A long time to catch you up on....

On the 18th of November, we got up REALLY early and left Alpharetta and started on to Faribault.  H ended up driving the entire 18hrs (1083miles) so I had some time on my hands.  I played with my new camera quite a bit.  For the entire trip, I took about 1500+ photos.  I won't bore you with ALL of them, but I'll share quite a few with you now so that I can catch you up.

 We had to rent a car as the Explorer had some issues and was in the shop and, being November, we weren't sure about the weather and were hesitant to take my Vibe as it is just front wheel drive.  We rented a Kia Sorrento.  And as the rental agent reminded us....Built right here in GA!

Overall, we were VERY impressed with it.   Probably the only thing that would cause me to hesitate in purchasing one is that I had a few blind spots that I would have to get used to, but the mirrors were able to help out with those.

 The Khakster was in the cargo area with Cozmo.  He had to pop up every once in awhile to make sure we were heading in the right direction and that LuLu (the gps) wasn't leading us astray.

 In about 8 hrs, we were in downtown STL.

 And before we knew it, it was dark again!

And all of us were very happy to finally pull into the cabin, especially Cozmo, who had a very bad trip up.

 Saturday am, we took a short walk around our neighborhood.  It was dreary and overcast.  Windy as well, and some snow blew in towards evening.

 A lot of times that we head north, we have Saturday breakfast with Chris, Rog and Cookie.  Normally at the Steer (a truck stop nearer to them) This time, they came to us and we went to Bernie's in Faribault.  Yum Yum!

 

 Sunday, we went to our favorite dog park.   When we went back on Monday, there was a bit more ice on the pond/swimming hole that Khaki had to run across.  Cozmo had to follow.   As it wasn't very thick or entirely covering the pond, we were quite frightened. 

From then on, we ran up to the dog park in Dundas (about 15miles or so) which doesn't have any water!  Faribault D.P.will be saved for the warm or really cold months!  We got to meet lots of great dogs and H even knew a few of the owners!

 Here's Rosy being chased by Cozmo.  What a cute puppy Rosy is!

Stopped over to see Wayne and Elvy.  They enjoyed having Khaki and Cozmo come over.

 

 And Cozmo (and Khaki) enjoyed looking out the windows.

 We went to Joe's place to watch the Vikings game and the Nascar Championship race at Homestead.   P&T and E&G met us and Chris.  It was quite fun!

 

 

 

 Aren't they so cute???  They had lots of play time and seemed to enjoy their down time.  Normally, when we give them a treat ball before we leave....they see through our meager attempt to keep them from storming the door.  This trip, they seemed to say "get the hell out of here so we can take our naps!"

Going...

 And coming...

 The ducks seemed to be holding abundant numbers.

 At P&T's, watching out the slider for the cats!!!!

And the yelps that they would give when they caught sight of one!

 H out with Luna Frypan, Khaki and Chip.

 T out feeding the birds.  Khaki is now an expert as he followed and watched her every move...he just needs thumbs and he'll be able to take over.

 Luna Frypan likes to sit on the sofa, right where someone just moved.  Chip was helping T help C on the computer.

 Thanksgiving was at P&T's.  I think that there were about 17 of us.  Most were T's family.  I hadn't seen most of them for quite awhile.  And a few, I hadn't met as they, also, have additions to their family.  Everyone was nice, in a good mood and had yummy food in their tummies.  Prime rib, turkey, salads galore, cheesy potatoes, pies to die for.....yum yum!

 Red.  T's mom.  She is so sweet and has a great laugh.  She was doing very well that day and H and I both enjoyed visiting with her.

 After everyone left with full tummies and containers of leftovers, H had some back pain that hadn't left him from the morning.  So T, who used to be an ED nurse and now works in the computer admin part of the hospital, joined the 2 of us to a jaunt to the ED.   In about 2 hrs, we were working on the assumption that he had a kidney stone.  Didn't really ever get anything conclusive, but even when we saw the staff dr on Friday, all of the symptoms pointed to kidney stones.   Some meds and some rest and he felt almost back to normal in 2-3 days.
On Saturday, we had a ham that we didn't cook on Thanksgiving, so we went to W&E's to cook it and to do a load of laundry.

 It was a very enjoyable day.

 

 U. Doug joined us.  He just lost A.Annie last month which made us all very sad.  He came to share lunch with us.  It was such an enjoyable time!

 Sometimes I get just the right angle and look...

and I melt.

 Spent Sat night out at P&T's again.  Computer time, laughs, dinner and fun!

Oh, and FIVE dogs....again.
I'm going to place a bet that taking a photo where there isn't one of them in a total blur is totally impossible.  Even sleeping, one of them will be moving!

 C showed us her ski racing helmet.  Apparently, it is larger than most as she has a large skull. (I didn't know smarter brains were larger, but I guess they are)

H had to show that he was also smarter than most.

But we all knew that!

;-p

 C talked us into the wii.

We normally do Mario Kart.

But this was some sort of dancing.

 We even got the boys to play.

Oh, and, thank you, P, for not taking my picture!!!!!

 H had to go to FSD on Monday for the day and I had planned on driving south.  But there was bad weather in KY and TN and GA that was going to last until Wed.  So I stayed put.  T&C took Monday off and kept me out of trouble....I think.   They can be bad influences!!

No, we went to lunch and C was adventurous!!! We tried the Kurry Kabob.  Very good stuff.  Then we went to the yarn store and then back to the pup-dogs.  Hung out til evening when I headed back to the cabin.  H got back and we spent Tues am packing up the car for me to drive back.  I took the mutts up to Dundas to run and we all called it an early night.

3am Wed came early.  Rog dropped Cookie off at 4 and we headed south to GA!

Took us 18hrs and almost 1100miles.  We made great time and we were all so glad to be home.  The short amount of daylight hours makes a long drive even longer.

Cook stayed with us til Sunday.  She joined us on all of our obligations and fun.

I managed to find out that they had 2 openings for the first Christmas High Tea at Bulloch Hall on Thursday.  We sat with 6 other ladies at our table.  The food and the conversations were fun.

 

Every year, Bulloch Hall decorates according to a theme.  This year, each room became a scene from Dicken's Christmas Story.

It was done very creatively and was quite amazing.

But I have to admit that I don't like the story and it was pretty dark and not real Christmasy for my taste.

 

We had our tea in the master bedroom.  The blue bubbles are clear glass ornaments hung on tulle that is stretched.  It was so awesome!

 Not sure why this photo won't rotate, but the dining room was beautifully done.

 The library was pretty as well.

Janice, the in-house artist, made all of the character faces.

 Janice, JoAnn and Pam.

JoAnn is a fellow docent.  She is so sweet.

Janice and Pam are Bulloch staff and are wonderful.  They are doing 5 teas this year as fund raisers.  Instead of being in the house for the month of December, I will be doing all of the ironing for the 5 teas.  I ironed before we left for MN and will go in on Tuesday and Thursday this week and next to help out!

 

The Wing Room was pretty as well. 

 

 In the Morning room, I took a photo of myself!

 I loved the entryway!

 Cookie in the dining room.  The swag was great.

 The Parlor had a pretty window.

 On Friday am, we had to run to the airport to pick up Steve and Arlene.  We had in our driveway a vehicle that they purchased from an Agco employee.  Since they live in MN, they flew down to drive it home. It didn't work out for us to take it on our trip to MN, which, from the sounds of it, Arlene was very GLAD OF!  She wanted to take a vacation with her hubby and it sounds like they had a fun time planned as they were going to spend some time in Chattanooga and Nashville.  Since H and I just did a short stint in both in Oct, I gave them what little I know and love about the 2 cities!

 Off they go!

 Cookie got approval fairly quickly from a white runty mutt.  He spent quite a lot of time in her lap!  At least he was living up to his nickname:
Lap whore.

 Dakneese had lunch with us on Thursday and then invited us all to pizza on Friday night.

Well, I guess you could say that we wheedled an invite!  I had already been to the a/p to pick up Steve and Arlene and H was coming in much later.  MoE was coming in about 30min after H was and, since we live 5miles apart....MoE was willing to put up with H for an hours drive...whew! 

I offered to make create the fixings for the pizza since I didn't have to drive to the a/p, and Dakneese volunteered to clean her house for us.
Win-Win in my book!!!Now, if I can just get her to come and do mine...what a disaster after 2 weeks of vacancy.

 Cook was quite surprised to find that MoE and H must have been twins in another life.

 

 The boys were happy to get to play!

 It is great to have H home again!

 Khak knows that he's not allowed upstairs, but had to go exploring as something caught his attention.

 Dakneese had some leftover grits and found a recipe for some yummy muffins.

 Laughter IS the best medicine!

After we finished our yummy meal, Coz got to sit at the table.

Heaven only knows what we were laughing about...

On Saturday, we went to pick up H's vehicle at the garage.  Cook and I stopped at Super H Mart to have a look around and to show her a Korean grocery store.  She could have spent a entire day there.  And I know what she means!   I love it there too.

There was some beef at HMart that H wanted to look at so he stopped after we did and then had to get some charcoal to grill up the salmon and rib eye.

Before a wonderful meal, H had to show Cook a little bit of the internet.  She became quite enamored with the recipe and the quilting links.  She says that she can't get one cuz she'll waste entire days....boy, don't I know all about THAT!   Don't think I've ever heard of anyone with a computer who HASN'T wasted a day or two on it.

On Sunday, we stopped up at the garden to show Cookie our "farm".  It is mostly asleep for the season, but we do have some radishes that H harvested and we noticed that our garlic has sprouted.  Oops.  We are hoping that we didn't get it in too early!!!

Then we headed up to the Christmas Farmer's Market.  They had it in a slightly different location, so it is hard to tell if if it was larger than last year or not.  I have to admit that I wasn't too impressed this year.  Oh well.  We did find a few things that we liked.

H had some problems with his battery so we dropped him at NTB and I took Cook to the airport.   I took her in and we had an ice cream cone.  About 90 min before her flight, we said our adoiu's and I headed home.  Sounds like she had a little bit of bumps, but that it wasn't too bad.

The boys seem to miss the extra hands that reached out to pet them.  Khaki has kept pretty close to us and Cozmo seems to think that he should still have the same amount of lap time.   Oh, it will be good to be back on our own schedule again!

This am, when H let the boys out of the kennel, I was thinking that he'd let them upstairs to wake up Cook.  Oops....they can look, but they won't find her!

Glad to hear that everyone had a great Thanksgiving, altho that does seem like an eon ago, doesn't it??