Blessing of the Animals

Aldersgate had its Blessing of the Animals services today. Many churches in the community have similar services in honor of the feast day of St. Francis of Assisi.

Dakota and Lilly were good (for the most part). We had help from Brian's mom, who came to see the pets and to hear Brian's solo. A couple of years ago we took Meow Meow to the annual service, and the poor thing trembled the entire time. We left her at home to fend for herself this time.

Most people brought dogs, but there were several cats, including the tiniest kitten. There was at least one tarantula and two snakes. Think Barley the snake is trying to make amends for the whole Garden of Eden thing?

One little girl brought her stuffed pups, including one named Rescue:


Think Lilly looks full of grace?

Drinks & drills

Saturday event No 1: Drinks

I started off my morning at Copper Oven, a favorite brunch spot where girlfriends of mine from Connect meet about once a month to catch up on life. We were devastated when the waitress informed us that the cappuccino maker was broken, meaning no Chai lattes. Mary Beth, who's pregnant and drove up from Derby, was especially heartbroken. But we somehow survived with straight-up cups of coffee instead. Lori R. brought her mother-in-law Connie, and Crystal joined us, too:

Saturday event No 2: Drills

About an hour after brunch, I met up with a different group from church at Habitat Village, an area near 33rd & Arkansas where churches and other civic groups are building Habitat for Humanity homes. Teresa and I went to town hanging drywall.

My dad, a very handy guy who has participated in previous Habitat builds, joined us there. (Trust me: Between the two of us and my friends, there were plenty of Catholic/Methodist jokes to go around. My dad said it would be all good if we'd just abstain from eating meat on Fridays. Yep. That was one of the jokes. Such is the life for a converted Irish O'Toole girl.)

Please note that the fact that we're both wearing camo pants was a complete coincidence. (You guessed it. We didn't plan this.)

Dennis, a fellow youth group sponsor, brought The Cutest Puppy In The World, Brooke. She's a tiny yellow lab who spent the afternoon hanging out in the bed of his pickup truck while we worked.

After managing to wash the construction dust out of my hair, Brian and I had sushi and went to the symphony. And afterwards, I got my elusive Chai from Starbucks. Mmm!

Crazy cats

My friend Nicole e-mailed me a link to this video with this message: "Thought you would enjoy this. I don't have cats, and I laughed so hard..."

She knows me so well. Hope you enjoy it, too.

We didn't plan this, part 7

Laurie, a quilting friend of mine, and I both sported brown to our monthly Quilt till you Wilt evening. We closed the place down at 11 p.m. after putting a solid three hours into our projects and taking some time to shop. She and I discovered that we both have a love for pink and green fabrics.

My mom, mother-in-law and aunt-in-law Lynn were among the group tonight. We traded stories about kid lies, wardrobe malfunctions and more.

One of the great things about being a quilter during this time of year is all of the great earth-tone fabrics that capture the colors of the season. I'll post a photo of my favorite fall quilt project to date soon. I brought it out of my sewing studio yesterday to display in my living room. Ah. Fall is here!

My mom and I fell in love with this pumpkin pillow project, displayed at the store where we met to work tonight:

Big top, big hit

We discussed the captivating, wonderful novel "Water for Elephants" by Sara Gruen at book club tonight. I read the book weeks ago and am still captivated by it. If you haven't read it, you must! My sister Amanda is borrowing my copy, but let me know if you'd like to be next in line behind her.

In the meantime, allow me to summarize the evening:

The circus book

The circus food
(We also had hot dogs, caramel corn, cotton candy, tater tots and more!)

The carnies
(Bonnie, Carrie and Robin - aka the turkey-headed woman)

My friend and co-worker Chris was the lovely and gracious hostess. I loved her cute home, especially her cozy kitchen with chalk-paint walls. Check out this great original artwork:


Rock Chalk, indeed!

Oui to the T?

A staple of KU student clothing is this T-shirt, which has stirred up a controversy about its offensive nature. And now students are talking about bidding it farewell, according to an article by the University Daily Kansan, KU's student newspaper. (I spent many a semester as an indentured servant, er, a staff member, of this fine publication.)

Funny story: A woman once had never heard of this Jayhawk tradition, deeply rooted in University of Missouri (aka Mizzou) rivalry, and saw a certain KU grad wearing it. The woman cocked her head to the side, studied the shirt and pondered its meaning.

"Muck Fizz-way?" she said. "Is that French?"

Pretty kitty

Meow Meow fancies herself a very sophisticated, fancy feline. Among her favorite perches is our front window. I always love it when she's relaxing here when I come home from work. On weekends, she hangs out in the window while Brian and I do yard work or read in the living room.



She must sense how much the late afternoon light becomes her:

Quilt tour time

My mom, mother-in-law and I set out Saturday on the Quilt Room Tour, a home tour for quilters. We visited five homes of fellow members of the Prairie Quilt Guild. Two had stand-alone quilt studios behind their houses, and the others had incredible studios dedicated to their artwork. (They all put my spare bedroom studio/storage room to shame. I'm committed to stealing several ideas, including a project board.) I loved the opportunity to be a bit of a voyeur and gawk at others' organization, creativity and homes. We also took a break to enjoy an autumn buffet lunch, an annual fall event, at Victoria's Tea Room. The food was rich and delish. Here a few images from the day:
























Afterwards, I met with the church's youth group members, who helped me hand tie this quilt I made. We'll soon send it to Biloxi to the woman whose home we worked on when we were in Mississippi last summer doing Hurricane Katrina relief work.

Game night sights

Brian and I got together with Connect friends Friday night for some good-spirited competition. We had to behave ourselves because we met at church. And good behavior can be a tall order for this group, which has had to ban Battle of the Sexes after a previous game night when the guy-girl opposition really heated up.

We spent most of our time (about two hours!) on a game of Cranium. It's hard work, as Jocelyn can attest:

Unfortunately, Brent and Roxy couldn't get their team to guess "fly fishing" on one round. Kirk proved that he's a charades fan, Nicole displayed her Sculptorade prowess, Ann wowed us in Mad Gabs (after she locked her keys in her car at a high school football game), and Lori R. made the tastiest peanut butter cookies I've had in a long, long time. The highlight? My team cleaned up in Cranium. Oh yeah: And that whole spending time with friends thing.

We didn't plan this, part 6

I'm all about diversity for my "We didn't plan this" Friday blog feature, so today was all about the feet. (OK. Truthfully, I wore a blouse with a paisley print that would've been next to impossible to copy, so I had to rule out the top.) But, fortunately for me, my co-worker Annie and I both wore strappy brown sandals and denim skirts:

And who on earth could've predicted that Denise and I would've had the same hair and makeup styles today?!


(That was her idea, by the way. Clever, huh.)

Slurp!

Did I ever mention that Lilly is a big fan of giving puppy kisses?

(Speaking from experience, that's better than a kiss from another random creature.)

Dog quiz

What do you get when you combine a dachshund and a chihuahua? Meet Dallas:

He's a fun and feisty little guy whose owner owns a local swimming shop where I went this evening to buy a new athletic suit. (The time I've spent in a very chlorinated athletic pool in the last two months swimming laps has pretty much destroyed my suit. I was in desperate need of a replacement.) While I was shopping, Dallas was running around the store chewing on various toys, including a stuffed ostrich that is as big as he is:


Any dog who can make you laugh when you're shopping for a swimsuit (a shopping excursion I find to be quite stressful and not much fun) is a great little creature. The store owner is pretty amazing herself. For example, I overheard her telling another female shopper that she doesn't allow the word "fat" to be uttered in her store. (I thought to myself, "This woman really knows something about selling suits!") And then she magically helped me find a suit that I really love.

Entitlement much?

Yikes. I think Lilly's inclusion in a little contest to match Eagle employees to their dogs, which appeared in today's paper and online, kind of backfired on me. After all, my little diva now thinks she really can live a life of posh existence and relaxation, as demonstrated by her pose this morning:

And keep in mind that relatives of Eagle employees can't participate in the contest. But you can click here to see my co-workers' cute pups.

Making scandalous headlines

My sister, Jen, bought me this card game for Christmas a couple of years ago. (It's a great gift for journalists and newspaper-lovers.) The gist is that each player gets five cards, each bearing a noun, adjective, phrase, etc. You have one chance to trade in up to three cards. Then you have to create a headline with the cards you're holding. It has to make sense grammatically, but not realistically. Each card has a point value assigned to it. (The most scandalous words -- or those that could help produce juicy headlines, including urologist, revealed, nun, missing and naked -- are worth 50 points.) You earn the number of points you show on each play. The first player to accrue 500 points wins. If you play an exclusive tag, you double the number of points on that turn. I won two out of three games the last time Brian and I played. Among my higher-scoring plays:

Pieces of the past

Tonight was my monthly quilting bee meeting. Before savoring scrumptious cheesecake, we shared projects we're working on or other sewn treasures.

My friend Sondra shared this family heirloom quilt, at left, circa 1890. She's recreating it using modern fabric, such as the block at right. I can't wait to see the completed project!

To continue our apron theme from last month (it was a little more low-key this time around), my mom brought an apron that her mom sewed using a popular pattern in the 1960s. It was so popular, in fact, that Carol brought one from her family that's nearly identical:

Sondra also shared a quilt that she made using a variety of batik fabrics, including some that she bought in Alaska. This is my favorite portion of it. (It reminds me of one of the coolest sights Brian and I saw on our recent vacation: A mama black bear and her two bear cubs crossing the scenic byway in a national forest.)

Fair play

I finally made it to the state fair Saturday, mostly to see Josh Turner and Sara Evans' concert, which was great. I really don't listen to country music anymore (about 10 years ago, it was almost all I listened to). But I had a blast jamming with Amanda and my dad, and I was surprised at how much I did like the music after all. I had to listen to Mandy say at least two dozen times that Josh Turner is "amazingly hot." Unfortunately for Mandy and hundreds of Kansas bachelorettes at the concert, Turner's gorgeous wife Jennifer Ford Turner also was there (she sings back-up vocals and plays the keyboard). You may recognize her from Turner's music video to his hit "Your Man." It's a pretty cute video. I've posted it below.

Sarah Evans was the better performer, and her little sister and big brother were in her band, too. So wholesome and endearing! The crowd seemed to eat up the family connections. Other fair play we enjoyed before the concert included a ride on Ye Old Mill, viewing of the dairy barn and butter and sand sculptures and sampling of Kansas peach honey and fried green tomatoes, which were surprisingly tasty.

Auntie M's home!

Dakota & Lilly were very excited to see a familiar white car pull into our driveway Saturday afternoon: Amanda (or Auntie M, as we call her to the pups) is here to visit for the weekend! She and Kurtis are spending time with the 'rents, family and friends. But Mandy made a special trip over to say hello to her favorite dogs. (If you look closely, you'll notice that Dakota, at left, is holding his beloved lamb in his mouth.) It's the first time Mandy has been back to Ta Town since she moved in mid-July.

A good animal aunt and dog trainer, Mandy reviewed some of her favorite tricks, including speak, sit, turn around, lie down and up: