St. Andrew’s and Di Gilpin
Did you ever meet someone and immediately just LOVE them? It seems that your senses of humor and love of the ridiculous are in sync?
That was how I felt when Di stopped by our first morning at the VERY beautiful B&B where she’d put us up, with her hair wet and a smile on her face. My hair was wet, too, and we shared that we both had an abhorrence of hair dryers.
As long as I’m tossing the word “lovely” around with such wild abandon, I need to mention the gloriousness that IS Di Gilpin’s shop. It’s not just a beautiful place to purchase yarn, it’s a DESTINATION!
She won’t have it open much longer in St. Andrews, but she IS putting her resources toward more designing (yay!) and writing and her lovely shop in Perth.
So now that Gerry and I have adopted Di and her husband and son (just a GREAT kid!) and their amazing doggie (a LION!) we have to return with our kids to make the circle complete.
Di & Colm invited us in her home as if we were family, and before we left yesterday I repaid in a very small part by making them an American classic, butternut squash. We added it to some polenta (Mush to the hillbillies among us) and a version of the wonderful dish Jess (of Ravelry) and I adored at Squam this summer. Huge win all around!
I was telling Di as we zoomed around the Scots countryside – she and Gerry and I took a wonderful ride around to Faukland Palace (where James V died and Mary of Scots was born!) and all over the lovely, lovely countryside. It puts me in mind of Southern Ohio into West Virginia (the highlands being the WV portion of our adventure)
St. Andrews, Largo Ward, the whole area of Fife will be an amazing memory for us. I am more glad that I brought Gerry (who is universally loved) on this trip than I am about anything else. My only sadness is that he has to return on Friday, and that the kids aren’t with us.
Our friend Jane, who is watching the kids, is going ABOVE and BEYOND the call of duty back in St. Paul. It seems things are going pretty well – the kids are getting along (for the most part) and the only disaster has been a recalcitrant toilet. But there are two others in the house so they can ignore it until Gerry gets home. Hmmm, maybe I’m NOT so sad that he’s going home ahead of me…
A very dear friend, Rebecca, took Hannah to the State Fair and every time we’ve talked with Hannah she just goes on and on about what a great time she had. We are so lucky – so blessed – just so damned happy with the folks we’ve befriended in MN. Yes, I’m homesick, too…