Peach Pickin and Lavender Sniffin

My least favorite season in Texas is what we call "super summer" which is July and August. When you walk out of an airconditioned room into the great outdoors it feels like you walked into an oven! It's hot! When it gets into the 100's it's unbearable to do anything outside. Well, this year there was a little bit of a relief on a few weekends and we took advantage of it. A friend of ours told us about a place call U Pick Peaches, http://www.redriverpeachorchard.com/. It's up in the Gainesville, TX area, very close to Oklahoma. I love fresh picked fruit, but the last time I picked fruit was when I lived in Virginia and that's been several years ago, so I was happy to hear about this. It was a cool July Saturday in the low 90's and in Gainesville, high 80's. It felt like a cold front had come through. A perfect day for picking. It was also nice to spend time with just my husband since I had been so busy doing weddings all summer and haven't been around too much.

When we pulled up to the gate, it was just a house with a little store front out back that worked the peach picking business. They had homemade peach ice cream for sale, peach jams and jellies and free lemonide. Also a clean restroom...which is important, and a place where you can wash your hands afterwards. It was a perfect day! We met some people up there from our church that were picking as well.

Grab a bucket and go pick! They weigh the fruit, put it in a box and you pay...cash only.

 

They have something like 900 trees!

 

Tons to choose from

 

 

We picked three buckets full

 

After we picked our peaches, we headed to the Lavender Farm, which was about 15 minutes away. http://lavenderridgefarms.com.

 

 

This is where you cut Lavender, but we were there after the season had finished.

 

They have a small café and an outside eating part as well. All the food on the menu includes Lavender in their ingredients. We had Lavender infused iced tea and lemonade. We shared a trio salad that had some Lavender in it as well as gooey butter cake with Lavender sprinkled on top. Not my favorite accent to food, but it was nice to try.

 

They had this nice little gift shop where you can buy Lavender things. We bought Lavender musk soap which smelled so good.

 

It was a really nice little get-away for Scott and I. Of course we had our work cut out for us when we got home, peeling peaches, but we got that done and made some yummy things.

 

Peach freezer jam. I had no idea how easy that was.

 

Peach preserves. Yum!! Never made this before, but it was pretty easy as well. I just watched a YouTube video and taught myself. Now we have jam/preserves to share with others...as well as lots of frozen peaches.

 

 

 

 

 



 



 

 

 

 

 

A Nice Wedding with a little Lily issue

When planning or coordinating a wedding, you never know what issues may come up that day. Take for instance, this wedding. Wonderful couple and family and just a joy to work with. The only issue...allergies caused by a little lily. Now who would think that this delicate flower would cause an issue? After all, it doesn't even look like a Lily. But it is, indeed, a Lily. It's a type of Lily that you see as filler in a lot of bouquets you can order on-line. It's official name is Alstroemeria, a Peruvian Lily. The story goes...as the flowers arrived, the mother of the groom, who has a terrible allergy to Lily's, discovered that she was having an allergic reaction. ( I believe this allergy was communicated, but maybe the florist didn't know it was a Lily either, :-) don't know, but it got lost in translation somehow). The groomsmen, fathers and grandfathers all had white roses and the Lily's attached...except the groom who just had roses. I really didn't think they were Lily's. The groom's father and I were using our phones, with limited WiFi available, to Google the flower to see if it indeed was a Lily. I texted my husband, who knows flowers better than me, and he came back with the name and indeed it was a Lily. Now what!? Well, we just took the Lily's out of all of the men's boutonnieres, then the groom and I took them out of the centerpieces in the Chapel. The Lily's were too incorporated in the bridesmaids bouquets so we left them. The mother-of-the groom was a great sport. She just took some Benadryl and made it through without too much of a problem and had a great attitude. She did have a epi shot which I made sure of. Whew!

Here is the little culprit...

The plain white rose looked just great after we took the Lily off.

 

On to the good part...the Wedding:

 

Wedding Music:

Seating of the Grandparents and Parents: Hallelujah

Wedding Party: Song for Sienna

Bridal Entry: A Walk Through the Forest

Unity Candle: In Christ Alone

Recessional - You Make My Dreams

 

Finally...a bride as tall as me! :-) It's not often I get to look a bride in the eye at 5'11", it's rare. Lauren and Alex were a great couple to work with as well as their families.

 

This was a great dress for Lauren. She's nice and thin, so she can wear this type of dress.

 

The ceremony was very meaningful, personable and Christ-centered.

I didn't get a close-up of the pew décor, but there were wood plaques with words from I Corinthians 13 on them, such as: Love is...Patient, Kind, etc.

 

Giving of the bride

 

Here's an idea why photographers get great pictures. :-)

 

Just married!!

 

Colors were teal and choral. I'm guessing everyone had their idea of what teal is. I know that everyone wants to feel comfortable in the dress they choose, which can be an issue for sure. They were happy, which is what matters. :-)

 

The groomsmen

 

Lauren just embraced the day and had fun with it!

 

The flower girl and ring bearer

 

I asked them for a personality shot...got it! :-) Fun!

 

Mother of the groom moment...sweet!

 

It was a lovely and really loving wedding, I was glad to be a part of it!