G.R.O.O.V.E.

Saturday was an experiance that most people will never have. For me thats what it was all about: bragging rights at Monday Morning's meeting! "What did YOU do this weekend?"  Most people had never heard of fire walking. I had, many years ago working for Sofa Express. My friend Rhea traveled to Florida for the experiance. but the GROOVE girls had IT come to Us (thanks Sheri, awesome planning)

Fire Walking is a 4000 year old practice, practiced on all continents except Antartica of course!

We picked up Kim our fire Guru at the airport and got to Sheri's around 11:00.  We searched for the perfect spot for the fire, Bob mowed it down, then mowed it some more.  Once the area was established Don and Bob cleared the land.  Kim stacked the Pine wood creating a 3 x 4 x 4.5 tall mound.  We then relaxed by the pool. 

The GROOVE girls started arriving around 5:00, we had some social time before Kim was introduced and we got down to business.  I had spent too much time in the sun and my feet and ankles were sunburned. I had trouble focusing on Fire Walking as I was already Burnt! how ironic?  After a brief history of Kim and Fire walking we starting searching ourselves for WHY WE WANTED to fire walk.  some said for Serenity, others for Peace, MOsaid JUST DO IT. I am with her.....we went out and each played a part of lighting the fire, tossing in cedar chips with or prayers (mine was for all my prego friends: may you have healthy babies!).  We went back in where we each had a famous quotation we read out loud, then learned a chant. Easy sing-song chant, very uplifting.  FINALLY the time had come to walk on fire. Karen Prenger was the first BRAVE GROOVE member to walk across the fire. It didnt take long for everyone else to follow.  We were out there walking almost dancing to our chant as we walked over the coals. I felt an extra HOT one on the pad of my foot but no burns. 

It was a great experiance. I loved the commorodity of my fellow GROOVE sisters as well as having Mo and Amy to share it with (thanks sis's).

I am sorry I cant seem to down load the pics onto this web sight. I have tried many times and keep getting errors. feel free to check out the GROOVE FB page.  Lots of ladies brought a camera and posted them there.

thanks again to our lovely GROOVE members who were able to make it!  couldnt have done it with out you!

Well I have not made it to the last 2 events. and I just cancelled POKER.  Sorry ladies. Work schedule conflicts!

I hope you had fun. I was hoping someone took pictures and might put on this web site.  We also have this blog page where anyone can put their thoughts. 

I could not make it to the Beeading Class at Cindy Sartains house.  I am hoping someone will blog a bit for me?!?!?!?!?!?

I SURVIVED!  I thought for sure I would be in a lot of pain today from stoopiing and crouching for 3 hours last night.  Thanks to the members of The Columbus Curling Club they made our experiance GREAT!  We learned all about the sport.  From how to through the rock (granite ball with handle), to Sweeping.  the scoring is much like bacci. I was impressed how we quickly learned and became comfortable playing. At first we could not throw the rock half way down the feild. by the second game it was NO problem.

the best part of the evening was meeting Jan Smith.  Jan and her husband was working/teaching my group of Curlers.  by the end of the evening we SIGNED HER UP as a new member of GROOVE.  she wont be able to join us next week for Wine Appreciation because her and Stephen are on their way to Vancouver to see Curling LIVE. Have fun and be safe.  thanks again to everyone one at the Columbus Curling Club.  It was a great experiance! I highly recommmend to everyone!

Lisa See is the author of international best sellers. for book club this quarter we read her most recent work Shanghai Girls.  the evening started out with a dinner (shich I was unable to attend so I hope someone else may blog!!) at the Thurber House.  I understand it was quite tasty and Lisa spoke with great enthusiam with everyone.  The auditorium was packed for the after dinner speaking. My fellow GROOVe members were in the second to last row. But that didnt dampen the evening.  Lisa See is a great speaker. She talked of her life, her family and how the book came together. Because there were people in the audiance who had not read it yet we couldnt talk in depth about the story itself. Like why did Sam have to commit suicide?

I was most humored by her families past.  her great grand father had a business selling crotchless underwear!

I learned so much by reading the book about PAPER sons and PAPER wives. Its amazing the hardships these people went through just to be in our wonderful Country.  God Bless America.

Well mother nature certainly was kind to us.  The weather was almost perfect. No wind, rain or snow!  I actually over dressed.  We started the day on the slopes of Snow Trails....ok well on the end of a hill at Snow Trails.  The hardest part of learning to ski was walking around in those heavy boots.  First we learned the parts of the ski's, our stance and about balance.  Then we had to walk sideways a bit up the slope and come down using are knees to guide us.  I did ok the first time, then on the second trial we went a little higher.  I think I missed the "How to Stop" lesson because I promptly used the orange plastic fence to do so.  There I was ski's, poles and legs all tangled in the fence. YES, Chris got a picture. Luckily she doesnt know how to get it off her camera and on the internet!!!  My goal was to go down the bunny hill twice. Well I doubled my goal and did it 4 times. WEEEEEE is all I can say. It was fun but I have no plans on ever doing it again!

Around 2:30 I went to the Manor for set up.  Melinda and Nanette helped unpack all the food and get it started cooking.  I  was glad to see we had a few extra beds.  The GROOVEttes slowly trickled in and we had dinner right on time. I made lasagna, meat and vegetarian.  I have never cooked on that large of a scale before.  It was a first for me to try a vegetarian recipe.  I heard it was good. SWoosh, another badge - CHECK!  (dine-in)

The banquet meeting ran a little long as each member told us of their accomplishments of the past year, Sheri interjecting  each time.  For me the most memorable was not a badge accomplishment but Tammy Manley speaking of a fund raiser for the coming year. I am looking forward to May and riding a Bus down to Cinti to particpate in a walk for Rhetts. (sp???)

After the meeting some took off back to the Lodge where Bad Dog was playing, and other hung at the house. Patti - what was that game called we played. LOVED IT!!

I dont know about the rest of the crew but I was in bed just after midnight. DOG TIRED!

I hope everyone had a great time like me!  Can't wait til next year!!!

dont misread the tile....it definately was not the BEST BOOK but the best book CLUB MEETING!  I felt a need to give something back to the poor souls who read the very cheesy book titled: The Perfect Christmas by Debbie Maccomber.  I chose that book while quickly flipping through Amazon while at the last meeting.  Knowing the book club was in December I wanted something "appropriate".  hence Christmas in the title.

Well we atleast we had a great time. We spent more time on Wine than on talking about the book!

 Bernie came out from Wine Shop at Home.  Wine Shop is a PARTY like tupperware. Bernie came in a showed off his product - and we did a taste testing. He talked about the 4 C's of wine tasting....hmmm what were those? I must have another party!!!  Seriously. Wine Shop at Home are wines from all over California but not marketed at Grocery Stores or anything.  And once they are gone - they are gone.  We tasted 3 whites and 3 reds.  I pick my favorites from the cute label - WINNER: Sun Fish.  They all tasted really yummy, so why not have a cute bottle too?!  For those who do not have their Wine Badge this was a great jump start towards getting your charm.  Now just host your own tasting and start a journal and you have completed the badge requirements! 

I did take pictures and will post those later in the week - so keep checking back.  Thanks to everyone who came out to my house!  I was glad to show off my decorating badge project: The Coppertop Tavern.  It's a little small for a dozen people or more doing a wine tasting - but fun none the less.

happy holidays - and since I wont see most of you until SNOW BADGE - Happy New Year too.

As part of the Wine Appreciation Badge Cami hosted her first ever Wine Tasting.  I think she might have earned a badge for hosting a Party too because a GREAT party it was. 

About 15 women showed up with 2 bottles of wine. One bottle was set out on the kitchen island and we filled in the note card (made by Cami) with basic info: name of wine, type and cost per bottle.  Then Cami had created Wine Note Cards.  We traveled around the island tasting each wine and making notes. My system was a basic grading A through F.  (no one got below a C).  As most wine tasters have suggested to me I started with the lightest wine and moved up to the heavy (white - red). 

I noticed I am not the only person who buys wine by the creative label.  I brought Wrongo Dongo, another person brought B!tch and a third brought Little Black Dress, just to name a few. All the wines were wonderful in my opinion.

Cami, thinking of everything, had delightful appetziers to taste with the wine.  It is amazing how some wines completely change in taste by simply sampling a cheese, dessert or other edible item!

After the tasting we gathered around in the living room where all the 'extra" wines had been creativly wrapped up.  Our names were selected out of bowl and we eaach had a chance to unwrap a bottle or steal from some one else who had already opened.  There was ALOT of stealing going on.  It was a great idea to add the white elephant because everyone went home with a bottle of wine!

Thanks again to Cami for hosting and inviting all GROOVE members to her tasting.  I also met a few other friends of hers.  One I think may even join GROOVE -

One last note, I wish I could remember who told me this but it's a GREAT idea: When at a resteraunt, or a friends house and you have just tasted a wine you really enjoyed.....you find yourself without your wine journal (another peice of the badge) take out your phone and TAKE A PICTURE! Brilliant. So the next time at the store you can just flip open your PIX and voila!  there it is!

We all gathered at Laura's house on Friday Night.  The hostess with the mostest laid out a beautiful spread with fine wine and appetizers.  The bruchetta dip was to die for!  Laura had Wayne from Ethan Allen come in and talk first.  He brought lots of new brochures of upcoming trends and items available at EA.  I noticed alot of stream lines in the furniture. Even the "glamour" looks were tight.  The most interesting items were the new  wall papers available.  TEXTURE, texture, texture.  remember the sea grass wall paper of the 70's? its BAAAAAAAACk!  And more interesting than ever.  Check out the photos.  The textured leaf and glitter stone are in the pics.  One popular one missing from photos is the Cork. Very environmentally friendly.  that seems to be the key these days.  It cant just look good - it has to be good to the environment too!  After a informative lesson in design elements and a brief lesson on fabrics we broke into 3 groups. The challenge was to take one persons room and make a story board. The girls had about an hour to come up with a solution for the room including the design elements.  All 3 of the groups came up with excellent rooms but our big winner was Cindy Duco's group.  The Boyz2Men Den was well thought outI  It had a great balance, fun and inviting color pallette, and wonderful use of space.  Congrats girls. 

All in all we had a GREAT time.  I think everyone went home with some fresh ideas.  Now getting motivated to DO THE WORK is the next challenge!

I cant find my blog I wrote Friday night. I must have been so tired I forgot to save it! 

We certainly had a great time on Friday.  We learned about Playing Pool and got 3 new members!!! yea.

We learned the difference between a Qtip and a Cue tip...now that was funny.  Bunch of silly women we are!!!

I learned the proper way to rack. I have been doing it wrong all these years. Our instructors were AWESOME. 

Thanks again to Fat's.  The establishment was very nice.  And very gracious when we went over ur alotted time!  Hope everyone else had fun. be sure to add your comments about what you learned!