a crane hill finish!

We arrived at the B&B mid-afternoon on Friday, and we had a blast together! Here's the crane photo for this trip . . .

I'm not sure if he's decked out early for Christmas, or wearing last year's decorations! Whichever, he was looking festive and happy to see us!

I picked my spot first thing Saturday morning. Todd took his fishing pole and tackle box down to the water, but I decided this was the perfect workspace for me!

Especially when you consider the view I had all day long . . .

It was sometimes hard to not get lost in that view!

Anyway, I plopped down in my chosen spot to tackle the binding on Sawyer's quilt!

I actually would finish a side and then read a couple of chapters in the book I brought. Consequently, I finished both the book *and* the quilt this weekend!

Tah-dah! Finally! I don't know why I procrastinated so long -- it's really cute and will look darling in his bed, with the matching bumper pads and skirt. More than anything though, I hope it becomes a favorite blankie and is loved and used!

And, finally, I knocked off a Charming Girls goal (from July/August). Better late than never is what I'm sayin'!

And it was good to get away, but blessed am I that when I come home from my getaway at the lake, I'm coming home to our peaceful, getaway in the woods!

:)

crane hill . . .

He's much more impressive in person . . .

Partially because, if you're seeing him in person, it means you're at the Smith Lake Bed & Breakfast, in Crane Hill, Alabama! I'm preparing to be seriously impressed, because I'll be seeing him up close and personal TODAY!

The first time we stayed at Smith Lake B&B was for my birthday in 2006. It's an absolutely beautiful spot.

Here it is from the lake. It's a huge home! There are actually two guest suites, several common areas (including a sun porch with a jacuzzi), and then the hosts' home. Each suite has a bedroom, full bath, sitting area, and a complete kitchen.

The first time we were guests there, we stayed in "The Loft" suite.

I've stayed in plenty of B&B's, but I wasn't prepared for how roomy and apartment-like the guest suites would be! This time, we're staying in "The Dock Suite" which has its own private screened porch. Oh my goodness -- couple that porch with the gorgeous weather forecasted for this weekend and this view . . .

We're in for a weekend of bliss!!

One of my favorite places on the property is one of the common areas, the gazebo. It's got great seating and a grill & refrigerator and offers another quiet place or a party place - depending on the time of day and your company!

There's also a fire pit right off the gazebo there, that's fun to sit around with a bag of marshmallows on a fall evening!

Todd isn't sure about me handling all the steps down to the dock, but I think I'm up to it. Steps aren't bothering me too much these days -- as long as it's smooth terrain, I'm good. We'll certainly have the opportunity to get our exercise and my physical therapy in!

Aside from wanting to experience a new suite (and if you happen to check out their website, you'll understand why we wanted to check out the other suite), if you look in the above picture and follow the steps up as far as they go to the right, you'll understand one reason why we decided The Loft was not the ideal spot this year! It's WAY up there!

Way down there is the floating dock. There's a sunny spot to read a book or just take a cat nap -- it's also a nice place to take a morning cup of coffee, your Bible and watch the sun come up. One thing to note -- that's a ramp down to the dock, not steps! The lower the water is in the lake, the steeper that ramp is! When we visited in 2006, the water table was the lowest it had ever been. That was one steep walk!

Last time the owners were gracious enough to take us out on the lake in their boat. We're looking forward to another ride! The lake, which is man-made, is HUGE, and incredibly deep, too.

So, I've vacuumed, scrubbed, and laundered everything in the RV (it's no fun going on vacation, only to come home to messy home). I've packed a book or two, my laptop, a quilt that's ready to have the hand sewing done on the binding, and some magazines (and some clothes, ho-hum). We're loading up the Keurig (hahaha!), some snacking foods and easy meals -- but no breakfast foods; that's on our hosts. Folks, we're hitting the road!

Hasta la vista, baby!

:)

one more from the weekend . . .

I just *knew* I had sampler photos of the B&B where we stayed this past weekend. Time didn't afford us to take all the pictures we would have liked to have taken, but this is a good start. The bed was HUGE and very comfortable!

The room was "The Wheelhouse" and there was a water view from every window. Even at six thirty in the morning it was beautiful! Our room sported a coffee maker, a fridge, and a microwave. The bathroom was *wonderful*! Roomie and comfortable; since living in the RV, I'm all about getting away for a shower experience. LOL!

The downstairs room, "The Fantail," is a bit bigger with a full kitchen. It also opens up to the deck, and has a very short jaunt to the hot tub. The bathroom is smaller, but the shower works just fine, I'm sure.

The picture at the top, right corner of my collage is the view from The Wheelhouse down to one of the gardens. This patio garden had a nice fire pit and overlooked the waterfall. Simply gorgeous. I can't imagine how pretty it all is when things are green and blooming. Only one way to find out . . . !

On another note, the Living Proof Ministries blog is doing a roll call for their online walk/Bible study through Beth's latest book, So Long Insecurities. This book is what the conference that Joc & I are going to in April, at Woodstock, is based on. I've never done a Bible study through blog before; I'm interested and excited to see how it works.

Not feeling great, but certainly not feeling worse. I guess it just takes time for the antibiotics to work their magic. But no mind, this too shall pass. And I am counting it all joy!

:)

more weekend pictures . . .

Okay. Because I realized I had not uploaded all the pictures I would have liked to, and because I finally figured out that if you compress your pictures they upload a LOT faster, here are some more glimpses into my super-wonderful weekend!

Here's that lovely breakfast I told you about . . . note that the napkin is still on the table with the spider! I had tomato juice (which was very fitting, considering our table setting, I thought). And please also note the truffles & ice cream appetizer! YUM!

Our second course of eggs, toast, bacon & grits! Doesn't it look great? And I kept the coffee coming! (As I told Jane -- Todd's a one cup of coffee person, and I'm a one pot of coffee person!)

One cat . . . Spot

Two cat . . . Maddy! (And three and four cat, too!)

More festive decorations! (And more cats.)

And more . . . most everything had cats!

See what I mean?

I loved this guy, hanging out at the bottom of the stairs!

This was Ginger, one of the upstairs cats. She was very shy. In fact, she bolted as we came up the stairs to take a look at the other guest bedroom, and only peeked around the door when I called her by name. I think, by her look, she's wondering who the heck I am to call her by her given name. She really did look rather indignant!

These are pictures of the quilts I found in her church . . . they really were beautiful.

And finally, a darling hand wreath which was on the wall in one of the children's Sunday school rooms! (We got the royal tour!)

The heavens declare the glory of God. That pretty much sums it up, perfectly.

:)

what a weekend!!!

And I can say that on a Tuesday, because my weekend extends into Monday! What a nice way to cap off my fun little surprise escapade with my hubby -- with one more day off!

So, the fun started Saturday morning. Todd came home off shift, showered, and we loaded up the car. I had lots of questions; most of them went answered! Anyway, we got settled in the car, ready to head out, and Todd had me put this into our trusty GPS:

Okay! I now know we're headed north to Murfreesboro, Tennessee! Our drive was about an hour and a half through rolling hills and lots of farm land. The leaves are just starting to change, and had it not been a drizzling day, the color would have been absolutely spectacular!

We finally turned our last corner, into the driveway of our destination, which was:

The Hastings House Bed & Breakfast! We were warmly greeted by our hostess, Jane Blakey, and shown to our room, The Quilt Room. How appropriate is that?!?! As you entered the room, the first thing that catches your eye is:

This beautiful quilt that her grandmother had hand quilted hangs over the sleigh bed. Quite beautiful! There were several quilted items in the room, including this gem which was one the wall at the door --

It was a piece of an old crazy quilt that had been in her family, and she'd had made into a skirt. When the skirt was finally too worn to wear anymore, she had a piece cut and framed to save forever. Really cool! There was also an embroidered quilt on the bed, with matching pillow, and several additional quilted pillows, including a patchwork cat! This was truly my kind of lady, as you can see here:

And this was definitely a home; she had two indoor/outdoor cats and four indoor cats! Two of the indoor cats were downstairs cats and two were upstairs cats. The two downstairs felines, Spot & Maddy, were long-haired, but groomed like lions. They were both very sweet cats and beautiful! Jane did warn us that we needed to shut the door to our room; the cats took ownership seriously, and to a cat (as anyone knows) an open door is an invitation! In addition to the live cats, there were a plethora of cats throughout the house as decor; Todd and I counted 49 just in our bed & bath rooms! There is no telling how many there were throughout the whole house. Hundreds upon hundreds, easily!

On top of the cat decor, Jane takes her holidays seriously, and the entire house was decked out in Halloween! It was quite fun, and literally was in every available space!

My favorites in the dining room were the buzzards perched on top of the china cabinet.

The three rats sitting on the parlor table were quite realistic (unless you take all the cats into consideration; perhaps that's why they were so "ratty"!

And there were lots more fun things (and I took lots of pictures that are not posted here), but it was time to get back into the car, because the surprises weren't finished! After a bite to eat at Logan's we headed to . . .

Bell Buckle, Tennessee!!! Where they had their HUGE annual arts & crafts/flea market/festival weekend going on! It was huge -- over 500 vendors, spread throughout the town. All *kinds* of stuff, from hand-crafted hats, to seasonal decorations, to jewelry . . . you name it, it was findable at Bell Buckle! We were able to park relatively close to the action, and the first order of business was finding a vendor who had GLOVES and HATS and SCARVES! It was *soooo* cold, windy, and drizzly! My first purchase, in fact, was a $2 pair of mittens. After that, I was good to go, but I didn't take a lot of pictures, because that meant taking my fingers out of their warm & cozy mittens! Weren't no way! I took one photo going into the food area, because at that point I had a very nostalgic sense of the Annapolis Renaissance Festival and it made me happy! :)

The festival shut down at dusk, and we stayed until the end! I found some fun pins -- a scarecrow, a cornucopia, and a darling snowman with snowflake earrings. I also grabbed some wonderful hot chocolate mix, a red flannel scarf that went perfectly with my newly fabricated sweatshirt jacket, a pink John Deere t-shirt for my Secret Pal, and some yummy pumpkin fudge for me and sugar-free fudge for Todd! Todd was more rudimentary in his purchases -- fingerless gloves with a mitten top, a crocheted scarf, and a crocheted cap. I'll probably end up wearing the cap! :)

Once we were spent, we headed back to the car. I was so glad to get the heat pumping! We had seen a Cracker Barrel on our way to Bell Buckle, and had already decided that would be our dinner stop. I was still so chilled, I had decaf coffee with my dinner! After dinner we (I) did a little (more) shopping. They had a black fleece poncho with a faux fur-lined hood which I snatched up. I also got a squirrel votive holder for James (because he'd coveted mine), and some Halloweenish stuff for my SP. From Cracker Barrel, we made a quick stop at KMart, and then headed back to the B&B to watch the Alabama vs. South Carolina game! When we got into our room, we found the fire place on, our bed turned down, and bon bons on the bed! I ate mine. Todd's is pictured. I ate his, too! :)

Oh yeah -- Alabama did finally win . . . but not before I feel asleep in the bed! I woke up in time to turn off the light and roll over! Hey, walking around in the chill and damp looking for serious sales and finds is hard work! :)

Sunday morning we leisurely got up and had a wonderful breakfast. There was coconut-rolled truffles in ice milk as an appetizer, with a slice of lemon friendship bread. YUM! Chocolate and ice cream for breakfast? I need to come back here! Then we had egg soufflés, country bacon, sour-dough toast (with a pecan honey jam that was superb), and garlic grits. Breakfast was delicious! Jane had put our napkins in big, plastic spiders. I immediately took mine and reposed it in a rather threatening way! Jane told me later that her husband noticed it and commented, "I bet I know where the man sat!" To which she was tickled to be able to say, "Actually, that's where the lady sat!" I'm a kid at heart, what can I say?!? Jane later showed me her collection of napkin rings -- I'm telling you, she and I were kindred spirits!

On a side note, she also told me that she purchases her milk from a local dairy farmer. He has, she told me, a "cow of the month". I'll have to check it out! Or rather, I did; clink on the link back there and check out Hatcher Family Dairy!

At one point, she was telling Todd & I their history and how they came to purchase the house and whatnot, and she said, "My husband said when he finished school he'd have to work another three years for the VA. I told him, 'You better plan on working longer than that -- I like to shop!" I felt the need to give her a high-five!

After breakfast, we showered and dressed and headed down the street and around the corner (we really could have walked) to First Baptist Church Murfreesboro. We had decided to go to the 11:15 service, which was the contemporary worship. It was a light crowd (the pastor explained they were in the middle of their fall break), but the worship was sincere and wonderful and the message was right on point.

We headed back and packed up, and Jane decided she wanted to show us the rest of her house (included the elevator and the basement) and her church, which was out her back door, through the gate, and across the parking lot! What a bonus for me, as there were several more quilts hanging in their vestry! Lovely.

When it was finally time for us to hit the road, I noticed the house across the street:

BOO! I love the spiders crawling down the side of this big, old, beautiful home. I am sure this town is a lot of fun on Halloween night!

Then we were back in the car and ready to hit the road for home!

My husband *loves* having his picture taken!

What a wonderful birthday weekend I had! We had a lovely drive home, stopping for lunch at a steak house along the way. The sun was shining and we got to see the beautiful fall colors. I really enjoy my dear man's company. I like just sitting beside him and noting things of interest as we drive. We are definitely comfortable companions!

We got home about 4:30; Merlin was most happy to see us! Traveling is fun, but it's always nice to be home. I think that's one of the reasons we're both so excited about RV living. The comforts of home will follow us no matter where we travel!

Thank, dear husband, for a lovely and memorable birthday trip! I had a marvelous time!

Mmmmmwah!

:)