A Bit of Bling

On our first day in Minnesota, I had the opportunity to meet a lovely woman named Sherry who has her own jewelry business. Aside from being super friendly and sporting that Minnesota accent, she is VERY talented and her work is beautiful. And luckily, she has an online shop!

I am partial to supporting creative women; women who use their gifts to make beautiful things.

These pictures were all taken at her home. Her studio is right in her living room and she was having an Open House so all of her creations were on display. I wish I could have taken more pictures, but the battery died and the last shot I got was of the earrings I purchased....


Yeah, that didn't work. Unblurry, they are even prettier... So, go visit her website today. Or tomorrow. I don't want to be pushy. Click here to go - there: JitterJewels

On our LAST afternoon in Minnesota we went here..

Different kinda bling for me...

This is Penzey's Spice Market. An awesome shop in St. Paul (although they have others scattered around the country. I didn't really want to leave, but we did have a toy plane to board a little later, and I really depleted my wallet at this store, so I guess it was necessary to go. You can also visit them online: Penzeys

I purchased spices entitled Italian Sunset, Sunny Paris, Paprika: Hungarian Sweet. And quite a few others... They packaged them all up so beautifully, too. I'll have to take a picture later to post here. It just added to the whole experience. And I have to say that I LOVE ST. PAUL! It does not seem city-ish to me at all. Lots of cool restaurants and boutiq-ee type shops. And St. Paul's Cathedral is beautiful! It made for an excellent "girl's weekend" stop.

Tomorrow, I'll tell you about our other stop and then that will be it. Because I still haven't even gotten to the rest of my family's experiences while I was away - and guess what? I'm going away again tomorrow for ANOTHER girls weekend with my mom and sisters. Then I'm done for a while. And Keith didn't even say that. I did.
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Lastly: Weight Loss. You may have noticed that I skipped last week. But probably not, so I'm just coming clean with you. I was up at 4:30 am last Friday to catch a plane, and wasn't capable of seeing any numbers on the scale. That doesn' t happen til much later in the morning. So, to get back on track here is where I now am from 2 Fridays ago....

+ 1 lb. Okay. I haven't really worked out much since Easter, so time to get back on track! After this weekend...