The last days of the summer vacation......

Well it's been a very busy couple of weeks!! We went upstate for a couple of days to see Franky Boy and my father-in-law. He's coming along great. He goes to the Dr. on August 30, and hopefully the Dr. will let him start to put weight on his leg. Once he's able to do that, he can start to walk around which he's really looking forward to. We've had our own Dr. appointments, going school shopping, and stuff like that, just the papers alone that I need to fill out for school takes like 2 days to complete! It's always so hectic just before school starts, I always say I'm going to start early, but of course I never do. When I was upstate my mother-in-law made peach jelly, it was pretty easy so I bought peaches, plums, and hot and sweet peppers to make my own jellies. I also got some tomatoes to make my own salsa. I guess I'll be busy with all this for a while! I'll let you know how they came out.
My father-in-law, he looks a lot better than the last time I saw him. Franky is really doing some job helping out upstate, he's such a great kid. My father-in-law said " you're not getting him til Labor Day!" So we'll be making another trip upstate again next
week!

A neighbor up the hill from my in-laws have a few animals, this one looked like she wanted her picture taken.


Mario at his physical, the poor kid HATES needles and at this visit, he had to get 3 shots and blood drawn, for a minute I wasn't sure he was going to make it!

ROCCO'S JOB......

I "happened" to be in the neighborhood where Rocco works today, (Well not really the neighborhood, but close enough!!) So I decided to surprise him and make a visit. I nexteled him and he soon came outside to say hi, and even treated me to a tour of " his private office".. Rocco is starting his 3rd year of college for Architecture at NYIT in Westbury. He always did great through school, but is really doing his best in college. He finished with a 3.9 GPA in June!! Because of his grades, half his tuition is being paid with a scholarship.One of his college professors that he kind of made friends with helped him to get a job as a draftsman, (I think that's what he is ) at a Custom Kitchen and Bath store. The salesmen sell the kitchens, I guess they tell Rocco what the customer wants and Rocco draws, drafts, or uses his computer's CAD program and makes the plans for the craftsmen to then custom make the cabinets. He enjoys it. Since he was a little kid he was always drawing. I once heard " The perfect job to have in life is to pick what you love the most to do, and find a way to get paid for it!! " Sounds good to me and I guess it did for Rocco as well. He works over 50 hours a week in the summer because once college starts in September, he'll be busy at school and doing his projects, so his hours will be cut down dramatically. I'm so proud of him, he's only 20 years old, and really knows what he wants and he's doing what he needs to do to get there!!

So mature and handsome!!

MY BOYS ARE SUCH TROOPERS.....

Well today was the day!! Angelo and Mario got their braces on today. Angelo actually didn't get all his braces yet, he "JUST" got that palette expander put on which to me and to him is much worse. The poor kid can't eat or talk, (well that's good for us) but he really is miserable. It needs to stay in for about 6 month's. Mario did pretty good, but then again he only got simple braces. ( he doesn't agree with the simple part!!)
All in all, they were so good, the staff there just loves them, and said we are the only family that has fun at the orthodontist!

Poor Angelo, It doesn't look like much here, but it really is. There's a special "key" I have to turn once a week, to expand the appliance on the roof of his mouth.

Mario told the technician, "It doesn't matter I got braces, I still look good!!" I agree. It's a little hard to see but Mario got red and blue rubber bands on his.

Oh and I finally got "real" glasses today, no more .99 cent glasses!! Angelo insisted in taking a picture of me, I guess it's only fair.

Our celebration dinner and dessert....

Yesterday was our 25th wedding anniversary, we weren't sure what we wanted to do, go out, stay home and celebrate with the kids... So we decided to go out for dinner ,then come home and have a cake with the family. Now where were we going to go? We decided to go to Charlie Brown's. When we are out in Holtsville we always go to the one out there of course, but we were in Massapequa. We checked to see where there were restaurants in Nassau, and there weren't really any that close, so Frank decided to just go out to Holtsville being we knew that one. Just as we pulled into the parking lot, we see a little black car flashing his lights at us, and instantly Frank says " that's John !!" So we pulled up to each other and there was John and Barry. They were there to celebrate John's Birthday, heard there was maybe a 10 - 15 minute wait and thought maybe they would just go somewhere else, but when we pulled in, they asked if we wanted them to join us, we agreed of course, and the 4 of us had a great time.
What timing and what a great surprise!!



When we got home, Norma had candles lit and a big beautiful cake set up on the dinning room table waiting for us. I have to say I think it was the best cake I ever had, it was chocolate moose and cannoli filling. But it just wasn't layers, it was a very thin piece of chocolate cake on the top and bottom with the whole height of the cake being the filling. It was decorated with huge strawberries and chocolate cannoli's. WOW!! Everyone gave us really nice gift's and we had a great time.

******* 25 YEARS AND COUNTING...*******

Well it's here, our silver, quarter of a century, 25th wedding anniversary!! I'm amazed at how fast it really did go. I know people always say that, but I feel it's really true. When I look back over the years, I can't believe all the things that has happened in our married life, but we made it and we made it together. The funny thing about all this is, I know we are 25 years older, but we don't really feel ( most days anyway!!) or act like it. I think that's a good thing, for us anyway!
( double click pictures to enlarge)






























Our reception was here at The Manor East, we had 225 guests. We had such a good time, everything went perfect without any problems, that's a miracle in itself! We had a huge cocktail hour, which we went to. The person in charge that day said we couldn't go, he said "the Bride and Groom don't ever go to the cocktail hour" being we needed to be "introduced" at the reception, well they didn't know Frank, there was no way he was missing all that great food!!(Especially when we were paying for it) Next was the main reception, then a Viennese hour. We had a 7 piece Italian band, but they played plenty of American music as well. One of our guests played the Italian accordion, so he gave the band a rest or two, but watching all the "Italians" dancing the traditional way was a lot of fun. After the reception the tradition is who ever wants, goes back to the grooms house, for spaghetti with oil and garlic. We didn't go, but we heard the crowd stayed until about 4am! This is something everyone really looks forward to. I think I should take out stock in spaghetti, if we intend to keep this tradition up!!
We went to Paradise Stream in the Pocono's for the first 5 days of our honeymoon, this picture isn't so great but look at our "nerdy" shirts!! From here we stopped upstate overnight, then off to Niagara falls. Well, we spent a total of maybe 20 hours there, we got there at about 4pm, saw the falls, and walked back to the hotel, the next morning when we woke up and wanted to start our day of real sightseeing, we discovered our van had been broken into. The back doors were destroyed and they stole all our souvenirs, our pictures from the week before, Franks 2 brand new suits, and a bag full of dirty clothes!! How mean was that? So we left. Then had to stop back upstate again because our van broke down and we had to wait for Carmine to come and help us fix it. Oh well life
happens as they say.... And the rest is history.... Or should I say stories for blogs to come!!

Just a few different things......

Daniella BellaRina lost so many front teeth, her mother is calling her a Jack-o-lantern!! No matter what, she is still beautiful!!! Too bad it's not October though, she would have half her costume already...Sorry Daniella, only kidding!!!








Isn't Franky so strong??


I don't know who's having more fun, Butchy
Boy or Dominic and Franky? If you're wondering, that's a sock chain Dominic made with old socks I was going to throw out, he can find a use for anything. For example.....



He said he couldn't afford a helmet, my question? What does he need a helmet for???











The funniest thing about this picture, is that Dominic said he was smiling under the box for the camera !!



How sad is this picture? Even though it's just a plant, I thought it looked so sad hanging over the fence like this. Like it was looking for help or something. By the size of the flower it looks like it was growing for a long time, but yet the inside doesn't look ready. I guess the plant just couldn't go on any longer.

UPDATE ON ANTHONY'S DR. VISIT......

Today was Anthony's yearly Cardiology appointment. Anthony had an EKG, and an ECHO. After the ECHO we went back to the waiting room to next go into the Dr's office. But Dr. Reitman came out into the waiting room, sat down with us and said,"He is doing so good, you don't even have to come into my office to talk, every things the same as last year!" WOW, I love hearing that!! Anthony has been going to the same Dr. since the day he was born , so we know him for 17 years now. Being I'm the kind of person I am, I completely drove him crazy, I had questions and worries I don't think anyone else would have thought of, plus Anthony was so sick and made such great progress that he kind of treats us a little different. I think Dr. Reitman liked the challenge and that when I would start to get nuts he would just tell me to shut up and trust him and I did. But it's amazing how after so long he still remembers some of the crazy things I came up with, and he still laughs at me!! He's the best.