Party Pictures

I thought I'd share a couple of pictures from my party the other day.

First impressions: here we see a cleaned up porch (who knew?), with one fluffy golden retriever ready to bark at anyone who fails to greet him. As you may recall, most of the spring and summer the front porch has been dominated with various projects including, but not limited to, baby robins, plant potting and screen door staining, and consequently has looked quite trashy. So it was nice to finally get it cleared up.

Here I am, in my kitchen, which was all clean only a few hours before. It is a constant battle. And sorry to disappoint, but that is only iced tea there in my cup.
The all important dessert spread. My grandma Gloria made the coconut cake. It is kind of her specialty. She makes it with fresh coconut, and it is soooo good. Grandma Gloria got a pacemaker only six days before the party, and had heart bypass surgery five days before that, but she looks great and is doing so well that she was able to come, and my grandparents stayed for more than three hours. I think the thing she is most upset about is that she can't wash her hair! She's so funny. There was almost a week between the time the doctors determined that she had a heart attack (absolutely no pain) and when they scheduled her for surgery, so she had too much time to fill, so to keep herself busy, she made my birthday cake and put it in the freezer. She was worried that I wouldn't have a birthday cake! Can you imagine? Grandmothers!

p.s. Who needs tiebacks when you can use mis-matched scrunchies? Aah, now isn't this the life, eh, Oliver?

And finally, some beautiful flowers that were given to me by dear, lovely people I work with. Although, as you know, I can't leave well enough alone. I had to take both bouquets apart and sort them into arrangements I found more pleasing than the florist's.