Two Weeks in a Nutshell

It's hard for me to believe two weeks have passed since we returned from England. What's even more surprising is how long it took me to blog about the trip--longer than we were there! At any rate, in the interest of getting this blog current, I'm going to sum up two weeks in one post. Don't believe me? Here goes:

Carol returned from Melbourne, a week ago Monday, and was most anxious to see her siblings ,which means having a dinner party here. Then it occurred to me, why not make it a birthday party for Maureen who turned 65 last Friday? Cooking ensued, folks came, eating home made fried chicken, yellow rice, green beans cooked the old-fashioned way, and sliced Alabama tomatoes. I'll tell you this much, frying chicken for a crowd takes a very long time. The Texas sheet cake was not my best, but folks did not complain. To say Maureen was surprised is an understatement. Lynn, the realtor who sold Angela's house joined the party,

as did Bill and Fallon, along with David, who came solo as Michelle was working. Our brother Pat, vegan that he is, skipped dinner, coming later to socialize. Sadly we did not get a photo with Maureen as she was gone when Bruce took this:

Spending an entire afternoon frying chicken left no time to clean myself up, thus the grubby look! Lisa is on my left, Pat, and then Carol. We're only missing Maureen and Nancy, who, by the way, has moved to Arkansas, taking a management position at a brand new Marshalls there. On the table to my right is a photo taken of all of us after our Mom's funeral, nearly 10 years ago. My how the time flies!

During our absence, the caterpillars were busy, eating most every leaf of my oleandars;

there were hundreds of them, thus, finally on Saturday I cut the plants to the ground. My Spicy Jatrophas are in shambles as well, with scale as the culprit. In one spot of bright yard news, my Thryallis is going gang busters.

Carol left last Tuesday afternoon, and it was time to get busy around here, with ordering high on my list! Wednesday afternoon I set up at Darden for the yearly Craft & Art show, heavy on craft.

The building is beautiful, both inside,

and out.

There's actually no roaming around the building for a visitor without an escort. Someone told me Mr. Bruce was on some kind of board as a Brilliance Award winner, so when his assistant Dennise came down, she was kind enough to take me to the second floor to see it for myself. This is a digital display, sort of like what you might have at home in a grander scale,  so I waited for you know who's photo to come up:

This will be running for the next year! Still so proud...

The room looked like this, or at least from one angle:

Thursday was better than last year with Friday very slow. I spent nearly the entire afternoon talking to
my neighbor behind me, Desnee, a very interesting woman whose daughter works at Darden.

Most of the folks who do the show are the same year in and year out, however, if I'm not adjacent to someone I don't really get to know them. Am I ever happy I got to chat with her as she is one fascinating lady. Slow sales events can have their bonuses-- getting to know others who like to create. I see a trip to Brooksville in my future--she's that interesting!

Friday night Bruce finally came home from Houston around 7. Because our regular stylist could not find time to cut his hair Saturday, he went instead to a nearby Floyd's Barbershop, which looks nothing like the barber shops I used to frequent with our boys!

Bruce had a return ticket to Houston Sunday evening, so in the interest of seeing his wife for a few hours, he asked me if I would stay home Saturday instead of going to Winter Garden. It did not take much to convince me that four days in a row of selling would tax even chatty me! 

After mowing the lawn, I spent nearly all day sitting on the couch, going through some old "Cook's Illustrated" Nancy gave me. Oh yeah, and watching college football. About mid-day Dave called saying they were having an impromptu Halloween party and they'd like us to come. No costume for this girl, hey, it was short notice, but Dave and Michelle sure looked cute, even in this picture which is not my best:

The thing was, I'd been waiting all day for the FSU game to start, and I could not miss it. Fortunately they have a room with both a television, and comfortable couch.

It did not take long for the score to change, much to everyone's surprise with Florida State walloping Clemson--51-14!! We were hoping for a win, but this score was more than anyone expected. Because we know most of their friends, it was not as rude as it sounds, with many of them joining us to watch throughout the night. Imagine this--we stayed up past midnight!!!

Starting slow, the market on Sunday built steam as the day wore on. In a first for me, some folks from Melbourne, Australia bought several prints. I'm pretty sure that's the farthest anything has traveled to date. :)

No sooner had we unloaded the car, then Bruce ate a little something, and headed to the airport for his big inspection Monday at the Capital Grille in Houston. He did everything right for the job, however, once the big-wigs came in, they decided on some pretty major changes to the design, which, as you can imagine, is not what he wanted to hear. Don't let anyone tell you that construction project managing is an easy job.

Monday I found myself ordering once again and shopping for our house. As well the appliance repair guy returned for the third time to fix our refrigerator. The yard spray guy was kind enough to blast the jatrophas with his huge nozzle. I tried to spray them myself before we left, but obviously, from the look of things when we returned, it was not an adequate job! Then too, Cheryl and her husband David came knocking early Monday morning. Sadly they came to tell me David was laid off last week. :(

So, here we are Wednesday morning, October 23, and this blog is much tidier, or at least nearly up to date. If you've been paying attention you noticed I left yesterday out...tune in to find out where Mrs. Camera Crazy went--you won't be disappointed, or so I hope.