My husband is the best!

Busy, busy, busy ... ever since we came back from Peru/Nashville. It's almost like ... where to start? James was very busy with Timberly Court, the townhouse Sarah lived in as a student while becoming a pharmacist at VCU with her two room mates. It's for rent since she moved out ... and a renter just left. Oh, but how he left it! And surprise, surprise ... when we checked today ... no batteries in the fire-alarms either. We replaced them today with the new "no batteries needed for 10 years guaranteed" kind. James hopes that today was the last trip there for a while.

 First thing I did to get ready for my lace-meeting in Williamsburg ... cut up the necklaces I had bought in Peru to make dividers for my lacemaking friends.

It was great to take time out from all the things which need to be done for a day making lace at Maria's house. So relaxing.

I always like to see what others are working on.

Several were working on this Christmas tree ornament. It's going to be 3-D.

Lali is from Barcelona. This is her traveling Spanish pillow.












Catching up with the volunteer bookkeeping for the church.
Getting ready and holding a workshop for this year's Chrismons for St Martin.
Getting ready and holding a workshop "Chrismon Ministry" offered to other churches in our Diocese.
Making things for my charity sales table at the CR bazaar (CR = CrossRidge = our subdivision).
And just generally thinking of getting ready for Christmas ...

Helen, Ben and William are coming in a week. Omi cooked her little heart out and put individual portions into the freezer for William ... all natural chicken ... selection of veggies.

Yuck. This is what the stove looked afterwards. Thanks to my German cleaner  not really a problem.

A flowering bush at our church last Sunday.

It is called "Yuletide Camellia". So lovely to see when most plants are dying and the trees are becoming bare.

First I read Dee's blog and her cooking-baking-jumpstart on the holidays.  Then I read Carolyn's blog about Muffin News, the Banana Praline Muffins the dog ate.

I had to be inspired!!!

I baked two recipes of Cranberry Bars (oh, yes) for the freezer and the above mentioned Banana Praline Muffins. Recipe here. We had two as dessert after dinner (no, no, one each!). The recipe needs a little tweaking but is going to be a keeper.

Yes!!!!!!!!!!!!! One problem solved.
THANK YOU, JAMES!
Love this house, but the kitchen is small and the pantry just not sufficient. So we found space to put up shelving ... which James did today. I am sooooo happy! I will be able to have provisions handy and KNOW what I have.

Love my husband!