Summer 2022 is in the Books
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So what have we been up to? Well, after the Yellowstone Anniversary Trip we had planned to just settle down for the rest of the summer and enjoy an easy and laid-back lifestyle. Like that ever happens!
At the end of July, we hosted Mike's sibling reunion at our house. After Mike's mother passed away, the kids seemed to sense that it was going to be harder to stay in touch, so they have made a concerted effort to get together once a year. We don't necessarily invite all the nieces and nephews, but we sure don't turn they away. It was a good weekend of fun and visiting and catching up with one another.
In August we met Michael, Sarah, Natalie and her boyfriend Taylor in Ft. Pierre for Natalie's final 4-H rodeo. We couldn't get into the campground that we usually stay in, so Mike just picked one from a list on Google. Turns out we've been missing out on the most beautiful campground ever! It was on a bluff overlooking Pierre and the Missouri River...the most awesome view you can imagine. Sadly, it's unlikely that we will ever need campground accommodations in Ft. Pierre again, but if we do...we know where we're staying!
The last Saturday in August, as I was sitting on the couch nursing along what I figure was probably my third case of Covid, I got a call from my sister's friend in Michigan. Connie had fractured a disc in a boating mishap and wasn't able to stay alone, could we come? Well family calls and we will go, so off to Michigan we headed where we spent two weeks helping her recuperate and become independent enough to live without us. While we were there we organized a garage sale, which had already been scheduled, and hauled away the leftovers. Mike made friends with her two Shar Pei dogs, and they were so sad when we left.
Since we got home around the 10th of September, it has been non-stop rush. We had our Fast Draw Championship in Valentine, which involved 4 days of our lives. Then Heather's father-in-law passed away, and since I work part time for them, I was called into work for some extra days.
The garden, which I planted with such high hopes, was only mediocre. After gardening for 50 years, I figured I knew pretty much all about gardening, but this year presented some new challenges. I don't know if it was the drought or the heat or my soil or what, but we finally picked the last of the tomatoes a week or so ago and the frost took care of the rest. I feel disappointed, and yet I remind myself that the days when I needed a cellar full of canned produce are gone and that there are only two of us to eat it now. So we did fine in the end.
I had one funny (now) story from this summer that I was going to share, just so that you could all laugh with me. And hopefully if you ever decide to do what I did, you will remember this story and think twice: I was going to make peanut butter fat bombs, which is a Keto snack that kind of gets me through sometimes. It calls for natural peanut butter, which if you have ever used it, you know that it doesn't stay emulsified like Jif or Skippy. No, the oil separates from the peanut base and sits on top while the peanut base gets hard in the bottom. So I always end up stirring, and stirring, and stirring, and then finally put a single beater in my mixer and stir it that way. This day I decided to skip the stirring part of the process and just go straight to the beater since it was going to come down to that anyway. As I wiggled that beater down into the jar as deep as I could and got ready to turn on the mixer, my last thought was, "Don't let go of this jar or it's going to be a mess!"
When I turned on the mixer, the oil boiled over the top of the jar and down the side and you know what happened then! Yep, it was slick and I couldn't keep hold of it! I was trying to shut off the mixer while chasing that jar across the counter while peanut but was flying everywhere. This couldn't have taken more than a few seconds, but the mess created in those few seconds was a sight to behold. It was splattered all over the backsplash, the counter, my recipe book and the front of my shirt. I had a kitchen tool carousel sitting right there and it got peanut butter on every utensil and all over the carousel. That entire mess took at least an hour to clean up.
Then, just as I was beginning the clean-up process and muttering vile oaths under my breath, my dear, innocent husband walked in the door with a cheery, "Hello, Dear!" You can't say he hasn't learned a few things in 50 years because he took one look at the mess and the dark storm on my face and simply moved on to the next room and said nothing!
They say it's an ill wind that blows no good, and this was true here also. When I took the peanut butter-plastered kitchen tools out of the carousel to wash them, I discovered that the carousel was absolutely filthy down inside, and not with just peanut butter, so that whole mess went through the dishwasher and the carousel is now much cleaner as it the backsplash. The shirt even recovered its cleanliness...after 4 washings! And I learned a lesson I will NEVER forget, use the mixer to stir up the peanut butter only after you've stirred in the oil so it's not all on top!
We usually pack up and head for Arizona after Christmas, but this year, remembering the disastrous trip to Arizona of last year in the bitter cold and dodging storms across New Mexico and the extra day on the road, we have decided to head out after Thanksgiving. I have mixed emotions about not being here for Christmas, but I've never done Christmas where it was warm and without the possibility of a white Christmas. And it won't be a struggle to hang the outdoor Christmas lights on the camper awning! We have dear friends down there now, so we won't be completely alone but will enjoy the company of people we care about, just not our kids and grandkids...unless they want to come to Arizona for Christmas!?!?
Hope your summer and fall have been enjoyable, and maybe less eventful than ours. I'm not sure why I thought retirement would be so relaxing and laid back!!!
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