Monday, July 30, 2007

To Blog or Not To Blog, That Was Today's Question!


It's been an exciting day all around and since it's also been a LONG day, I really couldn't decide whether or not to post an entry on my blog. The more I thought about it, the more I thought that it was important for me to do this, so here goes!
Frank went to the hospital early this morning as he started to work as a volunteer in the Cardiac Rehabilitation Center at AMH. He put on his handy dandy little uniform and I couldn't help but get tickled at him. I haven't seen him wear a short sleeved shirt with a tie since our early marriage days. All he needed was a T-shirt under it to complete the picture ;-) all kidding aside, he looked very nice and I'm sure that he will not only benefit from having the pleasure of working with these patients since he's been there and done that himself, the patients will benefit from his presence since he is so good with people and makes everyone feel better just by having been around him. He's such a neat guy and I'm blessed to have him as my husband and friend.
Once he was gone, I showered, got dressed and headed across town for a belated birthday celebration with my CbC group. Three of us have birthdays a few weeks of each other, so it was a group celebration. It was not the actual day for any of us, but we don't really need a reason to celebrate, eat and enjoy life!
We started a wonderful tradition 3 years ago before the business was formed and we were still just a group of women who painted together who are great friends.


Rather than just giving a small token gift to each other, we decided that each one of us should paint a painting each year for one person in the group, so that at the end of a designated length of time, we would each have an original painting by each person in the group.
This year Cindy C. had my name and she painted me one of my favorite things ... a martini! She knew that I had painted "A Shot of Olives" and also "Prelude to a Martini", so what better painting than one that would complete my triptych and sit on my bar for all of your guests to enjoy. I was both surprised and delighted with what she had chosen to paint for me. You can see that it's the perfect thing to complete the "setting" in our bar. A little vermouth might be the very thing to complete the scenario. What do you think?
My friend, Margie, did a collage for me of some of the fun times I have had over the past 71 years and I absolutely love it. In my mind's eye I still look like the 103 pound tanned girl in the bikini in Puerto Rico. What on earth do you suppose happened ... gravity ???
I also received lots of darling and useful gifts from some hand painted pliers to open certain tubes of paint, a bottle of Limoncello had delivered from Pompeii, cocktail napkins that I can use with my martini as soon as I make it, a tiny little refrigerator magnet which is a replica of the cupcake that I painted for Canvas by Canvas and many wonderful, hand made and designed greeting cards. There's nothing better than having artistic friends. The gifts are AMAZING!!!

To top everything off, each "Birthday Girl" was served a delicious piece of intense chocolate cake with a candle on the top which we shared with the rest of the group, and one of the waitresses sang Happy Birthday to us in Italian ... a perfect end to a perfect celebration. My thanks go out to each and every one of my beautiful artsy fartsy friends. I love you all like sisters!
Pcasso

3 comments:

Margie Whittington said...

Thanks so much Pat for sharing your day. Loved CC's painting and your description of the luncheon.
Thanks for sharing the collage and the dessert looks to die for. I know Frank will enjoy his volunteering at the hospital. He is a sweetheart and so are you!!!!

BG Hackney said...

Glad you Blogged today, that was a special time and lots of fun, even enjoyed reading about it!! bg

Elizabeth Taylor said...

Pat I loved reading your blog almost as much as sharing your cake at lunch today! =) Those three paintings look wonderful on easels together. What fun we had and thanks for chronicling our celebration for the July birthday girls of Canvas by Canvas.