Girls Weekend, Thirteen_Monday, November 8

Woo Hoo!!  Today is ziplining day!!  I went ziplining with my family while up in Whistler, Canada this past summer and had an absolute BLAST!!!  It was so much fun that I actually have given thought to becoming a zipline tour guide when I decide to retire from pharmacy. All of this is to say that when I found a brochure for ziplining in nearby Branson while we were at Cosmic Caverns, I told Kathi that we MUST go do this.  She, of course and as always, was game.  So Monday morning had us getting up early to make the hour drive up to Branson, Missouri to do some ziplining.  Since ziplining had not been on my mind when I packed for this trip, I realized that I did not have the appropriate shoes.  None of my shoes tied on, they were all slip ons, and I didn't trust that they would stay one my feet while flying through the air so we had to stop at, where else....we are in Arkansas, after all, Walmart so that I could get a pair of tie-on tennis shoes.  About 20 minutes past our Walmart stop, Kathi's phone rang and IT WAS RIDLEY!!!!!  We pulled over so that Kathi could talk to her.  Ridley, honey, I don't know if you are reading this or will ever read this, but if you do, I want you to know that your Mom's face absolutely lit up like the stadium lights at a Cathedral High School football game when she heard your voice.  There was even some "sass" in your voice this time and it was like music to your mother's ears.

After the phone call, we were back on the road.  Once again, God blessed us with an absolutely, magnificent, beautiful day.  Clear blue skies, warm weather.......we couldn't have asked for a better day.  We even spotted a pair of bald eagles flying overhead while driving.  Don't see that everyday!!

We actually arrived a little bit early at the zipline place, even though we passed the entrance to the place  (somehow the GIANT signs on the highway weren't enough for us), and we could SEE the zipline towers from the highway.  We wandered around outside a bit and took pictures and watched some other folks zipping through the trees before it was our turn to get geared up.

 And off we went!!  First we hopped into a Humvee and they drove us up the side of the mountain(?) , then dropped us off  at the foot of one of the towers along with our two zipline guides.  We walked across a few suspension bridges to the first tower where the guides gave us a few pointers about ziplining.  It was a bit windy so we were warned that on a couple of the lines we could possibly be zipping into a head wind and might not make it all the way across.  No worries, we were told, they were ways that we could be retrieved if we didn't quite make it all the way to the other side.  As our darling guide Mady said, if we didn't make it all the way across, they would let us dangle on the line for a while "to think about what we had done" :-), then we would be "rescued".  Funny girl!!!

Once done ziplining, we made our way back to Eureka Springs.  Because it was such a beautiful day, we thought we would see if we could take a hike somewhere.  We had seen signs for Pivot Rock very close to our lodging  (Pivot Rock!!  Featured in Ripley's Believe It or Not!!) and thought we would go check it out.  After driving a couple of miles on a narrow, winding road we came to a parking lot and the Pivot Rock gift store.  There was a sign in front of the gift store saying that it would cost us $4.50 to go take a look at Pivot Rock.  Hmmmmmm, we wondered, was it worth it??  We went into the gift store, took a look around, checked out a few postcard shots of the rock and decided that it wasn't worth it to pay $4.50 to take a 2 minute walk to a rock.  So back to the room we went.

Now, one thing that I have left out is that the place we are staying, Oak Crest Cottages, has a variety of lodging choices.  There are 3 cute little rock cottages, several small suites like the one we are staying in, a "chalet" that looks like a barn and 3 treehouses.  I really wanted to stay in one of the treehouses when I  was browsing the internet for places to stay in Eureka Springs, but the suites were much more attractive economically and how could I resist staying in a suite that was used in a Billy Bob Thornton movie??  But Kathi and I were very curious about the other types of lodging, so upon returning for our morning adventure, we went and asked our host, Don, for a tour of the other places.  He showed us the Rock cottages today and promised to show us the treehouses tomorrow after everyone had checked out.  Each cottage had a "theme". One Italian, one New York and one Southwest.  All were quite charming and I would definitely recommend any or all of them to someone looking for a place to stay here.  Turns out that Don also officiates at weddings right there on the property.  There is both an indoor and an outdoor chapel and both are delightful.  Remember Eureka Springs is second only to Las Vegas in the number of weddings performed in the United States and this place definitely caters to those that are coming here looking for romance.  Although, this, obviously is not what Kathi and I came here for, we can certainly understand why people do.  After our tour of the property, back to the room we went to settle in for the evening.  Kathi decided to make a snack run, while I stayed in the room to catch up on e-mails and Facebook.  When Kathi returned we watched Pelham 123 and ate leftovers and snacks.  Did a little bit of packing since tomorrow is our last day here  (always over way too fast!!), then the final tossing of the states for this trip.  Where will we be going next year???  Wyoming!!!!  Yellowstone?  Jackson Hole?  I will do a bit of research and see what looks interesting.

Off to bed!

Girls Weekend, part Thirteen!! Sunday, November 7

This is the day of our massages.  Just the word massage sounds relaxing, doesn't it??   I looked it up on dictonary.com and the slang definition for massage is:  attentive or indulgent treatment; pampering.  I believe that kind of treatment is exactly what we are looking for!!  So we got up around 8 a.m. and set out for the New Moon Day Spa and Salon in the Crescent Hotel.  Our licensed massage therapists, Chris and Elizabeth called us back to the room at just about 9 o'clock on the nose.  We each received our dose of pampering and indulgent treatment for an hour.  It was quite lovely and incredibly relaxing.  Kathi liked the blue oil from Aveda that Chris used so much that she just HAD to purchase some before we left.  As soon as we were done and were dressed and about to leave, Kathi's cell phone rang and IT WAS RIDLEY!!!!!  She was doing well enough to have earned the privilege to call Kathi, and one of the first things that she told Kathi was that she was feeling better.  This was significant because Kathi had asked her, upon leaving her at the hospital, that whatever else Ridley did and even if she didn't feel like talking to Kathi at all, to please call her and let her know when she was feeling better.  I could hardly stop myself from jumping up and down with joy over this phone call.  As soon as Kathi got off the phone, she broke down and sobbed.  This was the moment we had been waiting for all weekend, the moment of breakthrough, the moment that Ridley realized that she was being helped while in the hospital, as difficult as it was to be there.  In Kathi's words, "it is like the sun has come back out in her world".  Thank you, God, for your mercy and grace.

After our massages, Kathi had further pampering with a pedicure.

I sat in the lobby area and worked on this very journal while Kathi got her pedicure.  Once done, we went downhill (by car this time!!) to down and had soup and salad for lunch at the Cafe Sanctuary out on the deck in the sunshine.  We then strolled the downtown shops looking for gifts and souvenirs.  The shops all close down around 6 p.m., so we went back uphill to Ermilio's for dinner.  There was a bit of a line outside and we had to wait about 30 minutes or so before we were seated.  We ordered sauteed artichoke hearts as an appetizer (yummy!!!), then chicken parmesan and spinach fettucine with a primavera sauce for our main course.  We each had a glass of wine with dinner and ate until we were full.  Once back to the room, with a full tummy and all warm and cozy, I was feeling the need for a "nap" as early as 8:30.  So I laid down for a nap and Kathi decided that it sounded like a good idea, too.  We did a quick toss of the states before we laid down and we are now down to Wyoming and South Carolina.

Our "nap", it turned out, lasted until morning.  Apparently, we were in need of a good, long night's sleep!!

Saturday, November 6_GW13_Eureka Springs, Arkansas

I must say that the weather for this trip has been spectacularly beautiful.  It has been sunny every day and unseasonably warm, usually between 65 and 70 degrees.  As always seems to be the case for Girls Weekend, God is smiling on us.

So, even though we returned to the room fairly early last night and decided to stay in, we ended up staying up and talking until 4 O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING!!!  I can’t remember the last time I stayed up that late!  But, since Kathi and I had not seen one another since July, we had a lot of catching up to do, so we did.  Once we went to bed, I think we both fell into a dead sleep but we still managed to get up at 10 a.m.  We had big plans for the day.  Our agenda included Quigley Castle and Cosmic Caverns.  

Quigley Castle is not a castle at all.  Just a house that sits a little bit outside of Eureka Springs.  Notice that I didn’t say an ordinary house.  It is not an ordinary house at all.  It is the house of Elise Quigley’s dreams.  It is a house that is covered in the rocks, shells and fossils that Elise collected along the nearby riverbanks since she was nine years old. It is a house that “lets the outdoors in”.  It is the house that has twenty eight windows and an indoor tropical garden.  It is one of the most unique homes that I have ever been in (House on the Rock in Wisconsin would be its main rival, although House on the Rock is just flat out weird, while this place is actually quite charming).

                        

So, back in 1943 Elise Quigley and her husband were living in a fairly ordinary house of the times on their land, but Elise had this house in her head.  Her husband had agreed to build this house of her dreams, but since part of the plan included 28 windows and glass was nearly impossible to get hold of at that time, he wanted to wait.  Elise decided she did not want to wait.  One day, once her husband left to go to work, she and her five children moved all of their belongings into the chicken house, then tore down their existing home, as incentive to get her husband to start building her dream house.  So construction began and about 6 months and $2000 later, the wooden house was built, but no glass was available for the windows for another 3 years.  The family just used blankets as window coverings until they were able to get glass for the windows.  During this time, Elise used her rock, shell, and fossil collection to cover the outside walls.

            

Today, Elise’s granddaughter lives with her own family in the house and has parts of it open to the public for tours.  She recalls her grandmother working on the wall of butterflies in one of the upstairs bedrooms as her last big project before her death. 

A most unusual, but delightful home.  One well worth visiting if in Eureka Springs, Arkansas.

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

From Quigley Castle, we moved on to Cosmic Caverns, one of many caves in the area.  Kathi loves caves and this is the third cave that we have visited together.  The first was Howe Caverns in the state of New York and the second was Marengo Cave in Southern Indiana.  All have a particular beauty of their own.  This particular cave has two lakes where the bottom has not yet been found.  It is the warmest cave that I have ever been in, about 70 degrees.  Unfortunately a previous owner of the cave decided to stock the lakes with trout and the trout ate up all of the native cave lake creatures.  To this day, the owners of the cave carry on the “tradition” of stocking the lakes with trout, making it impossible for the lakes to be repopulated with the creatures meant to live there.  Nevertheless it is a beautiful cave and Kathi and I thoroughly enjoyed the tour.

                

After leaving the cave we went back into town and bought tickets for that evening’s concert at The Auditorium.  The headliner was folksinger Eliza Gilkyson.  Never heard of her before, but apparently she is a fairly prolific singer/songwriter.  Once we had the tickets in had, we went back to the room to rest up a bit and catch up with our e-mails and stuff.  Then back into town we went for the show, which we enjoyed very much.  In fact we enjoyed it so much that we bought Eliza’s latest CD and had her sign it AND had our picture taken with her!! 

Back to the room for a late dinner of Italian leftovers. Kathi called the hospital back in Indianapolis to check on Ridley and see how her day went.  Apparently it was a bit of a rough day for Ridley. The Dr. is still working on tweaking her meds in an effort to get them just right.  We continue to pray for her and ask that all who might be reading this do the same.  We were exhausted after our day full of trekking around the area and listening to good music and turned in a bit early...............after the tossing of the states, Oh, and the count of African Americans still stands at two!             

Eureka Springs, Arkansas: November 5, 2010, Girls Weekend 13

Today was our first full day of Girls Weekend and after arising a little later than normal and just hanging out for a while in our cute little room this morning, drinking coffee, checking e-mails, and journaling, we headed into historic downtown Eureka Springs.  What a captivating place.  Built on hills with winding streets (there are NO perpendicular streets in downtown Eureka Springs), we parked the car in a pay parking lot ($5 for three hours) and started off on foot.  We decided that we were kinda hungry, so we went in search of a cup of coffee and something to eat.  No Starbuck's here so we found a cute little coffee shop close to a scrapbooking store.  Wellllll, there was no indoor seating at this particular coffee shop and, though the sun was shining brightly, we decided it was just too darn cold to sit outside and have a cup of coffee, plus we were in search of some kind of food.  The kind lady at the coffee store made us wonderful drinks and gave us a coupon in hopes that we would return sometime later during our stay.  We wandered into the "scrapbooking" store, which is really more of a specialty paper/art store kind of place,  found nothing we couldn't live without there, then went in search of food.  We ended up in a restaurant named the New Delhi Cafe and Restaurant where Kathi had a hamburger and I had tomato soup.  (Uhhhh, what happened to the Indian food we thought we were going to get???)  The food was OK, not great, but served its purpose.  There was a live band playing in the outdoor area of the restaurant, so we did get to enjoy a bit of that.  We are fortunate enough to be here on the weekend of Eureka Spring's "63rd Ozark Folk Festival", which involves lots of folk music being played around town in different venues all weekend long.  Once done with lunch, we ascended a set of steep stairs that took us up to the street above the one we had parked on and started browsing the shops.  One of the shops whose window we had peeked into the night before was a leather store that had some awesome shoes displayed in the window, so it became our first stop.  While the only purchase that we made in there was a pair of sunglasses for me (I left mine in my van back in Portland), we so enjoyed the ladies working in there that we just HAD to take have our picture taken with them.  They were also kind enough to give each of us a $5 Starbucks gift card with the purchase of my sunglasses.  Now we just have to find a Starbuck's!!  The shops here are fun to browse because most have unique and unusual things and most are NOT selling the trashy, touristy type items that one so often finds in these types of destinations.   Kathi was longing for a massage and pedicure while here, so during our lunch at the "Indian" restaurant, she called the spa at the Crescent Hotel and set up appointments for massages for us both and a pedicure for her.  We had talked about doing a ghost tour of the haunted Crescent Hotel, too, so decided that we would walk to it while we were walking about town so that we would have some idea about where we would be going.  We stopped in at a bookstore and got directions and a warning that a walk to the Crescent was not for the faint of heart or out-of-shape 50 year old women, since the Crescent sits at one of the highest points in town.  We, of course, did not heed this warning and made the trek anyway, at Kathi's insistence, I might add.  I am still recovering from this uphill hike as I write this and hope that I can find it in my heart sometime soon to forgive Kathi for forcing this torture upon me.
:-)

The Crescent Hotel was built in 1886 as a hotel, but has served various functions during its years.  One of these is as a Women's College, another is as a cancer hospital under the direction and leadership of a man who claimed, falsely, to be a Dr. with a "cure" for cancer.  Instead "Dr." Norman Baker was a vaudeville man who made millions of dollars off of unsuspecting, vulnerable people who were seeking health for loved ones whom the medical community of the time could not help.  Once "Dr." Baker was exposed he was run out of town and the Crescent was, once again, operated as a hotel.  Kathi and I decided that while the building is an impressive one, it isn't really what we would consider a beautiful one.  In fact, it is kind of a creepy looking place.  It LOOKS like a hospital where the world wants to hide away sick people that it does not want to look at nor think about.  However, present day, it is a very busy place where many locals choose to have weddings (it does sport beautiful lawns and scenery), as well as a place that capitalizes on the many stories about ghostly apparitions and paranormal activity.  During our ghost tour, we learned that the TAPS ghost hunting team came here a few years ago to do an investigation into the paranormal activity here and they had some positive and impressive findings.  In particular, they caught on video a shadowy figure of a man down on the lowest floor of the hotel in the room that "Dr." Baker used as a morgue.  They showed us a video clip of this at the beginning of our ghost tour.  I have to say, it did give rise to goose bumps!!  But, I get ahead of myself.  After checking the place out a bit, we made the trek back downhill (MUCH easier), via the scenic route.  We saw many charming homes, bed and breakfasts and beautiful garden areas on the walk downhill.

After the walk downhill, we were both aching and exhausted (Kathi, I TOLD you we should have driven up to the hotel!!  :-)) and decided to go back to the room and rest up a bit before our ghost tour at the Crescent that evening.  We gobbled up our leftovers from De Vito's, checked up on our e-mails and stuff then made our way back to the Crescent Hotel.

I already shared a lot of what we learned about the Crescent Hotel on the ghost tour.  Our guide was dressed in period costume and, as Kathi so aptly described him, he looked rather cadavorous.  Neither one of us can remember his name (shame on us), but we agree that he looks like one of the thieving characters in the Disney movie 101 Dalmations.

While the tour was very informative regarding the history of the Crescent Hotel and our guide shared many stories with us about guests experiences with paranormal activity and where most of it seems to take place, we didn't actually get to go INTO many of the rooms where activity is reported to be greatest, because, of course, this is still a functional hotel.  Again, in Kathi's words, we saw more inebriated wedding guests than we did spirits.  I guess one could say we saw many people that were inhabited by "spirits" just not the sort we were seeking on the ghost tour. :-)   Eureka Springs is the site of 6000-7000 weddings a year (second only to Las Vegas) and many of them take place at the Crescent Hotel.  We have seen 3 brides in our short stay here, one carrying her baby and feeding him a bottle while dressed in her virginal white, strapless wedding gown.

If you look closely at the picture of the staircase included in the collage above, you will see a white "orb" in the left-hand side of the photo at the top of the stairs in the portion of the photo.  The story that we were told regarding this staircase is that sometime back in the 30's a little girl leaned over the stair railing in answer to her mother's call from a floor or two below and fell to her death below on the tile floor you can see in the center of the photo.  Ghost hunters would tell you that the "orb" you can see in the photo is the spirit of the child who fell.  After going through the MANY photos that we took during the ghost tour, this is the only one in which we captured a "spirit".  What do YOU think??????.....

Our original plan was to go out and listen to music once we were done with the ghost tour, but we both decided we would be sure and catch some music on Saturday night and called it a night.

Eureka Springs, Arkansas: November 4, 2010, Girls Weekend 13

Before I go much further in describing the things that we did today, I have to say that this is a Girls Weekend unlike any in the past because of some difficult, as well as some wonderful circumstances that are currently present in Kathi's life.  On the wonderful side, Kathi is in love with a man that God put in her life at a time when she, most certainly, needs someone who is there for her and loves her unconditionally.  I have to say that I am truly amazed at God's grace and His timing at putting people in our lives who have gifts that we need at the absolute moment when we need them.  This has certainly been the case in Kathi's situation.  The difficult circumstances in Kathi's life right now revolve around her beautiful, spirited, talented and amazing daughter, Ridley.  This truly amazing child has suffered and fought with depression for a number of years and this struggle culminated in a suicide attempt about three weeks ago.  This, of course, caused Kathi great distress and heartbreak and she has been doing everything that she can in order to get Ridley the help that she needs to help her with this struggle.  The psychiatrist who saw Ridley in the program into which she was placed after her suicide attempt, diagnosed Ridley with  bi-polar disorder and put her on some medications to help her.  Even with this medication on board, Ridley revealed to the counselors in this program that she still has thoughts of harming herself on a daily basis.  Based upon this comment, it was decided that Ridley would best be served by spending some time in an in-patient program so that she could be observed while medications were added and adjusted, and so that she could participate in some intensive behavioral therapy, where she could learn some skills to help her cope with this disorder.  Ridley, of course, did not like this decision and railed against being admitted with everything she has, which led to a heartbreaking scene of Ridley being handcuffed in order to be taken from the outpatient program she was attending to the hospital to be admitted.  As a fellow parent, and loving Kathi like a sister and Ridley like a child of my own, I can barely even think about what kind of pain this caused Kathi.  So, this Girls Weekend is colored by these events, and while there have been plenty of tears, there has also been much therapeutic laughter.  I just ask that anyone who might be reading this, please say a prayer for both Kathi and Ridley in this great time of need and know that underlying all that we do here are thoughts of Ridley and prayers that God bring healing to her heart, mind, soul and body.

The only reason that I added any of this to the blog is that I want this to be "real", to exhibit ALL that goes into our lives and Girls Weekend.

(Ok, as I read the above to Kathi, to get her approval to post on the blog we are both sitting here crying like babies, so I am going to move on).


So, Kathi flew into Fayetteville airport about 3 hours before me and while waiting for me picked up the rental car, had a long conversation with Ridley's psychiatrist, then enjoyed a mocha and read a book.

Once I arrived, and after a big hug, we went to pick up my luggage, so that we can load up the car and make the 1 hour drive to Eureka Springs.  Over the years, we have kind of fallen into a natural division of duties regarding Girls' Weekend.  Once the state is determined, I usually am the one to do a bit of research and choose WHERE in the state we will be going.  I thoroughly enjoy this part.  Sometimes I have a place in mind, sometimes Kathi does, and we are always open to suggestions from friends and family.  As I said in the first post about this particular Girls Weekend, my mom was the one who suggested Eureka Springs and after I took a look at some websites describing the down, I was charmed and intrigued, so decided this would be our destination.  Having made that decision,  I started looking for interesting, charming, unique,  funky, yet affordable places to stay.  I REALLY wanted to stay at the Crescent Hotel because it is old and haunted and I thought that would be fun, but it was a bit too pricey for the budget, so, instead,  I found a charming little place with a small kitchenette that looked just perfect for us and was very reasonably priced.  Thus we landed in Suite number 4 at the Oak Crest Cottages.  I must share that the suite that we are staying here in Eureka Springs was used in a Billy Bob Thornton movie called "Chrystal".  Haven't seen the movie, but it is kind of cool knowing that it was used as a movie site and they have a few pictures up in the room of Billy Bob in this very suite!

Kathi's role in Girls Weekend planning usually involves car rental and maps of the area.  Kathi LOVES maps.  She studies them and fawns over them as if they were precious artifacts, but, by golly, she pretty much always gets us where we want to go.  So Kathi had Google mapped the route from the Fayetteville airport to Oak Crest cottages and printed out the directions.  Well, my goodness, for a 60 mile, 1 hour drive, I must say that there were so many turns and unclear directions (i.e. Turn Right......no street name or anything, just, Turn Right), that I think it was a minor miracle that we arrived here at all!!  Although, we did go a few miles past the place and had to turn around and try again.  Our host, Don, greeted us, gave us his recommendations for places to eat in town and grabbed a few brochures for the places nearby that he feels are worth visiting, then shepherded us to our room.  Once in the room, we immediately rearranged the furniture (which we often do) to suit our needs and unpacked our suitcases.  We made a run to the local grocery store, then had a delicious Italian dinner at a little place in town called DeVito's (Kathi had trout coated with parmesan and pesto, while I opted for spaghetti and meatballs) peeked in a few shop windows, then headed back to our cozy suite to turn in for the night, with plans of returning to town the next day for a full day of shopping and exploring the town.

                                  

Girls Weekend, part Thirteen!! November 5

It is that time of year again!  Girls Weekend!  I can hardly believe it.  In so many ways, it just doesn't seems like a whole year has rolled around since we were in Yellow Springs, Ohio.

Now, I don't know if anybody who reads this remembers, but at the last "flipping of the states" last year, when it was down to just New York and Arkansas, New York landed face down and Arkansas remained face up causing Kathi to experience great disappointment.  But, hey, we rallied and now that we are here in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, I think we both agree that this is actually looking like it is going to be a very cool little town to explore over the next few days.  At this point I have to thank my Mom, who is the one who suggested this particular town.  I was looking at Hot Springs and Little Rock, but when Mom heard that our destination state was Arkansas she suggested Eureka Springs, and, by golly, she knew what she was talking about!!  Thank you, Mom!!!

While in touch with Kathi yesterday (our travel day) she told me that God had already given her our trip slogan for this year.  She would not share with me over the phone, said she would write it down and that I must read it.  I want to share that with you now:

"Girls Weekend 13 begins!!  It is protocol to wait until at least the final day of our trip, if not later, to look back over the memories and come up with a trip slogan.  That won't be necessary this year. I (Kathi) only had to enter the airport at 6 am to begin her journey, when she was handed the slogan like a gift from God.  A really  nice friendly, helpful, extremely polite young black gentleman took my boarding pass and with cheery "Good Morning", started to enter the information into the computer. "Just one bag? And I see that you have already paid for it online--good for you!"  Then, on the next screen...."Ok, let's see now....."  still in rounded, even corporate tones.  But then......"ARKANSAS??"  Part puzzlement, part incredulity.  Then, straight to the hood....."You goin' to Arkansas?  What, you work for WalMart or somethin'?  E'erbody go to Arkansas work for WalMart or Tyson Chicken".  And so, a slogan was born, at the very start of our journey:  "Arkansas!?  What, you work for WalMart or somethin'?"    :-)

By the way, Kathi also tends to count the number of other African American people we see while on our trips.  The count so far on this trip at the end of our first day (now keep in mind this includes the airport in Fayetteville as well as right here in Eureka Springs), is ZERO.  This always makes me feel incredibly guilty.  I told her that next year, should New York be the state we go to, we should go to Harlem, just so I can experience what it is like to be in the minority.  This feeling of guilt is what landed us in Washington, D.C. on Girls Weekend Five.  This was also the year that we bought our wooden puzzle map of the U.S. that we now use to determine the following year's destination, because we were completely indecisive as to where to go that next year.

Speaking of future states, the tossing of the states last night left us with:  New York, Virginia, North Dakota, Montana, Texas, Alaska, Nebraska, Missouri, Wyoming, North Carolina, Hawaii, Colorado, South Dakota, South Carolina, West Virgina, Maryland, Connecticut and Rhode Island.  Of these Kathi is hoping for North Carolina, while Lori is pulling for Montana.

Today (Friday, Nov 6) we plan on exploring the cute little, winding, hilly streets and avenues full of shops and restaurants that make up Eureka Springs.

Kathi's Birthday Getaway in Florida

This was a very special Girls Weekend that was more, much more, than Kathi and Lori's annual getaway. This was a Girls Weekend on steroids event. This was a gathering of friends to help Kathi celebrate her 50th birthday in style. Nine of us, including Kathi, gathered together in Marco Island, Florida at the home of one of Kathi's friends, Connie, who graciously offered her second home there as a venue for this celebration. This gathering included 2 women from New York City; one from Toronto, Canada; one from Chicago, Illinois; myself from Salem, Oregon and 4 from Indianapolis, Indiana. We ate, we talked, some of us went swimming, we walked on the beach, we ate, we watched the Indianapolis Colts kick butt in a football game at a local sports bar, we drank a little wine, we ate, we laughed, we hung out and read books, some of us knitted, we played a crazy word game call "Pass the Bomb", we drank Pina Coladas, we ate, we laughed some more, we watched the Golden Globe awards, we learned another language (ole boy, ole girl, Nowember) courtesy of Capathia and Aisha, and we celebrated Kathi's birthday and friendship. It was a wonderful, magical weekend and one I am very happy that I was a part of. I hope that we can do it all again when Kathi turns 60!!