Gone Feisin'

We spent the first part of the morning at the Muskegon Feis yesterday. Anneliese stood in front of the state watching, then started doing the dance steps she's learned. This rapidly segued into generalized stomping of her own devising. Still, it was high on the cutest moments of all time list. We then wandered the vendors, of which there were few. Glad I got her shoes in Lansing. There were two authors there who write little girls' books about Irish Dancing. So I got her the first of each series, signed by the authors. ;-) Probably ridiculous and indulgent, but hopefully she'll enjoy them at some point. Whether Liffey Rivers or Kaylee O-Shay, both are cute.

We stopped at De Reuze's for a raid of the bargain gourmet section. I'm making the Red Velvet Cake with Cinnamon Buttercream for Dale's birthday and needed some more decent chocolate. The 85% Godiva was on sale, so we'll try that. Of course, I still have to hit JoAnn's for an extra 9" cake pan, as it's a 3 layer cake. Since the batter has buttermilk and soda, I'm guessing if I don't bake all 3 layers together, the last one won't rise right.

The I bought a passport for a quilt shop hop that I probably won't have time to finish. I sort of forgot I don't have Thursday off this week. Ah well, if I get a partial day off, I'll give it a try. I did pick a pattern for a vintage still little girls' apron and some quite pink fabric to make it out of. One of Anneliese's birthday presents, I think. Gotta figure out what else to get her. Hopefully something that she won't lose interest in in 5 minutes.

Today I have pears to can. And the cake to make. And more territorial research to do. We're sort of looking at Manassas and Fredericksburg. Both seem like nice areas, and have good programing for Autism.

Done!

It took way too long, but I got 11 jars of pears canned. And cleaned out the pantry so that the only thing in it is THIS years' preserves. Yeah.

Got the drop on ablackram and made her transport her own scrolls for this weekends' event. ;-) Hee. Evil accomplished.

Still have to make Dale's cake, which means a trip to JoAnn's for another cake pan.

I love surfing for quilt fabrics. But shopping locally is frustrating. The fabrics I like tend to be rather trendy and retro - Tula Pink, the new Sherri Berry Christmas fabric, Tanya Whelan, the Little Brown Bird collection. And what's available is kittens and cabbage roses. *sigh* Gotta do a shop hop at some point with company. 'Laina?

I did do a couple more professional surveys. Money that goes into Anneliese's dance account, so that, should she get to that point, we're set for an eventual school dress and hard shoes.

Which reminds me, there are no less than 3 Irish Dance schools in the greater DC area. Hopefully one would be willing to work with us. So that's good. Oh, and I happened across a real estate agent in Fairfax who is FROM Grand Haven. Used to be a Rycenga - one of the Great Clans in town.

Anybody know anything about the Barony of Steirbach?

Note to self:

Take butter out of freezer in advance of wanting to make cake.

Cake pans acquired. Though there is one odd effect of the whole relocation spectre: It is robbing me of any desire to acquire anything on the grounds that I don't want to have to move it. A major move will require me to rather ruthlessly divest of a lot of what I have already accumulated. Think we'll even leave the appliances here and deal with that when we move. Especially since any relocation allowance is likely to have a wt. limit on it.

Not that I couldn't stand to get rid of a bunch of stuff. And I was planning on a sale this spring anyway. I might just end up having to move up my timetable. A lot. Or maybe we'll play the two-places game again for a while. Won't be the first time. *sigh*

I am at least coming to terms with the fact that there are aspects of my life I can control and aspects I cannot. This is one of the latter, Still, luck favors the prepared. Hence the research into the area. I wonder if Manassas allows chickens?