It turns out that I have my very own fairy godmother. Unlike the typical fairy godmother, she is quite a bit younger than I, in her twenties in fact, and working as a nurse in Spokane, Washington. And her specialty is snapping up dishes out of thin air. Well, almost thin air. Here’s how it happened.
She knew about the Spode Emma’s Garland dishes I picked up in England, and she spotted a bunch of them in a Spokane (TJ Maxx) store marked down to incredible prices, so she called me to see if I would like her to pick some up for me. But we were out of town, so I didn’t get her message until a couple days later. When I got it, I assumed that I probably missed my window, but I called her anyway to say, “Yes, by all means, grab any you can find!” The dishes have been discontinued (though I have found a few sources that are still selling them at full price).
Unbeknownst to me, she tracked down a whole car load of dishes. She called area stores and had them hold the dishes for her, and then she drove all over Spokane gathering them up. She even drove over into Idaho to another store that was holding some for her. Finally she drove them all down to Moscow for me! The upshot is that I now have enough of these darling Spode dishes for my entire Easter dinner, even with all the guests and grandkids! And the total ticket price was a fraction of the normal price. Here’s a peek.
I am so very happy to announce that spring did indeed appear today! The temperatures rose up into the fifties, and we ditched our jackets for the first time in many a month. And even on time. I can only rejoice and thank the Lord for making four seasons. Spring is the best after winter. And summer is the best after spring. And you know the rest. They are all fabulous in their time. So we give thanks.
(Which, come to think of it, would be another way of describing our day yesterday!)
Do you see those clothes everyone has on? Those were the clothes that we started out in from Pavia on Tuesday morning. Look well upon them. They are the clothes that everyone still has on . . . only looking rather more rumply now.
However . . . the Circus Maximus!! And the Colosseum! And the Roman Forum! I mean I ask you. How can you complain about rumply pants with Nutella on them when you get to see that?!
So we interrupt this program to bring you the special feature . . . Rome AND bust!!
We made it to Rome . . . and there were many extravagent doings along the way, all of which are radically hilarious and well worth telling. But the trouble is that I don’t have time – not even to tell you about the uncouth and unruly Germans who are in charge of Neuschwanstein Castle and wouldn’t let us in, and what’s worse, didn’t show even a pang of remorse about it – even though we were there during opening hours. We’ll have to skip that bit – and skip the rest of the throw up stories – and skip the seedy hotel in Pavia – and skip the Italians’ failure to mark their roads. We also pass over the bit about minibus maneuvers that Ben was able to perform against all odds . . . even unto the part where he turned it into a pretzel and then drove back out the wrong way on a one way street.
We pass over these things, and move on to the spicy moment when we finally crested into Rome, and within the first (literally) 4 minutes of having found our hotel, we were Continue reading ‘Rome and Bust (ed)’
 This past weekend Doug and I were at Christ the Word in Toledo, and I had the pleasure of teaching at their annual ladies’ conference. The theme was “The Feminine Heart” and these ladies had been preparing and praying for the conference for some time, and it showed. One of the ways it showed was these favors they made for all the attendees, some 86 or so women. Each handkerchief is embroidered and packaged up and tied up with a bow. They are an impressive group of women in many ways, good at both the big picture and the details. And on top of that, they know how to have fun!
Well now. This week has turned out to be rather different that I was expecting a week ago. As a matter of fact, it’s been one week to the day since we got the phone call from Nate . . . saying that he thought they might as well bring their four kids over for Spring Break. They’d been wanting to come over again this year, and it was looking all of the sudden like it was now or never. “Carpe Diem” they thought to themselves, not to mention that there was a great deal on tickets.
We, of course, were thrilled to have them come – and the cousins were all super whipped up to see each other again after a six month separation. So far so good, right? The trouble was that we started having a lot of, “Oh wouldn’t it be fun if . . . ” sorts of conversations and there weren’t any adults around to stop us. And the long and short of it was that we decided to road trip it to Rome.
Right. Rome. With nine children under the age of ten, and three and a half days to plan it. Like I said, they called last weekend . . . and I am currently sitting in a hotel in Heidelberg where we are spending our second day. Continue reading ‘Rome or Bust’
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