Last crop day

Another crop day, another gift waiting for me at my station Sunday morning.

I finished our Key West 2025 vacation pictures.

Darla won the 10 a.m. "in your seat" drawing!

Group picture.

On the drive home Cindy took me down Staunton's Main Street. This is a new mural.

Andy had no dinner planned so we went to Magarita's. I don't recall ever seeing a Day of the Dead shrine there before so that was neat.

Delicious as usual.

Saturday at the crop

Lots of scrapbooking was happening on Saturday.

Cindy and I took a lunch break at our usual place - Chicken Salad Chick.

I got started on the Alaskan cruise album.

This page describes all the games we played with our new-found Houston friends. So fun.

Our table.

Dinner offering at the hotel - teriyaki chicken, broccoli and salad.

At about 10 p.m. this soccer dad wanders into the room and starts asking the organizer, Glenda, all about scrapbooking. He must have talked to her for at last 15 minutes, looking at various scrapbooks and asking questions. Cindy and I think he must have lost a bet with the other soccer parents staying at the hotel and was forced to come and see what scrapbooking was all about.

For some reason, Drury Inn thought it was a good idea to put a full mirror on a closet right next to the entrance for the bathroom. I draped my sweatshirt ober the mirror so we'd srop running into it. It worked - kind of like those stickers they put on windows so birds don't crash.

We made it to the crop

The scrapbooking crop started at 9 a.m. Friday but that's too early. Cindy and I were up and out by then, but we were hitting yard sales. You don't see buck urine on suburban yard sale. Obviously we weren't in the burbs. He had lots of hunting knives for sale too.

The second yard sale we went to in Gillespie had so much stuff and so reasonably (and kind of low) prices. Cindy got this footstool for $5 and the table for $2! We dropped it off at her house before continuing on our way. Look at those cute vintage pumpkin things - $1.50 for all three. And the fall reversible table runner was $2.

Didn't buy this lol. Look closely.

Why didn't I buy this?

I took my work earrings out when I got home Thursday and forget to put in my hoops. I found some Halloween earrings I thought maybe I'd wear again so I'm sporting skeletons.

We got to the crop around 2:30 p.m.

Treats were waiting for us.

Dinner at the hotel was pork carnitas with a very generous double pour of wine.

Cindy being creative with paper scraps.

I finished my album of E's wedding.

Uneventful drive

I worked half a day Thursday. Still admiring the new windows that were installed Wednesday morning. Preciously, the eyebrow winows were covered. Now the space is flooded with light and we can see the trees changing colors. I left at noon to drive down to Cindy's for a night before going to the crop.

I stopped in Normal to get gas. Better price than my last trip down. Prices, though, are still all over the place so this was the cheapest I saw.

Cindy and I did a little shopping then stopped at Taco Bell for a quick dinner. It took forever to get my food. I thought Cindy would have been done eating before I had my food. When I did get my food, I found an extra burrito in the bag - a crunch burrito, I think. We ended up splitting that and the hard taco that did come with my meal.

Spicy cropping gift

This year's gift for my scrapbooking girlies doesn't even include candy. What? I filled a bag with three Penzey's Spices sample bags and two assorted tea bags. The spices encourage people to vote but that's a good, nonpartisan thing, right?

Can't see the spices in the bags, but here they are. I'm excited to try the taco one.

I'm packed and ready to go. These are my scrapbooking supplies. I tried to pack only the essentials. We'll see how that works. I also have my weekend bag and a bag of puzzles to give to Cindy and Darla.

Aunts visit L

Julie has a conference in Orlando and Allison went along for the trip so that means L gets a visit from the aunts! Here theybate Saturday night at Frontera Cucina in Downtown Disney.

They took W too.

Here's L and Allison somewhere in Magic Kingdom on Tuesday.

Today, Julie joined them at Epcot.

They spent a few hours with L and she took them to Cast Connections to search for deals.

Residential Chicago

An added bonus of Open House Chicago is walking through neighborhoods and seeing the houses, murals, oddities and Halloween decorations. It helped that we had a perfect fall day on Saturday.

This is (the backside) od the Clarke House, considered the oldest house in Chicago. It's a museum but wasn't on the Open House tour.

It's not every day (and never in the suburbs) you see a city-owned street sweeper decorated for the White Sox. I wonder if there are Cubs street sweepers on the North Side?

This is a neat mural. I'm not sure where this was - Oakley and maybe Division Street? We ended up walking over six miles that day.

Sign supporting Ukraine.

Our afternoon goal was to tour the Ukranian Village neighborhood. I kept asking if we were in the neighborhood since there are no real border distinctions, but then we saw a sign. We were on the far edge of the neighborhood at this point. Such cute houses and lots of Ukranian flags.

Another pretty mural.

I liked these "fish" door handles at St. Helen Roman Catholic Church. Details impress me.

Even the skeletons are rooting for the Bears.

Skeletons were all over this house ... and what a cute house.

This was a bit too realistic. I thought there was a real person on the porch until I got closer. Creepy.

A skeleton and a political sign.

Football and tombstones

We had a busy, fun Sunday. Our first stop was golfer John's house for a Bears football game potluck lunch with the other golfers and their spouses. Here I am with the golf wives. I made an apple salad.

Andy and I had to leave after the first quarter to go to the cemetery and take pictures of the Historical Society's 35th annual Cemetery Walk. I could have taken pictures myself but, I guess it's time to admit, Andy's are better ... usually.

It's always interesting to hear the actors' stories. We raced around getting pictures and videos of the six actors and made it back to the golf party during halftime for burgers and brats. Bears won!

After a few rainy days, the weather was perfect for the Cemetery Walk and watching the game outside. Even the geese enjoyed the nice weather at the Cemetery Walk.