OK, I'm really back.

Kathleen just reminded me that I hadn't lived up to my promise to update the blog. I'm sorry. She did tell me that I was a funny blogger and really needed to get back to it.

So much has happened since I last blogged -- trip to Europe, hauling my carcass across Austria on a bike, robbie going off to school is the rain-soaked northwest, my nephew coming home from his mission next week, lots of other changes that can only be speculated about (or about which we can only speculate - don't like to end my sentences with a preposition).

Anyway, I left with a cryptic note about what I was doing 5 years previous. I guess I should elaborate. Several years ago, I bought a book, "1000 things to do before you die". (I'm not really sure if the punctuation should go inside or out of the quotation marks. Don't judge me.) I had been to London 3 times previously with my kids and/or my sister Kathleen, so I was looking at things to do in London before I die. There was this entry of the Chelsea Flower Show, the most incredible garden show on earth!! I decided then and there that for my 50th birthday I and my friends and sisters and daughters would go to the Chelsea Flower Show. I issued an invitation to anyone who wanted to go over the week of my birthday, 2005, with the caveat that they had to make all their own arrangements, I would not coordinate anything but my own travel.

It was so fabulous!! Rachel and Sarah came; my friend Pat Peterson and her daughter Katherine; Sarah's wonderful friend (and my extra daughter) Emily Jones, and my wonderful sisters, Kathleen Lewis and Fran Gordon. I guess what made this extra special was that Fran had been recovering from breast cancer treatments and it was such a miracle that she was able to come. Maybe this was extra, extra special because just a little over a year later, she succumbed to that awful disease. We still miss her terribly.

That was such a magical trip that I want to take it again. I use the pictures of the trip as the screen saver on my computer and when I turn away for a minute and then return, there is a picture of London and the people I love.

Take a look at these pictures and I dare you to tell me you don't agree.