A Weekend with Friends, Family and Blessings

This past weekend was pretty busy. We spent the early part of Friday afternoon in Columbia, S.C., doing a little shopping to help out the Easter Bunny.Friday night, we were invited to Aiken's downtown area by my friend, Harriette, and her family of barbecue cooking marvels "Smokin' Stacks"  for some great food and fun. They competed in Aiken on Saturday. The night before  a cook-off, most of the teams prepare some sort of  food for themselves, their families and some friends. For this get-together, they fried up what a lot of southerners commonly refer to as "a mess of fish." Along with the fish came freshly fried chips, hush-puppies and coleslaw.  It was all positively delicious!

The Logo on the Side of Smokin' Stacks' Trailer

Their barbecue is out-of-this world good. FYI, Smokin' Stacks uses and is also a dealer for Backwoods Smokers. The team has won many awards and trophies over the years and placed fourth in pork last October at a national event in Las Vegas, NV. If you would care to see more about "Smokin' Stacks" and Backwoods Smokers, you can go to Mid-State Consulting

www.midstateconsultingllc.com .  

Pit-Master, Jeff, Harriette And Larry

Several Friends Came From Georgia and Ohio to Enjoy the Pre-competition Festivities.

Harriette made these cute Easter Bunny Cakes for the event. Connie made a great strawberry dessert, but I'm afraid I didn't get a picture of it. There was also a really good chocolate layer cake. I really fell down on the job with dessert photos.

Harriette and Connie

We had a really good time. There was a play going on at the Aiken Playhouse which was directly across from our location. Two uninvited women, quite well-dressed, nonchalantly stopped by our serving table, asked what type of fish we were having and complained that they never eat flounder(which is what we were having). They each then filled up a plate, not only with flounder,  but everything else. They gobbled it up, then proceeded on to the Playhouse for the show, with never so much as a how-do-you-do, much less a thank-you. If they only knew what generous people my friends are, they would know they would have been welcomed, had they but asked.
All things said and done, we had to admit the jaw-dropping scenario, although bazaar, was ridiculously entertaining and we had a good laugh about it.

On Easter Sunday, our two daughters, their husbands, five grand-children, my husband's sister, Janet and her adorable 2 yr. old grandson, came over for the Easter meal and then we hid 134 plastic eggs, many with little prizes inside. The Bunny had left them some goodies here, too.The children all had a ball opening their baskets and hunting eggs. I snapped a few pictures of the goings on.

My Precious Daughters, Angela (Left) And Stephanie. Oh, How I Love These Two!

Janet, My Sweet Sister-in-law.

Five Grands And Austin, Our Adorable Grand-nephew, In Blue Shirt.

Facing Camera, Glenn And Jewelynn

Sophie

Rachel

Stephen

I hope I haven't bored you too much sharing these friend and family events and photos. Please, take time to love and be loved. We have learned how precious moments together are and we realize, more than ever before, that these times should never be taken for granted. All-in-all, it was a wonderful weekend and we felt so amazingly blessed to have such special moments to share love with friends and family.