Family Tradition

I am very proud of my daddy's name, although his kinda music and mine ain't exactly the same, stop and think it over, put yourself in my position, if I get stoned and sing all night long, it's a family tradition
-- Hank Williams, Jr.

After almost nine years of marriage, I'm finally getting to know my husband's family. We're all over the country: my in-laws live in Florida and my FIL travels the world to work; AoD's grandparents live in Minnesota; one sister-in-law lives in Indiana and the other in Georgia. So, it makes it hard to see each other more than occasionally.

So, this week has been pretty special. My father-in-law drove from Florida up to Minnesota to get his mother and take her on a road trip. She is 77 and has never been anywhere other than her home state, Nevada and Montana. So, this has been pretty amazing for her. My FIL took her to see her other son, whom she hasn't seen in many, many years. So, she had a visit with him and has been in North Texas since Monday. They plan to leave Thursday morning. So, we've been having a ball. The folks spent the day Monday with my sickie Hot Rod and then we had lunch at a local Mexican place. I took Grandma shopping at Wal-Mart for some necessities. That was great getting to spend some time with her and getting to know her. She used to work at a truck stop and can tell dirty jokes with the best of them. Then, that evening they watched soccer practice and let Stinkerbelle blow bubbles. This morning, Stinkerbelle spent the day at the hotel while I worked and then we all went to have pizza at our favorite Italian joint. Tonight, we had a special treat of going to see AoD's sister, who flew into Dallas for a work conference. We spent the evening at dinner and then for coffee before she had to attend a welcome reception. The guys - AoD and his dad - went out to shoot pool tonight a local sports bar. Tomorrow, we'll take the kids to school and the four of us - AoD, me, FIL and Grandma - are going to the shooting range and then to a country steakhouse out in the boonies. Tomorrow night, Hot Rod has baseball tryouts, so I imagine we'll all be out there to watch.