26 days...

...and still a lot to do! But I'm slowly crossing bits & pieces off my list.

(Wedding? What wedding?)

This week-end we took the dress to get it altered. For some reason I feel so much better now. The lady doing the altering seems so competent and so nice. And being a novice at this, this may be how they all do it, but I was so relieved to learn that Karen will go for a final fitting, and then they will keep the dress there till the Thursday before the wedding. Right before we come in, they'll steam it. So that means it has to to stay in my house only from Thursday AM to Friday afternoon, when I can take it to the hotel! That's a big relief! And the dress is just so beautiful! But of course that comes with a price. All the flowers around the bottom of the top overlay aren't on a strip. They are sewn only solely by the stitching in their sequins! So the seamstress has to cut off that whole strip, then cut off some more (damn my "short" genes that K inherited) then sew the whole strip back on again. I'm certainly glad that's not my job!

I'm still waiting for my "foundation garments" to arrive so I can see how much alteration my dress needs (and exactly how fat I'll look that day).

After the alterations and lunch, Gary and I journeyed to Pittsburgh to our dear friends, Craig & Pam's house. Craig has retired...the last of the bunch to do so (well, except for Pam his "young wife!") So we celebrated that with Duke and Sandy. Now the guys can play whenever they want! (The phone just rang...it's Craig calling Gary on his first day as a retired person. They're so darned cute for "old" guys). Craig and Pam have no children of the human sort, so we also spent a lot of time with their critters, which include an adorable new kitten named Indy (yep, Indiana Jones!). All their animals except the parrot are rescues. And Pam is amazing, as their house does not have any animal smell, their animals are exceptionally well-mannered, and their house is so clean. Their living room is huge and wide open with lots of white and beige and not a hair in site!

After THAT we stopped at New Castle to congratulate Big Karen's nephew, Justin on his high school graduation. Then home...

Here are pictures of the week-end and then some of the garden. Seems that when I should be doing something for the wedding, but can't get motivated, I grab the camera!

Some kind of decadent ice cream cake for Craig (and us!).

The Boyz: Duke, Craig, and Gary. The pets: JesseMollyNew kid on the block, IndyRuby (who makes beer can opening noises and says things like "Wanna go potty?")

And finally, this week in the garden -