3 Down, So Many to Go!

What's worse?

A kitchen that looks like your life, lunch and laundry and everything in between exploded all over it (never mind the rest of the house)?

Or a phone call during the life, lunch, laundry (and I forgot to mention two naked children in the kitchen sink getting their baths, toes and fingernails cut and bangs trimmed) from a fellow blogger saying she was in the area and could we meet?

Hmmmm, let me guess.

Follow me here.

See, Mom and a friend had a big sale this weekend at this friends farmhouse about 12 minutes from here. And a fellow blogger was coming to Kankakee which is a good, good hike but we had talked about meeting since she would be within 100 miles-ish. I thought, if anything we would be meeting at the sale Friday night, I never saw her so I figured, understandably so, that two hours to come to a "sale" might be a bit much. Chicagoland traffic-n-all.

I get this call all the time from a weird number with and "8" in it. A few times between Friday night and Saturday morning I got a call from a number with that familiar "8" so - like a dumb butt, I ignored it.

Until JOEL'S phone rang Saturday during the life, laundry and lunch - it was my Mom, "_______ is here! (at the sale) and she wants you to pop on over!" Then it dawned on me, the similarity between the stalker, weird phone call number and this bloggers phone number!!!

"8"

What? No make up, still in pj's, trimming little toe nails and twenty minutes before naptime, life, lunch and laundry to be done, with hubby in the middle of a carpentry project - But what are you gonna say, "Sorry, babe. Next time?" I think not. So, I invited _____ and her gang over to the Parisienne Farmhouse. Hung up the phone and was like Cinderella on steroids! You never saw my gimpy, pregnant hips move so fast.

ALL HANDS ON DECK!!!

Hubby was ordered to put down the saw, homemade pizza mess cleaned up, kids we herded off to bed, hairs and toe nails cleaned up, bra and mascara put on, kitchen floor crud mopped, hmmm, ceiling fan blades are filthy with no time to clean them so turn it on (you can't see the dirt when it's going round and round), everyone's sheets were in the dryer so the beds had to get made...

All this for who you ask?

Why, the ever conservative, farm living, food growing, Congress calling, hilarious, NASCAR and Junior lovin'...JONI FROM OLD CENTENNIAL FARMHOUSE!!!!!

Oh my gosh, thankfully they first stopped for lunch or all my dirty secrets would have been known (as if they aren't now that I have told you why a stye my house was on Saturday afternoon!). I directed them into town and stood out in the driveway to wave them in - it was Joni, her darling sister Mary with the cool jeans, let's see, I believe her sister's two daughters and a friend! And let me tell you something - not only is Joni my kind of blogger - I could hang out with her all day! What a doll! She is JUST like she is on her blog and better! The chickens latched on to her right away, Aidan took her hand and in the most darling fashion gave her a tour of the house room by room, his legos and other creations and Amélie let her hold her like she was her Aunt or something!

L-R, Joni, Amélie, Moi, Aidan & Mary

When you come to my town you HAVE to visit at least one resale shop (we have so many) so, I call my friend who was getting ready to close up for the day and said we were coming over with a car load. It was fun and she had good stuff too! I hope Joni posts some of her finds.

Our visit was short and sweet but I must say, it was so wonderful to meet her, her sister (who I found out is a lurker on the P.F.) and the girls! So, here is the rule, no matter how crazy it is, or what I am in the middle of, I love impromptu guests from near or far - so Bloggerbeans, if you are in the area, have a layover at O'Hare or Milwaukee and would like to come over for a meal, cup of coffee or trip to a local resale shop - PLEASE let me know!!!!!! I have had the honor and meeting Homemaker Ang, Anne Marie and Joni of Old Centennial and...I would love to meet you too!

Nada Farm & Labor Day Weekend!

Parisienne Farmhouse & Nada Farm Offspring...oh so cute!

What started out as laborious and dull turned into relaxing and

oh-so-very pleasant.

Sunday I had a photo shoot in Naperville. Or what I like to call, "NaperHell." Why ANYONE would want to live in that vast expanse of keeping up with the Jones' is beyond me. It just feels like 20 miles of strip malls, ugly million plus dollar McMansions, old corn fields being torn up daily and traffic, traffic, traffic. There are a few Chicago suburbs that I can't stand to even pass through and NaperHell is one of them! (No offense if you live there! :)

The shoot was in a word: dull and managing the clients requests (a list a mile long of group shots that she wanted) was NOT enjoyable. I got paid so I should not complain, but...

My style is more "artistic documentary" or at least I hope it will be someday and lining people up for family portraits isn't that fun.

The star of the shoot, a darling 2 year old was, well, not having any fun either. She would not crack a smile or mutter a word. I tried, I swear I tried but by the time I left I was about to cry. I simply wanted some shots of this lovely child and I feel like a took 400 photos of her looking off into space with that, "I'd rather be napping." look. Never mind that there was a step-teen as part of the mix and the step-mom kept whispering in my ear to tell him what to do since he would only roll his eyes at her. Oh, Julie Harris, how did you get where you are today???

The minute the shoot was done I ran out to the car, grabbed a change of clothes (I perspire like an Olympian on the job) threw them on in the Country Club ladies room and raced off...I mean, who wants to go to Anne Marie's Nada Farm with a pitted blouse???

An hour later, and three hours late for the party I parked my car at the end of a long line of vehicles running along a country road and chocolate cakes in tow met up with my family, the Nada Farm gang and all their guests...

YE HAW!

We got in a little square dancing, a little food and a ton of visiting with wonderful, family-friendly, interesting people! How funny to answer the question, "How do you know Anne?" with, "Well, we met on the internet!" One girl even came up to me and asked, "Are you Parisienne Farmgirl?"

Anne and family had outdone themselves working hard for over a week with country chic decor, harvested prairie flowers from the property, live entertainment, a bonfire as big as my house, a hay ride (pulled by a suburban which made me laugh out loud) and of course the most darling outhouse arrangement!!!

We felt like honored guests being invited to stay in the house instead of camp on the lawn and enjoyed crisp clean sheets and turn down service complete with heavenly Ugandan dark chocolate and Decaf coffee for the next morning for pregnant, yours truly.

I won't bother to attempt to put too much more into words except to kindly say, move over Mary Jane Butters. The rest I will leave to your imagination and these photographs. If you are not a reader of Anne Marie's blog and come on...at this point, who isnt? Well, get on over there, ya hear?

Click to enlarge...does anyone know how to make these photos bigger????

I am this close ------ to begging to move in. We even checked out a farm for sale two miles away!
Mary & Laura???
Oh, no big deal. Just Mr. & Mrs. pecking around the back door. Did you know chickens (les poules) say, "Cot, Cot, Cot" au francais?
The Prairie.
Morning Jo(el) and Amélie.
We were checking each other out. If I didn't have a little passenger I would have begged to go for a ride.
Pardon my shoddy Photoshop editing, don't look too close- I just wanted to get this post up quickly!
Best of friends heading out of the barn for more exploring...
...and good friends trying to recover from a late night with hot java.

I forgot to mention the dancing entertainment! I dream of knowing how to Irish dance and oh my, does her daughter inspire and get the toes tappin'!

Someday.

And last but not least - the loo, complete with washing station. Gentle and genius.

Our First "Weekend" of the Summer!

How blessed I am to have a new and "old" friend! I just made one "officially" this weekend by meeting a fellow blogger and her family and the "old" friend...well I have known her for eight years and our friendship has really blossomed in the last two. That is something I am just thrilled about.
How ironic that these two friends, one from Illinois and one from Michigan have a home and summer home within minutes of each other...
What a FABULOUS way to start the summer!

Mon Amie Mandi

The scrapbbok page from our visit 9 years ago!

9 years and it had been too long since I had seen my friend Mandi. We've been friends since we were about 12 years old, though our friendship really blossomed when we were around 14 and I had the priviledge of being a part of her falling in love with Jesus. She still loves Him to this day. And I, her.
We had a riot of a night a few weeks ago (around the time I dropped off the blogging planet). I went to visit her for a few hours while she was in Chicago. We started out at Sushi Samba but the website did not lie when it said it was "the pretty people meeting place of Chicago" and soon it became clear that our Creston girl butts were too big to fit it so we ditched for a fun little bistro further north...A few martini's and glasses of wine over a yummy French dinner and some hilarious video at a nearby hotel made it clear that Mandi is as fun as she ever was. Her heart is so full of love for her family and yet it still has enough room for this Parisienne Farmgirl all these years later.
Love you too Ms. Cameron.

Visit Amanda's blog at: funkadelica.typepad.com