Week 36 - Burn Pile Loads

It was my first full week home and I hope it was the first of many. I had plenty to get done and was still enjoying just being home.

First thing on Monday, which was Labor Day, I made a call I'd been dreading. I called Connie to tell her that I was not going with her on a road trip to Toronto. I had told her it sounded fun but that was mostly because I thought it wouldn't actual happen. As you know, I have no interest in going anywhere anytime soon. She took it well.

With that out of the way (huge relief!), it was time to get busy. The weather was perfect so I spent 3 mornings outside pulling beggar's tick and cutting sunflowers. I made 3 trips to the city's burn pile - gone is good! When I get that done first thing, I come back and shower then can do non-sweaty things in the afternoon. It works great. I did make a nice sunflower bouquet from the ones I cut down. So pretty.

I have been enjoying cooking and have been using produce from my garden, the peaches I bought from the Lions Club (most went into the freezer for future pies) and my friend Lorri stopped after church and shared produce from her garden. I've been trying to use what I have so cobbled together a pasta bake one night (all from the freezer and cupboards), have enjoyed BLT's with my tomatoes and made banana bread because I also have dead bananas.

I did have one fun thing on Saturday. One of my post-retirement goals was to make lunch dates with friends new and old. I had recently found someone on Facebook who used to work in HR and we had clicked but then she left UNL. Jane counts as an old friend because I left HR 22 years ago! We met at Burning Bridges, which is a restaurant in Omaha that specializes in chicken sandwiches, and enjoyed lunch and a LONG chat. We were in there for almost 4 hours and got all caught up and chatted about everything and nothing. It was great.

Also on the friend front, I had a nice zoom with Cindy to catch up before she leaves for her long overdue France trip, which was supposed to happen in fall of 2020. I also zoomed with my friend Lia in Germany, who is the other moderator of the Socks from Stash group on Ravelry (knitting website). We had some admin stuff for the group but also caught up on life in general.

I did chores all week and knitted between being productive. There was plenty of streaming while I knitted but I also started listening to the audio book for book club - another true crime (not my fave) so I listened at 1.5 speed to get it done. Andrea was away so I was feeding her cat ever daily. When I wasn't heading out of town for something else, I ran Wahoo errands while I was on cat feeding runs. Between that and the burn pile runs, I was out and about plenty this week.

So it was a nice week staying home with a good blend of productivity, streaming while knitting and getting chores done. Plus the friend stuff. As far as I'm concerned this was a perfect week in retirement. I hope there are more like this after the hot weeks that are coming up that will be cramping my style. I'm so looking forward to cooler weather. Are you?