12. Spending Time with Family

I feel so embarrassed lucky to have the family that I have.  They are absolutely amazing!  As part of my bucket list for the year, I told myself that I would spend more time with my family.  So far, I haven't had any issues with this!  In the past week, I have spend time with my family on four different days.

I moved last weekend and my sucker very sweet, older brother volunteered to come help us out.  We did have hired movers, but it was really nice to have someone around to help move furniture around until he ripped a hole in my brand new carpet .  But seriously, it really was great to have the help!  The day after the move, my parents invited my husband and I over for dinner.  We had some amazing BBQ pork steaks for dinner and enjoyed the free meal after the long move.

This past Friday was my youngest sister, Stephanie's, birthday.  She's finally 13!

Before she headed the the Cardinal's birthday game, the family got together and had dinner and cake to celebrate...

Mom, Dad, Me, Steph, and Devin

Steph got a new iTouch, so she is super excited to start texting iMessaging with her friends.  I got her a fun case for her iTouch perfect for a new teenager.  After dinner, my dad took Stephanie and my other younger siblings to the Cardinal's baseball game and I stuck around to hang out with my mom.  We had a good time just enjoying the quiet and playing a few board games.

Last night, my mom's side of the family had a party at a local dive bar, The Corner Bar.  We got together with the aunts, uncles, and cousins for some wholesome family fun.  My aunts and uncle rented out the basement of the bar which has a two lane bowling alley... but this was a special bowling alley. The alley was set up for 3-pin bowling.  It is actually the only 3-pin bowling alley in the United States.  Imagine regular 10-pin bowling... but you only have the three corner pins of the triangle.  The balls are actually pretty small (under 5 pounds).  Each person gets three rolls to knock down all three pins.  We really didn't know how to keep score, so we just made it up.  We also had a "pin monkey" who's job was to set up the pins after we rolled (I felt bad for that poor kid... it wasn't exactly cool at that end of the basement).

Midway through the evening, a couple of girls showed up handing out free beer... and who doesn't turn down free beer?!  (Oh yeah... that'd be me... I'm not much of a beer girl)  The girls were Kraftig girls.  Kraftig is the new beer being produced by the Busch family (part of the founding family of Anheuser Busch, which was sold to InBev).  My family all said it was pretty good.

Between the free beer and 3-pin bowling, we all had a great time laughing and enjoying each other's company.  By the end of the evening, we were all pretty worn out.

So far, this bucket list is working out pretty well for me.  I'm starting to check off items off my list and I'm really looking forward to the next adventure!