Happy Fall, Y'all

Hey y'all...I've been gone for 5 weeks...seems longer...Life just has a way of doing that.

I shipped my proposal and our niece traveled home :( and after that it has been non-stop. Had a little blood pressure problem & a 3-day unscheduled hospital stay for evaluation ... happy to report no heart problems!

So I will create some catch up posts and then travel round & see what's been happening with everyone! Here's a beautiful sugar maple picture from our property last weekend!

Work, work, work

The last 3 weeks have pretty much been all about working 12 hour days + OT. In some spare time DH has cooked and allowed niece & I to make cards. She  stayed to have kidney stone procedure, and we traveled to MS for my family reunion over Labor Day. She will get her stent out this week and feel 100% better!!!
My work deadline is almost over....proposal ships this week....ready for it to be packed in boxes & at Fed Ex!

Girl's Crafting Weekend

Well, it was interesting! And we crafted...it was just not what we expected. The long drive shook up one niece's kidney stone so that by the time they arrived she was in too much pain..so we went to the ER and found out it was robin egg size and they kept her over the weekend for a stent procedure until it could be broken up.
So we loaded all our cardmaking supplies and spent all day Saturday in her room visiting and making cards anyway.
I had planned to use 2 sets of CTMH Card Workshops as warm up...and move on to freestyle cards....turns out the kits worked great with the limited things we could pack. At least we did a few crafty things and she was getting good care and her problem solved. She has stayed since...

LONG WEEK - Cannot Brain

It's been a long week...results of my proposal review in a meeting tomorrow, and trying to prepare for a girls' weekend...I want to do some blog-hopping, but right now, this is how I feel....

So, I will just leave it at that and go to bed!!!

New Diet

Last week we had news that DH is diabetic. So the past week has been re-evaluating our food choices, and spending a lot of time learning about diabetes and what he can eat, as well as doing a lot of food prep on fresh vegetables to fill up on.  
Barnes & Noble loves us, because we have 4 new cookbooks!

Hopefully we can control it with diet. I cleaned out my pantry on Sunday and have lots of sweet things to donate to a food pantry.
The bonus is that we will both be healthier with a better diet and taking care of ourselves. We just need to take the dietician classes now, and learn to balance the diet so that he's not starving! 

I don't know if a whole T-bone and bread and baked potato will still be on his menu...but we will certainly try to work out how he can still enjoy his steak & potatoes!

Another interesting journey!

Wonderful Wedding at a Winery

Bride & Groom

We attended a friend's daughter's wedding this weekend, and, as it was about 2 hours away, took the opportunity to stay with the family at a nearby historic hotel. 

A beautiful water feature at the Winery

The weather was FANTABULOUS!  

In the upper 70's, which is highly unusual at the end of July in the Midwest! It was  a beautiful day to be married outdoors by a waterfall [manmade or not].

We have been fortunate to have spent loads of time with the bride's family and have been friends with them all over the years.  We have property adjacent to some of her family, and, funnily enough, live less than a mile away from them at home. 

Her aunt and grandmother & I make cards every so often, and we worked together with her mother to make their wedding invitations. We printed the 1 layer invitation and the response cards, then stamped & heat-embossed a very subdued champagne swirl in the corners. It was just an understated bit of elegance, which was PERFECT for the bride.  We thought they came out very nice.

Myself & DH -- in formal dress, no less.

So, DH and I traveled to the wedding and ended up having to stop at a florist on the way to pick up a replacement bouquet-toss throw bouquet, as it was omitted from their order. 

We arrived at the restored mineral springs hotel in time to get ready for the wedding and travel to the winery for the wedding. It was a beautiful evening!


Because we are near St. Louis, and the groom is die-hard Cardinals fan, his friends chipped in and had Fred Bird come to the wedding for entertainment.

He was a BIG hit!

We adjourned to the historic Original Springs Hotel and visited near the pool for a while, and today had a wonderful brunch at their restaurant before heading home.

It was a nice change of pace and fun celebrating with the newlyweds!