well hello, September!

My how the summer days fly by here on Cape Cod!! I can not believe it's September already. And we're already a few days in!! My life has been a whirlwind of little bits of time snatchers.

It seems all my friends are turning 40 this year! I've been to at least 3 parties this summer, the latest being my pal Hannah's 40th last night. I wish I had brought my camera...her adorable hubby bought her a retro Huffy that my sisters and auntie would swoon over!! (hey, girls she wants to hook up with us for a canal ride some time...leaf peeping season is headed our way...)

Work has kept me busy both at the store AND outside of my scheduled hours. As I may have mentioned I was asked to be 'section leader' for our cheese section some time ago (geez, was it all the way back in the Spring??). Since taking the responsibility, they have changed the way they do employee tastings to include an all day thing where little groups of co-workers come to the break room, do a little tasting, get a little informational presentation from the section leader, then off to the section for some pointers on how we like things to be done...for consistency's sake.

My section was 3rd on the list...I should've done this weeks ago. However, I was pushed back a week because we had a flyer coming out, so we had daily tastings for that. then Hurricane Irene sent everyone into a tizzy and I ended up just working the day I was scheduled to do my 'bit'. And so, today is finally the day I can get this over with. What's the big deal?? Well, I'm no public speaker and I have been on edge since the moment I found out I would have to do this...yes, the entire time...about 6 weeks of stress! So here's the deal...the first girl made a poster with some facts and had a couple recipes using the chicken sausages she was sampling. The second girl wore a toga b/c she was sampling Greek yogurts. 'I am not dressing up!!'

Here's my poster: Maybe you can click it and see the detail and my 3-D visual aide (my up close pics were sideways and I'm far too busy (or lazy) to fix them!) It has been hanging in our break room for about a week and a half! So my 'class' will mostly be a tasting since most people are already sick of looking at my poster!! (I did get kudos on my Martha Stewart-esque poster making skills and added 3-D affects.)

Of course, to prepare myself, I also brought back wine and cheese Sunday a couple weeks ago: Starting at the top left corner; plain ol' Red Wax Gouda (Goudas, if you don't know are VERY mild cheeses...not much to say about them), Pinot Grigio Salami, granny smith apples, some meats from a Spanish meat sampler (everything from Trader Joe's btw & of course), Reduced fat smoked (if you like a smoked Gouda, and care about fat and calories, this is a great sub...doesn't takes low fat at all, and I'm sure it has to do with the smoking), Old Amsterdam Aged Gouda (omg, so good! i said Goudas are mild but if you get an aged, hard variety there's some depth. I grated leftovers into risotto! yum!), crackers...pita crackers are so yummy!, and lastly a Double Creme Gouda (the last cheese leader said she hated this cheese and that she didn't stock it b/c it didn't sell well...I decided to bring it in to fill space and sell quite a bit. I thought it was a nice change from the boring red wax Gouda...the first few bites are kind of buttery.)

Okay, enough about cheese and Trader Joe's!!

My garden bit the dust (again) this year. I am terrible at watering it and just get too caught up in other things to remember it's even there! Hubby is still getting a few late tomatoes, so he's happy. He got one tiny pumpkin that had been sitting in the window until yesterday (rotted). No other squash (I think the giant pumpkin patch that formed kept the rest of that one bed from getting any sun). I got a few snow peas and beans that were consumed by Moxie and me upon picking, so nothing in the freezer this year. My edammame grew and I wasn't sure how to harvest them, but I wanted to try this year (last year I ended up just saving the peas to replant). I got some tiny ones that i cooked and ate!!

They were just so small compared to what you get when you order them out! Yummy, though!

Let's see...in spider news, I nearly got eaten by another giant one!! I noticed this little beauty in the nick of time before walking straight into it when arriving home from work. Then Hubby nearly did the same thing when he came home. And then, we went out last night...and i forgot about it and was on the other side of the car when Hubby said, 'oh, did you get rid of the spider!?' To which I replied, while wildly flailing about messing up my hair, 'NO!! IS IT IN MY HAIR!!!???? IT'S IN MY HAIR!!!' Which it wasn't...it must've blown away or something? Perhaps i walked into it and he scurried up the awning? I don't know, but the thought of that giant spider in my hair...yuck! 'Stupid hair!'

Oh, hair... (pardon my bug eyes) it's getting there...it's already actually longer than in this picture. I think my super short cuts have caused my hair to revert to it's 'baby days' when I had ringlets. It is pretty curly these days. Sometimes I think I look like my grandmother.

And mixed in with it all, Hubby is actually working MORE now that he lost his full-time job. Hurricane Irene took a lot of power out here on Cape...we were out from Sunday at 11 am until Tuesday at 5 pm. Luckily we have a gas cook top, hot water heater, and also town water. We also had little food in our fridge, so it ended up just being a good reason to get rid of last years half jars of pasta sauce. We had fires and wine in the back yard...and bbq's and gin & tonics. You can see my new summer gift to myself (which I purchased the weekend before Hubs found out he was losing his job, of course!)...it's a retro rocker...it was half price and I wanted it!! Irene also took the power out at our friends bakery...when it finally came back on (last Thursday) we went over to help clean up ...and pretty much throw away everything they had! Sadly, it included someones birthday cake! :(

You can see in the spider picture, one of our new outdoor lights (also purchased that same weekend...we had finally decided to fix our non-working outdoor lights!!). We got two new post lights, 2 new front porch, 2 new back porch, and the one side light. And my nice electrician friend put them all in in about an hour...and invited us to his annual Halloween party while he was here. Great...another social engagement!! :)

I've been running (which is another reason I've little time for creativity or blogging...I've been trying to lose the last 15 pounds -again- so most of my blogging is in the form of fitness ups and downs and kept elsewhere) and signed up for my first 5K. It's a week from today and I've managed to pack on another 5 pounds these past couple of weeks...which means I'm going backwards. Whatever...I have other things to think about! :) I'm nervous, but I've been running 3 miles 3 days a week, so I know I can do it. But I'm running with 2 friends, and so far I have only ever run alone...it will be an adjustment.

The day BEFORE the race, my in-laws arrive. This visit will be interesting. For one, they like to have lunch with us when they get in...but hubby is working until 4 pm that day. And then I have the race the next day...and he's working. They are used to him at least having weekends off. But I have taken 3 whole days off to coincide with Hubby's days and their visit. And then there's the birthday dinner...to which he decided he wanted to invite a few of his close friends...which, I think, doesn't make mommy very happy...she likes that intimate dinner, just the four of us, but its HIS birthday, so i hope she doesn't guilt him too much.

A little farther into the future, we are getting away to New Hampshire for a couple nights next month. I got a AAA email with this deal for 50% off admission to a food festival of some sort here in Mass. When I opened it up, I saw another 'deal' on the sidebar, and clicked it. It was a 2-night stay at this inn & spa, including one dinner in their lounge, breakfast both mornings and an afternoon tea, plus $20 off any spa treatment. for $260...for the both of us!! We barely hesitated to book the trip and I'm so excited to get away and sit on a wrap-around porch surrounded by mountains and trees, sipping a hot cup of coffee snuggled up in my warm bathrobe.

So that's it for now. I know I've said it before, but I'm hoping with summer winding down, I can get back into the swing of things. I re-opened my etsy shop and keep forgetting it's there. I am making a decision to add stuff or shut it down...when I can find the time to think about it!

I hope everyone's having a great summer...and, looking forward to fall?? I've not been able to keep up with my blog reading, but I've caught a few bits here and there...and I can see I'm not the only busy one around!!