Due to scheduling shifts and availability, we had our Girl Spa Week at one of the houses on the resort. Advantage, we’re all in one place. Disadvantage, distance from the shops, spa itself, etc. Pros and cons aside, we’re there to have fun!

I needed to pack for the week prior to Derby as the car would be loaded. The Amazing Kat hauled all my stuff from here, to her house, then hauled it all up to Nemacolin. My suitcase, the Fabulous Prizes, the Bag ‘0 Games, the bags of clothes purged from my closet through the year. Champagne. It’s a lot.

Good thing as we stuff my G-Wagon—that’s Laura, Jo, Kayla and me in the driver’s seat along with luggage, snacks, wine and all the things girls need for a week away from home.

A nice, clear day for the drive up, and traffic isn’t too bad. We check in at the welcome center, and the delightful Mason comes to meet us, leads us to our home for the week, and hauls the half ton of stuff inside. Sarah got there right before us, so her stuff’s hauled in, too.

Snacks in the pantry, fruit in a bowl, drinks and whatever in the fridge. Open some champagne because the fun begins now. I don’t have much to unpack until Kat and Griffin arrive, but I check out my room. I’m on the lower level this year, have a wood burning fireplace—woo!—and they’ve set up a DVD for me in the living/game area down there for my workouts.

Pat should be there, and when we check, she’s lost somewhere on the property. We send out our search party and guide her in.* Some hang out time, take dinner orders—by text for Nicole and Kat, who are on their way.

Then the gang’s all here, and we eat, drink and make merry. There’s a pool table downstairs, and Griffin’’s fascinated. Pat and I show him how to play. Not really as we suck at it, but he enjoys, a lot.

We might have hauled out the clothes—Sarah brought tubs of her own (from which I bagged a very cool black jean jacket)—my memory fails me on that order of things. But whenever we did it, lots of fun, and lots of new-to-whomever stuff. We are all girls who like clothes. **

Early-ish to bed as travel days are travel days.

I’m up early, and am checking my email in bed when I hear: Hi!

And Griffin’s standing with a big grin at the foot of my bed. Up and at ‘em. He works out with me for little while, then plays with the pool balls. He claims Number Ten cheats. He instructs me to draw the pool table on a big sheet of paper. I draw a rectangle because I also suck at drawing. Together we draw the balls where he designates, number them, then he makes a maze out of it, and we put both our names on the masterpiece.

I go up to make bacon. 

Kat’s made Bingo cards. Bingo begins at 8 a.m. Laura’s already up and out for her daily walk and an early treatment. Kayla’s out for a run. Jo and Sarah are at the dining table, and Jo’s hit Bingo. At about five minutes after 8. She takes this very seriously, though I’m told Sarah nixed her wondering if seeing a fly meant she could cross off See An Animal.

Big no.

Jo bags the first prize of the tournament.

Most of us decide it’s a good day to shop, so we do just that. Always fun to shop with girls.

It’s time for the games to begin. Kat’s made our scoreboard. First round of Scrabble. Laura, Pat, Kayla, Sarah. First round of Bowling. Laura takes Scrabble—big time—and Kayla does the same in Bowling.

We order ice cream.

Thursday cools off and brings some rain. The fireplaces come in handy. Griffin again joins my workout for a bit, then hangs out while I finish. He tries to teach me how to play a game on his IPad. I’m better off watching him play. Jo and Kayla are off for nails. I skip this as I just had mine done at Derby. And the afternoon is for painting. Always fun and challenging and fascinating to me to see everyone’s work. We’re all doing different things this time out, and with, imo, really impressive results.

Paint Day is also Pizza Night. Mason delivers! He’s also made sure we’ve had anything and everything we could want.

More Bowling, more Scrabble, and the first rounds of Just Dance. Kayla takes the Dance, Jo plays a seven-word at Scrabble. We play Monikers to much hilarity.

Another cool morning. Good thing I know how to build a fire. Pat has to leave us today. Nicole has to leave briefly—one son’s big lacrosse tournament, and her older son’s college graduation. She’ll be back Saturday night.

I have my Hot Stone Experience with the magical Autumn. It’s glorious. Kayla has her massage, and says the same. Her tech—new to her—is also Kayla. So she says it’ll be easy to remember and request her when we go as a family in August.

It’s the Bowling finals. Kayla and Laura are top scores. It’s nip and tuck, strikes, spares. Griffin invents a Strike Dance and gives high fives when the pins go down. He dances a lot as these ladies are hot! The scores are breathlessly close, the tension brutal!

In the end, Kayla nips Laura by two points. It may have been one. ***

It’s down to Kayla and Sarah in Just Dance. These are fierce competitors who routinely dominate the game. Who will get the coveted sticker and the fabulous prize? Once again, it’s neck-and-neck. And once again, Kayla nips Sarah by the thinnest margin.

Then because she’s a very good cousin, she does many dances for and with Griffin.

It remains cool on Saturday, and IIRC, a little drippy with it. Fires burning, and Sarah, Jo and I spend pretty much the entire day reading. I can’t remember the last time I spent the entire day in a book. Kat’s taken Griffin off for an adventure, and when they return, he has a Mother’s Day present for me. He’s made me a bottle of felt flowers, with buttons. It’s adorable. And as any mom or nana knows, there’s nothing like a home-made gift. It’ll go on my work station and make me smile every day.

He’s also decided I should have the gift he picked out for me. It’s nice to be known as it’s a three-wick candle in an oval wood bowl and covered with little crystals.

Kat, the Amazing Kat, made me a pillow for my new living room sofa. It’s gorgeous. She not only handmade it, but she SPUN THE WOOL! It’s so beautiful, so me, and will also make me smile every day!

It’s Laura Grills Night. I do my part by marinating the chicken. Veggies are scrubbed and prepped. It’s a beautiful presentation, along with Sarah’s and my request for burn-‘em-up dogs and toasted buns. It’s all seriously yummy. ****

Nicole returns. Her younger son’s team won their tournament, and her oldest had a happy graduation. And though we’d give her some recovery time, she’s ready for the Scrabble finals. *****

The sun comes back! It’s wonderful to go outside. Kayla, Laura, Sarah and Nicole go to tea in The Secret Room. I’m just too lazy for that. Kat and Griffin have another adventure. Jo and I have a Sloth Day. Everyone’s very happy with their choices. ******

She and Laura have unseated the Scrabble Queens, Kat and Jo. This is unprecedented. It’s the Underdog Story of the decade. Which of these upstarts will emerge victorious? They give each other no quarter as the lead shifts back and forth between them, with Jo carefully keeping score. After a long, hard-fought match, when the last tile is played, Laura claims victory.

She also claims she can bitch about games as much as she wants. *******

Jason FaceTimes to say Happy Mother’s Day. He asks if Kat and I got the flowers he sent. We have not. He checks, we check. Mason searches. Connor, the head butler for the estates, searches. And the flowers are discovered on the porch of an empty house. This mystery is solved when we learn they use that house’s address for the one we’re in.

The flowers are rescued, the lovely roses—thank you, Jason—freshened up. So pretty!

We decide on cards for the Wild Card match, and play Hearts for a prize. I don’t play, but keep score as six players makes it easier. It’s fun to watch these great, good friends get cutthroat over a card game. It’s a fairly close match until—and I saw this one coming—Sarah runs them. She was already at zero!

I will say Jo had bad luck, getting the Queen in the widow on the first hand.

I think winning this one might have taken some of the sting out of losing by a hare’s breath in Just Dance.

Last day, and the sun’s shining again. Walks, runs, workouts, books, treatments. And for me, packing. Kat’s going to haul most of my stuff back again, bless her heart. Still, we eat, drink and make merry. And have our Crowning Ceremony. The scoreboard shows Kayla has dominated. While everyone takes home prizes, she is the undisputed queen of Girl Spa.

When Sarah, our queen and Griffin have retired, the rest of us sit around. I comment how everyone always has their phone, and why is that. Discussion. My phone’s been down on the charger all week. And when I’m espousing the benefits of disconnecting, Nicole’s phone signals. It’s Sarah. And when I say Sarah’s just downstairs, why didn’t she just come up? Nicole says: Sarah saw a mouse!

We went through this on a much more intense basis the last time we stayed in this house. I blogged about it at the time. Nicole rushes into the kitchen for a bowl—with which we would capture the mouse as before—and we all go downstairs.

We hunt. It’s a large area, lots of rooms. Kat using the flashlight on her phone to look under Kayla’s bed. After a thorough search, we find no mouse, and conclude it’s gone into the (locked) utility room, and deduce we disturbed it that day because several of us did laundry.

Mason arranges for Heart Traps as don’t want  to kill the mouse.

I discover the heat’s suddenly not working in my room. It’s 66 degrees. I build a big fire. And build in up in the morning when I wake up to 64 degrees. Brr! It’s raining, and pretty hard on Departure Day.

Sarah leaves early—hugs!—she had work waiting. The rest of us take more time, and Mason—what a guy—loads everything up. Nicole’s next, more hugs. Sarah texts to let us know the rain’s bad and so’s the traffic.

Oh well.

My group gears up. Hugs for Kat and Griffin (it’s his last Girl Spa), and we head out.

Yes, the rain’s bad, and so’s the traffic. The first 90 minutes of the drive is anything but pleasant. Finally, on the last leg, the skies clear. Ahhhh. And home again to insanely happy dogs, BW who hauls luggage to various cars.

Many hugs after a really wonderful week. Can’t wait to do it all again.

Nora

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Note from Laura: Did you think I wouldn’t stick my nose in on this???

* I call Pat on her phone, Kayla was sitting next to me. Pat’s dealing with a lovely illustrated map from the hotel that doesn’t quite list all the roads from the welcome center to the house. I try to send her a google link to direct her. She tells me she’s going to park and let us find her.
Now, I’d sipped some champagne so Kayla offers to drive. Pat’s five minutes away from the house, but it felt like years after all the circles she made. She has champagne.

**We do the clothing exchange on the first night.

***It was one point in the semi-final, two in the final. And someone’s Nana was calling it for me since I had a couple strikes in the final frame. The shock in Nana’s voice that I might win was apparent until the final score showed up and Kayla won.

****In 2021, I missed cooking for big groups since we were all still living separate lives. The gang said it was one of their favorite meals of the trip and loved the idea of doing it again. Made me so happy to grill veg, chicken and hot dogs — something for everyone. And Nicole made it back in time for dinner!

*****Not quite, we wait until the next evening.

******Actually, Nora and JoAnne go with Kat and Griffin to the first arts & crafts and make candles. THEN they head back to the house and hang on the deck in the lovely Mother’s Day sunshine.

*******You bet I will! And a PS: give Nicole a follow on Instagram. She’s so very entertaining.

Laura

Laura’s done a roundup of our Spa Girls Week, but I’ll fill in a few details before I continue the adventures of our last night.

First, the house was all Laura said, and so perfect for our needs this year—though we SORELY missed our butlers. The weather struck me as more March than May the first few days, but the indoor space provided all we could ask for. (And a little more than we wanted!)

Kayla had her first spa girls experience, and that was a bonus for all.

The best was just seeing each other face-to-face again after a very long year-plus. HUGS!!! Lots of laughs, lots of catching up, and of course, the annual tournament.

Griffin’s also had a long year-plus unable to socialize, but he got used to a house full of women pretty quickly.

I had bags and more bags of clothes purged from my closet—no chance to see each other since 2019, so a lot of bags.

How Kat managed to load luggage for five women, one toddler, two cases of champagne, two enormous bags of games and prizes, snack food and more as we’d be in a house instead of the hotel, a case of toys, etc into two vehicles remains one of the greatest achievements known to womankind.

So the tournament began. Fierce competition, as always, and Elaine, our oft-reigning queen seemed a bit off her game. Youth nipped experience in Just Dance time after time with Kayla taking the lead and holding it. Laura and Nicole proved Bowling For Giggles experts. Nothing made the boy laugh harder than watching the ball roll down the alley, strike or gutter ball.

 And, again Nicole and Laura proved dark horses in Scrabble. Kat unmercifully crushed all comers in her first round, but a steady feed of vowels in her second defeated even her mad skills. In the semis, Nicole looked poised to send Elaine, our other Scrabble Queen, packing, but at the very end, Elaine slipped past her by one point.

One soul-shattering point.

As Laura reported, she faced off with Elaine in the Scrabble finals. Though she went down in defeat, I feel her complaints about the score board now ring hollow. The Cranky Publicist bagged an array of Fabulous prizes this year.

I will say it’s interesting for a nana to play Cards Against Humanity with her granddaughter. Interesting, yet hysterical.

And Reverse Charades is, always, just brilliant. Fave of this year: Sarah bending over, pointing at her butt. And Kat guessing—pretty instantly—Full Moon. It was a moment.

Sarah also shared bacon with Griffin at breakfast each morning. So when we gathered at the dining room table one evening, Griffin reached over took the end of bacon peeking out of Sarah’s bacon cheeseburger, and slowly, carefully, pulled it out.

He enjoyed the bacon almost as much as we enjoyed THAT moment.

So you have the girls, and you have the games. Now we’ll discuss the (unwanted) guests.

The first morning while Jo and I are doing our workout in the communal living area, Sarah comes out. She’s laughing, but her eyes are very large. As they have just seen the dead mouse in her bathtub.

This, we agree, is A Problem.

We also agree we’re not going to deal with A Problem ourselves. We call for disposal.

A Problem is solved. Maybe not as quickly as a group of women on a spa vacation might like, but it is solved.

Until, a couple days later, the unfortunate mouse’s sibling—alive and well—makes an appearance in the kitchen. 

Ten women, a toddler, and a mouse is A Problem. 

All of us but Laura are country girls. And all of us have seen a mouse in our lifetimes. But we do not want its company. We call for a solution to A Problem.

I have to say the solution didn’t arrive as quickly as any of us liked, and wasn’t solved in a way I’d have chosen. Setting snap traps under the stove isn’t ideal in a house with ten women and a toddler.

The problem solver promised to return to check said traps. But he did not follow through until more calls for solutions. However, the second mouse joined its sibling in the Great Mouse Hereafter.

We had a amazingly fun time at our group paint session. Everyone’s painting was fun and pretty. Kat’s isn’t yet finished as Griffin woke from his nap. But I can already see it’ll be amazing.

 Nicole taught Elaine how to make other art with dried flowers. Gorgeous!

For our last night we were a smaller group as Pat, Elaine and Mary had to leave. Hated saying goodbye, but so grateful we had our time together.

Laura and Kayla had shared the loft bedroom, but that evening, Kayla informed Laura she’d moved her things, and herself down to Mary’s room due to the Big Spoder on the skylight.

I didn’t see said spider, but am assured by those who did, it was BIG. And what’s left of it after Nicole smashed it as it was too high and too BIG to catch and release—remained on the skylight.

Laura also moved down to Mary’s room.

For our last evening, we decide (poor Laura!) to play Hearts.

We’ve enjoyed our dinner. Kat’s on the lower level putting Griffin to bed. We’re enjoying our champagne. While chatting with Nicole, JoAnne knocks over his glass. Broken glass on the carpet. A (new) Problem.

Jo claims there must be a vacuum, but we pay no attention and call Housekeeping. We watch the sunset, and have the array of tiki torches lit. Lovely!!

Housekeeping arrives with a broom and dust pan. No, we said vacuum cleaner because carpet. Come back with a vacuum cleaner please.

Meanwhile Jo finds we DO have a vacuum cleaner in some random closet. We’re stunned, but clean up the glass in case Housekeeping doesn’t return. And in case they do, we leave the chairs pulled out, in innocence.

Nicole discovers we’re out of tequila, and she wants some. Since the intrepid butlers said we could call for any reason, she tries them to ask how we might acquire a bottle of Patron. She leaves a message.

Housekeeping does return, and as Kayla supervises the clean-up, she spots A Problem. Apparently the mice have yet another sibling and this one dashes across the kitchen floor.

Nicole and Sarah begin devising a cunning plan to capture this one as the mouse problem solvers have proved neither efficient nor timely. And the housekeeping guy looks stunned speechless when we suggest he deal with it.

We let him off the hook as Nicole and Sarah are determined they will capture the mouse, removed it and take it out to the woods and release.

Jo turns off the kitchen lights as she thinks this will bring our quarry out of hiding. I think, the lights haven’t stopped him yet, but we try that while Sarah and Nicole finalize The Plan.

There’s also discussion about how the poor mouse will starve after we go as no one will drop crumbs on the floor.

I am long past caring about the mouse’s welfare. But that’s just me.

Brendon the Butler calls back. As Nicole’s asking him the best way to acquire the Patron, Jo—obviously forgetting about the mouse—strolls into the kitchen.

The mouse makes its dash at her feet.

The scream should’ve broken another glass. And her leap was Olympic level.

The scream brings on a chorus of screams, curses, shouts, hysteria, all of which Brendon hears. The screams of six women would alarm even an intrepid Butler who’d just asked Nicole if a half bottle of Patron would do.

Nicole responds: It’s the mouse. Gotta go! And hangs up on him.

And so the hunt begins.

Nicole snaps out orders: Shut the door, move that towel, guard that door.

The rest of us shout:

It’s under the chair. It ran over there! Now it’s under that chair! Under the fridge!

Laura is The Flusher, following Nicole’s or Sarah’s orders to Herd It This Way! Which she does by stomping. There’s chaos, confusion, more screaming as the mouse skitters under one of the small refrigerators.

Sarah is battlefield calm as rear guard, bowl at the ready as Nicole hunts with her bowl and Laura drives.

It’s making for the hallway to the bedroom! Cut it off! No escape!

Laura prepares to pick up the fridge, Sarah and Nicole pursue doggedly with two stainless steel mixing bowls.

I think, I admit it, this will never work.

Laura stomps, they pursue, the mouse streaks across the floor desperate for cover. Nicole tosses the bowl! A miss.

Another toss—missed it by THAT much!

Sarah follows up, tossing hers. It wobbles, wobbles, wobbles over the surely exhausted and traumatized mouse. Then settles.

The mouse is Under The Dome.

Cheers, screams of triumph, wild laughter.

Nicole and Sarah celebrate with a double high five. Unfortunately, Nicole missed with one hand and smacked Sarah in the eye. Sarah deemed it worth it.

Then the thought: Now what?

Nicole asks for tape. We must tape the bowl to the floor in case Griffin comes up in the morning and picks up the bowl.

I say: It’ll be gone in the morning, and mean it.

I helpfully offer the bottle of Dawn dish detergent (A big one!) to weigh the bowl down. This offer is rejected.

We must remove the mouse from our house. We’ll slide something under the bowl, trap it, carry it out of the house and release it into the woods. We are not murderers!!

A paper plate? But we discover the plates have lips, so won’t do.

The cutting board? The question: What do we do with the board after, is met with: Toss it out.

Fortunately cooler heads prevail, plus the board’s too thick for the job.

Nicole takes the big glass turntable out of the microwave. I think, but….

Laura actually asks: But how will we clean it after?

It’s suggested (Sarah!) we put it back after and turn the microwave on to kill the germs.

Again, cooler heads—and it also won’t work.

Sarah says: Someone’s coming down the drive, and they’re coming in hot!

Brendon arrives—and as we’re a serious distance from the Chateau, he must’ve flown. He says: I heard you screaming. I heard all of you screaming! Every one of you! And he brought Patron!

He volunteers to help dispose of the mouse (impressed by the capture). Maybe we have a box. A box will not do. He agrees the paper plate is also a bust.

While we’re discussing solutions, Jorge—who has been our stand-up guy throughout—arrives. He also came in hot.

The poor guy looks so upset that we’ve had yet another A Problem. He has something rolled under his arm which makes Nicole ask: You brought a tube?

No, he and the guy with him have a piece of FLAT cardboard (rolled up)—exactly what’s needed.

The mouse, cardboard, bowl and all are removed. We see Jorge stop the car at the woods, and so the mouse lives to scamper in the woods—until he meets an owl or hawk. But that’s not A Problem for me.

Tequila shots, relief, ridiculous laughter.

Then Kat, who’s been trying to settle Griffin for the night comes up, with a narrow look in her eye. When the Asian Goddess give you The Eye, you feel it shiver in your bones.

Ringing phones, screaming, stomping, more screaming. But when she hears the story, we are forgiven. She also said that it was a relatively short amount of time. Felt like hours, but there you go.

Kat who rarely has more than a sip of wine, makes herself a tequila shot.

Then we played Hearts.

Nora

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Thus ends the 2021 Spa Girl Recap — Wait! It’s not official until we have a photo of the winner of the tournament. This year, the crown went to Nicole!

And in another step toward life without restrictions, Nora and family will travel back to Paw’s Up in early June — so stay tuned for the return of travelogues!