Elizabeth’s Journal

Visits from Mom and Dad

I can’t believe a week has already gone by since my last entry—and I thought I was doing better! So here’s a quick recap.

Daddy arrived last Sunday afternoon from Wichita Falls. We were all lazy around the house; it’s nice when there’s synchronicity of mood like that. Eventually Daddy & I bestirred ourselves to go out to Radio Shack and Randall’s so we could eat dinner that evening. (The Radio Shack was to get a part so Dale could digitize some of the taped oral interviews I’ve done and burn them onto a CD for me. I’m hoping that will help the transcription process move along a little faster.)

We had a nice time with my dad here, Jonathan especially—he does love playing games. Wednesday morning Dad took off for Bandera and Mom arrived in the afternoon. She went to bookgroup with me in the evening (serendipitously hosted by Jennifer & Stepan this month). On Thursday and Friday she was absolutely wonderful and went to the grocery store both days so that I wouldn’t have to go. What a reprieve to get to skip a couple of grocery trips! Thursday evening Jennifer & Stepan came over, and since Felicia was spending Wednesday & Thursday here on the futon, we had a nice group. I made a stir-fry dinner of shredded pork tenderloin, mung bean sprouts, and Chinese chives (garlic chives) from my garden—it was a hit. Then we all gobbled down a bunch of ginger sandwich creme cookies for afters and felt bloated. (At least I did!)

Friday we had an easy dinner—Mom fixed crab cakes, and I did corn on the cob and steamed broccoli. On Thursday I had also made both regular bread and dill bread with the Kitchen-Aid that I’ve borrowed from Jessica & Archie, so we had that as accompaniment. Saturday morning Mom took herself off to Bandera, and Jonathan was attached to Dale all day long so I got absolutely loads of family history stuff done. Daddy and I got him a copy of The Master Genealogist at 50% off last month through a special they were having, and it’s lit a fire under me to know that someone else will be browsing through my database—I’ve had to finally make some decisions about how I’m going to record research status on a person or a line, for instance. Now I’m going through my data to try to bring it up to date with my new system.

Beautiful day here today—mid-seventies and not a single cloud. Jonathan and I ate our lunch outside on the deck (Dale was on a bike ride), then we sat next to each other and rocked in the shade. The little birds are coming round in greater numbers now; I’m seeing more goldfinches and house finches than I have for a few months, and the tufted titmice, cardinals, Carolina wrens, and chickadees are still present too. It’s lovely to see them all hopping about in the trees and among the bird feeders.