Sunday, Feb. 17

We were up around 7:30. Skipped my exercises, as usual, on Sunday. As soon as we had breakfast, Hubbie accompanied Mother to our house, while I got ready for the day.

The first thing we did was prepare ingredients for Autumn Stew. Mother diced onions, carrots, and apples, and cubed a pork roast. After that, I browned the meat, cooked the veggies and apples, and added broth, tomatoes, a can of beer, and spices to the mixture, and let the stew simmer for an hour and a half.

In the meantime, I did the usual Sunday things...programming the DVR, reading the newspaper, washing cloths. Mother clipped coupons to send to Granddaughter. Hubbie busied himself sprucing the house for a visit from his daughter later.

The stew was very good, as usual, served with biscuits and honey. Afterward, we just relaxed. Mother went to her jigsaw puzzle, and Hubbie and I read our novels.

Daughter arrived about 3 p.m. We understood that she would only be able to stay an hour or so, and then would have to head out to make the five-hour trip to her home.

When 4 p.m. rolled around, and Daughter was still absorbed in the jigsaw puzzle with Mother, I asked if everyone would like a snack of ice cream and strawberries. We were all up for that, and I served it with a choice of chocolate cake sprinkled with powdered sugar, or Girl Scout Thin Mints.

We chatted after that until around 6:30. Now, I had a dilemma. Was Daughter planning to have supper with us? Usually, we just have cereal and toast on Sunday evenings. But she'd mentioned earlier that she doesn't drink milk. So the only other thing I had in the refrigerator was the leftover Autumn Stew, which I'd planned to have on Monday night. I try to fix a Sunday meal that will carry over to Monday, because by the time I go to water aerobics in the morning, and tutor for two hours in the afternoon, I don't have time to fix a fresh meal.

But...I had no choice. I asked if Daughter would like to join us for supper, and she accepted. I heated the stew, and baked a batch of canned biscuits, and cornbread to go with it.

Now it was arund 7:30 p.m. Surely, Daughter didn't intend to hit the road this late, so I said that I hoped she planned to stay the night, because we didn't really want her on the road so late. She agreed. So we don't know if she planned all along to stay the night, or if she just dragged her feet until the time got away.

Whatever the reason, after Hubbie accompanied Mother to her house, he dragged out a big box of old photos, so he and Daughter could take a trip down memory lane. Around 10 p.m., I left them to enjoy themselves, and went upstairs to shower and go to bed, since I want to get up early in the morning for water aerobics.

Note: this afternoon, a lady who was my friend in high school called to inform me of the classmate who died recently. She was helping relay the message after another classmate called her.

Of course, I already knew this, but it gave us a chance to catch up on each other's lives, and to reminisce about high school days. She, like I, and a couple of other girls, came to the small parochial school from other states, whereas most of the others had been there since kindergarten. So we were the outsiders, who never really fit into a clique of girls known as "The Big Five."

I think she still harbors resentments about it. I admit that I probably wouldn't have attended the first class reunion a number of years ago, if Hubbie hadn't encouraged me to go so he could meet my classmates. I'm glad I did, because, of course, everyone has outgrown their childish clique attitudes, and are quite friendly and likeable now...all just aging grandparents like us.