Hanging with my BFF and The Pioneer Woman

I abandoned my family twice in two nights this week.Yes, I felt guilty, but also knew that I needed to do some things that were just for me. So, I bit the bullet and scheduled to be away from my family on consecutive nights. Crazy, I know! (The kids and Eric were fine and survived with nary a scratch or emotional scar ... WHEW!)

On Monday, I attended a monthly Mamas with Cameras meeting and learned all about capturing the moment when snapping photos. Great information and I can't wait to get a jump on this month's photo assignment.

Last night, my BFF (Kate) and I went to a local book store and listened to The Pioneer Woman (aka Ree Drummond) as she spoke about her life on a ranch in Oklahoma, how she got into blogging, as well as being a mom, foodie, wife, and dog lover. It was highly entertaining to listen to her funny stories and know Kate was there laughing right along with me. Kate and I both adore cooking and The Pioneer Woman is a constant resource for great recipes... not to mention hilarious anecdotes!

Ree spoke for about 45 minutes and then the book signing began. Kate and I were in group L. There were 50 people per group... you do the math. As soon as Ree (yes, we are on a first name basis!) was done talking, the book store employee announced that group A could get in line. Kate and I patiently (and loudly) chatted for about 20-30 minutes and then we heard "Group B!" SERIOUSLY? We'd be there all night before they got to our group.

So, we decided to walk around the shopping center and catch up. We wandered around, chatted to our hearts content, got frozen yogurt (FYI: Cake batter frozen yogurt topped with blueberries, strawberries, and blackberries is beyond yummy!), and even stopped at Ross so I could get some pants for Annika. We meandered for well over an hour, laughing and chatting the whole time. Knowing Kate had an hour-long drive home and we both needed to get up for work the next day, we decided to check the status of the line and if we were still a ways off, we'd put up the white flag. We wandered back into the book store and asked about the status on the line; just as we did, we heard "Group D!" Yeah, not gonna wait around. Fortunately, we had the option of leaving our books for Ree to sign and we could pick them up on a later day.

Yes, we missed out on the chance to have a 1:1 encounter and photo op with The Pioneer Woman, but spending extra time catching up with a life-long friend was much more of a gift than meeting a well-known blogger could ever hope to be.

Kate all a-twitter ... yes, she's a goof -- just one of the reasons we've been friend for 30 years!

Kate enjoying The Pioneer Woman's presentation

The Pioneer Woman

The Pioneer Woman singing "Endless Love" to her dog Charlie