty because I get to enjoy something they put time and energy into when I'm too lazy/busy to do the same. And as a friend pointed out, sometimes blogging does seem a bit self indulgent. But I am going to assume that if somebody takes a look at my blog it's because they want to know what's going on with me, so I guess I shall blog.

I enjoyed Christmas a lot. It wasn't a traditional Christmas for me, but I did enjoy making new memories. I spent a couple of hours with my dad and step-mom. It was a bit interesting because they had failed to mention that we wouldn't be having Christmas dinner. So I was starving by the time I got to my second destination.

My mom's best friend's daughter invited me over to spend the day with her family (they have 5 kids!). It was great fun to see the kids open their presents with great excitement and anticipation. I haven't had a big family Christmas for quite awhile, so it was a nice change of pace to spend it with them. Watching the boys try out their new snowboard and saucers on an icy hill was hilarious. And watching their dad wipe out and then try to carry the boys back up the hill was even better!

I also got to spend a couple of hours with my best friend from high school. She lives near Atlanta now and we haven't seen each other since last Christmas. Hope everybody else had a happy holiday!