Well, our stories just keep getting better and better. Let me begin at the start. Randy rented us a truck from Uhaul today to continue our clean out of the storage and we had ordered a chair and buffet from Pier 1 for the kitchen, so I would have more space to store “goodies”. We thought as long as we had the rental truck we could pick up our order and clean out more stuff we didn’t have room for that we had brought from Texas. So we take our Halloween masks with us, knowing that we would be wearing them to haul the new items upstairs. To insure that the neighbors don’t recognize us, we stopped and bought Randy a wife beater shirt to wear with his Richard Nixon mask while unloading the truck here at the house. We don our masks and drop off unwanted furniture at the Thrift store and head to Pier 1 to pick up the new furniture. The back in of the Uhaul is loaded with more things to bring upstairs so we push that towards the front of the van and arrive at Pier 1. The nice young men help us load the 400 lb buffet in the back of the van and I am signing the papers when all of a sudden we hear a huge “crash”. We turn around and a sweet little ole lady has stepped on the gas instead of the brake and t-boned another car, swirled it around and she then crashes into us. Now she is trapped between the Uhaul and the other man’s car, so we are trapped there on the street at Pier 1 waiting for the police. After we check to be sure everyone is ok and they are, I immediately remember that I have no make up on, my hair is flat to my head and people are staring at us. We both look like we haven’t had a shower in days. The police come and we finally leave with the new furniture headed to our house. We arrive now, not only in a Uhaul van that has in huge orange writing all over the side “Rent Me for $19.95/day” but the whole side is totally smashed and makes the most awful sound, as the wheel is about to fall off. We quickly put on our mask and unload the old stuff into the trunk of my car. We are NOT going to bring any of this stuff in until after dark. Now we are trying to unload this huge buffet up the back steps (17 steps in all) and in the back door. It is so heavy that we have to stop with each step just so I can catch my breath. We make it finally up to the back door where it is still sitting until we can get the energy to move it where it will be permantely placed in the kitchen once I unload the piece of furniture that is where it will go. So tomorrow, we will have clean out day for two other pieces of furniture to make way for the two new pieces. We headed back to Uhaul, having to drive about 20 mph in case the wheel fell off, which it didn’t. It took a little over an hour to fill out the paper work and thank goodness Randy had taken out insurance on the van. So we turn it in and get back into our car and head home. We will be busy tonight unloading bags and boxes that are in the back of my car. But we’re not worried, we have already washed his wife beater shirt after a long day of loading and unloading. He is ready for dark to when we will empty out my car and make room for next Saturday….we found 3 thrift stores today that we haven’t had the chance to explore…….Hope they get the van ready before too long, sometime tells me we will be needing it in a couple of weeks.

Yesterday, WordPress informed me that my next post, which is this one, would be my 500th post and the blog has received 14,290 views over the past two years. I decided that instead of posting a recipe for the 500th post, that I would give you a little history of why I began this blog. Back in 2009, Randy and I went to see Julia Julia and during the movie he leaned over to me and said, “you should be doing that and if you don’t, shame on you”…..so walking out of the theater, I decided then and there that the recipes that were continually being requested or when phone calls came asking me for ideas of what to cook; these items should be on the blog. So the very next day I began to blog. My son, Jason, had mentioned a year before this that I should be putting all my recipes on a blog so they would be in one place, but being the lazy, undisciplined person that I am, I put it off. But now, well, I was determined and felt that God had spoken to me through Randy, so hence, the blog. As I began to post recipes, stories began to come to mind that I just felt I wanted to share, and as I began to write, ideas just kept coming. Cooking is one of my passions, but people are even more so, and as Randy and I had many opportunities to open up our home, I began to realize that it really wasn’t the cooking that was my passion, but serving and cooking for others. Because of that, each and every time we have had people into our home, we have been so blessed to share with others a sweet time of fellowship around the table. That is one of my greatest joys. Sitting around the table, eatting and sharing our hearts and thoughts, laughter and sometimes tears……but each of these occassions has given me the desire to try and capture how much we both enjoy sharing food with friends and people that we hoped would be new friends.
Thank each of you for reading this site and for all the encouraging comments….To God be the Glory….for His faithfulness, for His inspiration and for His goodness to our family. Chocolate Castles has been not only fun to write, but has been a joy to my heart to share so many special times in our lives with you. Hope to hear from you from time to time, and again, thank you for your friendship and encouragement! Please feel free to share the blog with your friends and family!

I wish all of you could have been with Peter and Penelope Punkie (yes, we are already changing our names for Fall) this morning.Peter tells me that we are going to storage this morning to begin cleaning out and to “let” me bring home some of the Fall decorations to begin decorating our house for the season. Well…that’s all you need to say to me, is “let’s decorate” and I am ready and out the door. We get to storage and begin going through each of the boxes, only to learn that there are boxes and boxes of clothes that need to be taken to our church thrift store and still more furniture to get rid of as our house here will only accommodate half of what we had in Texas. As we begin to look for the Fall Decorations we realize how much we are going to be bringing home to use. We went after 3 fall trees, plus the decor that go on them……..we end up making 3 trips to the car, or as Peter calls it, the “mercedes pick-up”. There is too much for one trip home, so we load the car and head home, knowing that we will be coming back for another trip of fall clothes and decorations. On the way home, Peter pulls into a Halloween store and tells me to get out. I look at him wondering what in the world. When I inquire what are we doing, he says to me, “you don’t think I’m going to unload all this stuff without a costume on do you,?” The neighbors have already called “1-800-I Am A Hoader” on us and he thinks that we will be getting another visit from them if neighbors see us hauling more things into our house. As we “camouflage” ourselves, we begin unloading and hauling upstairs, bag after bag and container after container. We see neighbors peeking out their windows, wondering where in the world all this stuff is going to go, as their houses are exactly the same size as ours. So, we wait until after dark to unload all the bags of “fall clothes” “fall decor” and hope that they dont see us. We are convinced that they probably think we are carrying up dead bodies in bags, but Peter assures me that if we were doing that, we wouldn’t be using the white garbage bags, as all the bags we see on Unsolved Mysteries are always the dark black or green bags. So we are sticking to white to hopefully lesson the neighbors concerns.
Since I didn’t get through writing this post yesterday and am just returning home from Costco today, I have another update. Peter and I take his small 2 seater car to Costco, knowing that we are only going for cheese, gas and Dr Peppers. He reminds me that I cannot buy anything other than these items since we are in his car. Well……we walk down the TV isle and low and behold they have the TV that he has been looking at for 3 months on sale. Do I really have to tell you the rest of the story. Yes, we buy it. We carry it out to the car and of course it is too big for the trunk so he pushes up the seats as far to the front as they will go and proceeds to push the boxed TV behind the two seater. We are pushed up against the dashboard, with our knees up under our chins, and he decides that it will be impossible for him to drive because he can’t position his leg to even step on the brakes, so I unfold my body out of the car and switch seats with him. Cars are passing us, laughing as they pass. We finally make it home, after stopping twice just to let our legs, which have fallen asleep, due to no circulation, get some feeling in them. We arrive at home and begin to unload this when our worst nightmare happens, our downstairs neighbor is walking out and sees us carrying not only a crate of Dr Pepper, but the television. He remarks to us, “are you sure you have room up there for that” which tells me that he was watching us out his window yesterday. I need to close and post this, as I am going to go hide a few of the bags which we brought up yesterday. Our neighbor already informed us that his ceiling is sagging and we are expecting a knock on our door in the morning from “1-800-I Am A Hoarder”.

We are home from Cameron and Mandy’s wedding and still feeling a little festive from having all our meals with our kids and extended family, it is easy to already get excited about the upcoming holiday season when we will get to be with family and friends again. That never seems to come fast enough, but I have discovered a secret that I just had to share. As soon as the plane flew over the border of Texas and knowing that I was about to re-enter the land of No Sister Schubert Rolls, I got a little down, not only were we flying back to grocery stores which do not carry breaded fried okra, but they also have never heard of these amazing rolls. So…upon awaking our first morning back in Sushi-land, I got on the computer, contacted Sister Schubert Rolls and found that they ship all their mouth watering rolls to anywhere in the USA! Well….I guess I don’t have to tell you that I have 12 pans of rolls coming my way. Since I am cooking breakfast for a brunch next week, these ladies out here are going to be introduced to these amazing little gems.
Sushi and salad lovers, watch out……you are about to discover a little roll that will have you saying, “ya’ll” and “git back here” before you know it……Some ladies might need to go for a mani and pedi or massage to get regenerated……..me, I just need to bake a pan of SS rolls, and I’ll be dreaming of grits, gravy and green beans seasoned with bacon tonight. Meals as I remember them are about to “git” good again!

Am headed to Texas for our son’s wedding. Will not be posting until Monday, September 5th! Have a great Labor Day and get out a favorite recipe and try it out for some sweet friends.

Yesterday was just one of those days that I cannot let go by without writing about. We went with some friends to eat mexican food after church. They invited us back to their home after lunch so we went, promsing them that we would only stay for a minute. We ended up staying for a couple of hours. They had just bought a 3D TV and we ended up putting our feet up, sitting with a bowl of M&M’s and nuts and watching a 3-D movie. Joe, the Lou’s husband has taught himself to play the fiddle and they had a keyboard, so we ended up laying some songs together and just had a great afternoon. On our way home, Randy and I talked about how long it had been since we had just gone to someone’s home and sit and visit and watch a movie or sing along while playing a piano much less the added fiddle. It was like our growing up years when we use to go to peoples homes after church and just sit, visit and talk….brought back so many memories. Thank you Jo and Lou for a precious afternoon.
Today, I went to the grocery store to buy some rib eye steaks to make Philly steak sandwiches for dinner. When I asked the butcher to slice one very thin, he replied, “we don’t have any machines that will do that, I would have to do it by hand.” I couldn’t believe my ears…..every grocery store in Dallas would be able to slice steaks, but then again, this is Pasadena and some of our experiences here have truly been like stepping back in time….in most ways, it is so refreshing and such a precious time of people taking the time to get together, but when I want a steak sliced, I want the convenience of being able to have that. If I had to pick between the two, I think I will take the slower, more relaxed visiting time and just slice the steaks myself. It will give my arms some exercise. Pasadena, we love your slower pace of living, but am going to add a meat slicer to my wish list for Christmas.

Wow, Jaden is on the plane headed back to Dallas. We can now watch whatever we want on TV, we can go to any restaurant without worryimg about whether or not they have chicken strips or hamburgers, there is no computer battle sounds in the background, no guilt over how much I let him sit at the computer or Ipad to play video games, no trying to figure out how I’m going to get the energy to head out to either miniature golf, bowling or sitting through a cartoon movie, life is now returned to normal……….but why did I break down when he walked onto the plane? Because, no matter the trouble, no matter the exhaustion, no matter the different interests, he is our grandchild, one in which we both have enjoyed this week, more than we ever dreamed. We fell in love all over again this week withh our new “grown up” version of our first grandchild……he is beginning to grow up, to show signs of different interests: cars, TV shows, such as America’s Got Talent, sitting and reading for over an hour. So…here we both sit tonight, so exhausted, we can’t hold our heads up, but sad for knowing that Jaden’s weekly visit won’t be here again until next summer,…..we will cherish this week, the memories,the love and bonding that both Randy and I truly enjoyed between ourselves and Jaden.

To continue the saga of our grandsons visit, he came here with the intent to break a record of eatting a cheeseburger or hot dog everyday of his 8 day visit. We are on day 5 of “his” vacation and I cannot look another hot dog or hamburger in the face. We have been to the zoo, Universal and the circus, even Costco and have had so many nitrates that Randy has begun to glow when sitting in the dark, trying to escape for a few minutes of quiet.
We have purchased a snow cone for $12.00 and a box of popcorn for $8…..I have begun to realize that our Italy vacation is just not going to happen this year, as our vacation “fund” has gone to help Jaden pursue his dream of eatting junk food every day. We have forgotten what the wonderful sound of “wheel of fortune” sounds like when Vana is turning letters, but we now go to sleep counting “angry birds” or singing “doodle jump” as we fall asleep exhausted from riding the Simpson ride more times than I care to remember.
Tomorrow will find us headed to the Long Beach Acquarium where Jaden has already asked us if we will be passing an In and Out Burger on the way. I lied and said that they closed down all the hamburger joints down by the beach, because the sea gulls were allergic to the smell of hamburgers…….Don’t judge me! We have watched Rango, Captain America, and Mars Needs Moms, gained 10 pounds from all the junk food and the little darling never sleeps. With all the miracle drugs that have been invented, where is the pill that you can give 10 year olds that makes them fall asleep around 7 and sleep until 10 the next day? Any politician that can invent that will get my vote. Randy and I have decided that we are not in the right shape to keep up with a 10 yr old. When Jaden turns 30 we will invite him back. Maybe by then, we will be rested and have enough money saved up to feed him again.

Wednesday, August 10th, woke up at 5:30, so excited about heading to airport to pick up Jaden. He is visiting us for 8 days and we cannot be more excited. No more quiet car rides just driving around by myself during the day. Now I will have my sweet angelic 10 hr old grandson to drive around with me. We will laugh and talk about what he has done this summer and stop for ice cream and I will snap impromtu pictures of him, as he takes in the sights and sounds of Los Angeles for the next week. How memorable this will be. I cannot wait to just watch him walk off the plane and give him a giant hug.
10:00 a.m. Here he comes, walking off the plane with his cute little backpack. Wait….is that a skull and bones I see on the front of the backpack, surely not, Jaden is only 10 and I think he would still have SpongeBob Squarepants shirt and backpacks. I bet maybe he picked up the wrong backpack. We hug him while he says, “Nana…not in public….and don’t even think about kissing me.” Oh, I’m sure he is just a little fussy after getting up so early to catch the plane. Will get a real hug when we get to the car.
10:30 a.m. We are walking to the car. He tells me that he can’t talk to me until his ears pop. They are all stopped up and he just can’t hear anything. And…since his ears are all stopped up, and he cannot hear us talking, could he just play video games on my iphone in the car until his ears unstop. Of course he can, after all, he is at grandmas and he can do anything he wants, right?
11:00 a.m. We ask him if his ears are unstopped so we can talk, “not yet” he says. Isn’t this just awesome, Randy and I are having to yell over the precious sounds of Angry Birds to talk to each other. Oh…that brings back the days of living around all our family when we lost our television rights to grandkids who always had to watch the Wiggles or Elmo or SpongeBob. But….after all, when was the last time we heard Angry Birds in the background. Oh boy, this is going to be a great 8 days. Am so glad Jaden is here.
1:00 p.m. We have treated our young sweetheart to his First In and Out Burger in California. He is so excited, he even put down the iphone to eat. Things are warming up and he has even said a few words to us. Gotta love these grandkids. Can’t wait to take him and show him the beautiful homes here and the different museums. He is going to love them.
2:30 I guess the sightseeing is going to have to wait, Jaden fell asleep from being so tired from the flight. Doesn’t he look adorable, all curled up in his room. I bet the minute he wakes up all he is going to want to do is tell me about his first plane ride and what all he is wanting to do. Will be excited to have him wake up.
5:00 Have to go wake up the little darling. He is now a little fussy from being woke up. Oh well, I’m sure once he really wakes up he will start to enjoy being here. We leave to go get Randy from work, stopping at the grocery store first to let Jaden pick out a few things to eat. Wanted to be sure that we have everything he would like to have. He asked if he can sit in the car while I go in to the grocery store. He wanted to play Angry Birds. Not on your life, Mister. We go into the store and he picks out 2 frozen pizza’s and a box of cereal. He is anxious to get back to the car to play on my iphone. This bonding time isn’t quite what I expected it to be. Expect tomorrow to be a little better, after he gets rested up.
7:30 We have finished frozen pizza and tear him away from the computer to go for a walk, but make it short, as Jaden is cold. AFter all, he tells us, “I am used to the Texas heat of 105, so this 80 degrees makes me cold”. We head home. Well, that’s ok, he can curl up by me on the couch and we can watch “America’s Got Talent” together. This will be a great night…”nana, do you mind if I play Witches and Wizards on the computer while ya’ll watch AGT, I’m not really into that?” Oh, no, mister, you are going to watch AGT with us and you are going to enjoy it. Maybe if he has ice cream and brownies, that will get him in a bettter mood. Yep, that’s what he needs, sugar….so we have dessert and that makes him happy. We enjoy a little TV and around 10 I announce that I am exhausted. Getting up around 5 and then entertaining the little darling has been exhausting. Jaden, Randy and I all head to bed around….
10:00….Randy and I are asleep when I feel a presence over me…”Jaden, what’s wrong sweetie?” I can’t sleep, Nana, maybe it was the 3 hour nap or just being excited about going rock climbing in the morning….well, go read, I didn’t bring a book, well…..close your eyes and try to sleep…ok…….11:45 “nana, I still can’t sleep” Well, I can and so you just go lay there until your eyes close”
Midnight……got him a glass of water and another tucking in….he’d better better go to sleep before I pour a whole bottle of Benedryl down his precious little throat. Maybe all that sugar wasn’t such a good idea.
6:30 a.m. Second day….Good morning Nana and Papa, I’m awake…….can I play on the Ipad? Yes, you can do anything if I can just go back to sleep….
7:00 a..m. When are we going rock climbing Nana? They don’t open until 10 Jaden, go play video games or watch a movie. How many days do we have left of this wonderful bonding time we are having? If I hear Angry Birds one more time this morning, I am going to throw the iphone out the window (oops, did I just say that?)
1:00 p.m. Got his second In and Out Burger for lunch. That’s all he wants. Am gagging at the thought of another burger…but after all, this is his summer vacation. so will force one down my throat.
2:00 Showtime, am headed to see Captain American…now here we go, this is what I’m talking about…..sightseeing at the Americana, movies and fun….”what? Oh, ok, Jaden, rock climbing wore him out, so could we just go home and he could play on the computer” Well, I guess that’s ok, after all, I do want my sweet little grandson to be enjoying himself”.
4:00 We are anxiously awaiting Papa to come home. I am going to tell Randy that it’s his turn to entertain this little darling for a while. I’m Angry Birded out and the sounds of aliens and army guys blasting away at each other has already got me deaf……man, I wish Jaden were staying longer than 8 days. The time is going so fast…..will update you tomorrow if we are out buying a ticket to send him home early or not…….