Monday, October 11, 2021

Home Again, Home Again...

I'll be home again early this afternoon from the Gateway to the West aka St. Louis, Missouri. Had a wonderful time driving through Oklahoma and Missouri, in the city itself, and at my conference. More on all of that to come.

St. Louis is the home of the Arch (see above), the 2019 Stanley Cup Champions (who defeated my Dallas Stars on their way), toasted ravioli (see below), and boatload of history. Did you know that St. Louis was originally a French settlement?? I didn't, but I'm intrigued. I'll read up on that more later.

Had toasted ravioli at the Riverboat Cafe and it was good, fine. Tasty. Very much like a cheese stick, if you ask me, just in a different shape. :0)


 

Now that the conference is over, I can look ahead to the rest of the year and to next year in earnest. More on all of that as well.

Hope you had a wonderful weekend. Have a great week.

Craft Time

I'll be home sometime this afternoon and then it'll be a nice looong stretch of being home.

Thank goodness. I'm tired.

Of course, hockey season starts this week, but luckily our boys in Victory Green start the season on the road. DD and I are cutting way back on games this season. We've chosen the must-attend games (opening night (of course) favorite opposing teams, bobblehead nights, and the like) and the rest of the tickets will be listed on the secondary market. If they don't sell, we'll go.

Speaking of hockey--I'm sure you missed all my hockey talk, didn't you?--DD and I have some crafts planned.

From last year, wee have these lovely Nutcrackers...


And this year, we found gnomes(!!) while we were out and about trying to get ideas for our annual Stars ornament...

Ornament idea yet to be determined.

Recap and pictures of the conference to come. Hope you had a great week last week and here's to a good week this week.

Monday, October 4, 2021

Happy HOCKEY-tober!

 


I'm off to my con tomorrow and then after that--hockey season begins.

Happy fall everyone, it's finally starting to cool down. We've even had rain.

Hope you're all well. Have a great week.


Wednesday, September 15, 2021

GRL here I come...

The countdown has begun. Now that my Labor Day road trip has come and gone, it's time to ramp up preparations for my trip to St. Louis...not only for being there, but for not being at home or at work.

Last GRL in Albuquerque in 2019...

For home it's a matter of getting aaaaall the laundry done so DH has enough underthings to get through two weeks without necessarily having to do laundry and laying in enough groceries in advance. I usually shop on Sunday mornings, but I'll be out of town for one, and I'd rather avoid a major trip to the store at any other time and any other day. Might need to pop in for some fresh veggies, but that would be it. Thanks to my mother-in-law, I now have a second fridge to store extra perishables in. :0)

For work, it's a matter of making sure all the bills are paid in advanced or scheduled to be paid, as well as making sure the employees are prepared for my absence. Sure I can take care of stuff while I'm gone if something crops up, but getting things taken care of in advance is preferable. I won't be on vacation per se, but I won't be in regular work mode either.

As for the conference itself, it's checking last years' lists for notes about what worked and what didn't; what might be good things to have handy during various events (scissors!), and what are must haves. Then it's packing up what's needed for those events: SWAG and cover images and orange mints and Sharpies among others.

This year was going to be different in that I was supposed to participate in a panel discussion. Unfortunately, two of the four authors had to withdraw and us remaining two got relegated to author Q&As. I'm really disappointed about that... I don't know anyone in the group I've been assigned to, so I should go check out some of their books, read their bios on their websites or on Amazon and pray I don't make a fool of myself. This kind of un-prepped interaction is not my strong suit, but it is what it is and I'll make it through I suppose...

Hope you're having a great week...


Monday, September 13, 2021

A moment to remember...