Christmas and the Return of Mustafa

I received an unexpected phone call from a dear, long lost friend a couple nights ago.  Mustafa the squirrel gave me a jingle and needed a ride to the mall to get his Christmas shopping done.  Without  hesitation I agreed to pick him up, take him to the mall and spend some time with him.

I arrived at his home.

It was cleaned up a bit but I still mentioned to him that it might be time for storm windows.


He hopped in the car and requested we make one stop before we went to the mall.  Suspicious, I asked if it was on the way and he replied, "yep".

I mentioned to him that this technically wasn't on the way and if we could hurry this up a bit it would be much appreciated.  We arrived at his destination.  He put his coat and hat on and we entered the establishment.

We sat down ordered up a few winter lagers... four hours later we left.

I took him straight home and he started getting friendly with the neighbor.

We didn't go shopping and once again Mustafa played me for the fool.

Merry Christmas!

Winter Wonderland 2010

Ready or not here comes Winter! The above pictures were taken on 12/2/2010 during my journey from Tonawanda to East Aurora. The worst hit areas were Lancaster, Depew, West Seneca, South Buffalo. Not even a dusting of snow made it to Tonawanda. Along with hundreds of passangers stranded on the I90, I discovered Mustafa; also an unlucky soul who was trapped on the thruway. He was shivering and cold, but thankfully the Thruway Authority responded to him before any trapped drivers and rescued him. At last report he was found at a bar eating beer nuts and drinking on a Guinness.  I am so glad to hear he is safe and sound!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY COOKIE!

 Here is a toast in honor of your birthday. Hope everyone had a drink for Jll tonight.

Also, because of this very special day; we all decided to wear our birthday hats for you. Thank you to Jff and GG for participating.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO OUR CJ

 

A weekend getaway ended much to fast as we had many reasons to celebrate this trip. The biggest reason was our CJ was turning 1! How very proud we all are to have her in our lives! I can honestly say she fits in PERFECTLY with us!We had a special guest appearance by the "talking head." Grandma was all bundled up for the party. We do think she was hiding some brownies on us. She is such a good sport about her picture getting taken!

Although some things just don't change in our family; it was great to have spent some quality time with cousins we don't see very often. This truly is family bonding! Notice my sister shows her displeasure towards the Boston Red Sox while Adam has turned a blind eye to what was going on behind him or maybe his focus was on his bisquits and gravy.

After breakfast at the waffle house, we took a brief tour of Atlanta as the birthday girl rested up for her big day! Aunt Sue, Mom, Jill, and I took our first ever visit to a Presidential Library. As it was clear we were the only one's there we made the most of our trip.

We had a few hours before our flight left to finish up our trip with some sight seeing. But top on the list was landing grandma a part-time job. She had an interview promptly at 9am. We grilled her with some informative questions that the interviewer might ask her. We thought this job would be a great opportunity for her to relocate, start over, earn some money to support all of us, and of course land onhe fortune 500 list.

 Grandma sure looked like she had done this before! Here she was proof reading some contracts before they went out. She was getting ready to sign on the dotted line for a long-term employment contact with KDHRC. How excited we were to hear that she got the job! Since gram is now gainfully employed; we have changed the criteria of the pirate game. Gram is in the process of creating a document that she will PDF to all of us.

Thank you Kristen and Eric for such a wonderful weekend! Happy Birthday Caroline!

London Greetings!

Dear Adm: I'm writing this with tears in my eyes. Your sister is HURT that she's the only family member that didn't receive your email about your mugging in London! But Thank God you weren't injured because you complied immediately. Let us know how it's going across the pond as you visit the embassy and Police (who are of no help) and settle your hotel bills. In the meantime, the whole Holtz family will be gathering up our bank account information and other personal information (SSN, mother's maiden name, PIN numbers) to send over to you, stat. I'll put together a spreadsheet. Cheerio!

more summer pics

A pictoral blog
by JT Pilaf

The evening was moist...
hands down this is my favorite way to start a story. Sandra and I received a night of from the kids (they were down at Camp Pioneer) so we went to Letchworth SP for the night and brought Jeter too.

We love going to the zoo

... there's always something new to see

Emma loves the Kids Play soccer program. This is the last night of the year, the kids/ parents game.

Of course there was a beautiful wedding and this may have been my favorite part 'snif'

Rick and Stacy came to town.

Zach's baseball banquet at the Bison's game.

The playoff champs Red Sox... ugh, I think I vurped a biit in my mouth.

We had a wonderful and fun filled summer. It's amazing how every weekend can be filled.

CAMPING 101

Camp site 222 was the setting for Jeff's birthday celebration! After a hectic summer of wedding planning, it was nice to just relax and enjoy Cayuga State Park and the company of the Rice's!

On your mark, get set, GO

Nephew had lots of activities planned, so everyone was kept busy, and had fun!

It was 3-D glasses nite at the ball park! Geo is pointing out the beer vendor!

It was definately a sitting and chatting weekend, another planned activity!

Austin, Emma and Zach just waiting for breakfast.

Not a very flattering picture of my sister, but a nice one of gary, don't you think?

A birthday toast for the birthday boy!

a beautiful end to a beautiful nite at the ballpark!