Food Glorious Food!!!

Ello World,
      It has been about a week since our last blog. . .please forgive us for we are new to this :) . Anywaysss. . .dustino is studying, so today I (Mary) will tell ya allllll about the past week. If I had to sum it all up in one word I would say it wassss......a FEAST! Thanksgiving was last Thursday and being Italian, the Lamb family ALWAYS overcooks. We had sooooooo much food and soooooo many left overs, but don't worry they were eaten :) . This past Thanksgiving was very special because two of our good friends, Keiko and Tomoki, who my father met while teaching in Japan 6 years ago, traveled all the way from Iowa just to spend the day with us (their family in the states). It was very nice to see them and catch up. We also had another special guest, one of my brother Joey's fellow classmates who is a foreign exchange student from China. His American name is Jason and he was very nice. I hope that he had a good time with us. They don't celebrate Thanksgiving in China obviously so the food and traditions were completely new to him. . . not to mention the silly family videos we watched haha. That night, I slept for about 3 hours and Dustin went to Best Buy at midnight for some black friday deals. I met him up at 5am and we went shopping. Needless to say, I LOVE black friday. I'm probably going to do it every year now. The trick is to go after the rush and before the late comers. . . so early morning. (at least this yr it seemed to work. we'll see about next year). I guess it's different if you want a high ticket item. Then you may have to go at midnight. But we got to the mall let's say around 5:30am and it wasn't packed at all. I don't think I waited in a single line, but there were deals galore. PacSun was buy one get one 50% off so I pretty much went nuts haha. That night, we feasted once again as it was Dustin's little brother Jacob's 13th birthday. Icecream cake anyone? The next day we feasted yet AGAIN because we celebrated my brother Joeys birthday (which is actually the 24th). That feast was AWESOME! It really couldn't have gotten any better. I came home from work that Saturday to homemade meatballs, homemade fettucini, homemade raviolis, homemade sauce, and homemade cupcakes. . . .we also had sausage and broccoli which were not homemade but shhhh! To top it off my uncle brought over his HOMEMADE WINE!!! It was awesome! Great Italian family, great Italian food, celebrating a great birth= Good Times :) Here are some pics. .

My Aunt Eileen and Grandma Lamb (with the wine from Uncle John)

Frani, Mom, and Grammy Lamby cooking their homemade raviolis. 

Joey and Dad hanging out. (dad throwing up the Villanova "V" of course [that's where he, my two sisters and myself went to college])

Uncle K and Uncle John

Mom prepping the food. . .yummm

Myself and my broseph Joseph :)

Yummy cupcakes - My great grandmas cake recipe. . . pretty much the only chocolate cake I like. It is AMAZING! 

My Gram <3

Is your mouth watering yet?

Mmmmm

Doesn't that all look yummy. I'm getting hungry just blogging about it haha! And of course. . .we had looooooots of leftovers. . except the wine haha, that we finished. We ended the night playing Catch Phrase- always a good time. Oh, I forgot to mention one of the highlights of Thanksgiving day haha. . . .Swampsgiving! haha there is this show on the History Channel that had a marathon on Thanksgiving. . . it's called 'Swamp People' i beweave (laura bell bundy anyone?). The show is about people who hunt for alligators and other interesting animals. It is pretty crazy. It's really funny at times, but all in all it's fun to see a completely different way of life. There are these two guys on the show who haven't been to a grocery store in years. They just live off of the land. They're pretty weird, but hey who isn't? It's def a good laugh and who knows, you might learn a few things for if you ever have to survive in the wild!

In other exciting news. . . I am not once, not two times, but now THREE times an aunt! Welcome to the world little baby Evan Francis Cantrell who was born yesterday around 8am!!!

SO yes, it has been a wonderful week! After that novel of a blog, I must go because I have to memorize my lines. I start rehearsing tomorrow for a Musical Christmas Carol, which I am very excited about. There are just so many special days recently. Thanksgiving, Joeys and Jacobs birthdays, Evans birthday, annnnd even more! Coming up is me and Dustin's 6 year anniversary! WOWZA :) . Annnd today marks a very important day for my good friend CJ. He is moving out to CALI-FORN-I-A to pursue his dream! I am so proud of him. I'm gonna miss him so much, but WOOO now I have an excuse to travel across the country!!! I met CJ last year while working on Hairspray in Philadelphia and he really helped strengthen a lot of my views on life and happiness (thanks ceej). I love you Ceej! Dustin and I wish you the best of luck!!

Follow your dreams Ceej! We love you!!!

Welp. . . .that's a blog! Off to memorize lines so I can feast yet again with the fam and hopefully see my beautiful boyfriend later! Take care all!!