Mindless happiness or thoughtful reservation?

I've been meaning to post since last week to give you guys a recap of what happened over spring break and such. First I was waiting on pics so I can post them along with the story but since John never got around to getting the ones I wanted I better post before too much accumulates.

During spring break we wanted to take a mini vacation to New York and hang out with John's cousin, stop by Niagara Falls but we decided to stay home and do some repairs that we've been putting off and save money for our big trip this summer. We are going to Puerto Rico for a month! I've already booked the place July 11-August 8. I am so excited. I've been trying to plan stuff to do and boy is there a lot to do. Besides all of the wonderful things to do on the island I'd really like to take a boat ride over to Mona Island, the kids have been studying the Tainos and this trip is my attempt to giving them a crash course of their heritage, to be able to see where they are from and get to know it. A month sounds like a long time but really it's not especially when there is so much to cover. I am hoping they get a real sense of their culture while we're there.

So we got the house tuck pointed, the roof repaired and the garage door fixed and a few minor things John did himself inside the house (toot toot to my engineer!). There are still a few other things that need to be worked on but we got the major stuff taken care of that week. Also.....John bought a "new" used car, I'll post a pic tomorrow if I can get him to pose for it :P. We had a very productive week indeed and....

I made my first pot pie and I was so proud of it *big cheesy grin*

The following weekend my aunt and uncle came for a visit, well they had gone on a cruise and made a quick pit stop in Chicago before they went back home. I made them a fabulous dinner the first night they were here and the next day we had a family get together at my parents house. Talk about a full house! It had been about 27 years since they had all seen each other, it was less for me though I was 17 when we went to California to see them. We all had a great time looking at pictures and trying again to fill in some more of the family tree. It really was really nice to get everyone together. Maybe next year we'll all go over there for a visit.

Thursday night we went out to a scholarship fundraiser at Excalibur night club. My aunt has been doing this for 12 years now. The scholarships are awarded at a Gala every November and are awarded to Latino students who are studying to work in the health care field. So far they've awarded over $150,00 and this year plan to award $30,000. My aunt is the CEO of a program called Hispanocare, it is a health care discount program and she has been running the it for 19 years now. It offers free health screenings at fairs during the year aside from the discounts when you go to network providers who all speak Spanish or have a Spanish speaking staff. It is a very good program and I'm proud of her accomplishments. I had a great time at the event and got to hang out with friends and family and a few of my old co-workers.

Alright, I think I'll save some stuff for the next post, I've put quite a few links up to keep you guys busy ;).