my favorite color

I graduated on Saturday.

It was one of the best days of my life--not because of graduation per se, but because of the time spent with my family. So many emotions involved, I'm still not able to articulate them. I doubt I'll ever forget much about the day. It didn't hurt that the weather was so perfect, you'd have thought it was ordered from a menu. I'll share photos from the festivities later.

But this post is about two gifts I received from my sister, brother-in-law, and sweet nephew and niece--four of my most favorite people on the planet. The fact that they flew down to Texas from New Hampshire for my graduation was worth more to me than anything that could be wrapped with a bow ...

... but I have a bucket list of jewelry items about which I dream. I blogged about two of them back on Valentine's Day of this year.

Guess what I received from them? Sweet, sweet Tiffany blue. Such treasures to me--for reasons that far eclipse their shiny perfection.

in this time of 'truthers,' 'birthers,' and 'deathers' ...

... it's hard not to look at the word 'mother' and think, "This must be somebody with a crazy-ass theory about moths."

holiday snob

Tip of the hat to Ann Althouse

"justice will be done"

aggie graduation wine

(No, this isn't an Aggie joke. :) So if you're a hater, you're just gonna have to continue to hate and move along.)

For my maroon-blooded friends and family, I think you'll appreciate this. I was at H.E.B. yesterday (for the non-Texans, H.E.B. is a huge grocery chain here in the The Great State). I'm always looking for new wines to try, so I was a tad curious when I was summoned by an eager store employee, asking if I wished to buy some of the wine she was pushing.

"We've dubbed it, 'Aggie graduation wine' ... and people love it," she said.

Hmph. Yeah. Right. What do you take me for, lady ... an idiot? As cute (and over-the-top cheesy) as the idea was, I scoffed at the obvious marketing ploy.

(But I caved)

"What makes it 'Aggie graduation wine?' I asked?"

With a twinkle in her eye, the H.E.B. sommelier (ha!) responded, "It's festive. It'll make you smile. And it's maroon. Trust me. You'll love it."

I'm a sucker for anything and everything Texas A&M (the evil marketing people know this). And being that I'm receiving my second degree from Aggieland in a couple of weeks, can you blame me? So, looking around--making sure no one I knew saw me--I quickly grabbed two bottles of the Aggie wine and disappeared around the corner.

....

Fast forward to today. Guess what? The wine was fantastic. Crisp. Fruity. Multi-faceted. A sparkling, cold (something that doesn't suck on a warm Texas afternoon) Spumante that I'll definitely buy again. On top of it all, it was indeed Fightin' Texas Aggie maroon.

So without further ado, I bring you "my" Aggie graduation wine (Rocca dei Forti Brachetto) :).

Cheers & Happy May.