A Lightbulb Terrarium

I am amazed at what people can do. This is the absolute cutest terrarium idea I have seen. You can get details here: http://www.etsy.com/storque/how-to/how-tuesday-top-10-spring-tutorials-by-etsians-7440/
Happy Spring!

FRED a remembrance

My brother-in-law, Fred, spent a lot of time changing a 1920's postcard into this great picture of himself and his wife (my sister) , Lois as Poirot and Poirette. In the days when he was first diagnosed with lung cancer, he lost many of his inhibitions and told me he didn't appreciate my publishing the picture on my Facebook page. He NEVER would have made such a comment before! But I can post it now....Luv ya, Fred!

Snowmen About Town!

This has been a very good year for snowmen as you can see

Merry Christmas to Everyone!

A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!!!!!!

Times Change?

My husband used to play Santa on Christmas Eve at my Mom's house. He was a hit all around! His career was cut short when my son told me after looking at the Christmas pictures that "Santa looks just like my Daddy".
Today he resurrected the role when he played Santa for the children of the members of my Brother-in-law's club. Needless to say, he still has it. The Santa suit was way better than the original, and the beard and wig were also nicer looking in my opinion. What do you think? He needed a little less padding, but he is great.

A View From My Kitchen Window

I lived in the city most of my life and we moved to the suburbs 15 years ago. But it was just yesterday that I looked outside while having my coffee and really appreciated the view. You can teach an old dog new tricks! Happy Holidays!

25 YEARS OF WEDDED BLISS

John and I were married on November 3, 1984. We had planned the wedding for a very long time. I made my dress and the dress for my bridesmaid, Kathy. My other friend Carol made her own. The pattern for both my dress and theirs was actually the same. I made mine longer without the cowl and added the sash. Theirs was shorter with a cowl and sash. The mother of another friend of mine did my flowers as a wedding present. Lilies of the Valley and Violets. My favorites.
The ceremony was going to be at St. Vincent of DePaul church which was down the street from our house on Webster. We had the organist booked for November 4.
The reception would be at The Parthenon in Greek town. We chose that venue because not only was John friends with Johnny, who owned the restaurant, but we always left there happy and had never had an argument or disagreement there.
The invitations were out when John's back went out. He came home from work one day and said his back hurt. I told him to lay on the floor thinking that the firm surface would straighten things out. Three hours later, he couldn't get up! I called an ambulance and he went to the hospital. He was in the hospital for two weeks before the wedding. I don't know if it was just how they treated back pain in 1984, or Grant Hospital was just a crappy hospital, but their treatment plan was ' when you can walk to the bathroom by yourself, you can go home'. Some Tylenol 3, no physical therapy.
After about a week, he asked if there was something else that they could do, and they sent someone to put ice/heat on his back. Then they sent someone in to massage the area. One week later, he could walk to the bathroom and was released.
Meanwhile, I had to call everyone on the guest list to cancel the wedding. I had no idea when he would be released from the hospital, we had missed our pre-cana meetings and couldn't count on him getting well on time.
He was released on time, but everything was already cancelled.
We decided that we would get married at City Hall, but had to change the date from Sunday, November 4th to Saturday, November 3rd. City Hall isn't open on Sunday. To this day, I have to think twice about our anniversary!
We had no trouble changing the date with Johnny at The Parthenon, but we invited fewer people, just immediate family and our closest friends. I just didn't want to go into everything on the phone over and over again.
Because it was an afternoon wedding, we thought that we could have a party Saturday night for all our other friends and invited them by word of mouth. Nobody we knew could resist one of our parties. As it turned out, John's friend Paulie owned a bakery and made the wedding cake. He also catered the party for our wedding present.
As luck would have it, we had wonderful weather, got to drive around in a white '57 Bel Air,
had two great parties and just one sore back!
My sister took our photos in the Lincoln Park Conservatory and those all turned out beautifully.
And 25 years later...here we are!