The Keenan Family 411

Wildwood Dance-Off!

There's a new family Wildwood tradition...annual Wii Tournaments!

Last year, during the week-long trip to Wildwood, NJ, we staged a 16-person Wii Boxing tournament, during which we discovered that duking it out with Riley was a bad idea.  Even the legendary boxer, Howard Wein, couldn't stand between her and the tournament title!

This year, pursuant to a request from the Fasig's, we held another tournament, except it was MUCH more entertaining than boxing:  "Wii Just Dance 2" where you have to do your best to mimic the dance moves of a model on the TV screen.  Fun...but friggin' hard!

It was a heated competition and all three generations were represented in the Final Four:  Alan (from the "Elder" generation) shocked the field by mowing down Sammy and Danielle to earn a spot in the semi-finals.  Tony (from the "Soon-to-be Elder" generation), being the cut-throat that he is, took out his own wife in the 2nd round to get into the Final Four.  And not surprisingly, the "Young Punk" generation crammed not one, but two members into the F4:  Connor and Kayla J.

In the end, it was an "All Young-Punk" final with Connor defeating Kayla J. to keep the annual tournament title in the Stevens' household.

There's a pretty funny photo album on the right...

 

Art on a Griddle...

Oh...our "Mega-Ultra" pancake yesterday morning was a dandy!  We're talkin' marshmallows, fresh strawberries, honey, fresh blueberries, jelly beans (of course), chocolate syrup and strawberry syrup.

Can't you just smell it through the screen?  Hey, stop drooling all over your keyboard...it's gonna short-circuit!

The boys consumed this just hours before shoving off for Point Sebago.  I think the carbs from this beauty should stay in the kids' systems til the Point Sebago 2-Miler!

Owie Unveils his Christmas Project...

The long wait is over.  After a grueling Sunday of drawing and writing, Owen polished off his big Christmas project for school in which he was charged with coming up with a display that features some of the family's Christmas traditions.  He chose (1) visiting the grandparents, (2) running in the Santa's Run, (3) doing the Advent calendar each night, (4) hiding a pickle in the Christmas tree (long story) and (5) going to Yankee Candle.

The picture he did for Yankee Candle was actually pretty cool; he decided to drip hot candle wax onto the paper, draw around the wax to make it look like a picture of a candle, and then write in the candle fragrances so that his classmates can smell them.  Now that's thinking out of the Yankee Candle box!

The Keenan's are Fast as Reindeers at the Santa's Run!

Participating in the local Santa's Run 3.5-Mile Road Race at the high school has become yet another Keenan holiday tradition.  In fact, we haven't missed a single Santa's Run since we first moved into our little apartment on Hebron Avenue way back in 1997!

The race is always held the first Sunday of December and it's the second largest athletic event in town, after the enormous Hartwell Soccer Tournament in the spring.  The race has become famous for the creative Christmas costumes that many runners wear, and the daunting nearly-half-mile-long hill at the end of the race course.

Poppy & Grandma showed up to take in the race, as they always do, and they had plenty to cheer about as Cameron improved by nearly a minute compared to his time from last year, finishing in 186th place out of nearly 1,500 runners! 

Meanwhile, Daddy tried his best to take home his 3rd Santa's Run title, but got smoked by three young punks (anyone under the age of 30 qualifies as a "young punk" these days) and settled for 4th overall, but 1st in his age group.  That would be the "old punk" age group!

On the downside, Amy was all set to jump into the race herself, which would have been her first race in umpteen years.  But on Saturday night she learned that the entry fee had been jacked up to $15 and the deal was off.  Always budget-conscious, she decided to do her own private 3.5-mile run on Sunday morning for a $0 entry fee!

Another downside was that Daddy discovered that he is officially "old" now.  Why?  Because halfway through the race, as he was trying his darndest to chase down the three young punks strung out ahead of him, a lady on the sidewalk yelled out, "Yeah!!!  Go get those young guys!!!". 

Daddy was all fired up by this exclamation until he realized that if he was chasing the "young guys", that means that he was an...gulp..."old guy"!!!

Holiday Mantels by Amy

Amy's careful and painstaking creation of a beautiful fireplace mantel display for the holiday season has evolved into a Keenan Christmas tradtition, and she somehow manages to make the mantel looks more alluring every year...

Christmas Pancake Morning!

We adopted a holiday theme for our Saturday morning pancake breakfast this morning as we adorned our flapjacks with crushed candy cane-flavored Oreo cookies, and chunks of red and green baking chocolate!

Shane's request to enhance the recipe with Pepperidge Farms Goldfish was soundly denied, and not solely because it didn't fit with the holiday theme. 

I'm willing to take this "out-of-the-box pancake cuisine" approach only so far!

Early Turkey Day

Today we continued a tradition that was started a few years ago of journeying to Milford, Connecticut to have an early Thanksgiving celebration with the Keenan side of the family on the Saturday before Thanksgiving.

Pa enjoyed a day out of the nursing home to revel in the chaos of his seven great grandchildren running around Poppy and Grandma's house. 

I was impressed by what was officially the healthiest appetizer table in family history as we somehow ended up with two families bringing large veggie platters.  This was fine by me and our two Paleo-dieters (Heather and Ben).

After a few hours at the house, we all shoved off for the Stonebridge Restaurant in downton Milford.  And despite the fact that we were stuffed with delicious food at the house, we still enjoyed a turkey dinner with all the traditional trimmings, along with multiple rounds of red wine.

It was fun to catch up with everyone and we're already looking forward to Thanksgiving Part II at Nana & Pop-Pop's next week!

 

Saturday Morning Halloween "Pig-Makes"

Our Saturday morning pancake tradition took a ghoulish turn (ghoulish in a couple of different ways) as we made good use of our Halloween candy surplus.  We ended up with pancakes containing Kit-Kats, Butterfingers, Twizzlers (those didn't come out too well, to be honest) and...of course...Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. 

By the way, our continuing efforts to get Shane to say "pancakes" instead of "pig-makes" are going nowhere.  In fact, I think he's picked up on the fact that it's driving us crazy, so now the little booger's making no effort to say "pancakes" whatsoever.

Clone Wars Party!

Owie and an ARC Clone Trooper take in tonight's new Star Wars: The Clone Wars episode.

Pizza, Pizza!

A Wednesday night family tradition has slowly developed for the Keenan's over the past few months..."Pizza Night at South Tavern"!  They offer $10 larges and $5 smalls with a long list of creative pizza's to choose from.  I also like the dozen big, flat-screen TV's scattered throughout the place playing a variety of sporting events.  All of this within a short walking distance from the house, which means we always bump into someone we know while we're there.

Amy's favorite part is no cooking and no post-meal clean-up for us on Wednesday nights.

My favorite part is eating up everyone's discarded pizza crusts...after dipping them in A-1 Steak Sauce, of course.

Hey, don't knock it 'til you try it.

So...have you ever tried breakfast cereal with orange juice instead of milk?