Sunday, March 27, 2011

A Weekend in Spring

It was a terrific Spring Saturday - wow, do I love Saturdays!The Saturdays I love the best have only a little planning and a little serendipity thrown in as well! Yesterday was that perfect Saturday.

We started by going to do some service at the church. We went down early (7 am!) and got some tasks done extra early so we could have more of the day to play with.

It was perfect spring weather so we treated ourselves to a visit to the Tempe Festival of the Arts down on Mill Avenue near ASU. It's always a great celebration of creativity. Music, art and Kettle corn!! Mmmm. (Rich is all about the chocolate covered strawberries though.)

See this booth?
INCREDIBLE fine custom jewelry!
Compassionate artist.
Mind-reader.
Judy Lazar.

I've known I wanted to re-design my wedding ring for a long time.
I just didn't know what I wanted.
(I can be like that sometimes - like ALL the time!)
I've spent lots of time looking on the computer, in stores, and wishing.
When the engagement ring broke awhile back my searching intensified. (I never knew there was a time limit to how long a wedding set would last?!?! I guess 34 years is a long time in ring years.)

Who knew I would find just what I wanted at the Tempe Festival of the Arts??

This artist had lots of designs I was already attracted to. With a few comments from me she was able to quick sketch a great design and whet my appetite.

(When we were engaged in the pre-blogging- dinosaurs-walked-the-earth-days, no one photo-documented it. Now we are doing it right! )

We returned later with my broken wedding ring and spent about an hour with Judy and the design process really took off. It was like she read my mind! I was just about in tears...Oohhh, I can't wait.

We enjoyed more of the festival - imagine where I found Rich....
He made one of these babies his!

(cute grandchild not included in the price!)

I had saved up enough money and yesterday was the perfect day. Rich had scoped out bike prices and I bought the bike I need to spend some more exercise time with him. I love to walk but Rich is a bike rider! He loves to ride his bike and has been strongly suggesting that I get a bike so we can enjoy rides together. I figure if he will willingly attend author lectures and book festivals that I can make the 'sacrifice'! Now we can cruise the canals and bike paths in style - walking OR riding!! The bike's a beauty. Now to name her. (It's an extra-small frame - the first time I've been an extra small in anything in years!!)

My basketball team had an amazing ride in the NCAA championships - I will not be greedy and want it all. Maybe I can watch the rest of the Final Four without needing heart medication.

The day was getting pricey - too much fun. I guess suggesting another trip to the bookstore was out of the question. Another good part - I avoided housework for another day!! Wahoo! Why stay inside when there's spring outside??


My book companion this weekend has been Once a Spy by Keith Thomson. I'm really enjoying it. One of the protagonists is a man who was secretly a covert operative and is now suffering from Alzheimer's. His son always thought he was an appliance salesman! This book has been out for 18 months and reminds me of a twist on the movie, Reds. It is well done and the writing is clever and crisp. Meeting the author was a fun perk.

Church and basketball, family and friends were the words for Sunday. It was almost too pretty to stay inside for long. There seems to be a magnetic attraction to the patio on days like this. It was also perfect strawberry weather. Those juicy, ripe berries dribbled down our chins - it's so much fun to eat with a four year old! It brought back lots of memories of Sunday afternoon drives when we lived in California years ago. We would drive to the fields and buy two flats of strawberries. We would strip the boys of their shirts and hand each of the four boys a basket of strawberries; munching and singing songs all the way home. It was just like that today!

The night is beautiful and I'm not ready for the weekend to end. But bring on the week, I don't want to be greedy. It's been a super weekend.






2 comments:

Suey said...

Wow, that does sound perfect! I love Saturdays where you work really hard, then play really hard. Nice.

I want to be a bike rider! I wish I could get my husband and family into it. We don't really have that many cool places to ride.. up the canyon I guess. But that's HARD! :) Still, I want to do it.

Bookfool said...

The design of your ring sounds like such fun! I've just been wearing cubic zirconia, most of our married life. Our apartment was broken into when we were still practically newlyweds and I just happened to be humongous with our first child -- couldn't fit my engagement ring on my finger, so I left it on the dresser. I've always thought we'd eventually replace my diamond, but it must not be all that important to me. :)

I'm so envious of your bike riding! I've got a bike but the hills in the military park are too intense. I tried to go the opposite direction because the terrain is flatter and just as I was getting to the point that I could almost conquer the big hill . . . a ranger stopped me and said, "You can't go that way." Sigh. I can't ride in our neighborhood because of the dogs -- no leash laws. Have fun!!