Monday Lunch With Brenda!

Brenda and I have been having a monthly lunch date for the last dozen years or so.

We've missed a few lunches due to Life and schedules but we plan it and therefore it usually happens.

I chose an easy peasy menu of loaded baked potatoes and fresh fruit, cheese, crackers and celery and mini carrots for crunch. I probably won't be using the oven much as the season heats up so it was nice to be able to bake the potatoes - smeared with a thin layer of shortening and rolled in seas salt - in the oven. I love baked potatoes....or potatoes any way you can do them!

Brenda and I can share our hearts with each other and we were both better for having a chance to visit. We even made a date for our next visit and it's soon!

I love Brenda. She's there for me and I am there for her. We all need friends like that.

She comes on her lunch hour and the time just flies by.

I had the dishwasher running so after lunch I piled the dishes in the sink and decided to take a nap.

I slept long and deep. So deep that when I woke up I had no idea what day it was!

Louis Dean worked all afternoon while I slept. He cleaned all the gutters out and took down all the gazebo cover and curtains. When I finally staggered out of the bedroom, I brewed us up some fresh tea - he likes plain old Lipton and I prefer herbal teas which I often combine with plain to make them go farther. We would take a tea break and then go back to work.

My work was pulling up the honeysuckle and mint that was threatening to smother the rose bushes in the flower bed by the front door. Plus I had to cut back the rosemary. It pained me to throw most of it in a trash bag. Boy, oh BOY, did it ever smell good out there!! I use a good bit of fresh mint leaves in any and all my herbal tea combinations so I made up a big bouquet of some of the cut mint.

If anyone locally wants any - I am pulling huge bunches up by the roots! I'd be happy to share it instead of throwing it away.

Dinner tonight was so easy! Chicken and dumplings made from the remains of a rotisserie chicken and a can of biscuits. Louis Dean loves this - it is his comfort food so I fix it every once in awhile.

I've been working on the sewing room tonight. While I did not completely reclain it, I did make progress. I thought I had found everything that had been wet by the last round of water coming in - but I found one more woven basket full of denim parts - pockets, collars and such. Only the top layers were dry. I dumped the whole lot of it in a trash bag and took it to the curb.

I've done enough in here that I know I can finish it tomorrow so I am calling it a day.

I'm going to the orthopedic doctor on Wednesday for my knee so I printed off all the forms to fill out.

5 pages - front and back. My last visit was in October 2013! I had no idea it had been that long.

When the lady pulled up my record, I said, "Well, it's gotten worse and really hurts now!"

We have a LOT of firewood!!! At least it will be firewood once Louis Dean gets it cut up - John Wayne style. But that won't happen for a long time. He's got more projects on his plate than he can shake a stick at!

But we have done enough for today.

Taking our books and going to bed to read for a few minutes before turning out the light.

It's a good way to wind down.

But before I go, I would just like to take a moment and thank Mary of Colorado for her lovely words on last night's journal. What a blessing it was to me to read them. It was like a gift. I would write you directly if I had your email or your address. Perhaps you could send it to me?