It’s a little past dinner time on Saturday afternoon. It’s been a beautiful day. I visited the Farmer’s Market this morning, and then did some house work. I read for a while and had a nap. Generally, I’ve been occupied.
From six to ten on Saturday evening is the most difficult time for me when Dear Husband is away on his sailing weekends. I’m usually too busy to mind his absence during the day, but as the sun starts to dip and chores are finished, I realize how quiet the house has become.
I have several quilting projects to finish, and more that I want to start. I think that’s the way to keep myself busy until bed time. Next week I may go to a movie, and the following week I may take a friend out to dinner. I bet there are millions of women who would like to have the quiet that I have, and I plan to keep that in mind! *G*
I hope you are all enjoying your Saturday night.

I finally got into the garden along the sidewalk on Monday. I filled TWO wheelbarrows overflowing with the daisies I ripped out, and I’m only halfway done. I deadheaded half of the coreopsis. The rest will have to wait for the weekend.
I’m suffering finger problems. In May I was treated for a fungal problem. The antibiotic worked….for a bit, and then the problem seemed to rage back, and other fingers became infected. It seems that this time I have a bacterial infection, so I’m on more antibiotics and a topical cream. No gardening for a couple of days.
BUT, I don’t mind so much, because my oldest sis is taking me to hear the Dixie Chicks and the Eagles in St. Louis. Frankie, my youngest sis is also going. We’ll come back for the weekend, and then Frankie and I will go to Indy to hear Michael Buble sing. I have never been to a rock concert, and I haven’t been to see a performance other than Mozart for years and years, and now, in the space of less than a week, I’ll get to go to TWO! Thank you, my dearest sisters!
I was working at the computer in the living room earlier this week and out of the corner of my eye saw a young deer walk around the corner of the house. I think it must have been the same deer that Frankie saw when she was walking her dog, Sidney, this weekend. I think it’s also the same deer that has helped itself to a beautiful, tall rudbeckia in the herb garden that was just blooming! I was looking forward to the contrast of the golden blooms against a dark purple clematis on the arbor and now all that you can see are the chewed off stalks. Hmpf!
An on-line friend, Mike, from Scotland, had bypass surgery this past week. I’ve been waiting to see him pop up on-line again to reassure me that he came through the surgery well. It’s really tough to sit on the sideline as on-line friends go through troubles like this, and not be able to keep track of their progress. If you believe, would you please say a prayer for his well-being? If not, I’d be happy if you think positive thoughts and send that energy his way. Mike….I hope all is well!
Friday night my washer died in the rinse cycle with a load of Dear Husband’s work clothes left soaking. This was just as guests were coming for the weekend. We had a full house until 9:30 on Sunday. Monday, we bought a new washer, and took TWELVE loads of laundry to the laundromat. We brought them all home to dry, and on the first load, the drier died. I feel rather like the character Al Capp drew who had the storm cloud that followed him around. The washer was delivered today, and the drier was repaired. All is well in time for me to go to the rock concert!
I hope you’re all faring well, with the storms coming through, and the heat. Remember to hydrate!

I am very blessed to have had the chance to spend three days with my youngest sister this weekend. You may know her as Frankie, of Just My Opinion. Frankie teaches kids at risk, and August through May, her calendar is SO booked up that it’s tough to get more than a day or two together other than major holidays, and even those can be tough to schedule.
She arrived on Wednesday afternoon, and we kibitzed and caught up on family news, and then Dear Husband fixed his famous Caesar salad with marinated chicken chunks. I added bowls of strawberries, mandarin oranges, and a plate with tomatoes and olives. It’s a good thing dinner was light because the food really flowed the next two days!
Frankie and I went out about 7:30 and worked in the gardens for three hours. She helped me to dead-head the peonies and cut back iris. I pulled weeds and she hoed out some invasive clover. Each time we drove by that garden for the rest of her stay, I slowed the car so that we could “Oooooh and Aaaaahhhhh” over how beautiful the garden looks now!
We were going to work on her quilt top on Thursday afternoon, but we seemed to need a bit of couch potato-ing instead. We read magazines and sat with feet elevated, and schmoozed. We collected my stepson and Dear Husband and went to Olive Garden for dinner. Our waitress must be good at pinball. She was incapable of setting something on the table without hitting something else. Luckily, nothing was spilled.
Friday morning we went to my regular exercise class, cleaned up and headed down to visit with Elegante Mother. On the way, we stopped at Trader Joes. I want to tell you that it is NOT MY FAULT that I bought all that candy. This was the second time in a week that I got to visit Trader Joes. The first time I brought home chocolate covered raspberry sticks and English Toffee. This time, I replaced the toffee that mysteriously disappeared, and also picked up chocolate covered peanuts, and praline pecans. Ohhhhh, isn’t a sugar high wonderful while it lasts???
Elegante Mother is doing relatively well. She still has a little cough, but even that has improved. Frankie brought her new pictures of her family, and we also gave her a lovely apricot colored miniature rose, and a purple orchid from Trader Joes. The orchid really made a hit.
I have to tell you that Frankie is VERY careful about what she eats. She doesn’t binge, and she doesn’t eat empty calories, and she doesn’t overeat. She’s very selective about what she puts into her body, so it can be difficult to decide what to cook when she comes to visit. She, on the other hand, chooses to give up those restrictions when she comes to visit. That’s how we ended up at Merishka’s having garlic poor boys for lunch. The buns were just soaked in a garlic-butter mix, and the sandwiches were so oversized that we could have purchased just one. We each ate half our sandwich and brought the rest home. Thank you, dear Sis, for the garrrrrrrlicky lunch!
Our next stop was a quilt fabric shop to see if we could match a piece of fabric. You know that the answer was NO….and you probably also know that we both left the store with about seven yards of fabric unrelated to the projects on which we are working. (We just couldn’t resist! Frankie is already planning her return visit.)
The last stop of the day was Caputo’s Fresh Market. It’s a store that carries virtually every fruit and veggie that you could want, as well as an amazing array of Italian foods. The deli area alone really deserves an hour or two to peruse.
Dear Husband broiled flank steak for us. Frankie sautéed mushrooms, I made a fruit salad and baked potatoes, and we cut into a loaf of bread from Trader Joes. Mmmmmmmmmm! Hit the spot.
I had to say goodbye to both Dear Husband (who went to sail for the weekend) and Frankie, early this morning. Frankie would have liked to stay one more day, but there were two engagements calling her at home. Her social calendar is astonishing!
Sooooooooo…..What does a girl do on a free, rainy day?? (Grins)

My exercise class is incredibly gregarious. They chatter away through class, meet before class to see what’s been happening over the past two days, go out for coffee on Monday morning after class and go to breakfast once a month to celebrate with those who have had birthdays.
For a long time it was our tradition to invite the class to have a breakfast potluck at our house in May. It was scheduled so that I could show off our iris, and maybe sneak in the chance to show off a new quilt or two.
Last year, my mother left our home to be cared for by a round-the-clock caregiver, and I was still busy helping them to get settled in May, and didn’t extend the offer to host the brunch. I’m pretty sure that everyone in class understood that I was otherwise occupied, and they were very kind about it. This year, I thought it might be time to resume the tradition. We have about forty-five people signed up for class and I believe that thirty-five of them, possibly a few more, will be here after class tomorrow.
Luckily, this is a pot luck meal. I set out a sign-up sheet, more to get a head count than to manage the meal. The people who sign up can see what is already listed in terms of what others are bringing, so it pays to be among the first to sign up. This year we have an interesting cross between breakfast and lunch. I plan to do breakfast items, while our exercise dragon lady is bringing a hot pasta dish. There will be fruit and muffins and ham and a range of other items.
My youngest sister is quite the cook, and I’ve borrowed her baked french toast casserole recipe, and one for an egg and sausage casserole. Another friend does a variation on the french toast casserole that has thinly sliced Granny Smith apples and dried cranberries mixed in with the brown sugar/cinnamon/butter mixture on the bottom of the pan, so I thought I’d do that, too. And, I decided to do the praline pull-apart bread. All but the egg casserole was assembled this evening, and Dear Husband cooked the sausage and onion for the eggs while I put together the french toast.
I plan to hop out of bed early tomorrow, dead-head the iris, and bake the bread. Then I’ll work on getting the tables set and beverages set up. One of my nieces has offered to help me serve, and she will be here early to help me finish setting the tables.
The only thing I forgot to do was to buy some flowers for the tables. I may cut some of the overwhelming population of daisies and put them in simple vases. That will give the iris a chance to stand out a bit more, and save me the trip to the store. I love it when a plan comes together.
I’m going to set the table with china. Why have it if you don’t use it? China, silverware and glasses will be most of the cleanup. I’ll have help putting tables back where they need to go, and our visitors are bringing folding chairs, so we won’t have to return chairs.
I’m really looking forward to tomorrow, but I better get to bed so that I have enough sleep to carry me through the day. With luck, I’ll have some pictures of the iris to share with you. I hope you’re enjoying spring as much as I am!

We are a great family for making lists. My-Sister-The-Nurse makes hers orally, but I prefer to write mine down. I rarely leave the house without a list of errands, and usually that list is in the order in which they are to be done. I believe in saving gas and spending as little time as possible on errands, so I pare my list down so that I am not criss-crossing the entire suburban Chicago area.
The particular list that I want to write about has not yet been committed to paper. It’s been developing over the past five or ten years, and we’ve only just begun to acknowledge that it’s a list-in-the works.
Dear Husband and I have seen the last of our fifties, alas. We tend to laugh about all the problems attendant with aging because the alternatives are just too grim. One of the things we have noticed is that there are a number of places to eat that we visit less frequently. We have finally had to accept that there are some things that bother us too much to risk eating them.
Of course, we also have the lost of memory that seems to come with aging, so occasionally we will give it the old college try, only to be reminded just why it was that we have avoided some things.
Kentucky Fried Chicken started the list. MORE than ten years ago, I realized that my family was less interested in KFC than I was, and I kept trying to get a taste of it now and then. But, as much as I love extra-crispy, the fat, and the breading just don’t sit well. About every two years I’ll try a couple of pieces of chicken, and remember immediately that it’s supposed to be on THE LIST!
Gyros were the next to fall. In DeKalb, Illinois, (and in Sycamore) there is a shop called “Tom and Jerry’s Gyros King.” It’s right on the edge of the campus of Northern Illinois University. We would make a trip out to Farm and Fleet to shop for tools, and stop for gyros for lunch. They taste SO GOOD, and are SO HARD on older bodies. Alas, poor gyros, we knew ye well…
I’ve noticed that we order pizza much less often. Rather than once every two weeks, it might be once every six to eight weeks now, and I tend to try to find other options before I resort to placing the pizza call.
About ten days ago, when Frankie was visiting with us, I gave her the option of rainbow trout cooked at home, or takeout Chinese for dinner. She opted for the Chinese. First let me say that we all enjoyed the meal. We have been patrons of this particular place for at least twenty years and I look forward to our occasional Chinese take out nights. But, having said that, we ALL suffered, some more than others. I don’t know if it was some particular ingredient, or whether the cook is using more oil, but we all spent an uncomfortable night. I’m very sad to say that the day of ordering five items for dinner is a thing of the past. We’ll have to try ordering just one entree and an appetizer and see how we do. If that doesn’t work, Chinese will have to go on the list.
My absolute favorite place to eat for the past ten years or so has been Pappadeaux, a Cajun restaurant that is part of the Pappas Brother’s group. We are fortunate to have two of them in the Chicago area, and we used to try to eat there a couple of times a year. Dear Husband took me there for Mother’s Day, for a very early lunch. Ohhhhhhhhh, was it good! Unfortunately, although I brought home half my meal, I was practically comatose for the afternoon. Have you ever seen a copy of the “Bubba Gump Cookbook?” Each recipe starts with “Ya take a pound of butter…” I think Pappadeaux’s recipes must read like that.
We just can’t deal with that amount of butter in our meals these days. We have pared down the fats and have been working on smaller serving sizes. Soon meals will be more about sustenance and less about entertainment. So I guess that means it’s formal. The list is in print. Damn!

Eighteen years ago, in the middle of a bitterly cold winter, we discovered that a black cat had taken up residence on the seat of the lawn mower in our unheated garage. When I discovered him, I turned to Dear Husband and said, “He’s going to freeze. We have to let him in the house.” Dear Husband has never been a lover of cats, and his solution to the problem was to put a small space heater in the garage.
The winter worsened that weekend, and to keep the pipes in the loft bathroom from freezing, Dear Husband needed to use the space heater that was keeping the cat company. I looked at DH, and said, “He’ll freeze.”
Dear Husband, knowing what his life would be like if the cat died in the garage, opened the door to the basement, and accepted the changes that were to come in his life. He did, however, declare that our bedroom would be a “pet-free” zone.
My step-daughter named the cat “Edward Scissorhands,” after a recently released Johnny Depp movie, in honor of the set of lethal claws the cat wielded whenever he felt threatened. His name was temporarily changed to “Edwina Scissorhands,” when the vet incorrectly determined his sex, but we changed vets and from then on we simply called the cat “Ed.”
Ed manipulated everyone. We could not persuade him to be an indoor cat. He quickly learned how to ring Elegante Mother’s chimes, climbing onto her stereo system and playing golf with her pewter miniatures when she didn’t respond to his request to go out.
Somehow, Ed trained our dog, Defer, to bark when it was time for us to open the door and let Ed back into the house. In return, Ed would take his time walking into the foyer so that Defer could sniff him to see where Ed had been. They had an amazing relationship, and Ed was always top cat (or dog, as the case may be).
When Ed was fifteen years old our vet told us that Ed was suffering from a thyroid problem. The vet is one of those very pragmatic people and she rarely recommends heroic efforts where they are not a good choice. I trust her judgment, so when she told me that Ed’s condition could be cured with radiation, we gave it a great deal of thought. It was expensive. It meant that he would have to be away from us for a week. We would have to collect his litter and waste for six months because it couldn’t go directly into the landfill without setting off radiation alarms! I finally decided that we’d do it. I felt that if we would have one more year with Ed, it was worth it.
The treatment was successful. Ed had a lot to say about the spa we sent him to, but he came back in good health, ready to take up his position as the head of the house. Shortly after that, we began to notice that his black fur was shot through with silver, and the vet commented each time she saw him over the increasing gray.
Two years ago, I knew there was something wrong, so after Christmas, I took Ed to see the vet and she ran a series of tests. Ed was developing kidney disease. I thought he’d be gone in a couple of months. He chose not to go out, and became the indoor cat we’d hoped for. All through winter he preferred to be where it was warm. Occasionally he would go to the door and demand to be let out, but when the blast of frigid air hit him, he’d shake his right front paw and back away. When it finally warmed up, his visits outside were shorter. He was becoming a cat who loved his luxuries, and his nap sites followed the sun as it moved from the east to the west side of the house throughout the day.
Ed’s personality never changed. He still expected to be the family member in charge, but he became more social these past two years. He would join us as we gathered for dinner, wanting to check out what was on our plates. Then, he’d sit with me as I worked at the computer, and at 8:00, we’d adjourn to the rocker and he would sit above me, or on my lap, or nose to nose with me.
In the morning, when I came out of the bedroom, Ed would be waiting on the table in the foyer, ready for me to scoop him up and carry him to the kitchen where I’d give him the first can of cat food for the day. He had a schedule, and he expected me to keep to it.
Tuesday, it was unusually warm. Our Spring has arrived about two weeks early. Ed wanted to go out, so about four o’clock in the afternoon, I opened the door for him, thinking he would be back in time for dinner. I called him, and looked for him for the next twenty four hours, but Ed ghosted out of our lives in the same way he came into them…..on his own terms.
He was a great cat, and I really miss him.

Where does the time go? I had a lovely weekend with my youngest sis. Frankie came up to attend a jewelry party hosted by one of our nieces on Friday night. I hate to admit it, but I usually don’t care for the parties where you are expected to go and buy something, but this was a lot of fun.
We’ve had a stormy weekend, with some serious thunderstorms moving through, but we managed to miss most of them while we were out and about. We visited Elegante Mother, and then had lunch with My-Sister-The-Nurse. We picked up some summer weight slacks for EM, and spent a little time chatting before heading home.
Frankie and I spent another hour on the quilt we started a year ago (Yeah, Cop Car….the one that was supposed to be done in ONE DAY….HAH!) We’re down to the borders now, so the rest will go fast the next time we can sew together. Frankie wrote down what she intends to do for the next three borders and the binding and backing so we won’t have to guess at it next time.
We sent Frankie off at 7:30 this morning so that she could have an hour or two with her hubby before he had to go off to work. I hate letting her go, but I wanted her to have a safe drive and a good day. As she was getting ready to go down the driveway, she rolled down her window and instructed me to save our grapevine for her this fall! Maybe I should have told her that she could have it if she would make me a grapevine Christmas tree next year! lol
It’s been a great weekend!