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We went to Williamsburg, Virginia for Spring Break and I have so many cool stories to share with you! But tonight I wanted to tell you about the most romantic thing that happened to me there.

I was in the Colonial Jewelers, admiring the authentic period jewelry and came across this beautiful ring:

It is called a Gimmel Ring.  Centuries ago, they were betrothal rings.  Three separate rings hinged into one.  Initially separate, (one for the woman, one for her betrothed, and one for the maid of honor) they were to be joined at the marriage of the couple.  Beautifully wrought hands, a man’s and a woman’s, each on their own individual ring,  clasping each other tightly over a third ring which was simply a heart.  How sweet is that?  I can get dreadfully sappy, so bear with me here.

I showed My Captain this way cool ring and he looked about as unimpressed and as uninterested as any man could possibly look.  Let’s be frank, no self-respecting manly man firefighter would ooh and ahh over a romanticly designed ring.  Hell, he’d lose his Man-Card over something like that.

Way back when, My Captain designed my wedding ring.  He drew the design and we found a jeweler to create it and it is truly a one of a kind thing of beauty.  Yellow Gold Ivy leaves with different kinds of precious and semi-precious green jewels embedded in it.  Beautiful.

But some of the jewels fell out, and our Artisan Jeweller, a frenchman named Jacque Hemsi of Jewelry of Chardavogne , asked us to return it so he could rework it.  He takes tremendous pride in his work and it chaffed him that it happened.  He’s even replaced the stones at his own expense.  I love this guy!

But unfortunately that means I won’t have my ring for a couple of months.  I’ve felt naked without my wedding ring!  I felt DIRTY!

Well don’t you know that, despite his apparent casual dis-interest, My Captain bought me one of the pure silver Gimmel Rings right then and there, hand made by the artisans in Colonial Williamsburg?  He gave it to me so I wouldn’t feel so naked until my real wedding band returns.

Is that not the most beautiful gesture ever?

He’s a keeper!

Every family has their traditions, and if Facebook is any indication, family photographs of beautiful children out amongst the daffodils searching for hidden eggs is a popular one.   And then you’ve got your traditional photograph of the girls in their Easter bonnets, with sweet sunshiney faces.  And you’ve got your young men looking spiffy in their bow-ties and Sunday-best clothes with their hair slicked back.  And one of my personal favorites is when people have matching family-clan type photographs, where everyone wears the same hue of Chartreuse sweatervests.

Regardless of the specific type of traditional photo, they are always super flattering.  They’d have to be because who in the world would consider posting their out-takes on Facebook, I ask you?

Me.

Duh!

We also have a tradition on Easter that contains photographs.  Every year on Easter, we try to take a picture of the kids, and every year Varmint fakes her smile, and Critter photobombs it.

Every. Stinkin. Year.

I won’t bore you with photographs of years’ past.  But I will share this year’s Easter Brunch photo:

You realize in 20 years we’ll still be taking this kind of picture, right?

I’ve come to terms with it.

Pass me the jelly beans, please.

Today is cloudy, gray, cold and just plain bleccchhh.  We’re waiting for Winter Storm Virgil to come be a pain in the petootie.  And as this is the beginning of our Spring Break, Critter and Varmint are less than pleased about it.

I confess I, too, have been a little glum.  It’s hard to be an optimist in the face of all this grumpy, stormy, moroseness.

But just a moment ago, I came across this picture:

And the sun came out.

Not literally, of course, but it did make me grin and chuckle.

Isn’t it crazy how a silly moment at the beach can brighten a day months into the future?

Makes you wonder what today’s moments might do months from now.  I have a suspicion that it works both ways….happy moments can bring future happiness, and dark moments can bring future darkness.

I’d better get my happy game on!

Today My Captain opened our shiny, brand-spankin’ new, extra-wide Mama Boe-sized mailbox to find someone had mailed us a curiously shaped package.

After the police dogs finished sniffing it for anything dangerous, we cautiously lifted it out to find:

The weirdest ding-dang package we’ve ever received.  A see-through bucket with Easter wishes and colored Easter grass inside, and something else we couldn’t quite make out.  The return address proved it was from our friends Paul and Heather (from Social Climbing fame).  THIS was bound to be interesting!

We took it inside, had to scour the basement for a paint-bucket opener, pried the top off, and pulled this out:

Followed closely by this:

A Moose Cozy.  For when I need to insulate my beverage of choice with a large North American Mammal.

A large North American Mammal with a cute hiney:

I have the weirdest friends.

Thank God.

I want you all to know that I went ahead and took down the Christmas lights from the tall Spruce in front of the Little Cottage today.  I mean, I was GOING to, I had INTENDED to, I really WANTED to do it tomorrow on St. Patrick’s Day, but you know me, I’m an overachiever.

As I stretched this way and that, using the hooked pole, unwinding and lifting and lowering strand after strand of lights, I thought back to our beautiful Christmas holiday this year.  The kids had so much fun; WE had so much fun giving them so much fun; Grandma Jane and Mike had so much fun watching us have fun giving the kids so much fun…..

It was a wonderful season, filled with love and laughter and peace.

I thought about all of that as each *^%%^@! strand of light got tangled into other @#!#$$ strands of lights, and it was REALLY starting to  piss me off.  Several strands actually snapped in my impatience; my arms were burning so badly that I just yanked the dagnab thing, sometimes snapping the branch off in the process.

I began muttering.  That soon ratched up to cursing, until I called over to My Captain, who was in the yard cleaning up sticks and leaves.

“If you don’t help me with this thing right now, I’m going to snap this damn pole in two, SO HELP ME!” I hollered for all the neighbors to hear.

My Captain hollered back for me to just throw the pole down and go inside before I ruptured an artery or something.

I hurled the damn pole down with a ferocity that only a 220lb woman can hurl, and stomped back into the house, swearing I’ll never put those goddamn lights back up so help me…..

….er,….God.

And then I remembered Christmas peace and joy and fun, and everything I’d been so content with just a half an hour ago.

And thumped down on a kitchen chair, and felt about 2 years old.

The good news? I beat St. Patrick’s Day for getting the lights down this year.  The bad news?  Only half of the light strands are still in one piece.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day, friends!  May your day be filled with…uh….PEACE!

Mama B.