Stuff is missing

I woke up early thinking about coffee.

Today might be a good day for reorganizing stuff. What brought this on is that I’m missing earrings. I’ve been wearing the same pair since I got here on Christmas Eve, and I miss the others.

George says it‘s frozen outside, so we’ll have to wait at least another day to travel to our partially vacant home and get stuff. More things I’m missing:  my full-size Cuisinart, under the kitchen counter stereo, watercolor brushes, fabric & big roll of paper (for wrapping my homemade soap).

When I got out of bed, Star (our 10 year old golden lab/Shelty cross) was laying as close to the heater as she could get, so I figured it must be chilly. With my hot flashes, early mornings sometimes feel like a heat wave (very good in winter!).

Yesterday we took another ride on the 4 wheeler, this time down the mountain to visit friends. Friends are extremely important here. I can be alone with my husband and dogs for 3 maybe 4 days, but after that, it’s time to get down the hill and find somebody else to talk to. Our friends live right along the big river and have a beautiful place surrounded by tall pines. It was sunny when we got there and all kinds of birds were at the feeders (we watched them from the dining room). Some looked so plain until they lifted their wings to fly -- they had exquisite orange feathers underneath.

Even as icy cold as it was, there were fisher-people standing in the river -- yes men AND a woman fishing! I was so excited to see her I waved a big hello and yelled “Way to go!”  The big river is very good for steelhead, so once the ice inches back a bit from the river, in come the fisher-people. (!)

I’m boiling what’s left of a huge smoked turkey a neighbor brought us for Christmas (thanks Ed!) and am going to make something delicious with the broth today. Turkey soup & dumplings sounds good, huh?  George and I have been having lots of tortilla meals lately: quesadillas, burritos, tacos. We bought that big sack of tortillas from Costco. So I’m excited to make something burrito-free today.

Besides cooking, I have some soft red cashmere yarn and I want to start a knitting a scarf or something. I think I’ll go to Knitty.com and see if I can find a pattern.

Today is the last day my friends are on Christmas vacation. I’m thinking about you all and, of course, missing you very much.