Last vacation

Hmmm. Guess I shoulda said something about how I'd be gone for Husband's family reunion last week, huh? We were up in the mountains of TN at his family's cabin and had a really lovely time. Just for the record, I take back everything I ever said about the (ahem) rustic state of the cabin. When we drove up, I was startled to note my happiness in seeing it again, spiders, dust, must and all. And I promise, it wasn't all due to my relief at getting out of the van after 8-1/2 hours. No, really! I was even genuinely sad to be coming home, and I usually LOVE to come home after vacations. Was it me who even suggested to Husband how great it would be to stay there for a month sometime?! Yes, it was!
But here we are at home and it is nice to be back after all, except for the evidence of an enormous storm that blew through on the 4th. It knocked a huge branch off our neighbor's old maple, crushing a particularly lovely part of my flower garden out front. I have blackberry lilies, obedient plants, hollyhocks, and spiderwort there and hope they'll all perk up again. Oh, and a 7-foot tall cactus we keep on our front porch to ward off religious proselytizers fell over, taking out both our porch railing and half a gardenia bush. Our metal porch railing! Now there's a big hole in the house siding that will no doubt cost an arm and a leg to repair. How random is that?

Still, it was a lovely vacation and our last one for quite awhile, I think, since work is getting so busy. Hope all you American types had nice holidays, too!