A Quiet Southern Weekend

The Workshops of a Lifetime start this week (Woo hoo!), and while I’m looking forward to those, I know it’s going to be a pretty brutal schedule. So I stole away for a long, quiet weekend in Savannah with the Browns before heading out. 

We didn’t do a lot—built train tracks with the boys, played outside, ducked out with Shalae for a quick shopping break. . . . The weather was LOVELY, although I was kind of shocked that the grass doesn’t stay green year-round. It turns brown for a few months every year; I guess it needs time to rest and rejuvenate like everything else.

Shanna happened to be in Jacksonville visiting family friends for the weekend, so on Friday we drove down there. Had fun visiting, catching up and meeting some new faces, then spent the night there.

On Saturday we headed back to Savannah, but the boys were feeling a little deprived (most of the attention had been paid to grown-ups!), so we found a shopping center that had a little train that ran through it, and while the big kids went for ice cream, the little kids and Grandma took a train ride.

The boys thought they had died and gone to heaven—and they thought Grandma was the coolest person ever! Can’t have that happen too often, can you? It was well worth the 15 minutes and $3 train ticket!

Now I’m back at it. I’m finishing up final preparations for the first Workshop of a Lifetime this week. Sara (she’s going with me to many of the workshops) and I are busy, nervous, but very excited! Check back on Wednesday night for a full report—or at least a few highlights! (And I haven’t forgotten the Q&A I promised either—it’s coming too!)

A New Look

Notice anything new?

Yep, I finally updated my blog header. I know you were all loving the hollies and berries and holiday red, but I figured since it’s past Valentine’s Day, we had all celebrated Christmas long enough!

Seriously, I was aware that my seasonal look was a little unseasonal, and all I can say is that while I LOVE sharing with you everything I can, it’s been a busy, hectic few weeks, and (Shhh! Don’t tell anyone!), the blog hasn’t been one of my top priorities. (Although you all always are!)

You might also have noticed it’s been a few weeks (even months!) since I’ve done a Q&A as well; now that we’ve got the header updated, I’m turning my attention to that, so watch for one of those coming soon!

In the meantime, you can enjoy a new look and new color when you visit me.

Hope you have a great day!

Vonna's Gift

At leadership in January, I showed part of a necklace I was making for my sister’s birthday this month. I planned on adding a few things to finish it up, and I promised those at leadership that I’d post it—after Vonna’s birthday so it didn’t ruin the surprise!

Well, her birthday was this week, and so now I can share this with you! 

I recognize that it’s a little over the top (how many pieces of jewelry have a handful of charms?), but my sister deserves it—and I sure had fun creating it!

Enjoy!

Happy 30th!

Today Sterling and I celebrated our 30^th anniversary—can you believe it?!

The celebration actually began on Sunday, when Sara and Sean and their kids showed up for Sunday dinner. Each of the grandchildren were sporting an anniversary button that they had made.

They even had anniversary buttons for us! (I wore mine all day today at work.) Sean is working on a button project for Stampin’ Up! (more on that later), and he designed the buttons and the kids helped put them together.

 

The celebration also included a beautiful anniversary banner hung above our bed that Sterling had made himself! He traced hearts using the OnBoard Heart book as a template, cut out the hearts, punched holes in the hearts, strung them onto ribbon, and hung the banner up. (Sara helped him a little with the fan accents behind the glitter words.) He even put chocolates on my pillow!

Tonight we continued to enjoy our time together. I think we’re both appreciating the time even more because we know that next week I head off for the Workshops of a Lifetime, and I’m going to be very absent for most of the next four months. He will be my traveling companion some of the time, but we will be seeing a lot less of each other than we are used to—and I am already missing him!

Happy Anniversary, Sweetheart!

A Day with the Dinosaurs

Sterling and I spent some time with dinosaurs on Saturday—and our grandson Kona too. We watched him for the evening because Sage and Jason had plans. We took him to the Museum of Ancient Life at Thanksgiving Point, near where we live. The museum is the world’s largest display of mounted dinosaurs, and it was Kona’s first trip. He loved it!

We had dino chicken for dinner, dug for fossils in the sand, played in the water-erosion hands-on exhibit, and stopped at almost every single dinosaur! Kona wanted to know the name of each one, and since I’m such a dinosaur expert (NOT!) I had to read the placards pretty carefully. Thankfully the dinosaur names were spelled phonetically!

Kona didn’t want to leave, so we stayed until the museum closed! Kona had wanted popcorn earlier, and when we went to get some as we were leaving, they had already closed down the machine. So we went home, popped some popcorn, and put together a set of four dinosaur puzzles (his souvenir from his first visit to the museum) several times each!
 
It was a rare treat to have Kona alone, and we loved every minute!
 
And by the way, I hope you all had a Happy Valentine’s Day!