Galantines 2022
Posted on February 17, 2022 by Ching under Community, Events.
I had such a great time celebrating Galantines Day with my pickleball girlfriends on Sunday. Debbie Fanning organized a great brunch for us ladies at Rain. She even went all out on the decorations.
It was league day so a few of us arrived late. Thankfully, there was plenty of food to be had. The $9.99 brunch buffet included bacon, sausage, eggs, potatoes, biscuits and gravy, french toast, fresh fruit, and a variety of dessert options.
The ladies brought all sorts of Valentines treats to share.
We had a wonderful turnout.
I had such a great time celebrating with these ladies.
Until next time, GNG.
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Dining by the Alphabet – Part B
Posted on February 15, 2022 by Ching under Food and Drink, Projects.
For our second Dining by the Alphabet adventure, we decided to go to Blue Hook Cajun Seafood & Bar. Brian’s not really into seafood or cajun so I found needing a B restaurant as the perfect excuse to go back.
Brian’s not really into the food there so he just got fries and cheese balls.
I didn’t feel like getting dirty and having to take another shower so I just opted for the combo fried rice. I get it with both chicken and shrimp. I really like their fried rice there. It’s one of my favorite things to get.
I also had their specialty drink that week. It was a Wakanda drink and it was yummy! I can’t wait until we are back to the letter B again so I’ll have another excuse to return. Till next time, GNG.
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Dining by the Alphabet
Posted on February 7, 2022 by Ching under Food and Drink, Projects.
Brian and I kicked off our “Dining by the Alphabet” project a couple of weeks ago at Albero Bistro. It’s quickly become a favorite of ours since we tried it for the first time a few months ago.
You can’t go to Albero Bistro without getting the arancini balls.
They are so good!
I was pretty basic and just got spaghetti and meatballs (above pic), while Brian had the chicken saltimbocca sandwich (below pic).
We were too full for dessert on this visit but they have pretty good tiramisu. You must try it when you go to check them out. Until next time, GNG.
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Gearing Up for Picklemania
Posted on February 2, 2022 by Ching under Community, Pickleball.
My Rotary club has started gearing up for our second annual pickleball tournament. Last year we hosted our first one out of necessity. Because of the pandemic, we had to cancel our main fundraising even in 2020. Since we could not have Haus of Brews, and we had to figure out a way to raise money for our club projects, we decided to host a pickleball tournament. We originally planned it for May 2021 but it ended up getting rescheduled to June 2021 due to rain. We are hoping that the weather will cooperate and we will be able to hold our event on our selected date this year.
Last year our club funded the event on its own. This year we are partnering with local companies so it’s going to be bigger and better than ever.
Another significant change is in the format. Last year we opted for a more traditional tournament with social and competitive brackets in the morning, social and competitive brackets in the afternoon, and lunch served in between. Everyone got plenty of games in because we did round robin plus bracket play.
This year, we are still feeding lunch and including free drinks and everyone will still get lots of pickleball play, but we are going to a team-style tournament so it’s going to be even more fun.
Ever since I participated in the MLP-style team tournament at Chicken N Pickle last December, I’ve been toying with the idea of hosting a team tournament. I presented the idea to the other two members of the pickleball tournament planning team (Chris McGill and Ryan De Santis) and they approved it. I am super excited!
We couldn’t do full-on MLP because, when we did it at CNP, the matches lasted almost an hour and a half on average and we don’t have that kind of time. So we modified it a bit so that there are only three games per match for the round robin matches — women’s doubles, men’s doubles, and mixed doubles — and best two of three games (same format) for the bracket play.
The twist is that for the mixed doubles game, it’s going to be “wrestlemania” style. So you can tag-in and tag-out team members during the timeouts, as long as the resulting combo is still one male and female. It is mixed doubles after all.
During the round robin portion, the plan is for all three games to be played that way everyone will get to experience the mixed doubles “wrestlemania” format. We will keep track of the number of wins and use that to determine the seeding for the single elimination bracket tournament in the afternoon.
In bracket play, we will do best two of three — so the mixed doubles game could potentially be skipped if one team wins both the women’s doubles and men’s doubles games. This is to save time so that the tournament doesn’t run so late. Anyway, those out of the tournament can continue to eat and drink and just hang out and enjoy. It’s a win-win for everyone.
So far we already have three sponsors committed and I have a few more asks I’m waiting to hear back from. I am really looking forward to the event this year because we are not doing it on our own anymore. We have others willing to partner with us. I think it’s going to be even more fun!
You can find out more about our tournament and sign up here. Form a team or simple be a spectator, have a nice lunch and some drinks at the country club, and enjoy the day with us! We would love to see you!
Until next time, GNG.
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Celebrating with Tiffany
Posted on January 29, 2022 by Ching under Pickleball.
Brian and I celebrated Tiffany’s birthday with Tiffany and Donnie Lesperance a few weeks ago. I actually didn’t know it was her birthday until after dinner. We went to Texas Roadhouse with them because when we were driving home from St. Louis, we talked about places that they dine at all the time and Brian and I hadn’t been to TR in many years. So we jokingly said that next time they decide to go to TR, they should let us know so we could go with.
Well, we got home super late on Sunday night and they went the very next day and didn’t tell us. We could have gone too because Brian and I both took that Monday off expecting to be home late on Sunday night. So I gave them both a hard time about that the next time I saw them.
Anyway, they decided to go to TR the Saturday before Tiffany’s birthday and they actually remembered to invite us this time so the four of us went. LOL.
After that, they came over to our house and we had a Mexican train dominoes marathon. Brian, who is usually the big loser at dominoes, actually end up second place that night and, after playing for several hours and about 500 points, I was the biggest loser. Tiffany brought these delicious shots in tiny mason jars (will have to look for these next time we are at the liquor store) and so we did some shots so it was still a win. Although, looking back, maybe that’s why I was losing?
Tiffany’s birthday is actually on January 17 (also known as Martin Luther King Jr. Day) so she’s one of those lucky people whose birthdays always fall on a holiday. I have another friend whose birthday is on November 11 so she always gets the day off for Veterans Day. Of course, you could be like Brian and just take a vacation day on your birthday every year and make it your own special holiday.
Anyway, since I was off work in observance of the MLK Day holiday, and so were Tiffany and Donnie, I set up some birthday pickleball for us at Nahola with Chris Wilson. Chris and I work for the same company and so he had the day off as well. And, I knew that he was also going to be there for our Monday night league so he would just need to come a couple of hours early. It worked out great and we had some fun games with really awesome rallies.
The following night I brought a big sheet cake to Chicken N Pickle so we could continue celebrating her birthday during our mixed competitive league.
It was way more cake than we needed on Tuesday night because we enjoyed the rest of it again on Wednesday night during the men’s competitive and super competitive league. I think a lot of people got to partake of Tiffany’s birthday cake over those two days because Danny Leddy said they ate some of it earlier in the day too.
Tiffany sure knows how to handle a big knife. Donnie better watch it. LOL.
We continued the celebrations all the way through to Friday night at Nahola with the Friday night pickleball crew. Kimberly brought homemade brownies for everyone. They were still super warm in the pan when she brought them in. These guys are such a hoot.
From left: Tiffany Lesperance, Kimberly Howe, Chris Wilson, Debbie Fanning, Donnie Lesperance, Dave Fanning, Greta “the Machine” Siemens, Mark Armstrong (hiding behind Ryan Kellenbarger’s arm), Ryan and me.
This is our full crew minus Eric Howe who has been in recovery. Ryan has been serving as a permanent sub over the last several weeks.
Friday nights are so fun because I get to play for four hours straight — two hours of open play, followed by two hours with Debbie’s Friday night group — but it’s even more fun when one of us is celebrating a birthday. And it has been super fun getting to celebrate Tiffany’s birthday with her this year. Cheers!
Until next time, GNG.
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