Saturday morning started with some last-minute cleaning and then a shower before MaryMargrt from the Lush message board got here. We talked and traded sniffables for a while (she brought me the sweetest basket full of discontinued Lush, new Lush not available here yet and stuff from other etailers) then headed over to her parents' house, where there was some more talking, and a lot of petting of the two German Shepards (who are utterly adorable). After that, we went up to Beachwood to the brand-new Cleveland Lush store, YAAAAAY!
I managed to stay pretty close to my budget. It helped that I won a bubble bar and a bath bomb for answering two trivia questions correctly, and that there were goodie bags and free ballistics for those who spent over $40. I got a Fresh-Faced starter kit for combination skin, three French Kisses, a Golden Slumbers and a free Sugar Rush ballistic. The store had samples of the discontinued items to sniff, but I'm going to have to sniff some of the stuff over again when I go to the Grand Opening on Thursday night, as my nose burned out halfway through and I couldn't smell anything from any of the shower gels. I am definitely going to order lots of Ice Hotel and Flowertub bubble bars, if nothing else.
While we were there, we met KellyGirl, Carla, Maresche, Meabh and HeyLookAMidget from the board, and when everyone had done their shopping, everyone except Carla headed over to the Cheesecake Factory for lunch. Everybody is exactly like their forum personalities, only moreso, which is a very good thing. MaryMargret is thoughtful, sweet and open; Midgie looks exactly like her avatar, and is a sweet and funny girl with a secret addiction to carnival food; KellyGirl is a smart & sassy blonde with an engaging smile and an infectious laugh, Maresche is the perfect advertisement for Lush henna and a charming lunch companion and Meabh started out shy but warmed up and started getting silly with us pretty quickly. Midgie brought out a giant enabler's bag and passed it around twice, saying she didn't want to take anything home, and we talked and joked and it was as if we were meeting for the zillionth time rather than the first. MaryMargrt has to go back to NJ, but I think the rest of us will be there for the Grand Opening.
This morning, MaryMargrt came over for a bit and we made her custom strawberry Wet Willy and yakked about everything under the sun while it hardened. Sunday morning is usually my cleaning time, so it was a real treat to have the cleaning already done and just be able to sit around and chat. However, I have to admit that this weekend was a lot more in-person contact than I usually have, and so I was rather glad to be alone when she left at noon. So if I owe you a phone call or a Yahoo chat, please forgive me for hiding a little bit longer to recharge my sociability batteries.
Some pics from yesterday's meetup:
Back row, left to right: Me, MaryMargrt, KellyGirl, Maresche
Front row, left to right: Meabh, HeyLookAMidget
