Day 26 ~ HAPPY! (Pioneer Woman Style!)

Okay, today's word is happy!  I love the word happy.  I really do.  It's such a...happy...word!

I'm stretching the "photo-a-day" idea to share some real happy that was actually 2 days ago already.

I think it was a couple months ago when Marlece called and told me that The Pioneer Woman was coming to the Seattle area for a book signing when her new cookbook came out.  I don't think I even let her finish the sentence before we had decided to go. 

I missed my son's pre-state solo recital (with his blessing) to go see my cooking hero.  This gal is one of my dearest friends, I just hadn't met her yet.

Before I go on, I've had several people ask me who The Pioneer Woman is.  REALLY??  I am shocked, but I will back up and fill you in.  She is a delightful gal who had her life plans interrupted by falling madly in love with a real life cowboy, married him and moved onto his working ranch in Oklahoma.  She cooks real life food, and does it with such humor.  She blogs about her life on the ranch, about her bassets named Charlie and Walter, and about cooking.  She is still crazy in love with her cowboy, and is a bubbly, passionate lady who makes you want to eat cinnamon rolls and kiss a basset.  You must check her out if you have never met:

THE PIONEER WOMAN

She also now has a cooking show on The Food Network, 10:00 on Saturday mornings, as a matter of fact. 

So now that you know, here's how our happy day unfolded:

We left town at 3:30 in the afternoon, arrived at 5:00 to get our "signing tickets" so our new cookbooks would have the lovely branding (that's a cowboy word, thank you very much) of PW or P-Dub, as her close friends call her.

Our ticket?  Group "K".  Yeah, about 50 people per group, starting with "A".  Uh-oh.  We did the basic math and realized it added up to a late, late night.  We didn't hesitate at all.  She spoke for almost an hour, told her happy stories and made us laugh.  I forgot my glasses, so I couldn't really see the slide show she shared, but I laughed at all the appropriate spots and Marlece filled me in on what I was missing.

here we are waiting for PW to show herself!

here's my zoomed in view of her speaking

So after she spoke, and they lined up the "A" group, we began the long (and FUN) evening of talking and talking and talking and eating and wandering the bookstore and laughing and thoroughly enjoying our night together.

Shortly into the evening, feeling overheated because of THE TEMPERATURE!, I got myself a cookies-n-cream milkshake.  Yum, right?  Well, there was an unfortunate cup malfunction, which I discovered when Marlece looked at me and gasped with wide eyes.  I had brown milkshake running down the front of my white t-shirt.  And then on my jeans.  Leave it to me to finally get close enough to meet this lady I love and spill ice cream all down my front.  I can't take myself anywhere these days.

as we sat and waited to be called, Marlece pulled out her reading glasses and opened her book.  we had some good laughs about how old we are getting.  we met when our oldest were newborns, and now here we are fanning ourselves in the "heat", holding books at an arm-length to read, and wearing reading glasses, yawning at 10:00 at night.

FINALLY at 11:00, they called our precious group K to line up!  We were a bit rummy, but everyone was.  We laughed and had a great time...

and here we finally are in line, about to hit the final straight-away to meet our friend.  isn't my friend lovely?  here she is in her horse-shoe jeweled necklace, cowboy boots, turquoise jeweled purse...lookin' the part to meet PW.  I love this girl.

And then...THEN!!...at 11:54...

She was everything I knew she would be.  Funny, gracious, warm, HAPPY!  We laughed together, I showed her my messy shirt and told her I would hide behind her for the picture, we just shared a moment of friendship!

And then she signed our books:

Can you read it?  It says "Love to Leanne! PW" with a heart and a smiley face.  See?  She loves me.

So, 7 hours after walking into the bookstore, we walked out.  Happy indeed.

So thankful for this fun night with my precious friend, and so glad we got to make this fun memory together!!

Happy.