Video of Band Playing at the Birthday Bash

Disco Ball video from Nancy's party

40th Birthday Bash Weekend Grand Finale :)

The weekend festivities continued on Sunday with everyone attending the Cubs game (14 of us!) together. Greg arranged this and got the tickets :). It was a perfectly beautiful day, and the Cubs won! We saw several homeruns and even saw a guy catch a ball on Waveland Avenue! Beer drinking and hot dog eating was enjoyed by all. The amazing weekend finally drew to a close with the Albrights piling in their car for Columbus and Alex boarding the Megabus for Cincinnati. Dennis and I left this morning and shunpiked our way back to Ohio in a leisurely manner.

40th Birthday Weekend Continues...

Amy & Jorge hosted a cookout on Saturday afternoon for the family. Aunt Co & Gabe could not be here for the weekend because Gabe is having a kidney transplant on Tuesday (happy, happy, joy, joy!) but they sent an edible bouquet. :) Aunt Debbie made a wonderful album of childhood pictures for Nancy.

On Saturday night, Nancy, Greg, Dennis, Janie, Amy & Jorge went to see Neil Diamond in concert and the others went to Venetian night fireworks downtown on the lake.





Friend Baldy also attended :)

Nancy's 40th Birthday Bash Weekend

The weekend started with a party at Fitzgerald's side bar on Friday night. Cannonball played and Nancy's boyfriend Andon is in the band. We had the party room reserved with food from Wishbone (outstanding beef brisket sandwiches among other things) and we decorated the tables with various themes that were Emily's clever idea. About 40 people were in attendance including all of the Albright's from Columbus and Alex Blumer from Cincy. If you look closely you can see everyone is wearing a "40 and and fabulous" button with Nancy's picture on it that Amy had made . Masks were made by Aunt Debbie. Reena brought the beautiful (and delicious) cake. Mickie did all the flowers. :)

Friday Night pictures

Sunset on Buckeye Lake

It may not be Puerto Vallarta but surely is a pretty sight. :)

House built on our old lot in LOW

We drove by the old house in Lake of the Woods and, lo and behold, there is a house on our old lot. We bought it in 1984 and always intended to build a house on it. It has over 300 feet of water frontage on Hoover Reservoir. But we never got around to it, I guess because we loved our home so much. Finally as we approached retirement we decided the last thing we wanted was to build a big house so we sold the house in 2005 and the lot in 2006. A younger couple bought the lot and built a house with a magnificent view of the lake with a huge great room similar to what we were planning. I could not capture the beauty of the view in my pictures. :(

Family Mourns Dean

Dennis' oldest brother, Dean, passed away from lung cancer early Monday morning, July 14, 2008. He would have been 71 on July 25. The family gathered and gave some loving and humorous eulogies, most notable, those by his brother Larry and daughter Debbie. Larry told a lot of funny stories and Debbie described her dad as the nut in the family fudge recipe. :)

Nancy, Amy & Jorge drove in from Chicago. Colleen came down from Cincinnati. Friends and family sent flowers and contributions to hospice and cancer society.

I got a few pictures at the luncheon afterwards.

Change in Plans

We had planned to be in Quebec and Montreal this week. However life has a way of thwarting the best laid plans. My dear brother-in-law Dean became critically ill with cancer and we headed to Winchester, Kentucky instead. We all sat at his bedside for four days until he mercifully passed away early Monday morning. I took a few pictures while there. His little dog Ginger and his daughter Sharon's dog, Sophie, were a nice diversion. Sophie is mainly beagle and maybe some bluetick hound based on her spots. Ginger reminds me of Benjy. :) I also got a cute shot of Sharon, taking a few minutes away from caring for her dad to steal a kiss from her husband James.

Heron Bay Fourth of July Parade

We rode our bikes in the Parade today :) There were 24 decorated golf carts and a few bikes!

Fireworks on Buckeye Lake

We invited my brother's family to see the fireworks over Buckeye Lake from our boat. They are always held on July 3 at 10 pm. All of the Albrights came. :) Aunt Debbie brought us all special red 4th of July T-shirts! We are modeling them in the pictures! The weather was iffy but the weatherman said the storms would move out around 7 pm and skies would be clear until midnight. Sure enough, the rain stopped and we were able to go out in the boat to stake a spot for a fantastic fireworks display! We had on the radio for the choreographed spectacle. It did sprinkle lightly at one point but we made it through. As we were leaving it looked like Christmas with thousands of red white and green lights twinkling as all of the boaters slowly headed for home. :) It was sprinkling again as we pulled up to the dock. Mother Nature gave us only the briefest respite. Today, July 4, has rained steadily so I imagine it has played havoc with many parades. :(

My niece, Emily, is going to post a video of the fireworks finale on her blog: www.millers.tumblr.com so look for it there soon. ;)