Thanks a lot Emily!! Now I will have to blog at least every week. Her journal jar question for the week is:
Family Traditions: What are your favorite childhood traditions? What are your traditions with your family now?

Tony says his favorite family tradition was Christmas Eve dinner. They always had a huge meal with no meat, only fish. They had several different pasta sauces made with fish instead of beef or pork. They had squid, eel, and crab. They had squid salad, cod fish, spaghetti with anchovy sauce. Stuffed escarole with anchovies and pine nuts, spaghetti with crab sauce. Broccoli with oil and lemon (served cold). Just writing about makes him hungry. And another tradition--cold pizza on Saturday mornings.

For Ann--how about chocolate cake in milk?? I am still trying to convert my sons- and daughters-in-law to this one! And Disneyland every summer. We'd drive down, stay in Long Beach at the Venetian Square motel--the early suites. they had one or two bedrooms, a kitchen, and a living room. The sofa in the living room went thru the wall into the bedroom--by day, it was half-way in the living room and was a sofa, at night it was pulled through into the living room and was a full size bed. One bedroom had a murphy bed--pull down from the wall. We would swim in the pool there, walk to POP (Pacific Ocean Park)--a very fun amusement park. Some years my G&G Smith would go with us. I remember Grandpa Smith riding the old wooden roller coaster and just laughing. He got in one ride--you'd stand around the edge of this big cylinder which would start to spin, then the floor would drop down and you'd be stuck to the sides by centrifugal force--Grandpa giggled the whole time! Then we'd spend at least 2 days at Disneyland. We were there in 1955--the year it opened. Tony & I have been back a few times--we've even taken 2 sets of grandkids there--Max & Kayla, and Sam, Helen & Maggie. A couple years ago we went alone--and kept looking for our kids.
Another tradition tony & I have started is traveling--not really far, haven't used our passports yet, but we go camping, visiting kids & grandkids, checking out new places to see--we're headed to Mesquite in 2 weeks with Brody and family and Liz and family. In November, we're going to Wisconsin and Sarah and family are driving up to stay with us at Seth's. In January, we're snow-coaching into Yellowstone and staying in a cabin at Old Faithful. This is why we both try to pick up overtime!!

OK--so now I'm not the slacker of the family bloggers!! Come on the rest of you--wanna hear from you!