Thank you for making my day a memorable one with your birthday wishes! Yes, we are having a great time and our DH's have been talking non-stop! The weather is spectacular and the beach is more beautiful than I have seen in some time. The shells are plentiful. Thank you again, Cathy

Aw, Thanks everyone! My day hasn't actually started yet, except here at the Cooking forum. Yesterday was lovely, until dh called me from the garage telling me our dog had a smackdown with a car. She unexpectedly crossed the street to meet and greet a neighbor and ran into a moving vehicle and knocked herself out cold. I guess it was pretty scary as it was thought she was dead at first, by him and the neighbors. She was bleeding from the nose and coughing, and by the time she was completely checked out, back to normal. Whew! Sharon, I used to have a bougainvillea exactly that color! Thanks for starting my day with such a blast from the past. And Sol, of course being a Scorpio, fall colors are my favorite! Thank you all. I'll check back a little later to let you know how the day turned out. The good news is my dog is healthy, the weather's fine and the day glorious with fall leaves...

Thank you ALL! How nice to see Birthday Greetings when I checked in this afternoon! I had a lovely day...the weather was delightfully crisp and cool, my dh baked our traditional German Chocolate cake and gave me my own personal gps. (The cake is delicious, and now he has all the important cake baking secrets and tips. In fact, he thanked me for sharing them, and said baking was kind of fun this year. We figured he's been making that cake for the last 12 years, and he's finally comfortable with the process after a dozen practice sessions, I guess.) I'm very impressed with him as he toasted pecans, split two layers into four, cooked the icing and cooled it until it was ready to frost the cake, and set wax paper strips around the cake to keep the goo off the cake plate. He only asked me one question about it this year, and that was ''how long?'' to keep the cake in the freezer until he should split each layer into two. I'm loving that he's turned into a baker, and not even a reluctant one! I gave him a gps last year that we shared, and I secretly think he wanted to keep it all to himself! Seriously though, I'm the one who is constantly known to always ''miss the exit'' so now I have no excuse. I'll accept all help given, and appreciate it too. Thank you my old (and new) friends, fellow Scorpios, candy and flower givers! I love Angel's Trumpet Sharon...how did you know?

This is a great thread. We're not remodeling but building a new house, and man, can I relate to a lot of these. ...you know every lighting fixture, faucet, sink, appliance by memory because you have endlessly researched each one. you freak out your own GC because you can discuss minute details about your house/kitchen from memory down to the 1/8". you have more e-mails from your GC/subs than you do from your friends. you wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat about some critical detail and then go downstairs to e-mail your GC about it right at the moment before you forget.