10 Questions About…

During the break Aine, Kate, Kate’s friend and I took a trip to the Science Museum (We’re members; so every trip is free.) Aine had fun climbing around. We also saw the Omni show all about the Hubble telescope, which is going down as one of my faves.

Did you know that they have used info from the Hubble to figure out how solar systems are formed? It was cool to see the solar systems that were just forming. I must admit that I could only really pick out the ones that had the oval orbiting like ours but it turns out they come in all shapes.

Aine has taken up Irish Dancing this year. I’m sure we’ll have some video to show for the effort this spring when they have their big show – but in the meantime… We went to a Christmas party sponsored by the dance company. Other famous guests – Santa!

We did a lot of our holiday celebrating the week before Christmas this year. It started with our annual Christmas open house. We took no pictures – but we did make a lot of food. As always we left everything until the very last minute – but all of my family is so great about helping. The Saturday before the party the girls and I go to Grandma’s for a marathon cookie bake. Our big lesson this year – don’t try to use healthy peanut butter for cookies. Dad and I went to Sam’s to get good things like shrimp trays. I try to hide one every year – but it never works out. So we share.

We opened presents mid-week. Everyone was very happy with their haul. Presents included a big princess tent, betta fish and Flip Camera.

We went on our annual sojourn to the Children’s Theatre. We saw A Christmas Story. It was a family favorite. Actually it’s always fun to see who likes which plays. Katie’s favorite was Frog and Toad. Patrick liked the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Many of us still go with Wizard of Oz.

The adults had an amazing dinner at Luci’s. Sadly Mom was sick – clearly sick if Luci’s was out. I’m trying to remember what we had – it was a 5 course meal. And if that wasn’t enough we also got an extra dinner of scallops just because we all wanted to try them. If you haven’t eaten at Luci’ you should try it. They have a 3-course meal that you just can’t beat. And much to our delight, there’s a special rate on Thursdays. We had hoped to go earlier in the week but snow helped us decide on Thursday.

One last thing I remember from our whirlwind week was the Mall of America amusement park. Due to a some excessive holiday spending and a bargain they were running we got some very economical free-ride bracelets. The kids had fun. There is a huge difference between the rides that O’Donnell’s think are fun and the rides the Lynch’s like. In fairness they have season passes to Dix Flag so they have been desensitized.

So Lily and I have taken on a new challenge. We are the neighborhood correspondents for the Twin Cities Daily Planet. That means we interview people in Mac Groveland for the online newspaper. We started with our neighbor Pete Greenheck up at the Nativity Christmas Tree Lot. We’re still working on our second interview. Got an idea? Let us know!

At Nativity (the girls’ school) they don’t have an all-school Christmas pageant, which is kind of nice. Rather a couple of the grades have different events. The first grade did a reenactment of the of the Nativity. Aine was an angel – so that wasn’t too much of a stretch for her.

I’m back. I’m going to catch up the blog because we did something fun today and I want to post about it – but I can’t until we’re up to date. So we might be heavy on pictures for December.

We got a lot of now in December. This picture was taken after the 18 inch snowfall early in the month.

Patrick and I had a great dinner at Luci Ancora – our favorite Italian restaurant. They had a wine dinner with St Innocent, Patrick’s favorite winery. We go to the wine dinners often – usually we sit by ourselves. This time they sat us with a few other folks. So that was different – Patrick was not so thrilled at first – but after a glass of wine, or two it was kind of fun!

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The Lynches came into town for the Minnesota State Fair. So we all went together (us, Lynches, Grandma & Grandpa). We had our scavenger hunt – which I posted earlier. We had a great time. I’ll have to post our annual Education Calendar when we get it. They are always great about letting all 13 of us pose in the picture.

We had a ton of good food – the potato chip tornado was a new purchase that I would make again. Some of us milked a cow – namely me, Kate, Katie and Aine. In other words the toughest of the group. Some folks went on the Sky Ride (not me!). Aine won a big ball in the arcade, she was the big winner. We saw the largest pig and largest pumpkin. We walked and walked. The weather was absolutely perfect!

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Since we were out of town for my birthday, we celebrated in August at the final Saints game of the season. It was great. I think I had about 70 tickets to the game – and they were all used. As always my favorite part was the tailgating before. But the game was good too. It did go into 11 innings, which we didn’t love because we were a little tired. We did love the fireworks after the game. The fireworks feel so close there and it’s a great display. I’m hoping that I can celebrate my birthday a little earlier next eyar – but a second tradition might be making the final game of the season – especially if they keep up the fireworks

Ag Building

1. How big is the biggest pumpkin at the Fair?

All About the Animals

1. 2. Get a picture of a baby animal.

2. 3. How big the biggest boar is? (Remember the Swine Barn closes at 3:00.)

3. Get a picture of everyone wearing pig ears from the Swine Booth.

Food Glorious Food

1. 5. There are 59 things to eat on a stick at the State Fair. Keep a list of how many you see. (Bonus points for each one you try.)

2. 6. What is the strangest food at the Fair? Was it good?

3. Andy’s Beer Garden is a great place to hang out. They sing a song each half hour. What song do they sing?

Educational Building

1. Get a calendar with a family picture.
2. 9. Who is smart enough for MENSA? Visit the MENSA booth and see if you can answer any of the MENSA questions.

Creative Arts Building

1. 10. Get a picture of all the kids with the healthiest food poster.

Dairy Building

1. How many butter queens have they carved so far? Get a picture.

Random

1. Ride the Giant Slide at the Fair. (Be sure to have someone take your picture.)
2. Visit the DNR fish pond. What’s the ugliest fish?
3. Pick up as many school supplies as you can. (Each kid should have their own bag!)
4. How many tickets can you win in the arcade? (Each kid gets $2; no spending your own money!)

1. Get an autograph from a famous person. (Or get a picture of the team with a famous person.)

1. What is your favorite part of the Daily Parade? (It starts at 2:00.)

1. Get a bird’s eye view on the Skyride!