…A little bit of laughs, a little bit of pain. That is what today has been. It was crunch time on the upper floor as we have overnight guests. I had to get real about packing up stuff and getting the house presentable. I packed all the linens except sheets and towels for the guest room. Finished packing up my fused fabrics ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äù my life line to little creative projects, like postcards.

For lunch, I had a date with my best friends – you know Diane, Pat, Rita and Janet – who I am going to miss so much. We laughed today about my chances of ever finding such a group of friends some place else. We had lunch at Janet’s house. Yummy vegetable lasagna in a cream sauce, salad prepared by Rita and dessert baked by Pat. That would have been enough for me, to just have their company one more time ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äù to laugh, share our mutual views  about the state of the country and gossip about goings on in the guild. But they gave me these beautiful gifts:

I was able to set this up in the living room so that I could take a photo. It actually goes outside in the ground. It is a funky birdbath. I put one of Lisa’s Mod Birds in it for fun. Oh, and notice the lime green!

Here is a closeup of the glass top:

And from list mom, Diane, this gorgeous lime green bowl, and Diane ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äù high praise ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äù Mr. C loves it.

Many of you know that I founded an art quilt group here in Santa Rosa called the Pointless Sisters. Well, they gave me a gift certificate for a huge amount of money to spend at my favorite quilt store in the Portland area – Fibers in Motion – in Multnomah Village. My daughter, Stephanie, was in cahoots on this and suggested the store.

I came back home and finished spiffing up the place. Steve’s brother, David, and his wife, Kristin, arrived from Winter Park, FL. They are on their way to Yosemite for a mini vacation. We had a wonderful dinner with them. Kristin teaches at Central Florida University and does a lot of publishing. Her next book is a collaborative venture about Bob Ross, who she says is the most famous painter in the world. So we had a lot of fun talking about that. David is a clinical psychologist, who has in the past done a lot of drug and alcohol abuse work, but now works for the Children’s Home Society in Florida. He is one of the nicest and kindest men I have ever known.

Tomorrow, we will celebrate Mark’s 40th birthday. I have invited some of his friends. I am not cooking. We are eating out!!