It's hard not to live for weekends...

...when they were as enjoyable as this past one. 

Friday was a busy day for me, as I ran out the door early so I could stop at the flea market and check on things there, and then head down to the Fayetteville recycling center to get some mulch for my front flower bed...which is enormous and needed a lot of love to recover from a year of being un-cared for before we moved in last fall.  Here's a tip.  If you are pining for a bulk load of mulch but drive a minivan instead of a pick-up truck, try using those big rubbermaid 5 gallon totes.  I lined them up and the guy at the recycling center just dropped a load from the front-loader on top of them.  They weren't so big that I couldn't carry them and it required no shoveling at all.  Of course, my van still smells like cedar, but there are worse smells on earth.

Moving on.  Spent a quiet day at the Heartwood Gallery.  Probably a little too quiet, but I did finish quite a few small things while I was "working."   Locked up and drove my mulch over to meet hubby for a lovely date:  attending our friend Sara's graduate program senior reading.  I had never been inside of Old Main before and it was the perfect setting for Sara's exquisite poetry.  We followed up with dinner with friends at Taste of Thai.  Robb's leftover Evil Jungle Prince is already making my mouth water when I think about my lunch plans for today.

Saturday morning, I was proud to roll out of bed by 7:30 a.m. and go out to unload that mulch.  With that job well done, we took the beautiful drive to Ozark Custom Butchering to pick up our half a cow.  "Half of the black one"  to be more specific.   Our local, grass fed cow led a good life and fulfilled its destiny to feed our family and friends; he is now in my freezer in well-marked packages.  

In an unbelievably well-timed coincidence, all three kids were invited to a birthday party at the Starlight Skatium   at the exact same time Robb and I wanted to be at the Springdale Convention Center for the Republican candidate debate and the NWA Boutique Show (respectively).   Seriously, what are the chances of that happening? 

At the show, which I confess I was mostly scoping out to see if I wanted to take part in the future, I was thrilled to meet a recently featured artist on Etsy, Tim's Sally.  I was smitten by her work and thrilled to find something I had been looking for:  a representation of Charleigh for my entryway.  By chance, I have collected some portraits that resemble Robb and Calvin, and I still marvel at Mattie's second-grade self portrait in oil pastels.  When I found a wee painting of a girl named Spice, I knew I had found my Charleigh, (aka our little Spicy Chalupa) portrait.  

Back at home, Robb made us Juicy Lucys...a burger featured on Man vs. Food which he tried out on his recent trip to Minneapolis.  Delish.

And on Sunday, we got to be with our Vintage family, which was nothing short of baby-tastic this week.  I got my fix holding Princess Addison who is growing from a five pound bag of sugar to a ever-snoozing 7 pounder just a few weeks since birth.  After an always-encouraging lunch meeting with our Oversight Team, we headed home for the truly sacred ritual of the Sabbath nap followed by our family tradition of AFV and Minute to Win It accompanied with toast and hot chocolate for supper.

This linktastic post brought to you by a truly blissful weekend.