Alane, I too would marry the host of man vs. wild. Having a son named Marmaduke is that much more appetizing for me. I also want to tell you that I think it's amazing that you are all (sans John) going to ride for Corn.(I like saying it that way) Good for you guys, you're children are athletes already, at such a tender age.
Ok, so this weekend was birthday weekend, Deklan's 1st circus birthday, and MariaRose's 20th Night at the Races birthday party. Both were thoroughly enjoyable. MariaRose's was modeled around the Kentucky Derby, everyone had to wear a hat. Jenia and I forgot our cameras, but PLEASE tell me Bazooka brought his to post some up here. The winner went to Steve Fatone, who wore a wooden bucket upside down, handle as chin strap, nailed a birdhouse to the top, glued styrofoam to the lower part of the bucket, and attached some leaves and a cardinal to it. Uncle Joe had a witches hat with a puppet of Graucho Marks sitting on top with a plunger on top of his head, sitting on a bunch of magazine clippings of things that are one Uncle Joe's mind. (Like a person sticking up their middle finger). Deklan looked Amish in his upside down diaper hat, Ellexa looked smashing (as always) in her pink, sequined cowboy hat. Joe wore a derby with a feather, Steve wore a homemade Pope hat, Jenia wore an awful pastel yellow black lady Easter hat, and I wore a Nature hat, made of fake flowers, butterflies, and anything else that came on the .75 rack at the store. I loved it, we watched pre-recorded horse races and bet on them, and then played a heated 20+ person dice game called Left Center Right. (Although for some reason in this family we all call it Left, Right, Center). We all had a blast. I got Uncle Vito to play dice, we wondered how many years it has been since he played a game. We're betting the late 1960's.