My friend R. sent this picture as her submission for this week’s 5 O’ Clock Friday’s. She was on the way to dinner and she couldn’t resist taking the picture of the beautiful river and the sinking sun. She said she loves that time of the day, and actually, so do I.
Thanks so much R. for sharing a moment out of your Friday with us.
I hope that you and everyone else has a safe and happy 4th!
I hope everyone has a fantastic day today! I actually celebrated last night with friends for a little cook out and fun times and I had a blast. I ate entirely too much, but luckily all the foods I did have were healthy, so I know I didn’t break the calorie bank. I had the opportunity to spend some time with my good friend Carrie and her husband, which made the evening even better.
In spite of the little bit of rain, we still sat outside under the terrace and managed to keep dry. Later, as the guys watched the World Cup, Carrie and I spent the evening sitting outside chatting away about any and everything. She and I even made talk of having a girls weekend somewhere with a group of fun friends. That’s something we definitely need to make happen.
Since I won’t get to see Carrie again before my birthday, she brought a gift to me last night. She knows how much I love and adore coffee AND coffee cups, so she brought me some delicious smelling coffee’s, plus she brought me the most ADORABLE coffee cup. It is cute and whimisical and it says “Happy Girl” on it. I’m going to have to take a picture and share with y’all.
That was my celebration for the 4th, and sadly, today is going to be a work day for me. I don’t mind though, since I didn’t have anything planned anyway, plus I have enough left over grilled chicken and salad from last night to eat without me having to cook. Marcel, on the other hand, will go to his moms for Sunday dinner.
The picture above is one that I borrowed from the Nestle website and is for some Toll House Stars and Stripes Cookies. I thought they looked so scrumptious and festive that I just had to share.
PREHEAT oven to 350º F.
ROLL cookie dough to 1/4-inch thickness between two pieces of wax paper. Remove top piece of paper. Cut cookie dough into stars with 3-inch star cookie cutter. Transfer cookies to ungreased baking sheet(s). (If stars are too hard to remove from wax paper, refrigerate rolled dough for 10 minutes.) Roll remaining dough to 1/4-inch thickness; cut out additional stars.
BAKE for 10 to 12 minutes or until light golden brown. While hot, reshape and pat edges of each star back into shape with knife. Cool on baking sheet(s) for 2 minutes; remove to wire rack(s) to cool completely.
BEAT cream cheese and sugar in small mixer bowl until fluffy. Spread onto cooled cookies. Place strawberry slices onto each cookie pointing outward. Place 5 to 6 blueberries in center of each cookie. Top each cookie with morsels.
I’m not counting down or anything, but it won’t be that long now before it’s time to start packing for our vacation. The cruise will be our vacation within a vacation, but the real vacation begins when I head home to be with family and friends. I’m excited that I’ll get to choose a new computer for mom and diddy, and also that I’ll maybe even be able to talk them into getting some modern office furniture to add to their home office. I’m not holding my breath about that one, but a girl can dream. There is SO much that I’m looking forward to doing, and honestly, it can’t get here soon enough.
I guess I’ll just continue to work out and such to keep me occupied while I count down the days. At least that way, when I get off the plane, I may look my absolute best.
Two or so months ago, Marcel and I bought a flat screen television for the guest bedroom. We got it for a fantastic deal and then had an additional 100.00 off from a rewards program, so it was almost a steal. Right now, we have it on the dresser in the bedroom, but I’ve been going back and forth on whether we should mount it on the wall, look at tv stands and find one that would look good in the room, or just leave it where it is. I can’t seem to come up with a decision. I like the wall mount idea, but I’m afraid once I get it mounted, I may want to switch things around and then it’s stuck where it is.
What do y’all think?
A few days ago I was browsing online (which is something I like to do in my spare time), and I came across some Vacheron Constantin watches. I loved some of the really sharp looks of the watches and I found myself thinking that they would be great gift ideas for the upcoming Christmas season. I know, it does seem a little early to start thinking about Christmas, but when I see things that I like and believe will make great gifts, I like to shop early.
What about you? When do you start doing your Christmas shopping?
I love it when I log in to the cruise website that I see a little message like the one to my left that tells me how many days it is until we head off on our adventure. As the official ‘tour cruise guide’ of our little group, I’m the one who will be setting up everything from our on board accounts to researching the excursions and getting detailed information about the ones we are interested, so that we can make informed decisions. I’m excited about it. It’s my first cruise, plus I’m excited that I’ll get to spend it with some of my favorite people. If all goes as planned, I’ll even have the opportunity to swim with the dolphins, something I’ve wanted to do for as long as I can remember.
I’ve been thinking quite a bit lately about family. I think about my family quite often, but lately, I’ve been thinking about my great grandmother McCormack and also my mom’s mom. I’m not sure why. I often wonder if my grandma would have lived to be a much older age than 72, if she’d had that spot on her breast checked out long before she did. It had been there for 30 years, and I often wonder why no one did something about checking it out far before it was too late. My great grandmother lived to be very old, and one of my grandmother’s older sisters just celebrated her 95th birthday. I saw some of the pictures and it doesn’t look like she’s ever needed to pull out any wrinkle cream, even at the ripe age of 95. Her skin is perfect.
Someone commented to me a few days ago that they thought someone who was several years younger than me was actually several years older. My mom has no wrinkles. If all these great genes are any sign of the things to come, then I’m looking forward to it. I miss them all-
I mentioned a few days ago that Desere and I had an interesting day. She was invited to go to a very prominent theater in the area and watch a live gastric bypass surgery. Since she had the sugery several years ago and almost died; it was something she really wanted to see, so I went along with her. The theater was packed and in addition to us seeing it live as it was happening, we were also connected live to the doctors in the hospital, so if we had questions about the procedure, they could respond from the operating room. The surgery went great and I hope it will make a huge difference in the life of the person who had the surgery. I was happy to be able to share in that experience, since it isn’t every day that you get to see something like that.
When we left the theater we noticed that the streets were getting crowded. We saw someone walking around in breeches and wondered if they’d just came from horseback riding and popped in to the city to pick up a few things. We never did see what store she went in, but it was definitely a day for interesting things. We had a blast, and I’m ready for the next adventure.
I have a busy week on the horizon and I am finding more and more that I need to write myself notes to make sure that we take care of certain little things. I hate having to remind Marcel about everything, such as the paper that he’s had sitting on the table for two weeks about a life insurance lead. He’s signed all the paperwork but it needs to be sent in.
Maybe it I write my to do notes here in this space, they’ll actually get done.
This is a picture (stolen borrowed from the OPI site) of the nail polish that I bought on Thursday when Desere and I went away for the day. I love the color. It’s a beautiful, bright fuschia and on Friday evening I used it to pain my toes.
Yesterday morning, I grabbed the bottle and took it to the bathroom so I could put it in the medicine cabinet it’s OPI brother’s and sister’s. When I put it on the shelf, it fell and I grabbed it. Unfortunately, it bounced out of my hand and fell to the floor where it hit the ceramic tiles in the bathroom and shattered. There was nail polish all over the bathroom floor, all over the tiles that hold the bathtub, and all over my bathroom rug.
I cleaned everything up- through the tears, because I felt so clumsy- but the rug couldn’t be salvaged. I didn’t even try, because I knew it was hopeless. At least I got to use the nail polish once, but so much for it being my new favorite color for the summer, unless I get a new bottle. Right now I think I’ll make due with the colors I have.
