Men are like a fine wine.

“Men are like a fine wine. They all start out like grapes, and it's our job to stomp on them and keep them in the dark until they mature into something you'd like to have dinner with.” Kathleen Mifsud

Okay, not trying to be a jerk. Men are great!! I just thought it was a funny quote and for some women, probably a way of life.

With all my lamenting about my overgrown garden I sort of forgot that we have our own "vineyard". Three sets of overgrown grapevines which sit outside the fencing and thus seem to be in another world entirely. Adam and I were walking around the house today and you could smell the purple grapes basking in the sun. We're going to try our hand at making grape juice. Also I seem to remember an old recipe for Grape Pie. My friends mother used to make it and it was delish.

Took the opportunity to snap a few pictures of some purple invites.

Popular Damask look with a border and names highlighted in purple.


It's hard to tell in the photo but this invite (below) has a subtle lilac rose pattern in the background.
Very pretty with a soft charcoal print and fleur de lies symbol on top.

The envelope is really pretty too with the pattern printed on the front.

The matching RSVP postcard. Very popular. You just apply the postcard stamp and your guest (hopefully) only has to sign their name, put a check mark and drop in the mailbox.


And finally a nicer quote to end this message
"We should all do what, in the long run, gives us joy,
even if it is only picking grapes or sorting the laundry."
E.B. White, American Writer 1899-1985

Choosy Moms choose Jif

Started my day out with a peanut butter and jam (plum jam) sandwich. I knew it was going to be a good day for at least one of the dogs because I was scraping the bottom of the jar to get enough PB to finish my sandwich. This means that before that plastic jar hits the recycling box it gets thrown outside and the fastest dog gets to lick it clean.
Magnet (Adams dog) is normally the fastest and true to form she won the prize. However, Magnet is a more dainty dog and she finished what she wanted fairly quickly. That's okay, because big bruiser Jr. (my dog) is more than happy to finish the job. It's not easy for a large-sized dog to shove her snout into a 28 oz. jar of creamy peanut butter, and lick it clean but she did it!

Some Fun Facts from Jif website http://www.jif.com/home.asp
- Peanut butter was first introduced to the general public at the 1904 World's Fair.
- We began marketing Creamy Jif in 1958. Extra Crunchy Jif made its debut in 1974.
- The name 'Jif' was chosen because it was easy to say, spell and remember.
- People in the U.S. eat, on average, 7 pounds of peanuts and peanut products per person, per year.
- 270 million pounds of Jif are consumed in the U.S. each year. That's enough to make 2 billion peanut butter sandwiches, or to spread a football field with a layer 55 feet thick! (Now, there's a thought that'll stick to the roof of your mouth!)
- There are about 1,218 peanuts in a 28-ounce jar of Jif. The Jif plant in Lexington, Kentucky is the largest peanut butter producing facility in the world.

Peanut Butter reminds me of fall, back to school, football. Here is an invite that I did recently for a chic August wedding. It would also work well for an autumn wedding. It's a very rich looking shimmery bronze color with a wide brown satin ribbon. Very Pretty!

Food, Family, Festivals, Friendly People and Fun . . . and then more food.

Let's not forget Farmers Markets, Fallish weather and Finding time For Fun. That's a lot of "F" words, huh? These last couple weeks have been very busy and with the weather being cooler I'm reminded that the holidays are really just around the corner. Last week we had our town festival Bremenfest, which always seems like the end of the summer to me. But while we're still on this side of Labor Day let's discuss summer things.

First off, I have two Columbus haunts to rave about. Adam and I were in C-bus to make deliveries and run other Sara Paper related errands. I had also promised to treat Adam to a nice steak dinner since he sacrificed a big chunk of study time to help me make a couple of deadlines. One of my best clients (hey Miss Alana!) suggested we go to j.gilbert's and enjoy a dinner. It was fabulous!!! A bit more pricey than our normal favorites but definately a treat and probably the best steak ever. After that you'd think we'd be full (and we were) but we couldn't pass up ice cream at jenis. Adam went for the Dark Chocolate Mouth-filling, palate-gripping, intense chocolate flavor with a fudge-like texture. Pleasingly dry finish while I opted for a lighter sorbet Riesling Poached Pear - A surprisingly rich sorbet; pure pear flavor with unique pear texture; sweet Riesling notes shine on the finish. Both excellent. The flavor combos are amazing.

Saturday was a fun day. I traveled to Troy to meet with a new bride (hello Miss Rebecca) who was as sweet as could be. Then I decided to go on to Tipp City to do a little antiquing. I was pleased to see that I was able to catch the last of the Farmers Market. I bought two great products - homemade soap by Living Simply Soap . I bought the pink vanilla scent. I used it this morning and really loved it. There were tons of choices, each packaged as cute as could be. The website is great, I have plans to try out the candles and lotions. Then I bought a great loaf of sour dough bread from the Woodland Gardens Booth. Very yummy!

And then the antiquing!!! I limited myself to a couple hours as I had to get back to my office to work. It's so much fun to find treasures.

Got this cute little creamer pitcher. Reminded me of our garden
and of the cute notecards I made last spring.

Check out the bounty from one day in the garden. Proof that you can plant something, never weed it, and still run a successful garden. The tomatoes on the scale are in the colander I picked up in another shop.

This is a shot of a fan program I did recently for an outdoors wedding.
Seemed to fit in with the tomatoes.

I finished my weekend with a visit with my Great-Aunt Madonna. My mom and my aunt and I went to see her and put some names with some faces. Mom wants to hang some old photos but would really like to be able to say who they are and how they fall in the family tree. Donna was helpful and fun. She told us about the wedding days from long ago. Her wedding day consisted of an 8:30 am wedding mass, then home for a breakfast celebration with the family after which the wedding party would trek to Celina to get their wedding photographs taken. They would then return home and have lunch with more family members before setting up for the barn dance. They would dance all afternoon working up an appetite for dinner with even more family and friends. Then still they would have to attend the public dance in their honor at Kempers Grove, which was a popular reception spot at that time. The parties would last to the wee hours. I couldn't believe it. I asked if everyone did that for their wedding and she nodded and said, "everyone". And the wedding night . . . a trip to the hotel in Greenville only to return the next day to help clean up after the party.

Below, fun picture of Grandpa Willy, Madonna and Anna (with dog Coalie)

Wish I were in Chicago

I wish I were in Chicago because that is where I was last weekend and we had a great time on our little "vacation". All week we knew we wanted to get away for the weekend but neither of us had the time to really research or make any substantial plans.

Thursday evening we had it narrowed down to three random places, somewhere in Pennsylvania (maybe the Hershey factory), Tennessee, and Chicago. Friday morning we decided, "okay, Chicago it is."

I've never been less prepared for a get away. Normally I like to scout out all sort of restaurant options, find things off the beaten path, maybe a nearby random festival to check out. This time we shoved our clothes in a suitcase, Adam packed a cooler and found a hotel on priceline. We also decided to just buy a GPS on our way. We had an awesome time!

Friday afternoon I'm turning off the computer and saying goodbye to the pooches. Friday evening we are enjoying our super swank hotel in the middle of Greek Town, trying to decide where to grab a late dinner. The hotel was in an excellent location and we were able to walk the path of Greek Town, smelling all the foreign (to us anyway) food. We decided to stop at Athena Restaurant, which is located on Halsted Street. Adam got the loin of lamb and I ordered a combination dish so we could try a little of everything. Adam even tried eggplant (his only known hated food).

The next morning we took our time getting the day started and ended up finding lunch instead of breakfast. You can't go to Chicago and not try "Chicago Style Pizza". We enjoyed an excellent pie at Giordano's. We kept twirling the cheese, and twirling the cheese until we had big lumpy forkfuls of the best tasting pizza. The folks at Giordano's were happy to point us in the direction of all the shopping and the Navy Pier, though they warned us to not try to walk it. We ignored them and went on our way only to find ourselves in a nice sprinkling of rain. Great! We discussed walking back to the hotel (they had free umbrellas we could use) or just buying one along the way. Then we decided to rough it and just walk and see how the weather panned out. It turned out to be a wimpy rain and not even close to getting in our way of a good time.

The estimated 4 mile walk seemed like nothing. We ducked into shops when we got tired of the rain. By the time we reached the "Miracle Mile" the rain had stopped and we were in need of new shoes, our feet were killing us with our old sandals. Who knew we were going to be doing this kind of walking? So we bought new ones and Adam spent the rest of the day trying to bait people into taking the Eddie Bauer bag containing his shot out sandals. While I shopped he had a great time putting the bag down, casually walking away and then watching people as they looked two or three time at the tempting shopping bag. It drove me crazy because I was just waiting for someone at these upscale shops to report a suspicious bag left in their store. Adam loved it and was having a great time chatting with people, giving out candy to kids (another thing I figured someone, someday, will file a report about).

The weather finally cooperated and we spent the whole day walking around, visiting Navy Pier and riding the huge, giant Ferris Wheel, which was more scary than I had anticipated. We ended the long day with a trip to a "greasy spoon" sort of gyro shop down the street from the hotel. Excellent, excellent gyros. We even discussed going into a bar to check out the music but decided to turn in instead.

Sunday Adam tested his Chicago driving skills and couldn't believe how fast people honked. Red light, red light, green li - HONK! Along with the GPS we drove around all the other areas of the city, Little Italy, China Town and a few others. Before we left town we stopped to check out the House of Blues, which wasn't really open but since they had just finished with their gospel bunch we were able to walk in and just sort of check the place out. We'd like to get back and catch a show there. From there we stopped in at Harry Carys restuarant and looked at all the pictures in their lobby. We walked around just a bit more before hitting the road and heading back home.

I'd love to hear of great places to go in Chicago if anyone has any suggestions. Our little get-away was a great time. Probably my only regret, and one I didn't think of until now, is that I didn't take advantage of the GSP and the fact that we went past Ft. Wayne. We could have looked up Harry and Helens old address and seen the house where they lived.