I have often thought about and puzzled over the scripture which admonishes us to lose our life in order to find it.

I think I might have gotten a little closer to understanding what it means this weekend.

Let me explain:

On Saturday we went out to eat as a family, and as we were ordering our grub we grabbed two brownies. The idea being that we would consume them after lunch was over. But as these things often go – at the end of lunch Jan had his brownie – moist, chocolaty goodness, waiting for him. And my brownie had been eaten by Millie and Clara.

So, the plan was to grab me another brownie as we left. But the line was so long that I said, “Forget it!”

And we headed for home.

When we got home I asked Jan,

“Would you be willing to share your brownie with me?”

He said,

“Yes! Of course!”

And then I took that little brownie, cut it in half and turned it into

THIS

Mini-

brownie sundae

happiness.

As I tucked into this yummy treat I wondered if this is what the Lord will do on a cosmic, eternal scale if we will share our brownies – and lose our lives in service to him?

Food for thought…

(literally)

OUR WEEKEND!

Friday – Pumpkins everywhere you look!

Including our VERY OWN, Lil’ Pumpkin!

(Thanks for the shirt, Annie – it is darling!)

Millie’s fine pre-school art work.

Jan had been out of town all week, Millie was sick and missed her school trip to pick a pumpkin from the patch. SO, I told her that she and I would get a few from our local floral shop and when Dad got home we’d carve ’em.

A mom who keeps her promise (sometimes) definitely kept it on Friday evening.

Meanwhile, the thing I was most looking forward to? OUR TREAT! I’d been craving doughnuts for days. WHY? I do not know. I just needed one. So, after getting our pumpkins from the local nursery, we stopped by our local Dunkin’ Donuts and got one for each of us.

They tasted marvelous and then once they hit our tums – ARHG! – you let enough time pass between doughnut ingestions and you forget just how hard they are on your system.

Moving on to…

Saturday

Here comes the Ghostie Family! Millie and Jan made our family in “ghostie” form.

Millie wanted her ghosts on the door so that she could be just like Jack and Drew (who also have ghosts hung on their front door)

And Clara did her bit by looking cute. (This may end up being her costume – Millie’s hand-me-down pajamas – cuz that is the kind of Halloween mom I am – aka LAME).

(Millie under the covers)

Monday

First fire in our fire place…

Looks terribly romantic, don’t it? WELL, it so happened that I didn’t open the flue. This meant lots of smoke, stress, and stink. But if you want to pretend like I never told you what really happened you can just imagine that it was

P E R F E C T I O N !

And the rest is our secret.

Oh, Emily! My wonderful friend, Em, Em, Emily. Today is your birthday. Remember how you told me “it’s no big deal” when I asked you what I could do to make your day WONDERFUL. But I just kept asking you anyway (you know what they call that, right? – annoying!)

Well, you are on an air plane, flying back to New Jersey – having spent your weekend helping your sister who just had a wee babe and I am thinking of you. Of what a wonderful human being you are,  of the millions of times you have saved my bacon, of all the laughs we’ve shared, of how you’ve listened to me no matter what it is I needed to say, of the times we’ve spent working ourselves to the bone at the Cannery (we need to go back – it’s been a year!) and the list goes on…

Here is the thing – Emily is what I consider to be my “daily bread”. Let me explain: once as I was reading through the Lord’s prayer, and was thinking about the phrase, “give us this day, our daily bread” – I thought about that plea. About what that plea means for me personally. About how we need to petition God for help on an moment to moment basis.  As I thought about what daily bread is to me, I realized that for me, it is friends.  I love people and I really love the people who love me back – mis amigos! (I know, isn’t that terribly noble and heroic of me!) And you know how every once and a while you so get lucky, that it just so happens that the person you adore lives a three minute drive away — all of the sudden that person has become your daily bread. Emily is the kind of person where, if a few days go by and I haven’t seen her face or heard her laugh, I start to feel hungry. Soul hungry. Like I need some bread — and fast!

Here is why I feel hungry if I don’t get enough Emily:

Emily is one of the most thoughtful people I know. I feel like she is always looking out for me. True story: One morning she and I were talking on the phone. She mentioned how she puts “blue ice” in her kid’s lunch boxes.   I’d never heard of it, but she swore  that it kept her kids lunches cold. “Ooh!” I said, “I’ll have to try and find me one.” A few hours later she shows up at my house with some “blue ice”! Now every time I put Millie’s lunch together I think of my pal, Em.

She is organized, her life is in beautiful order – just go to her house. I love it when I go over and she says, “This place is such a mess!” and there are a few pop corn kernels on the floor from 15 minutes ago when her son was watching TV with a bowl of pop corn in his lap. All I am saying is I have never gone over there and seen a mess yet. Once I hung out at her house while her boy’s were all asleep in their beds and she and Mike went out. It was so nice just to sit in her house. It was in perfect order. It felt so cozy. Not only does she keep a beautiful home, she fills it with love.

She is a work horse. She is a tiny slender little thing – but the woman packs a punch. She can do anything! You give her a task and she is ON IT. I served with her in the primary for two beautiful years – and man, she was awesome. She is an absolute dream to work with – she always does her best, she does it on time and you can depend on her 100 %. I also know she has a testimony. I have heard her bare it multiple times to the primary kids.

Her capacity to do is NUTS – she always seems to be having people over for dinner, or hosting multiple play dates, getting the carpets cleaned, planting flowers, getting someone to a dentist appointment, helping out her neighbors. She just never ceases to amaze me. She always knows what is going on. How long it will last and what time it is over. I always call her whenever I need to find out the details. She reads the fine print & then she REMEMBERS what she read.

Her heart is so kind. If I am frustrated or hurting I know I can talk to her about it, and she will listen to me and then she will do whatever is in her power to help me. This might sound odd, but if you knew Emily you would understand perfectly what I am going to tell you about – Emily has this very distinct way of saying, “Oh, CRAP!” when things have gone horribly wrong. Sometimes, when I am telling her my troubles, I just wait for her to say it – because it is so her and the minute I hear the phrase I feel like she gets the gravity of the situation and she is totally, unequivocally on my side.

She is so much fun to be with. I know if Emily is going to be somewhere – there will be laughs and it will be F U N.

She is the mother of three handsome, spirited, ENERGETIC boys. One time I offered to pick them up from school and in one instant I had a whole new level of respect for her. I have two little girls who cling to me and stay by my side every moment. Her boys were independent, darting around, talking with friends, throwing their back packs down, and running in three different directions. Just to get them from the playground to the car took all the energy I could muster. I thought to myself, “Em wrangles these three dynamos every single day.” It is a huge job and she does it beautifully –  and she doesn’t just corral them – she runs them to soccer, tennis, baseball, basketball, football, wrestling and “Yum Yum cooking class” (lest you think that these little men are ONLY sporty! and, yes,  that is seriously the name of the cooking class!)

I also happen to think Emily is a total BABE! She has got a killer figure. I swear that sometimes she looks like  teenager!!   One morning I was working out with her at the YMCA and I looked over at her running three times faster than I was, her cheeks flushed, hair pulled back, no make up — she was BEAUTIFUL! And I though, “I think I am working out with the cutest person in this whole gym.” Her husband Mike must want to congratulate himself ever stink’n day – when he considers what a babe he married.

I love her.

Em, please send me your mom’s info so that I can thank her for giving you life.

You make my life so happy and so good.

H A P P Y  B I R T H D A Y!!!

I have news so tremendous, so joyful, so exciting – I need help to express it. I need far more eloquence than I posses to voice the feelings of my heart.

I need THE BARD!

Just imagine, if you will, Romeo and Juliet…but with a HAPPY ENDING!!!

The families aren’t feuding, they have loved each other for YEARS. The moms are the best of friends who shared endless laughs and Costco runs, the dads love and respect one another and have served together in a bishopric. The older kids have babysat the younger kids, had play dates and even little high school crushes…wait for it. Oooh, just wait for it because it gets even better.

I give you the new and IMPROVED version of the classic tale (I know, you thought nobody could improve Shakespeare, but prepare yourselves to be gobsmacked… this is good, oh friends, THIS IS GOOD)

Two households, both alike in dignity,

(well, one might be a little more dignified than the other… that second bunch looks a little WILD to me)

In fair Provo, where we lay our scene,

From forth the life-giving loins of these two families
A pair of star-gazing lovers take their vows;

Whose triumphant goodness cheerfully yields yet more happiness,
Do with their engagement heighten their parents’ joy.

The courageous passage of their life-mark’d love,
And the continuance of their parents’ glee,
Which, but their children’s marriage, could only enhance,
Is now the traffic of this humble blog;
The which if you with patient eyes attend,
What here shall read, my toil shall strive to celebrate.

It’s true! It’s true! And every conversation I have with any member of my family results in giggles, exaltations, and this phrase, “CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?!?!?!”

It is so good it is almost too good to be true, but believe it,

because

This here cutie

asked this here cutie

to be his WIFE…

&

she

said

“YES!”

A few words about my FUTURE sister-in-law, Sam Card (soon to be Kelly), for those of you who may not enjoy the blessing of knowing her:

You can see that she is lovely. She is also a hard worker, a great student, a hip chick, and a person of true depth & substance. She is a person who has been through some very challenging times and she has emerged from her trials with grace and beauty. She is courageous. She is so good.  She has a testimony. She is strong because she knows where to go and Who to turn to for strength. If you were to meet her you would instantly think “Oh, what a darling, fun girl.” And you would be right, but that is just the beginning.  You might not know that she has managed to confront the darkness of life and remain full of light. And even be lighthearted. Joyful. Fun.

She is remarkable.

And, let the world take note, her FUTURE family-in-law LOVE, LOVE, LOVE her.

So does her fiancé.

Now a few words about Sam’s fiance, my little brother, Chas Kelly.  Chas is a peace maker. He can take a heated situation and calm everything right down. He is a real man. He is a person of integrity and goodness. Of the many things the world prizes and esteems my brother is something that is, these days,  grossly undervalued, but I KNOW how important is is and so I am going to tell ya, he is pure. You heard me, PURE and good to the core! He has made covenants to live and be a certain way – and he has kept them.  He has lived his life to be worthy of a woman like Sam. I have so much confidence in the husband and father he will be. He honors God by honoring the power that God has graciously extended to him. I love him for it. He is also terrific with kids. This picture is for you Sam, it’s gonna melt ya, get ready…

Aw, Shucks! How cute is he??!!! He lived with us last summer and he was a champ with Millie. I would also add that he is also a wonderful listener. And he is a funny fellow. Oh, how he tickles me! Man, I dig him! He also has EXCELLENT taste in women…that is to say, one woman in particular.

Three cheers for Chasio and Samiet!

Hip, hip, hooray!

You better believe that I have plans to carry on posting about this lovely couple.

I will take great pleasure in keeping you POSTED, as they say.

In fact, I would like to invite this happiness, which they have freely given to all of us who know and love them, a permanent home, here, on Dawesome!

Samantha Kelly, that has such a nice ring to it, don’t you think?

In the word’s of Ruggles of Red Gap*  “YIPPY, YIPPY, YIIIIIPYYYYY!”

*(Sam, have Chas show you this film, I’m afraid it is “required” viewing to be a full blown member of the Kelly band! Well, you don’t HAVE to, but it will sure help you to get a lot of our inside jokes. And when Xmas comes, and you are forced to watch Nicholas Nickleby, don’t worry, your future sister-in-law, Allison can teach you the special dance a.k.a the “shoulder shimmy”, which she invented, to help get you through all eight hours of it.)

A little birdie called me last night and left a message on the answering machine to let me know,

that today is Karen’s birthday.

And, quite frankly, Karen is a person I just have to CELEBRATE. In fact, I might need to request emergency assistance because there may be a love explosion if I am not careful here.

Shakespeare wrote that “beauty lives with kindness” – and in Karen, this truth is realized. Just look at that golden face of  hers – can’t you just feel the goodness?! She is as good as she is beautiful. She is a wonderful friend, a fantastic mother and a down right awesome human being.

She is good fun and funny to boot!

Don’t hate her but…her children are polite (and have EXCELLENT phone manners), her house and automobile are always immaculate, and quite frankly she scatters sunshine every where she goes! (She might be cringing as she reads this because she is so very modest) BUT IT IS TRUE! And here on Dawsome the truth gets spoken.

I love Karen because I just feel like she gets it. She gets why we’re here on the earth. She knows how to give love. She constantly shows love for others  – I always feel so loved when I am with her. I always feel understood and like she is 110% on my side. And she is not ashamed to show her love for the Lord. I respect and love her so much for the way she lets her testimony be known. It just beams out of her.

Her heart is so tender and so good. And her feelings often bubble up to the surface in the sweetest ways. For example, when Millie gave her first talk in primary, Karen was there and when I looked over at Karen after Millie was finished, she had tears in her eyes. Is that a true friend or what? Like I said, she is just right there with you. What a gift she gives to her friends- the love and support she is constantly throwing out to those of us who are blessed to know her are like life lines.

I have the tremendous blessing of not only knowing and loving Karen, but I serve with her in the church. She is the primary chorister in our primary. And man, she rocks it! Every week I stand back in awe as she comes up with some new and creative way to teach the primary songs. But it isn’t flashy or showy – behind every creative endeavor beats the heart of someone with a true testimony of the gospel. She really teaches the gospel as she teaches the songs. She gives it  her all – and I can’t even begin to tell you how much her service and her effort means to me.

I also love to have her in our primary meetings. When I look over at her she nods furiously. She hasn’t done this, but I feel that she understands so well what I am trying to convey that I keep waiting for her to say, “Mmmmhumm!”, “That’s right!” or even “Amen!” as I am talking.  Oh, how I love her for this!!!

She makes my life so much better and more wonderful just by being my buddy. I feel like she helps me to be  a better person.

Oh, and Karen is a wonderful cook.  Once we had Karen and Ryan and their kids over and I somehow managed to ruin a crock pot meal – you didn’t think that was humanly possible, right? Well, I managed it, somehow. I am not kidding – ask Jan, the man who doesn’t exaggerate and even he’ll tell you it was bad. Anyway, Karen offered to bring the salad that day and boy, am I glad she did! It was so delicious. It was the best thing on the table. Karen, being Karen, will say otherwise – I was just grateful that we had something good to eat when they came over, if you know what I am saying!

As nice and kind as Karen is right to her very core – she is totally down to earth and real. I can always tell her what I am  feeling and thinking without the fear of being judged. Even though I am pretty confident she is ten times the woman I am – I never feel like less when I am with her. She makes me feel like a million bucks! She is the kind of friend who will laugh with you, or cry with you or whatever you need. She is in-tune and on board for the the ride.

Oh, Karen, I just ADORE you. Thank you for the beauty and the kindness you have brought to my life. You are a treasure. With a capital “T”!

Happy Birthday to you (and the same goes for that much OLDER husband of yours…a little birdie told me that it was HIS birthday this week too!)

I am soooooooooooooo grateful that you were born.

Happy Birthday!

Millie claims she loves to help me cook.

But really, I think she just wants to lick the bowl.

Raise your hand if you’re the same.

If a picture speaks louder than words, than this one sums up our weekend!

I love General Conference so much.

But at this current juncture in our family’s life – we  are doing our best to survive it.

I know it will get better over time. But right now if it were a mathematical equation this is how it would look:

one year old + eight hours of church = YIKES!

I’ve got to give a shout out to my Mills. She was really great. She is the one who gives me hope of a more spiritual tomorrow. I think for the first time ever she got a little something out of conference. At one point Elder Nelson quoted the scripture “Knock and it shall be opened unto you” the very scripture we’d read the night before during family scripture study and Millie recognized it. Then Elder Nelson mentioned it once more and she said, “AGAIN?!”

If you care to read on, here are some highlights of our Conference Weekend.

Saturday Session:

We carried on with our tradition of ordering pizza and eating it during the first session.

Good times.

I’d read on some Mormon Mommy Blog that a family put up a tent for their kids – you know, like the people who turned their tents towards the temple to hear the prophet speak in BOM times? Sounded fun to me, so we did this for Millie. And set up the tent in our little room right off the kitchen.

She also got some treats of her choosing.

This gig lasted about 15 minutes and then she wanted me to come into the tent. We strung her along for as long as we could and then eventually turned on Sesame Street.

Meanwhile, back in the living room…

Clara decided for the first time ever that she would scale the TV cabinet.

Lovely.

Sunday Session:

The light was pretty so we decided to take a family portrait.

If you want to keep the Spirit in your home, DON’T take a family portrait. That is all I am saying.

This picture sums it up, nicely. Just look at the expression on all the females’ faces. Are you thinking what I am thinking? “POOR JAN! He has to live with those grumpy broads!”

The saddest thing of all (next to how AWFUL my bangs looked) is that we didn’t actually get one decent photo, despite the fact that we took around 75 and drove the Spirit from our home in the process.

A few of the out takes that turned out to be kinda cute:

(I just love little Clara’s expression in the photo on the left.)

After the family portrait session was over conference began.

Tactics for keeping them listening and engaged. (ALL Jan! How I love him.)

That’s right, Conference BINGO! Yeah!

Too young for bingo, but never too young to be causing trouble…

We had planned for a picnic in the park, but Clara’s need for a nap trumped the original plan.  So, instead we had a picnic on the deck –

By the time the second Sunday session came around we just couldn’t face forcing our kids through the process. So we decided to go for a walk and get a little fresh air, with the promise to watch the recorded final session over the next few days.

I cut myself some slightly better looking bangs, at least they are a bit shorter:

We put the girls to bed.

Jan went home teaching.

I wrote this here post.

Had a long talk with a dear friend.

We watched Elder Holland’s talk. WOW! INCREDIBLE!

Like most days, these days, when I am in the middle of it I always wonder to myself, “Am I going to make it through this with my sanity intact?” The answer, thus far, is that yes I will, and yes, I do make it through. And then when I look back so much of what was hard fades away and what remains is a feeling of goodness and love. And so it goes with Conference Weekend.

To hear from the Lord’s anointed, even if there are constant interruptions – is a gift beyond measure. A pearl without price. And best of all, I can have all those talks on my iPod to carry around with me wherever I go and to revisit whenever I get the opportunity. And when those opportunities do come I know that I will be nourished, once again, by the “good word”.

Today is my ma-in-law’s big day. So you all know what that means, right?! It means a birthday shout out for our birthday girl, Gitte D.

For starters, I will forever and always be indebted to Gitte because she is the mother of the boy I adore. She and Stephen raised him to be a person of integrity, intellegence, and goodness. My life is blessed daily, moment to moment, from and by the goodness of her son’s heart.  So danke for giving me one of the greatest, if not the greatest blessings in my life.

Also, her mug is stamped all over two of my very favorite faces. Behold!

If you’re finding it hard to see the resemblance, let me see if I can help you out, a bit:

Another shared characteristic, other than the brown eyes etc, is a deep and abiding love of cats:

Millie has to make due with toy cats because her mother is anti-kitty litter and her dad, despite his love of cats, suffers from allergies. But fear not, when Millie goes to Granny’s house – there are always a few cats in the mix.

Gitte is as smart as a whip. She speaks several languages. Knits like a champ. Collects interesting and beautiful pieces of art. Reads endlessly. Is terribly generous with her time and means. And serves her guts out. She has served in local politics for over a decade – and quite frankly, she is awesome at it. Once, when elections were upon us, Jan and I had the priveldge of walking around her local village to hand out a flyer to remind her constituants to vote. Anyone we talked to GLOWED and the love for Gitte FLOWED as they pledged their support to her. “Nobody works harder than Gitte. She’s got my vote.” was the general consensus.

Yup.

She and Stephen reside in Bath. In the past 15 years that they have lived in Bath Gitte has organized two incredibly popular and memorable events. The Bath Christmas Market & The Pig Parade.

Check out this cool Christmas market, peeps:

Doesn’t this look fun & romantic? Well, it is!

Last year Gitte arranged a fund raising project for another project she’s working on (the Two Tunnels project – so many projects, so little time) known as The Pig Parade. Local businesses commissioned local artists to decorate a pig statue which was then placed somewhere in Bath.

Would you like a behind the scenes peek? Here is the pig prototype. Nice snout. Makes me want to oink.

This is Gitte with the artist who designed this fine fellow.

(He was a jolly – we met him about two years ago, in his studio)

Here are the pigs in their natural habitat.

Before they were auctioned off all the pigs were brought to the Royal Cresent. This picture of Gitte with the pigs was in the Telegraph (an English newspaper, like the Wall Street Journal). I love this picture.

The pig project raised a couple hundred thousand pounds. How cool is that?!

She has since moved on to a new endeavor. Building a new shop in their village, but that I will save for another post.

This is just the kind of thing that my mother-in-law does, and does and does.

She is a doer.

She is a contributor.

And when she sets her mind set on something you better believe it will be done. If you’ve got Gitte on your team you are going to get action! It is such fun for me to watch her hatch a plan, then work until her plan becomes a reality. She is a marvel.

I also mentioned her knitting. When Millie was first born we received packages monthly with her creations.

Cool no? And she whips these suckers out like it’s nothing. But I know it is something. I once tried to learn the basic knitting stitch and I couldn’t even do that. She can also sew, and do wood working, and added to her vast skill base is a fierce determination. So, if she has not yet mastered the skill needed for the given task, her determination and her will power will see her through.

She is also a wonderful grandmother to our girls. That same “can do” spirit comes to our house and she, like a whirlwind, goes about doing good. She and Stephen were here only a week ago – and she was the glue that held things together when I got food poisioning that knocked me silly. While she was with us she (and Stephen) played endlessly with the girls, taking them to the park, to school, an other adventures. She swept off the deck, put up a corner cupboard, fixed a kitchen cupboard that had fallen down, watered the flowers, washed the dishes, went to the grocery store…you get the picture, I’m sure.

When we moved from Boston to New Jersey Stephen and Gitte came all the way from the UK to help us move!!! And they had us totally unpacked, and I mean totally unpacked – NO BOXES left – in 48 hours. I have never seen anything like it. By the first week with her help we’d unpacked and re-painted two rooms. It was amazing. My friend Annie called in the midst of the move and told me, “If they get bored, send them to my house! I’ve got lots of projects for them.”

Gitte is a woman of substance, depth and true grit. She is a leader in the truest sense. She leads by example.

She is also a classy dame – with fabulous taste; evident in a lovely wardrobe, a beautiful home, and a super fun car.

She is also a wonderful hostess. I have heard her say she can’t cook, but everything she’s ever cooked for me has been pretty darn tasty. Check out this spread, come on! It is a thing of beauty, says I.

As is often the case with these tributes, this one just scratches the surface of the wonder of Brigitte Dawson. She is a woman that I love. And it is an honor to celebrate her on this day, her birthday!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

While making dinner Millie was playing at the fridge with her Cinderella magnets. She plays A L L  the parts from Cinderella and the prince to the the ugly step sisters to the grand duke.

Millie Princess: The gleam in your eyes is so familiar.

Millie Prince: I know, I know! I can’t see well.

Sometimes I wish that we had a digital recorder going all the time to catch this stuff. Of course I would have to edit out a fair amount – like me yelling and swearing – but oh! the treasures we could capture.

Ian has a wife who LOVES to go a ball game.

She takes the game very, very seriously.

Poor Jan. He has a wife who tells him, “I’ll do one game a year, tops.”

Here’s the thing: it takes two hours to get to the stadium if you’re lucky and don’t hit traffic. Then you park. Then you get on the subway (people, people, people everywhere you look). Then you arrive at the stadium (MORE PEOPLE!), then you sit down in your seat – crammed in with all that humanity – and 90% of them are swearing like sailors and 99% of them are drunk or getting there, the food is astronomical, the seats are sticky, the weather may or may not be on your side…you paid a small fortune for this?

NO!

You paid a small fortune to watch the drama unfolding on that emerald green field (where it is only a matter of time until a bunch of grown men will be forced to perform the YMCA while racking the sand, poor fellows!)

Jan’s birthday wish was to see the drama play out between the biggest rivalry in the history of baseball. So I grudgingly accompanied him to the Yankees/Red Sox game this Saturday. It’s not that I don’t like baseball, I just don’t  L O V E baseball – and my life is so full to the brim with demands that when I have a spare seven hours I like to spend them very wisely. Don’t hate me, but baseball is not my first choice.

Having said all this I have to say, I had a swell time on Saturday. The air was charged (sometimes overcharged – To all the Red Sox haters: STOP! that is all I am going to say) the game was awesome and my birthday boy was thrilled.

GO YANKEES!

P.S. Brynn, when I considered what to wear to the game I remembered how much you loved the navy buttoned down shirt with tiny white polka dots I once wore ages ago.  I recall you made particular mention of it.  Thank you, for noticing, dear sister.

It’s been a while so in case you forgot, here I am trying my hardest to be cute –

I kept you in mind when I dressed (for success) for this game:

I was going for a subtle navy and white combo. Knowing your love of a sweater vest I wore mine, with a white shirt and due to the nippy weather I donned my tweed jacket.

It’s hard to see, but, all the same – I dedicate this outfit to YOU.