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I’m killing two birds with one stone here. That’s our engagement photo from the local paper that I made into an Art Trading Card on paper-one of my first too! So it’s almost our 25th engagement anniversary which will be on my birthday in November. Notice my Princess Diana haircut and top of that era.
Our Sunday afternoon was a bit warm and crowded. We headed up to the Mushroom Festival and parked in a bank lot-what luck! We couldn’t really look at what the vendors offered-how many baby strollers are there out there and people who are in a daze? A store in town had some collaged cards that caught my eye. I told them I like being inspired. We heard that Ilan Hall and Miguel Morales from Top Chef were doing a cooking demo at 2:30 and waited inside a tent for half an hour. We could have met them before hand as they were standing outside the tent for about 15 minutes. Oh well. I got a few good shots and Bri said the heat was getting to him so we left.
To my surprise Bri took me to Chadds Ford Days! Now that’s when I felt the heat! Lots of vendors, artists, antique dealers and local restaurants. I did get a 9 month free membership to the Chadds Ford Historic Society and I can go to ‘the big pumpkin carve’ next month for free. I’ve never been to that event! We saw some vintage cars-a 41′ Woody and an early 1960s Lincoln Continental similar to the one JFK was riding in when he was assassinated in 1963. The later vehicle was owned by someone at Chadds Ford Days. I saw a Martha Washington cabinet like the one I had, but it had been refinished and looked like new. The asking price was $185. We saw a child’s MW cabinet at another vendor.
Bri treated me to dinner at Ruby’s Dinner (yummy burgers with avocado and the works) and we went over to Borders where I purchased some awesome art magazines. I have to cook up some chicken for tomorrow (meant for tonight) later, but I plan to relax and get some great ideas from my new purchases.
Some of the photos in this collage were just things that I liked-the sunflowers with their hanging heads, a tractor, and old barn (I guess they are all in the collage).
We didn’t eat a single mushroom dish! The guys from Top Chef were talking so much, they burnt the mushrooms they were cooking!
The only things I bought were handmade soaps from a Virginia couple at Chadds Ford Days. I didn’t see my other soap people from last year at the Mushroom Festival.
To tell you the truth, I’d rather go to flea markets and yard sales. My mom was here yesterday and we hit a yard sale up the road. I got some vintage compacts-one has a little powder holder, rouge and lipstick. Mom went a little nuts there and I had to whine because the 90 degree heat from getting to me. She loves shopping-second hand seems to be her new thing.
Tomorrow and Sunday is the 22nd annual Mushroom Festival over in Kennett Square. It’s become a big ‘to do’ over the years. I think I mention it here every year too. I may or may not go. I kind of want to go to Chadds Ford Days which is a little down the road. My mom decided to come over from my uncle’s house and spend the night. She can walk around only so much. The festival is usually jammed packed and parking is rough. The CFD are in a big meadow near the Brandywine River. Both are going on for two days, so we could go on Sunday. The winning chef, Ilan Hall from Bravo’s ‘Top Chef’ is going to be a guest at the festival. I’d like to see him.
Bri heard through the grapevine that actor Mark Wahlberg was in Unionville, a few towns away doing a movie. Not sure if he’s still in the area.
If I go to either event, I’ll take some photos!
21 years ago we moved into our house here in southeastern, PA. Sean was due in about 6-7 weeks, but I felt like doing a few things, mainly making curtains for his nursery. We had a lot of people helping us clean and paint, but we still had two rooms to do, our master bedroom and the guest room. Bri did the guest room and I helped by scooting along and painting the baseboard in our room. Not an easy task.
To think back on all the things we’ve done over the years, the latest being the kitchen remodel. There are still areas that need our attention-mostly to be purged.
It’s a glorious day and here I sit. Not too chipper today. I was thinking about going to mom’s, but neither she nor I are quite ourselves. Bri went to his dad’s, so I am fending for myself. What I really need is a nap!
I got some energy up and did a mini tour of our yard on this special day. It was actually 16 shorts combined. It should be up in Vod Pod soon.
Bri and I decided to go to my uncle’s house and do the yardwork today as it was suppose to be the coolest of Bri’s three off. Uncle Don has a very steep yard and dragging branches and clippings up to the back yard was a workout! His front hedges along the also steep front steps were so overgrown, no one could get up them. To make matters worse, in the garden at the bottom, some kind of viney weed with prickers had taken over a rock garden. Bri even used the hedge clippers to try and cut through it. We did the best that we could, I think it needs some Round Up weed killer to finish the job and the garden needs to redone. He also had a million and one sticks and branches of all sizes all over the backyard. We did the best we could with those. A lot of them were right near the neighbor who brings my uncle milk and bread. His yard was immaculate. I think if I knew my neighbor was in a home for 8 months, I would have cleaned up the area of yard near my house just to be a little helpful. My mom was trying to rake, but she suffers from what yard work she does. Needless to say, we are achy and very exhausted. UD did treat us to some Chinese food, but I wanted a large raspberry iced tea from McD’s, I was way more thirsty.
Even though we were dirty and a little rumbled, we went to a neat book store a few miles down the road. We got a little lost, but found our way there. It’s so big-they must carry 300+ magazines. I bought a few-a Cloth, Paper and Scissors magazine and a Better H&G Halloween issue. Bri bought a book and a few magazines but is too tired to look at them.
Sean enjoyed his first college football game at PSU! He’s in row 10 in the student’s section, so I guess that’s good. The home team won 50 something to nothing! Sean didn’t apply enough sunscreen and got a little burnt on his neck-bad boy!
; )
No photo hunt this week-but about 3 o’clock we were both dirty, but no one took our picture!
So I think the rest of the extended weekend will be more relaxing. Our own yard and bushes need a trim too.Yikes!
Some pals and I are playing with our Windows Movie Maker and I threw together the Fenwick Island one on the top of my Vod Pod list. I need to find a longer song, but it’s not bad for a first try.
First of all, I want to thank Zoey over at Perennial Passion for the Lynchis Coronaria seeds she sent me recently. Zoey had a flower game-a letter mix-up and I guessed them all and got this awesome prize in a sweet homemade envelope-love it. So in return, I am drying some seeds for her. If anyone else would like purple or lime zinnia seeds, let me know. I’m also trying to get the Autumn Harvest heads on a few of the sunflowers before the birds get to them.
Tonight it dawned on me that I planted saved marigold seeds from last year and hadn’t seen them. The marigolds are in their glory right now, but where were the ones in the circle garden? Here they had fallen over, but they were the yellow marigolds with the big flower heads. I thought they may be the white ones. I’ll save them too.
I’ve been to Big Lots twice today, by myself and then later with Bri. They bought out a local drugstore and the stuff is 30% off. I noticed they had compact flash cards for the camera, so that’s why Bri and I went after dinner. We got a 256 mb one for about $11! They also got some neat scrapbooking stuff in, many items for $1! I was playing with some of the new stuff when Bri wanted to go there.
Sean went to a pep rally for the football team tonight and it was fun. He got to see Coach Joe in person for the 1st time. This has been the slowest week here! It will be a week since we have been to PSU soon.
I realized that I haven’t taken too many flower photos lately. I wasn’t thrilled by what I saw around the yard-2 feet tall weeds! I thought I had kept on top of them, but the heat and rain really caused an uproar. I was out tonight pulling weeds, even from the back patio! The ants were not happy. I’m not going overboard, but I will get the gardens/yard presentable. Since I have to pay for online photo storage soon, I am going to start and use Flickr for my photos here. I can upload at their full size too. I love the colors in this sunflower!
On one side of the house, we have a yellow jacket nest in a window well area. They really fly in and out of it quickly, and I’m afraid to even walk by. It’s also near my fairy/gnome garden and glider, so I haven’t really been near that area for a while.
I had a craving for a brownie sundae, so Bri took me to Baskin Robbins tonight. I can’t remember the last time I ate ice cream. I’ve been good and have cooked well balanced meals all this week.
Sean called and said he went and checked his car and started it up. It’s a good distance from his dorm. We are hoping he gets brave enough to start and drive around soon. I have a care package almost ready to mail. It just needs his favorite goodie-7 layer cookies.
Now that my boy is gone for 3 months, I feel like I need to change things around in here little. The first thing I did was clean out a circular tin Sean keeps on the back of the toidy. I threw away a ton of stuff and put other stuff in a plastic bag and in the bathroom closet it went (even his old retainer-ugh). Also put his footballs and sneaks that were behind the front door in his room (grrghh). I would put things in his room and out they came. I think when he comes home, he’ll be editing the quantity of what’s in there. There is hardly a dent! The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
Back to the change part. Not sure if I just mean to do a change of the table cloth on the dining room table or to rearrange a bunch of stuff. I could start by getting into the autumn themed things-soon.
Sean is fine. He wrote an email and said the trash truck woke him up at 4 am this morning. Said it was hot all night. I told him two 6″ fans were a joke-he didn’t listen. He did move his bed away from the door a few feet. I’m curious to see what the room looks like now.
Wait until you hear this-Sean’s cousin is two doors down! They don’t know each other well, but maybe this will be the time they can get better acquainted. Their grandfathers (Bri’s dad and Ryan’s mom’s late dad) were brothers.
So I’ll have plenty to keep me busy today. I am tidying up for the priest’s visit tomorrow. I hope he doesn’t ask too much about Friday and Saturday as I am still a bit weepy.
Bri has had his moments, but he eggs me on I think. Worries about the car, Sean being sick, all that negative stuff. I’m trying to envision him going to his first football game in the second largest college stadium in the country; meeting a nice girl, you get my drift. Time to grow up. Times change and so can you.
I wanted this to be my first gift to him:
What an emotional experience, the hardest I ever had to do as a volunteer thing. It was a long, trying trip to start off with yesterday. We were doing fine and lost our way near Harrisburg, our state capital. We went about 25 miles one way out of our way and took like 5 hours to reach the motel. That was a lot of driving and seeing scenery like this:
These are big mountains. We also crossed the Susquehanna River.
We ate dinner at the motel and ventured out to Penn State a few hours before dark. Here are Bri and Sean outside Sean’s dorm,
Hamilton Hall:
The motel was about 12 miles further away, but off the main drag where the kids do all their shopping. We had a good laugh when we saw Big Lots, the store Sean had worked in all summer down here. We also passed through Bellefonte, a town near the water and there was a quaint park there with a little waterfall and a few step bridges with wrought iron sides. Sean said he’d go back to take photos of that area someday.
It was a humid and hot day and we got to check in at 10 and seemed to beat a lot of people who were probably waiting to check out of their rooms and eat lunch. His room is on the 3rd floor, which is really the 5th floor. The first two floors are used for a cafe, computer room, etc.
I should say how nice and clean the campus is, like Williamburg a bit, lots of brick and fancy building. His dorm was built in 1949.
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Photo Hunt-Happy
(I hope he will get this way)
Here is Sean in part of his room (not sharing and no a/c) which is 9’x16′. He has his laptop, printer, a tv that plays DVDs, a microfrig and lots of storage. I’m sure he’ll make it his own, but it’s nice to have this photo so I remember what the room looks like: 
And his window (open)-hello up there! He should be glad for the tree!
That’s the hottest I have felt in ages! I climbed the steps to his room twice-yikes, I felt really old. Notice there are no photos of me. I asked a few times, but it was too hot for Bri to bother and I was too blubbery.
Sean called his old high school classmate Peter and they met up for lunch, which was nice. Sean’s also been to a few meetings. He will be so busy he won’t worry about what roads to take home. Today we got home faster, even after stopping in Lancaster to stretch our feet and a few miles down in Gap for dinner. We went a different way which was better.
Good luck Sean and we miss you like crazy!
Collages & Creative Goodness 