My youngest and her wife came for a visit yesterday. We were all really hungry and decided to go out for brunch. My daughter-in-law has some food allergies so we pulled up the local restaurants and looked at their menus. We decided a breakfast place would have the most acceptable options so I chose Rise and Shine Restaurant.
I didn’t sleep well Thursday night and ended up grabbing a couple of hours sleep on the couch. I had promised Ben we’d have Sausage Gravy and Biscuits one morning but when he saw me asleep on the sofa, he assumed it wasn’t going to be biscuit day. So, he ate cereal and the rest of the crew got up. I heated up the French Toast from the other morning and I had my usual egg in a tortilla with cheese. We all decided we’d have breakfast for lunch so I made the biscuits and gravy in the early afternoon and we were happy campers.
I got up yesterday and went to the grocery store to buy the things I needed to teach the girls how to prepare several traditional Jewish dishes. I was so enamored with the King Soopers near Ben and Sue’s house that I wandered around for an hour and half just having a completely marvelous time! I’ve been doing a lot of the cooking and cleaning up to help Sue since she’s still recovering from knee surgery. She still gets in there and does a lot, but I swore I would NOT allow her to wait on us while we’re here.
I made Sourdough French Toast for breakfast yesterday and had enough left over for the next couple of mornings at least. It’s great when you can cook ahead, especially in the summer when cooking can heat the house up. Those summer kitchens they had in the old days would really come in handy. The guys grilled last night. We had chicken tenders and corn-on-the-cob and bless their little hearts…they grilled that corn till it was mostly black and dehydrated. I thanked them for cooking, but told them they could never touch my corn again! lol
When we were driving down from the mountains on Saturday, we had a chance to really see what the heavy snows and abundant rains have done for Colorado this year. Mr. FixIt wears many hats when we travel…navigator, photographer, snack reacher, and Googler, to name a few. All I do is sit there and drive and he feeds me, answers every question that comes to mind, reminds me to watch for the next turn or rest area, and takes pictures every time I say, “Ooooooh…LOOK!” He’s a gem!
The one constant in life is change, isn’t it? We can look forward to change as a learning tool and a growing opportunity. But there are changes we dread and it’s when we witness the decline and fragility of loved ones as we age. I often wonder what people see outside of my own self perception. Are they seeing my decline? Because, surely they are. It’s all part of life, but not the most welcome part.
We had a pretty busy day yesterday, even though we got a slow start. I cooked a nice breakfast and we sat outside, watching the Colorado River rush by the campground. Even though the temperature got down in the low 50’s, it was pushing 80° by 10:30. It ended up topping out at 92° yesterday afternoon but once the sun went down, we had a cool breeze coming in off the river at our campsite so it was quite comfortable as I sat down to write this.
Sue and I got all the prep work done fairly early yesterday and the kids came in the afternoon. The girls went to the pool and the guys did what guys do…whatever that is. I sat and knitted by the pool and visited with the girls. We had a room full of family and friends and laughter because it was storming like crazy outside. We figured the fireworks would be postponed from the weather, but the storm let up about a half hour before showtime. This is the first summer Ben & Sue have lived in their new home so they weren’t quite sure where if they could see the fireworks from their house. Then, I looked up and there they were. We could see them right out of the family room window!
Mr. FixIt went to the zoo yesterday with Daughter #1 and family while I went to visit with Daughter #2. She and I went to Sam’s No. 3…a really cool diner in Glendale. We enjoyed our visit and toodled around the bougie King Soopers for a bit.
When I got back to the in-laws’ house, the others were still at the zoo and Sue and I had a lovely visit. We went out to Dickey’s BBQ for supper then we went over to the camper to check it out and make sure everything was ok. I’m glad we did because I had left the pump switch on.
Well, first of all, the drive was a LOT shorter yesterday, even though we did have one bumper to bumper slowdown for six miles. But it eased up more quickly than the day before, so I was happy. We stopped at the Walmart in North Platte, Nebraska to pick up something special for supper for our last night of this leg of the trip. Mr. FixIt suggested my shrimp scampi, so that’s what we got. Colossal shrimp. Great big huge mama honkin’ shrimp that made my mouth water just thinking about it. We weren’t just gonna EAT…we were gonna DINE!