While we were away my mother-in-law celebrated her birthday, and she turned a young 88! We actually celebrated her birthday last month, when the whole family was at Honeoye Lake. Sarah and her family arrived from Chicago in time for the family portrait.
Ellie is smack in the middle of this great family portrait with family from Texas, Arizona, Illinois, and Louisiana as well as many of us who live in New York, and one of Jill's best friends from Australia.
Nothing makes her happier than time together with her family. She had a beautiful birthday cake, and a wonderful flower candle that was supposed to drop its petals when you lit it. Instead it burned like a torch! We think it was the wind coming in the windows. Fortunately, there was no damage to the cake.
I didn't give her a handmade card at the lake. We had a group card and group gift so I waited until her birthday in Vermont to give it to her.
Her card (made on the same day as Jasmine's wedding card) is a close CASE. I couldn't find a patterned paper I like, so I decided to emboss the sentiment from Reverse Confetti's "Simply Sentiments" in the same gold as the floral arrangement from Simon Says' "Floral Bliss." Once again a narrow strip of metallic paper separate the focal point from the sentiment. Like the wedding card, it's pretty simple, but the black and gold make it festive.
We arrived home on Tuesday night to three days of rain. It finally stopped long enough yesterday for the lawn to dry out to and be mowed. It was beginning to look like a jungle! There's lots going on, as is typical after being away for over a week. We're off again today with a good friend to go to the Ithaca farm market and visit a few wineries. I managed to squeeze in some time last night to make a card for a friend's surprise birthday party coming up this weekend, too. I'll be back with that once I get it photographed. Lots of photos from the trip to upload and edit, too.