Rainy Days and Mondays

Good Monday friends. First of all Happy Veterans Day to all of our Vererans past and present. Thank you for your service.

How have you been? I know I say this every month but how can it possibly be November already?  this year has flown by.  It is raining this Monday morning, again.  We are getting a new deck built onto the house and the materials have been in our yard for about two weeks.  Every time the workers try to get started it is raining!!!!

Last weekend, actually it was weekend before last,  I drove back to the Amish Farm market and finally bought one of the braided rugs I have been looking at.  There are different ones brought in every week and I fell in love with the colors on this one.  It is fairly small and I have it in my entryway and I will probably leave it there.

I also drove up to Bald River Falls a beautiful waterfall in the Cherokee National Forest.  I knew the colors would be at peak and that it would be a great time to go. I was not disappointed.  My sister and my nephew and his wife went with me and we had a great time!!

On the way back through Tellico Plains we stopped at a little antique shop, Stone Cottage, I hadn’t been in this shop for years even though it is a favorite of mine.  The owner dries flowers from her garden and makes amazing wreaths and arrangements.  I bought this dried arrangement of Nigella, or Love In a Mist it is also called. I love that name.  When they are blooming they are a beautiful purplish blue color.  These are full of seeds that I can plant now or in the spring.  Let me know if you would like some of these pods.

The last couple of weeks have been very busy for me.  I had to be gone earlier this week for a couple of days for a Gift Show in the Gatlinburg, Pigeon Forge area.  This is about seventy miles from me so I always spend the night.  I am not actually the buyer for my work but I like to go when I can and check out any possible new merchandise.  The drive up to Gatlinburg is beautiful this time of year and I always have to stop and get a few pictures.

We discovered a great restaurant in Sevierville that has only been open for about two months.  It is called Five Oaks Farm Kitchen.  They serve breakfast, lunch and dinner and we ate there for breakfast.  I highly recommend the Belgian Waffles.  Check it out if you get a chance. www.fiveoaksfarmkitchen.com I also got to spend time with some of my caving buddies who were at the show.   And in typical “me” fashion I realized when we were getting ready for dinner Monday night I had left my jeans on the bed at home and hadn’t packed them.  Soooo at 10:00 that night we had to make a run to Ross Clothing, the only thing open that time of the night in Sevierville, and get me a pair of jeans.  I hate shopping for jeans.  There is nothing that can make you feel worse about your body than trying on jeans, except maybe trying on bathing suites hmmmm.  But I went into Ross with only thirty minutes to spare and gathered six pairs of jeans and took them to the dressing room. Ross is the kind of store you usually have to dig for what you want.  It is an overstock type of store so you can find some good deals if you really look.  I got a pair of Jones New York jeans and I love them!!!!  Go figure it takes me hours normally to pick out a pair of jeans and I run in at 10:00, after having a big meal and a full tummy,  and find jeans I love.  Go figure.

We stayed in Sevierville where one of the shows was taking place and I got this early morning sunrise pic the morning I left.

Anyway I was gone for a couple of days and then drove straight back to work on Wednesday morning  because we were doing a Teacher Appreciation night for our local teachers. It went very well and we are having another one on Wednesday night.  We did tours and food and door prizes and our teachers loved it. We are so thankful for them.

We celebrated my husband’s Birthday on Friday so I took an extra day off from work. I was in Gatlinburg on his Birthday and felt bad for it but he also had to work. So we celebrated on Friday. On Saturday I went to visit my mother in law in the assisted living center where she is staying and took her out for a ride.  I try to do that every week so that she has an outing to look forward to.  I also went to a house-warming party of a co-worker and saw some friends there I hadn’t seen in a while so that was very nice.  I finished up the day with my sisters watching the Tennessee game and had pizza and beer.  If you know me you know I am not a football fan I actually could care less about it. But being with my sisters is always a good time, and I took a cowl neck scarf I have been working on and actually finished it before the end of the game.

With the traveling and eating out and not having time to work out I have felt a bit sluggish.  I try to remind myself that I have to make time to work out and eat better anyway.  I can’t use the excuse of special lunches, dinners and being gone.  I am doing those things all the time.  A day at a time progress  I suppose.  It’s back to the gym for me today.  No more excuses!!!!!

What have you been up to?

Love your day your way!!!