Saturday, August 6

Up around 7:30, and dressed to get on the treadmill, but just after breakfast, Hubbie's daughter called to say she and her husband would be visiting shortly after lunch.

So I dressed for the day and helped get the house in order. We didn't clear away our card making supplies, though, because Mother and I wanted to work on some cards while we waited for company. We have a long folding table and a card table set up in the living room, which is the only place large enough for us to craft.

Before we started crafting, I put a Dutch oven of spaghetti sauce on to simmer, and Mother cut up onions and banana peppers to add to beans later.

Then we set to work creating cards. Our goal today was to make several sympathy cards for Caring Hands Hospice. As we were doing this, I got a call from the man who is president of the Extension Homemakers Council (go figure why a man would be interested in heading up an organization of older women. I think he has illusions of whipping us into shape).

He called to thank me for the report I labored over Thursday and mailed to him yesterday. Apparently, my report was somewhat delinquent, having been due by Aug. 1. I thought it was due by Sept. 1. "No," he said, "it was due Aug. 1, but Sept. 1 is the absolute deadline date it is to be received by the government, so after receiving yours, I was able to get the total Council report into the mail today." Guess whipping me into shape is proving to be a bit difficult for him.

I'm sure he'd agree, since last month he had to pry out of me the information on our club members' total volunteer hours for last fiscal year. As with this month's report, I sort of let the deadline date for the volunteer hours report slip by me. This is what I get for accepting (because I'm the youngest among our members) the duties of president, vice-president, treasurer, and secretary, as well as community service leader, for our club.

After lunch, around 1:30, Hubbie's daughter and son-in-law arrived. Their reason for coming, aside from visiting us, was to bring back our generator, which they'd borrowed two winters ago, when an ice storm caused a power outage that deprived them of electricity for over a week.

Neither they nor we remembered they had the generator, until I mentioned the other day that I was glad we had it in case there was a power outage due to the extreme hot weather, and Hubbie said, "We don't have it. It's at Daughter's house." Whereupon he called Daughter to say that we'd pick it up when we visited their town later this month. That's when Daughter said they would bring it to us, since they recently bought a new truck and could haul it.

Daughter also brought her laptop, so she could show us snapshots she'd taken during a recent trip to Michigan to visit her niece (Hubbie's granddaughter) and family...especially the new baby girl.

Daughter and Son-in-Law left around 3:30, and Mother and I continued our card-making. Around 4:30, I finished supper preparations. The spaghetti, with salad, and cottage cheese, was very good.

Afterward, I put the beans, veggies, broths, and spices in a slow cooker to cook overnight. Mother cut up carrots to add to the beans, and then she went home. She stopped on our porch to check the thermometer before going, and found that it registered over 100 degrees. Since we'd stayed indoors all day, we weren't bothered by the temperature and didn't realize how hot it had gotten.

Later, Hubbie and I settled in to watch TV for the evening. Tonight, we saw the 1997 movie, "Jackie Brown," starring Pam Grier, Samuel L. Jackson, and Robert De Niro. A flight attendant plays a key role between the police and an arms dealer. Hubbie seemed interested in it, but for me it was slow and rather boring. Maybe that's because I was paying more attention to my laptop than to the movie.