monday already?

The weekends ALWAYS seem to go by too fast, but summer weekends seem to go by at twice the speed. Maybe because there's so much good stuff to do?

Saturday started early for me - had to bring diabetic kittykat to the vet to get a blood test- she was NOT a happy little camper! Went to breakfast, did a little grocery shopping then hopped the EL with Heidi so we could hit the sidewalk sale at
1154 Lill Studio because what we need in our lives? Are some more adorable, custom designed handbags. Yeah, totally. Came away with a darling Hadley bag (what? It's for work. And it was 50% off!) and a bag of really soft and fresh gummy bears (not from Lill, from somewhere else)and we were back on several EL trains back to the 'burbs for lunch with Jane. Burgers, wedding shower shopping, home, dinner, an episode of Bones, and the last half hour of the Vargathon on channel 20.4

Sunday - my first major forray into Indiana for Nicole and Mark's wedding shower in Valpo. I was up early (of course!! My annoying mental alarm clock makes it impossible to sleep in most of the time. And my meowing furry alarm clock doesn't help either!) and off to the gym. Back, made breakfast, did laundry, beautified for the shower.

Let me tell you, there is a reason I don't spend a lot of time in Indiana - it's BORING. And kind of smelly. There might be more than corn there, but I really can't be bothered to find out. The shower was lots of fun though. It was in this totally amazing restaurant Don Quijote. There were (seemingly bottomless) pitchers of sangria on the tables and platters heaped with delicious food - mixed vegetables, meatballs, potato salads, mushrooms, bread with this amazing garlic butter style spread, cheese (of some kind. really really tasty), and the main event was a gigantic vat of paella (no, seriously, it was huge. Two guys paraded it out from the kitchen so we could all admire it before they put it on a table and started plating it up) and some kind of pork and it was all really fresh and delicious. For dessert, we had a really amazing cinnamon apple crumb style cake with ice cream. It was all really fantastic, foodwise, and the shower was fun too. If you are in Valpo for any reason, go to this place. It was cute, the owners were there and really nice (they gave us all $15 gift certificates to come back!) and the food was, no kidding, totally amazing.

There were some games - one involving clothespins and forbidden words "bride" "dress" and "wedding" (if you hear someone saying those words, you can steal their pin. The person with the most pins at the end of the shower won a prize). Mine was lost fairly early because someone "innocently" asked what the forbidden words were, because she'd forgotten. And like a dope, I rattled them off. Busted.

There was a "price is right" kind of game where there was a "showcase" of stuff and we had to guess the price of it all and win a prize. You'd think for all the shopping I do, I would be better at stuff like this, but alas. I was like over 20 bucks off what the price was. There was also a game that involved breaking into teams of 5 and selecting a "bride" to craft a "dress" out of toilet paper and aluminum foil. Guess who ended up wearing toilet paper? That's right, it was me. And I didn't even win the contest, although all of the "brides" got a little prize. It was really really hilarious, actually. And I have pictures, but have to upload them, so keep your eyes on this space for my lovely "dress".

Gifts were opened (the four of us got Nicole and Mark a Wii - they had registered for one and we thought it would be a fun gift that they could enjoy together. Much more original than a toaster, yes?) and we were back on the road again. Got stuck in traffic snarl outside Chicago (grrrr) so it took a little bit longer to get home. Had a small dinner (really small), got things ready for work and then went to bed.

See? Too short!!!