A couple of weeks ago Lindee & I went to the library in Rock Hill to hear author Vanessa Miller speak about her book, The American Queen. It is a true story about this group of freed slaves, after the Civil War, who formed a sort of commune in the mountains of North Carolina. It sounded so interesting, and I had never heard anything about it. I did buy a copy, just haven’t started on it yet, but can’t wait to do so.

A couple of weeks ago Meg & I headed to Columbia, where we picked Mallory up & spent the afternoon at the South Carolina State Museum. I didn’t get any pictures of it, but in the planetarium they were having a show about the northern lights in Iceland, and we really wanted to see that. We had fun checking out the exhibits while we were there, too. I actually had no idea that an astronaut from South Carolina had walked on the moon until our preacher had mentioned it at Bible study the week before, so I was excited to see that exhibit.

We didn’t have time to check out nearly all of the exhibits, but I did enjoyed all of the history we learned about on every floor.

Every year on the Saturday closest to Valentines Day Epiphany Lutheran Church in Rock Hill hosts their annual Chocolate Festival, and Meg & I always try not to miss it. This year I won not one but TWO of the raffle baskets – a kitchen basket and the teenage basket. The way they were fixed up was so pretty, and there were so many nice things in both of them.

My friend Sharon Young asked me if I would like to have her late mother’s puzzle table, and I was so excited to get it – I have been wanting and wanting one. And she gave me several puzzles, too. I chose this 500 piece one to work first, and then it was way harder than I thought it would be, because every piece in the puzzle – except for the edges – was shaped the very same way. I don’t think I’d worked one like that before.

Tuesday my friend Kirkie wanted to visit a house out in the country that has the prettiest daffodils, so I picked her up and we headed over. Sure enough, the flowers were as beautiful as she’d said they would be. We spent some time walking around there, then ran a few errands and had lunch before I headed home – and had a great time catching up.

Last Sunday I met Addie & Sherri and Gary in Greenville to see June on stage at the competition there. She did an amazing job, as did all of her teammates, and they won lots of awards, including Best Studio. No pictures were allowed during the dances, but I got this one of her while they were on stage accepting one of their awards. We were all so proud. She’s the one looking to the side so you can see her beautiful headpiece, and with her senior banner on – all of the girls who are graduating this year have them.

.

Sunday afternoon I headed over to Andrew & family’s house to deliver their Valentine’s presents – Jeff wasn’t feeling great so he decided to stay home – and to see Adam for the first time since his wreck a couple of days before. He was actually feeling very good – he had participated in a weight lifting competition the day before and set two PR’s – but it was very, very good to set eyes on him after what could have been a terrible disaster. I got this picture of him before I left to head home.

Thursday afternoon Mallory was in town to speak at the Women’s Club in town, as a recipient of one of their scholarships, and they invited Lindee & I to attend the meeting with her. She did a great job, and I got this picture of her with her proud mom afterwards.

That evening Jeff & I attended one of the shows in the performing arts series in town: Nashville Legacy. It was Floyd Cramer’s grandson on the piano and Chet Atkins’ niece on the guitar, and they were absolutely fantastic. We loved every minute of it. The niece even had her three children come out and sing on some of the songs, and they were so talented. Great show.

My dear friend Pam Cato gave me this one for Christmas. Luckily enough, with the freezing weather coming in tomorrow, another friend just dropped off a couple of others for us to work