Fall Family Weekend:) ....

Well...as suspected, my computer was DUNZO this morning.  It didn't want to hear one iota about me uploading any pictures.  Siggghhhhhhh....so until we get some sort of motion in the ocean with this, I'll have to rely on some archive pictures to share with you guys. (and I ALREADY had some good dishes to show you when we're up and running again...oh well, SOON!)

So anyway...this blog post is lonnnnng overdue anyway since when I started this blog in January, I told my Aunt I would be posting it soon:)  Fast Forward 11 months and today is the day:)  However, it's appropriate since it was our FALL/Pre-Christmas family get together from LAST November:)  And as if you didn't need more proof after our "Summer Edition", I just thought you'd like to see how we party when we all get together:)

And by "party,"  I mean eating:)  LOTS & LOTS of eating.  IN FACT, I actually don't think we left the kitchen for more than a few hours the ENTIRE weekend:)  It's where all of the love is:)  As I like to say: Eating is the Italian way of saying 'I love you' :)

And we dove right in as SOOOON as we arrived after our 2 hour drive to my Aunt's house in Pennsylvania.  Does this say "Welcome," or what??

One Aunt made soup (although I actually don't remember what kind, since I failed to snap a picture:), another made fresh roasted red peppers (to DIE for!) and my cousin made AMAZINGGGGGGG broccoli & meat Stromboli.  And of course, a variety of Italian rolls we brought from Trenton, NJ:)  Food HEAVEN, let me tell ya:)

And do you think lunch did NOT require dessert?  Think again:)  I had made this Sweet Potato cake with Coconut Frosting...which reminds me that I need to make this again soon because I LOVEEEED this cake!  Quintessential FALL flavors:)

OK...and here was our 2 hour venture outside of the kitchen:)  We took a little trip to the town of Jim Thorpe for some window shopping and foliage gazing...

Butttt it wasn't long before we were back around the table:)  This time with MORE bread, almond spread my cousin brought from Italy...and yeah...and it was time to crack open the wine:)  So then we toasted...

...and toasted some more:)  (this time with Italian chocolate liquor:)

We toasted to Thanksgiving, Christmas & New Years, and we knew we had enough toasts when my Aunt was eventually singing rounds of "Auld Lang Syne" :)

Needless to say:  There were a lot of laughs:)

Oh yeah...and don't think that we didn't recognize that laughter burns calories:)  And we had burned JUST enough to enjoy my Aunt's homemade lasagna and meatballs:)  Simply Divine! 

And not long after that, we called it night and headed to bed with visions of carbs & wine glasses dancing in our heads:)

And get togethers are reasons to celebrate, right??  So are you ready for our breakfast the next morning????:

Hahahahahhaha...can you really beat that?  I mean, calories be damned, that is one happy table:)  And all homemade with <3 to boot:)

So there you have our FALL recap...and as usual, I would like to thank Aunt Anita & Mary for playing the hostesses with the mostess for our get together:)

CAN'T WAITTTTT to do it again!  Love you guys! :)