Oh Deb, I'm sorry Jessica isn't home, that must put a damper on your holiday. You & David need to start a new holiday tradition so you'll have something to look forward to (a little weekend getaway? B&B? Fancy dinner on Christmas Eve?). Hope your mother is doing well & enjoying the season. My shopping is DONE! With DD in middle school this year I wasn't going to purchase teacher gifts -- she has eight teachers!-- but the social studies teacher organized a field trip taking all the sixth graders to see the Statue of Liberty. Bless the man, they spent ten hours on a bus! Eight sixty person busses actually, 480 kids and parents participated. He's getting a Borders gift card. Yes, he deserves adult beverages but the kiddo can't take that to school. Christmas dinner is still in the planning stages, DH is vacillating between turkey and ham. So once a decision is made, I need to grocery shop. Baking I enjoy, that's not a chore at all. We tried a new pecan pie recipe from Southern Living at Thanksgiving and it just wasn't right, so the old faithful pecan pie will appear at Christmas. Happy holidays! Cecily

I had a couple of pink flamingos in my yard for awhile. I named them 'Tongue' and 'Cheek'. They finally died. I think of,embarrassment.

GAME TIME....girls were off to watch the ponies again! THE PREAKNESS 2014 RULES: At presant, there are 10 horses running. Rules are pretty much the same as The Kentucky Derby. This time SHIRLEY does not get to pick two horses...sorry! *To Shirley and each of her party guests (if you want to play), pick one horse and put your name next to it. DO NOT PICK a horse that someone has already chosen. *If you choose a horse and it is scratched, meaning for whatever reason it does not run in the race...to bad....LOL! *If you decide to play, please post your pick by 3PM Eastern/12 Noon Pacific on Saturday, May 17. If there are any horses left, I will put horse name(s) in a dog bowl...and in another dog bowl put all of the party guests that are playing.......and possibly you will get another horse. ******If per chance, you come late to the game and all the horses are spoken for, I will have another game....YOU WILL PICK WHO COMES IN LAST PLACE. I don't like excluding people from playing games and since there are only 10 horses and 17 possible OBF players....well, you can do the math....LOL! I will then post it for all to see. Prizes... WIN....1st PLACE...2nd SHOW...3rd And a prize for LAST PLACE if we go down that road! And if you will, as you each pick your horse, copy and paste the entire group of horses with names next to it, so everyone will know who has already been picked. Hope that makes sense! POST time..6:20PM Eastern on NBC I have removed ODDS, Jockey info. So take a guess on who will win THE PREAKNESS . Post Horse 1 Dynamic Impact 2 General a Rod 3 California Chrome 4 Ring Weekend 5 Bayern 6 Ria Antonia 7 Kid Cruz 8 Social Inclusion 9 Pablo Del Monte 10 Ride On Curlin GOOD LUCK!! Annie

@MrsPete My mom made a number of dresses for me when I was a kid, including the one I wore as a flower girl for her brother’s second wedding (by the time he married the 3rd and final time it was easier to buy a ready made dress :p) and when my dance costumes needed to be sewn she made those too. Those dresses and costumes are special memories for me, my mom‘s last sewing project is the quilt she made me several years ago - she only hems and mends things now. I made a duvet cover for our bed a couple years ago, pillow covers for the stationary back futon in the basement family room, and pillow covers for the sofa with chaise in the living room. The duvet I used some king sized flat sheets to make the front and back, then splurged on some pretty material and satin ribbon to ’dress‘ it up. The pillow covers for the futon I made when we still lived back in SoCal and I had access to a fabric warehouse store, what I didn’t buy in materials there I got on Etsy. The sofa + chaise pillow covers I did with cheap Walmart flat quarters in solid navy for the backs and fancier flat quarters from Etsy. The pillow forms themselves I made by ’cannibalizing’ old pillow stuffings (washed and dried in lingerie wash bags before re-use) mixed with shredded leftover fabric scraps and shredded clothing scraps, to go inside the outer covers made from an old white sheet set that was too dingy to go on the bed but since they weren’t holey they were serviceable to use for my pillow project. And yes, these projects were a lot of work. The total costs on the duvet, I spent less than I would have to buy a one of a kind duvet. With the pillow covers themselves I broke even, and the pilow forms ultimately cost me nothing since I used what I had on hand.