Ten on Tuesday

1.  I've been away for awhile; I guess it's because my life has been pretty boring.  Sometimes boring is good.

2.  The Cards lost last Monday to San Francisco, 9-0, so sad.  Then San Francisco won the World Series in four straight games, so I didn't feel so bad.  After losing our best player, Albert Pujols, and our manager of fifteen years I think it was great that we got as far as we did.

3.  My sister Lorie had family over Friday evening, because my sister Julie and her husband and youngest daughter had come in from LaCrosse.  We were supposed to play games but ended up sitting around talking, which was fine.  We hadn't all been together for awhile.  I had made Halloween shirts for a couple of my sisters' grandkids which they were all wearing.

4.  There were great garage sales on Sat.  I hadn't gone for about a month but decided to go since the weather was kind of nice.  Every year I go to one where they have tons of nice girls clothes, all Gymboree and Gap.  This year I got there a half hour after it had started and a lot of the winter stuff was gone, but I got like 15 pairs of shorts, new with tags, for 50 cents a piece and about six shirts and a dress, all size 12.  One of the grand daughters will be able to wear them next summer.  I also got lots of cool baby toys at another sale.

5.  I finished Corinne's dress for the second time.  I gave it to her for her birthday in July but it was too short so Kate took it to a seamstress in Boston to make it longer.  She did a terrible job and it was way too long, so when I went to Boston a few weeks ago I brought it back home and cut the skirt off and started it over.  I finished it last night and sent it this morning, priority mail, thinking she had a Feis this weekend, but heard from Kate that she wasn't going to be in this weekend's Feis.  Oh well, at least I finished it.



Dress front




Dress back



6.  We are planning trip to Cincinnati next week to see baby Stephanie.  We haven't seen her since Labor Day and they will not be home for Thanksgiving, so we thought we better go see what she is up to.  I do know she went to a pumpkin patch for the first time and got a pumpkin:

7.  We're ready for Halloween tomorrow night.  My two kids who are in St. Louis, Amy and Rob, always come and trick or treat at our house with their kids which is always fun.  I got four big bags of candy and we have already started eating one bag of chocolate candy.  Fortunately, the kids usually go for Skittles and Starburst, or maybe unfortunately, because we eat the chocolate ourselves.  Maybe I should just buy the junk, but it wouldn't seem like Halloween without chocolate.

8.  I'm planning a baby shower for Rochelle, my nephew's wife, who is due in March with a little girl.  Another niece and I are doing it together, but we'll do it at my house because I have more room.  We're planning on the weekend after Christmas since everyone will be in town.  I love baby showers, baby clothes, and just plain love babies.

9.  Last week the Old Orchard bridge, which is a couple of blocks from our house and on the way to the highway I need to get to work, reopened which had been closed for six months so they could build a new one.  I was so used to going around the long way to get the the highway that I've forgotten a couple of times that it is open.

View of one side of the bridge as I was sitting on it waiting for the light to change.

10.  I was worried about my daughter in  Boston and son in New York with hurricane Sandy, but they both are okay.  I know Kate's kids were off school yesterday--in fact I think everything was shut down in Boston.  Patrick had planned a trip to San Francisco, leaving today, but he had to cancel it.  He couldn't really afford it anyway, so it's better this way.

Jack and Corinne by the ocean right before the hurricane hit.  Kate says it's a tradition in Boston to watch it come in, but I was scared to death when I saw this picture on Facebook.

Go Cards!

We've had a pretty quiet week.  I took some pictures of the burning bush and mums in front of our house this week.  Most everything else is gone.  
 

Boston grandson Jack helping me route for the Cardinals (even though he's a Red Sox fan).

We've been watching baseball and routing for the Cardinals.  It's kind of amazing they have gotten as far as they have this year.  Tonight they're playing the San Francisco Giants in the League Division Series.  We are up three to two games.  It would be wonderful for them to make it to the world series again, but if they don't that's okay since they won it all last year.  Amazingly, we lost our manager and best player but are still doing well.  Our new manager has no experience but is doing a great job.

We had staff development this past Tuesday at work.  We all had to go to the Forest Park campus--it was mandatory that we attend from 7:30 in the morning until 5 p.m.  Our new chancellor, who's been here about a year and a half, organized the whole thing.  It was a fiasco.  We had to wear name tags with different color dots depending on where we worked, and we were directed throughout the day according to what color are dots were.  At the end of the day we had to put our name tags in a box--if we stayed all day we got to put them in the good box; if we left early we had to put them in the bad box. We were not given an agenda, just had to sit listening to different people speak for six hours straight, telling us things we already know.   Then we broke into discussion groups but we had six different groups in the gym and one was louder than the next.  There was a board meeting Thursday evening and quite a few faculty got up and spoke, but the chancellor denied that we were forced to be there and had to stay nine hours.  I'm really looking forward to retirement.

I haven't gone to garage sales for about a month.  It's cold on Saturday mornings and I have projects I'm working on, so I stay home.  I'm working on Corinne's Irish Step dress because it was too short and Kate had a seamstress in Boston lengthen it but she screwed it up.  I brought it home with me and am redoing a lot of it.  Her next Feis is the first weekend of November, so I need to get it back to her before then.

We've decided to go to Cincinnati the second weekend in November.  They will not be home for Thanksgiving, so we want to visit them since we won't see them until Christmas.  We haven't seen Stephanie since Labor Day weekend, but they put pictures on Facebook today of a visit to the Pumpkin Patch and she looks adorable.  I tried to download the pictures so I could post a few but wasn't able to.

Oldest grand daughter Katie is singing in a children's chorus and they had a concert this afternoon.  She loves to sing but hates the outfits they have to wear. 

I think her favorite part was the cookies afterwards.

Five Question Friday...

Five Question Friday...

1. Do you prefer to drive to your vacation spot or fly?

Drive. 
I will fly...i do fly--especially to Boston because it is a two-day drive. 
But, confession here, I hate to fly.
So, whenever possible we drive.


2. If you could live any where in the world, where would you go and why?

Anywhere my family is. 


3. Should grown women wear leggings?

No



4. If you could change your name to any other name, would you? 
And what would it be?

I used to hate my name but now I like it okay.   I don't think I would change it if I could--after 62 years I'm kind of used to it.



5. What magazines do you have subscriptions to?

Time
Traditional Home
Sew Beautiful
Victoria
Parents

Wordless Wednesday

Boston Visit

It seems like forever since I posted anything here--probably because it's been forever.  I spent five days in Boston with Kate and Grand kids Corinne and Jack.  We did all kinds of fun things, starting with a visit to farm to pick apples and buy pumpkins.

On the way to pick apples

Plenty of huge apples

There's a little petting zoo at the pumpkin farm

Sitting on the scarecrow's lap

J picking out his pumpkin

C deciding on her pumpkin

Then we started off Saturday with Corinne's soccer game.

Followed by Jack's hockey game

He hates getting on all of his gear.

He's happy it's over, and he doesn't realize they lost about 18 to 0

Then on Saturday evening we had a Thanksgiving dinner, since Kate will not be home for Thanksgiving

Kate's sister in law with her twins, Emily and Will

Kate's friend Michael and her neighbor, Eileen

Some of the food

The kids at the table

Then on Sunday morning Jack had another hockey game, but I stayed at the house with Corinne.  He had a soccer game in the afternoon, but I didn't take any pictures.

We watched Cardinals play their games over the weekend, advancing to the playoffs.

Then on Monday we went shopping for awhile then hung out at the house

Jack riding his Razor Rip I had given him for his birthday this past summer

And my sister who lives about an hour north of Kate, in Marblehead, came to visit Monday afternoon.

My sister Susie with her daughter, Elllie, at her wedding in June

Kate and her friend Michael--just realized I didn't have any pictures of Kate from the time I was there, so I found this one from my niece's wedding

Then on Tuesday I hung out at the house because Kate had to go back to work and the kids back to school.  I left late that afternoon and got back to St. Louis around six.  It was great spending a few days with them.

Wordless Wednesday

Ten on Tuesday

1.  I started decorating for fall last week.  I got most of the decorations at garage sales.  I was really excited about the pilgrim nutcracker, because I collect nutcrackers so he'll be out for a while.

2.  On Sunday we went to Cardinal game and our oldest grand daughter, Katie, sang American the Beautiful with the Kirkwood children's choir.  They won, 9 to 4.  We left after the sixth inning, thinking we could hop on the Metro Link and beat the crowds getting home.  Unfortunately, the Rams football game had just let out, and we literally shoved our way into the train.  I fell into a lady when the train started, but she was nice and said luckily she was well padded.

3.  Cardinals are almost in the play offs.  They won again last night but Los Angeles won too, so we didn't get the wild card spot yet.  I think we just need to win one more game. 

4.  I'm going to Boston on Thursday to visit my daughter and her family.  I haven't seen them since June, and they will not be here for Thanksgiving, so I figured this well be a good time to go.  I usually go in October and we go apple picking and take long drives looking at the changing colors.

5.  I watched grand daughter Erin for a while Sunday evening and she helped me get out the Halloween decorations and begin decorating for Halloween.  The grand kids always enjoy helping me get our holiday decorations.

6.  I finally got the miirror replaced on my car.  I was getting used to driving in the right lane on the highway since I didn't have that passenger side mirror.  I also got the car inspected last week and got new wiper blades.  I didn't realize how bad the old ones were--it's great to be able to see all around now when I'm driving.

7.  We still haven't talked to the guy about our addition.  This past weekend RW suggested we start looking at houses to see if we can find one with everything we want, rather than adding on.  We found one we loved, but it was already under contract.  We like our neighborhood and location, so I think we'll probably stay where we are.

8.  Had a meeting with the dean this afternoon and we have to all cut our budgets by 10% next year.  He asked if we had any ideas, and I suggested getting rid of half of the administrators down town--we have 6 vice chancellors now and our chancellor has three private secretaries plus a private personal assistant.  Five years ago there were 2 vice chancellors and one secretary.  And they want us to cut back our academic support programs.

9.  While watching the baseball game last night there was another stupid Hardees commercial.  Now they have a guy eating the big sloppy handburger, but he is fully dressed.  I guess they got some flack about the two barely dressed gals.

10.  I've been making Halloween shirts for the past couple of weeks.  I made them for my niece's two daughters and my nephew's three sons last week, and I just did a couple tonight for my sister's grand kids.  I love the way the appliques look, but they really are a pain in the neck to embroider, especially when there are a lot of fabric changes.