The Welcome Home Party

The Welcome Home Party was so much fun.

We were picked up by Rodger in his Cadillac. He let us off curbside at the Legion, where the color guard had lined the sidewalk and a bugler announced our presence. The invitees gathered outside and watched. As we walked past the color guard they turned toward us and when we passed the general's flag, he got in step behind us and followed us in.

We then did the punchbowl ceremony, toasts, remarks, prayer, and ate dinner. Then the party really began.

My crazy sister Kim was stuck in a snowstorm, so the other siblings, Ellen and Tommy, had to step up. Ellen took the mike and asked if there was any talent in the house as Sally was also stuck in a snowstorm and she was going to play piano. In attendance was Lester, the Concertina expert, and he agreed to play. Polka music filled the air and a couple of people danced. I tried to get Bob to dance, but he claims every time I polka with him he dislocates his hips.

Then Ellen and Tommy filled the gas can we had used in the punchbowl ceremony (ginger ale to represent the airport trips) with the grog and went around and filled glasses.

By the time Kim arrived, the crowd had begun to disburse to get home in the storm. So, it became our family show, where us siblings just entertained ourselves. Kim sang and danced to "Feelings" and Tommy did a rap song. Then Kim recited weird stories from her head as Tommy would play the piano (he would plink the keys). Ellen and I laughed until we had tears running down our face.

Then we had Kim prank phone call our friends. It's the regulars that we always prank. They expect it and look forward to it. We made their day.






Bob was talking to other guests while we were entertaining ourselves. He just shook his head as he saw us with our production. Welcome home, I'm sure you really missed all this great stuff.

Welcome Home Plans, Update 1

Mom continues to invite more people to Bob's Welcome Home party. It has now gotten to the point where I think we are footing the bill for her class reunion. The original invite list was people who knew both of us. Then it expanded to people who knew and helped support me while Bob was gone. Now...well, now, the hall will be full of mom's friends.

Pat (the man who's hard to understand because the dentures don't fit) continues to call me with ideas. He wanted to have channel 2 and channel 11 invited. I explained to him that they really could care less so not to bother. Then he called to say he thought we should have a police/sheriff escort to the hall. I could already picture the IG complaint on that one, actually, that could draw the media --for waste of taxpayer dollars.

Pat has been chosen to carry Bob's GO flag and walk behind him with it when we enter the hall.
Well, he hopes to. He almost cut off his finger and it's now infected. So he may have to get the finger tip removed. He says this will not interfere with his flag duty, but we'll see.

The head of the VFW and American Legion here are both very supportive. We now have a rifle platoon and bugler. But Pat told me that he called the head of the Disabled Vets who said he didn't want anything to do with us because we walked around with our noses in the air. We've never met him. Maybe we'll have to swing by his house to toilet paper it.

I made two more briskets, each weighing 7 pounds. My freezer is full, so I'm putting the food out on the porch to stay frozen. I just hope some dogs or other varmints don't smell it and come help themselves. It would be like the Bumkis dogs on Christmas Story.

I'm continuing to refine my punch bowl ceremony. To represent our 2 R&R's, I found a pomegranate juice called "Naked." This ceremony will be funny to the 5 people there who still have their hearing left. I am trying to figure out how to quiet the loud talkers and my mom during the presentations..."In the finest military tradition, we begin our formal portion by duct taping the mouths of those we love the most." Would that work?

The Beauty Makeover Party

My niece Kegan turned 13. My sister Kim had a sleepover party that was also a beauty makeover party for Kegan and her friends. Kim enlisted the help of the "beauty patrol." Me, our other sister Ellen, her friend Wendy, and a true beautician Sandy.

I look back on my life and I think 13 is the worst age. Your hormones are kicking into high gear, peer pressure is immense, self confidence is low. The age is awkward, caught between childhood and adulthood.

The girls waxed their hands, then we painted their nails. They all had chocolate facial masks, so their skin was clean and soft. Then the "beauty patrol" did makeup and hair.

One of Kegan's friends, Gigi, is an Emo. I think that is the term. I had never heard of it before. It's kind of a Goth look, with plain faces, extremely dark heavy eyeliner and her hair had about 8 colors of reds, blacks, pinks in it. Ellen looked at her and said, "I'll do Gigi." It took about a bottle of makeup remover before we could see she had beautiful eyes under all that black tar. Ellen did her hair and makeup and she looked like a princess. Although Gigi just could not live with such minimal makeup and went into the bathroom and applied a lot of additional eyeliner.

Another of Kegan's friends is a natural redhead who hates her hair color. Her mom won't let her dye it and she thinks her mom is so mean. When I finished putting tons of waves into her thick hair, it looked gorgeous. I told her she looked like Julia Roberts and she strutted around knowing she looked terrific.

The next pipsqueak to be done weighed about 75 pounds and 10 of it was hair. I put waves into her hair and then Sandy did it in an updo. She decided she looked too good to be wearing sweatpants and ran upstairs and changed into jeans and a pair of hot pink high heels that were too large for her tiny feet. (and watching her walk in the icy parking lot with bare toes hanging out was amazing.)

Kegan also had her hair done in an updo. She has natural beauty (it's in the genes) and transformed from 13 years old to 16 before our eyes. It was scary.

While we performed these transformations, we gave them positive messages about doing the right thing, not texting stupid pictures, staying out of trouble. They listened --probably because we were not their parents.

We then took the beauty queens out to a chicken wing joint for dinner. Us adults sat together and they sat at their own table. They were giggling and cackling and then in walks a group of about 10 boys that were about a year or two older than the girls. The boys' parents also came and sat at separate tables.

The boys noticed the girls rather quickly and a brave one walked over and circled the girls' table. Then his mother called him over and told him he had something on his face, so much for his bravado. The girls had to keep running to the bathroom, click, click, click in their high heels and giggle, giggle. No, don't take the straight path to the bathroom, take the one past the boys' tables. As they'd pass the boys would watch them go by and laugh as well, in their half man/half boy voices.

We left the restaurant but the evening was far from over, as Kim and I went into the bedroom with the girls and told girl stories until almost midnight. I then had to go to bed, I was bushed. I fell asleep to the sounds of giggling in the room next door. Kim is sure a good mom.

The Packers Game

My sister Ellen, my brother Tommy, his girlfriend Sally and I went to the Packers game on Sunday. Prior to going, I shopped for new boots, hat, scarf, gloves, ski pants, and ski jacket. I also bought hand warmers. Winter is not cheap. High temperature for the game was 17 degrees.

We drove to the game wearing only 8 layers of clothing and put the rest on in the car when we arrived at the stadium. This is a great challenge, as you cannot move too much with all these layers, yet you are trying to lift your leg to put it into snowpants. Oh, it helps to take the boots off before putting the snowpants on. But don't touch your sock to the floor of the car because it's puddled with melted snow.

Once dressed, we stepped out of the car and made our own tailgate party. The car next to us was tailgating with bottled beer, as soon as they opened a bottle, they had enough time for one sip before the beer froze solid. It was amazing. Our cans were not freezing. We were using straws to drink so we could insert them through the holes in our knit scarves. The bottle boys tried to put hand warmers on the bottles to keep the beer from freezing, but that didn't work. They offered to trade us 2 bottles of beer for one can. What did they think we were, stupid? I think it would be a great science experiment to figure out why bottle beer freezes so fast and canned beer doesn't.

The night before the game I had made 4 poster boards, one for each of us to hold up so that we would be on tv. They were very professionally done, with creative messages. We got to our seats and the first opportunity to hold up the signs came and two women about 8 rows in front of us held up their signs with the exact message I had put on two of my signs. How could that even be possible? They were even in the same colors. I still can't believe it.

I brought a hefty bag full of goods into the game, and a lot of people in line were snickering at me. Three people even asked me what was in it. Truth be known, it contained a mink blanket (from Korea) and a bath mat (to sit on). Both items came in real handy, but my brother refused to climb under the blanket with us and said the bath mat was probably loaded with dead skin cells. When my sister and I would go to the bathroom, we would kindly cover the men in front of us (which kept the blanket out of the slush) and tell them, "Here you go boys, warm up a bit." When we walked out, that mink blanket weighed about 45 pounds, it had soaked up so much water and other spilled liquids.

The Packers lost the game in the last seconds, which meant 70,000 people were there until the very end and 40,000 cars hit the roads all at once. What a crappy ending to such a fun day.

The Welcome Home Plans

When I booked the American Legion Hall for Bob’s welcome home party, they were surprised that there would be only 40 attendees for the party. I explained to them he has never really lived here, only visited twice.

Then, word got out around town that this party was booked and it spread like wildfire.

I first got a call from Pat, who just got new dentures, so is really tough to understand. He said that the American Legion chapter president found out about the party and wanted to offer his support to ensure all went smoothly. Add one to the RSVP list.

Then the head of the VFW chapter made it known that he had not yet received his invite. Oops, didn’t have him on the list. Sent him an invite. Add one to the RSVP list.

Next I heard from some sweet woman named Amy who met me a year ago at the garden center and wanted to know if I wanted her to bring a casserole. Add one to the RSVP list.

I talked with a Legion member and told him about the large banner I’ve purchased and how I need a way to get it hung outside the Legion hall. He volunteered to take care of that for me. Add one to the RSVP list.

I met with the local Concertina player, who’s 79, and I paid for Allen’s daughter to have her first lesson. He’s so passionate about his music, he played for me for 30 minutes. Even sang. He told me he could play for 35 hours without looking at music sheets. Amazing. It was precious. Add one to the RSVP list.

Mom then called the radio station to sell the composting toilet and remembered the celebrity who worked there, Norm, who is 85 years old. He’s a local legend and also had served our country at one point. Add one to the RSVP list.

So…the list continues to grow. Not a problem.

Our next issue was the Legion wants to do something special as Bob is a “distinguished person.” They suggested that they have volunteers line the street with flags (add ### to the invite list) and when we arrive to the party they follow Bob into the hall playing some song about an “Old man” (from Bing Crosby’s White Christmas movie). I ran this past Bob and he laughed at the picture running through his mind. He then said that it would probably be too cold for those guys to wait on the street until our arrival. We may have to adapt that idea.

I have devised an awesome punch bowl ceremony…18 cups of orange juice which represents each month he lived under General Order #1, no alcohol…2 shots of Wild Turkey for the two Thanksgivings we spent apart…a bottle of German wine for the 8 months I spent in Germany…you get the drift.

I want the missing trooper table to represent those who are no longer with us. Bob says he grieves so much every day for those fallen troopers and their families that he doesn’t want to be reminded of it. But I think it’s for everyone else attending, to remind them of the sacrifice, so I want to do it.

I am so excited about Bob coming home and the fun of planning this party, but always in the back of my mind are those widows I know whose spouse will not come home and those families who are without their loved ones this holiday. God bless them.