Chihuly at the Phipps

Partner and I made the annual trek to visit the family of origin in Pittsburgh. Always an adventure, but the most awesome part, this time, was the trip to the Phipps Conservatory and the Chihuly art glass exhibit that is mixed in with the amazing plant life. It was outstanding.
Here is the website from which I stole this picture since I forgot my camera (among other things) because we rushed off early to avoid driving through a big storm that was brewing...
http://www.phipps.conservatory.org/chihuly/gallery.html#popup

And, although I swore off IKEA after our last visit (after a less-than-pleasant experience in which each of us blamed the other for spending way too much time in IKEA when there was not a damn thing we really needed in the entire store), I did get a half hour in IKEA. I practically sprinted through the store trying to pretend I did not see room after room of cool stuff, right to the textiles/kitchen gadgets/candles area, where I threw a few things in my giant yellow bag with much less forethought than I normally spend on any kind of totally unnecessary purchase. Came out with eighteen bucks worth of stuff that caught my eye and then one more stop at the Scandinavian foodstuffs counter where I had to purchase a few more things that sounded tasty and looked Christmasy. It was an exercise in restraint, friends.