Just Because

Ice Cream Cone Cookies

In the kitchen at Still Waters pastry Chef Laurie has been testing this Kitchen Aid Mixer ...


................. a much loved ( and longed for) graduation gift.


These cute cookies were destined for the office.


For a friend's ( a student summer worker) last day at work.

Ice cream cone cookies. Too cute.


And good! They didn't all make it to the office.

Leaving Birmingham

Monday, Memorial Day, was a hot, overcast, muggy day in Birmingham, Alabama. Think sauna ....add a large truck waiting to be loaded.....and heavy furniture to fill it....and a set of stairs. And at least a hundred and eighty nine boxes filled with who knows what. ... perhaps with memories .... but they were heavy memories. (All of those things not in boxes were an entirely different matter.)

Up and down the stairs, arranging and rearranging, stuffing things into every free space including both of our vehicles until everything was loaded (thankfully with assistance) and we headed home. The Alabama skies did not shine on us but almost washed us off the road and Georgia welcomed us the same way.

This morning the truck was unloaded ( with more assistance) and the contents stored until Laurie decides exactly where she will live. I suppose that means at least one more move, but for now Laurie's at home and we are going to enjoy having her with us.


Thank you Jimmy for all of your hard work on one more move. Do you think you have at least one move left in you?

Laurie recently read me this quote from Aristotle with which she related or hopes to relate : "The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet." She's thankful for the education but ready for the fruit. She begins her career with an ENT group out of Valdosta and Tifton this Monday. May the juice of this fruit run down her elbows as if she were eating a Georgia peach fresh off the tree in the orchard!

Doctors of Audiology

East Tennessee State University graduated
three Doctors of Audiology with Honors
Saturday, May 9, 2009

Johnson City, Tennessee

Laurie McDaniel, Mary Todd Vann, and Erin Keller
(highlights to follow as soon as camera returns from Cancun)

Welcome to the World, Baby Girl!

Well, that's the title of a Fannie Flagg book that we all enjoyed. But today for you, Laurie, it is actually, Happy Birthday, Baby Girl!


March 31, today is your birthday!!!! Happy, Happy Birthday.


It seems that you were just a little baby days ago and now we have all of these little babies that you are so crazy about.



It seems that I was just holding you and now you are holding Bennett (over the stream that flowed between ponds this weekend.)


It seems that I was just reading to you and you reading back to me............


and now you are reading to all of these babies.......................................



And enjoying them as much as I enjoyed you at every age.




I love you and I am very proud of the woman that you are.

I love how you love all of your family........







And how you always entertain us.................painting parties.............





..................... letterboxing .................................



.............................. blogging...........................introducing us to all of these new friends..............





And just by being yourself. Funny girl! I love you !



We all love you and enjoyed your birthday dinner. Thanks Les for cooking!