The Essence

Dinner at Grams was lovely. Her house is decorated so pretty with al these little nice touches. And dinner was excellent. Food always seems to taste better when you don't have to make it or do the dishes. :)

Gram & Me









Pretty candles on the porch

We also looked at a lot of pictures Gram & Dick have taken over the past year or so. There was one of Gram & her old friend, Rachel Garcia, who Megan & I liked when we were younger because she always brought us presents. :)



In fact, one year she was down sometime in January/early February & she brought Megan & I both big red, faux velvet covered, heart shaped boxes of chocolates. She made the remar "after your done with the chocolates you can keep letters from your boyfriend in the box." In my mind I was thinking "Yeah right, that's forever away. I don't have a boyfriend & I'm only sixteen anyway."



I met Ray that February. Guess where I kept all of his letters? :)



I told Gram about that & she showed me the gift Rachel last sent to her. A beautiful scarf she made that Gram gave to me because they aren't her colors & she'll never wear it. I love the thing & I just know Mom will be so jealous. ;)

Last night we had my mother-in-law & her husband over for dessert. I made a chocolate raspberry cake from a recipe I found in a magazine. Oh. Wow. It was good. The icing was pure whipped cream with melted chocolate. The cake was incredibly dense & rich (1.5 sticks of butter will do that!). But it was really good. Ray even ate it for breakfast this morning - at least it will stick with him for awhile!

I also gave Mike & Trish their scrapbook last night. I was very excited about it & they really seemed to like it. Trish even cried, saying they finally have something pretty from their wedding. I'm just so glad they like it & that I was able to put that together.



Tonight Ray leaves for Tennessee. I also found out my family is doing Thanksgiving this Sunday & Ray said I should go for the weekend. I wasn't going to make the trip, but I figured that he won't miss me since he'll be gone anyway. I didn't want to have to pull from my dwindling graduation funds to pay for the gas, so I called my beloved mother who bestowed me with a little extra, meaning I can take the faster route of the expressway AND I bought People's sexiest man alive issue.



I've always bought that issue for years. It's like an addiction, I just can't help it. I finally got rid of all of my old copies with the exception of last years, because it feautured Mr. Depp & it would just be wrong to get rid of him. Don't worry Mom & Megan, I'll bring the magazine with me this weekend!