I got to have a lovely visit with my sisters yesterday.  It has been quite a while since we got together...everyone's summer was pretty busy.  

We still hadn't celebrated Brenda's birthday (from July!)  

It's so fun just to catch up on each other's lives and  just enjoy each other's company.  

Leslie showed us her pictures from her cruise.  She went on an Alaskan cruise and it was sure beautiful.  I was most jealous of her visit to Vancouver and to the Butchart Gardens.  They were amazing and reminded me so much of mums flower beds.  I wish she could have had the opportunity to visit there.  She would have really loved it.  I picture her and daddy planting and creating beautiful gardens in heaven where there are no bounds to their talents.

I have sure been missing mum and daddy lately.  I think it's this time of year when I have so many wonderful memories of them...harvesting the garden, bottling beans and peaches, sitting out in front of the old tree house, watching daddy cut the corn off the cobs so we could freeze it (I used to love to snitch chunks of it from the canner as it was being blanched). Helping mum  pick,(oooo the hey fever!) snip and stuff beans into the jars for canning.  (I always shied away from the pressure cooking of them though...that thing scared me and it still does.)  We would go out to aunt Sherry's and pick grapes, then pick them off the stems (purple fingers for days) wash them and bottle them for juice.

The flowers were always at their peak beauty in September...Begonias were huge and so beautiful (had to be covered every afternoon so as not to burn the tender plants)..rows of zinnias, marigolds, alyssum, geraniums and mums hanging baskets were glorious with fuchsias and ferns.  It really was a little bit of paradise there and just driving in the driveway felt like you were entering a different world.  Gosh talking about this makes my heart ache  and tears come I miss them so much.  Anyway, this time of year just makes me long for home.

I sewed this pillow for Brenda's birthday.  Thanks to Katie for designing it.

 Teina gave her this beautiful centerpiece that will look so pretty by the pillow!

 Getting together with my sisters always renews and fills that empty place in my heart I feel when I'm missing mum and daddy and home so much.I sure am grateful for them and for the sweet relationships we share.