Why I Oughta...

 I'm loving my new Chief Illiniwek shirt.  Nice way for the athletic department to cash in on the Chief without really using the Chief! Thanks, Nat!

Most every year, I document the return of the peonies in our yard, but this post isn't about that.  Hopefully, I'll get to that later this month when they emerge. This post, is rather, about this unknown bulb poking through the mulch.  I don't quite remember what it is, but give us a few weeks and we'll know!  Our yard is finally emerging from it's long winter's slumber.  I've gone out and done poop patrol once, but as we start to play more in the backyard with the girls, I'm going to have to get back out there and clean up even more.

I came across this jacket in the basement of an estate sale in Elmhurst over the weekend.  They wanted just $2 for it, but I couldn't pull the trigger.  Had never heard of St. Lawrence University.  A quick Google search tells you it is in upstate New York .  The house had a lot of artistic items in the Estate Sale - including paintings.  The jacket made a long trip both from New York, but also from way back in 1956.  Hopefully, someone else found it and it found a nice home and not in the bottom of a dumpster.

I was expecting something different from Martha.

We start 'em young at the Parrillo household. If you read our family blog (which you most likely don't!), you've seen a few of the photos over the years of the girls on this very important day in our house:  election day.  I think I've chronicled (over there) every time we've taken them to the polls. For some history from this blog: Here's a photo of  the Babe back in 2010 when she voted for the 2nd time. And  here's the first time The Babe came to the polling place back in 2010 when she was just a month old . After all these years of supporting Tom Cross, we got our first chance to vote for him on the ballot.  It felt nice!

We're going to get started this weekend with the water putty.  This guy is 'vintage-y' looking, so he'll fit right in with some of the past year's editions. Here's the mold we used in 2013 . Here's the mold we used in 2012 . Here's the mold we used in 2011 .

We picked up this kids bank at Affordable Antiques some time last year but we had to wait until this Spring to give it the intended target:  my brother-in-law. He's a hardcore Sox guy and also has an appreciation for old stuff, so it was a perfect fit.

Today marks ten years since I put up my first 'blog' post.  At the time, it was on a different domain, for a different purpose, but you can see the archives from February of 2004 here on JakeParrillo.com as I pulled them here .

Seems crazy to me to buy a $10 bag to stick your potatoes in so you can microwave them.  Wouldn't a paper towel wrapped around it do the same thing? While I was waiting to pick up a photo at Walgreens, I looked at all these "As Seen on TV" items.  The burger stuffer seems promising?!?

Saw a sign on Polay's in the Elmhurst City Centre this morning saying that they're moving up the block from 100 N. York to 378 N. York.  Which... looks like Google Maps is saying is North of North Ave .  Close to the Burger King up there.  Bad news for the City Centre - as another vacancy comes up - but potentially great news as this signature corner, which is just north of the tracks as you enter our Downtown can be reborn as something that has more foot traffic than the interior decorator.