It's About Love

It's about family.



It's about Jesus.

Primitiques Christmas Open House Slideshow

I'll let Mindy do most of the talking! She has that way with words whereas I words not have way with. I sure had fun! Thanks to everyone who came out! Just click the play button below...



Merry Christmas!

Winnie and Tulula's Christmas Open House 2009

Trying something new. An embedded slideshow...



Feel free to use any photos you'd like for your own blogging. All I ask is that you please give me credit as the photographer. Also, a link back to my blog is appreciated.

If you'd rather see the photos the old fashioned way...
click here to view the set.

I kind of wish I had systematically gone through and taken pictures in EVERY booth. But I didn't do that. I just wandered around and took pictures willy nilly at whatever grabbed my eye. Please forgive me if I didn't happen to take any pictures in your space.

My time is short this morning as I am headed to Primitiques to help Mindy set up for her Christmas Open House next Saturday. Mark your calendar and I'll see you there!

I haven't yet had time to name or describe the photos and they still mostly have numbers instead of names. Eventually, I would like to name them and even link them back to their respective blogs and websites so that when people view my Flickr photos, they are pointed to your business. (I have a bigger Flickr following than I do a blog following.) Unfortunately, I can't remember in which booths some of the photos were taken and I'm not very good with names. That's where you come in. Note the last three digits of the photo numbers taken in your booth and comment with those digits so I can give you recognition for your good work.

Merry Christmas!

Boo!

Photo by Donna Harkins (mom).

No, I wasn't scared either. Have a great weekend!

This Hallowed Ground

No, not the civil war book by Bruce Catton. And maybe "hallowed" is a slight exageration. But I did get the feeling that there's something very special about this piece of real estate!

On Labor Day weekend, Mindy took me to the place where she will be set up near Zapp Hall in Warrenton. I got to see the lay of the land. Up close. Personal.

I liked the colors, textures, highlights and shadows of this nearby rustic outbuilding. It seemed very photo-worthy!



I hope I am not treading on her toes to blog about our visit, but it was exciting to finally see this place in person! I'm pretty sure she will do a thorough blog later, so consider this only a sampling!



Talk about chippy white paint! It's quiet now, but not for long! I look forward to meeting new and old friends there very soon!

Our First Night in Boston

I wanted to share some pictures of our Boston vacation with you. I plan to spread it out over a few posts in hopes of not boring you to death!

On the first day, we arrived in time to get settled into our hotel and then go on a dinner cruise aboard the Spirit of Boston. This was the only time I wore slacks on our vacation. My mom took this photo of Mindy and I...



We had a short wait, so it seemed like a good time to take a few photos. The picture below is of the rest of our crew, from left to right: My daughter, Alissa. My mom, Donna. My aunt (mom's sister), Connie. My cousin's daughter (Connie's granddaughter), Angel.



A few more pictures before boarding...







Once we boarded the ship, the real fun started. They had a great buffet style meal, drinks, music, dancing... just a real fun time. I took a few portrait style shots. My cousin's daughter, Angel...



My mom...



My love...



My mom often took charge of my camera to make sure I was included. Aren't we a cute couple?...



There was audience participation...







And lots of smiles...



And virgin drinks...



I really like this one of Angel and Connie...



And this one of my daughter...



And, of course, we had a beautiful view of the Boston city lights from the harbor...



A couple points of interest about the city lights photo above. The bright half-circle toward the lower left is the entrance to the Boston Harbor Hotel. They had a huge American flag hanging in it for the 4th of July holiday and you can make it out in this photo.

The illuminated skyscraper on the right hand side is the Custom House Tower, the first skyscraper built in Boston in 1915. It is also known as "the four-faced liar" because each side of the tower has a clock face, none of which tell the correct time. The motor they installed is not sufficient to operate the clocks correctly. The building is now a Marriott luxury condo hotel.

Hope that wasn't too boring for you! More Boston vacation photos coming soon!!

Winner winner, chicken dinner! Valentine's weekend to remember!

Whew, what a weekend! I spent Friday night wrapping up the final details of my Valentine's Day surprises and didn't have as much time as I would have liked to keep up with all the details of Debbie's big 100th post party. Luckily, I had started a post earlier in the day that included my margarita recipe. I took a picture of Chuck the Buck and joined the party kind of late. Lo and behold, I woke up Saturday to find that I was the winner winner of an awesome junk necklace made by 2 Chippys!

I want to extend a big public THANK YOU to Debbie of Talking Trash for throwing such a fabulous party and for the generous give-away! I will take a picture before Mindy gets her hands on that necklace! And then I'll take some more pictures because I know she will look lovely in it! Thank you so much, Deb!

I spent most of Saturday working on Mindy's floor. Oh my gosh, did I ever bite off a big project! Suffice to say all has NOT gone according to plan! But I think I'm getting through it and I still have high hopes of the final result looking fabulous!

Then we came back to my house and cooked a couple of beer can chickens on the grill. That's where the chicken dinner comes in! We had baked potatos too. It all tasted great! Mindy and I also exchanged our Valentine's cards and presents. She gave me a very nice set of Sony headphones for exercising on the elliptical! And a VERY sweet and romantic card! She melts my heart!

My "card" to her was a custom Shutterfly photo book that I titled "What I Love About You." With 54 pages, 216 photographs and a whole lot of heart-felt writing about specific things that I love about her, I think I just may have hit the Valentine's Day grand slam!



I've been so excited about this! I'd been working on it for a month, so I think I earned every one of those sentimental tears in Mindy's eyes! Yeah, I did GOOD!

After dinner, I took a quick minute to comment a word of thanks on Debbie's blog. And then it was off to the Meyerson Symphony Center for the Valentine's Day concert of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra! And that was, of course, a lot of fun! I had a wonderful Valentine's Day with the woman of my dreams!

I spent some more time this morning working on Mindy's floor and putting the chain saw to some fallen trees that needed to be cut up in her back yard.

Quite a weekend! It was a lot of fun, but I can't wait to get back to the office so I can get some REST!

Christmas Sampler

This is a compromise. I could bore you out of your mind with lots and lots of my Christmas photos. Or I could skip it entirely. I decided to try for something in between those two extremes. I limited myself to six photos. Short and sweet. Here goes.

The now-famous cardboard fireplace.


My son, Dustin.


My daughter, Alissa.


My beloved.


OK, two of her cause she's so darn cute!


And my mom.


If you're a glutten for punishment, you can click on any of the photos and start browsing my Flickr photostream. Otherwise, until next year...

Santa has left the building.

Slowing Down

Absolutely, originally uploaded by Snakelover61.

Wow! Christmas! New Years! Crazy busy! But a very GOOD kind of busy! Now that things are beginning to slow down a tad, I thought I'd just get a quick blog posted. But I took gobs of pictures during the Christmas season and I reserve the right to bore you with them at a later date!

This holiday season was an important milestone for me in that Mindy and I shared it completely. She accompanied me to all my family's gatherings and I to all of hers. Family is extremely important to both of us. So to include someone so completely in it is just about the ultimate compliment. We did share Christmas last year, but not quite to this level.

Anyway, my holiday season was FANTASTIC and the beautiful lady in this picture is largely to blame! Thank you, Mindy!

The Love of Christmas

The Love of Christmas, originally uploaded by Snakelover61.

I'm just going to throw this picture out there. I converted it to black and white and cropped it for emphasis. By now, you probably know I LOVE candid pictures! I love to catch people just being themselves. This is my kind of picture.

Christmas Memories

My Oldest Christmas Ornament, originally uploaded by Snakelover61.

Click here to view today's photo enlarged and on a black background.

The little toy solder Christmas ornament is made from a wooden clothes pin. It is, by far, the oldest ornament on my tree. I was a mere child when I first received it. It decorated a present given to me by my uncle Tony's girlfriend, Carolynn. I think she made it herself, but I could be wrong on that point. No matter. I was just a kid, but I can remember she was very sweet to me and I loved her just as much as I loved Tony. They were going to get married and that would have suited this little boy just fine!

But Tony was tragically killed in a car accident while they were in college. Carolynn picked up her life and went on, eventually to become a wife, mother and, I suspect, a grandmother. I hope her life is filled with joy and love.

This was one of our family's ornaments as I grew up. When I was all grown up with Christmas trees of my own, my mom made sure I got it. It represents my childhood to me. And two people I loved, but who left my life far too soon.

I'm still making Christmas memories. Mindy and I went to a Christmas party at my mom's. We played a matching game where you had to guess which person was responsible for each piece of Christmas trivia. It could be a favorite memory, a favorite present, a Christmas tradition or just a little-known fact. As long as it was Christmas related and wouldn't be common knowledge of the people at the party. Anyway, I thought it might be fun to share some with you.

Here's Mindy's...

"The house I grew up in had no fireplace. Since it's common knowledge that Santa comes down the chimney, we had to build a cardboard fireplace every year to facilitate his entrance. I have no idea where one buys a cardboard fireplace (maybe Sears and Roebuck). But we had one. We hung the stockings on the chimney with care, with a stick pin. The fireplace had red brick, white mortar with a black shelf on top. And we had some orange paper flames with an orange light bulb behind to similate a nice cozy fire."

Sweet, isn't it? Can't you just imagine a sweet little baby-girl Mindy eagerly awaiting Santa next to their cardboard fireplace? Awwww!

Here's my mom's...

"Christmas time is full of wonder for me. It is truly a time of love, joy and sharing. My first memory of our Christmas tree was purchased from a "tree lot" then decorated with lights, cardboard ornaments and lots of tinsel icicles which had to be carefully draped - not thrown - over the limbs. The kids would pick and string up red berries along with freshly popped corn to use as garland."

A simpler time, for sure!

My own was just a bit of trivia that I didn't think many people would know about me. "I prefer my egg nog diluted with skim milk." I love the flaver of egg nog, but it's just so thick, it doesn't seem like a drink. So I mix just a little skim milk in it to thin it down. Oh, and of course, sprinkle with nutmeg!