It was a warm beautiful day today. Chelsea would disagree with me this afternoon when the rain and thunder swept through the county. The rain and the warm temperatures took care of much of the snow. Chelsea and I had a lovely walk this morning and now I know that spring is almost here. I saw a robin, I saw and heard the Red Winged Blackbird who spends his mornings on the corner of Morning Dove Cove AND the ducks are back.

I spent most of the day catching up on computer work. I had to transcribe the minutes for Rhine, get ready for Writer's CLub and several other things that have managed to pile up on my desk. I also baked the rhubarb pie for tomorrow's dinner.

Dick took me out for dinner tonight. We went to the China 8 Buffet in Taylor Heights. Does anybody know what the heck the 8 stands for. They do have a good buffet. People were really piling in that place. They are busy. We were glad that we went early.

It will be nice having Bobbie and Bill here for dinner. As I said the pie is done so I just have the rest of the meal to prepare tomorrow.


"Water to Wine"

An Irish priest is driving down to New York and gets stopped for speeding in Connecticut.

The state trooper smells alcohol on the priest's breath and then sees an empty wine bottle on the floor of the car. He says, "Sir, have you been drinking?"

"Just water," says the priest.

The trooper says, "Then why do I smell wine?"

The priest looks at the bottle and says, "Good Lord! He's done it again!"

***********************************************

Later - I'll give you an Irish joak until St. Patrick's Day. Only a few days now. ARE YOU READY!!!!!
Mary

What a day. It was Beautiful. The temperatures were in the hight 40s and are supposed to be even higher tomorrow.

I went out to Plymouth for lunch with the girls and picked up some fresh eggs on the way. When I got back, Dick and I racked the Gewertiziminer wine from the primary to the carboy. We had bottled the Concord Grape yesterday. We got 12 bottles and about a glass extra which I tried. It is good and will be REALLY good when it gets a chance to mellow and age. Tomorrow we will bottle the Lemon Balm. It makes a nice summer wine. Very light and refreshing.

Tonight was bust up at Rhine. The mac and cheese went over very well. Many used it for an additional side dish. Bobbie and Bill both got trophies in their class. YA! HOO! I won a decorated shovel with a bird house on it. I will probably put it in a garden, though Dick gave me THAT look.

Tomorrow is a quiet day. I don't have any out of house errands. Dick said he would take me out for dinner so I don't have to cook. Bobbie and Bill are coming over for dinner on Sunday. Schlitzhagen and Rhubarb Pie. Want to come? You are welcome. There will be plenty.

Love

Mary

We went grocery shopping today. That is always a production and we enjoyed our breakfast at Zana's. They were exceptionally busy and we ended up with much more food than we could eat. Oh Well, Could have been worse. We could have gotten totally the wrong thing.

I also swung by Joanne's Fabric and got new blades for my rotary cutters and a pillow form for a pillow top that I made on our trip to Kentucky. I ran out of stuff to do and bought a kit at a gift shop in Kentucky. I consisted of EVERYTHING necessary to make the pillow top except batting, thread and the form itself. And all the pieces were cut out and ready to go. The cutting out is always the most tedious part of making a quilt. I actually finished the assembly on the trip and just never got around to finishing it. Then when I took the free form quilting class, I put the top, backing and batting together and did some free arm quilting. It looks pretty good. As it is in pinks, I will put it on the bed in Waylon's room with the two pillows that Eileen made for Grandma Bowser years and years ago. It will blend well with them

Tomorrow is the bust up party at Rhine. Jim will get to go for the first time ever. He always has worked on Friday nights before this. I am making some Mac and Cheese for the Catholics who want to abstain from meat as the main dish is chicken. They will also have beans and cole slaw. The beans may be iffy but I can eat the cole slaw.

Hope your Friday is pleasant. It is raining right now. Temperatures are supposed to go up into the 50s in the next couple of days. God Willing.


Mary

It was already light out when I got up this morning and the temperatures showed 35, so Chelsea and I decided to walk right away. We made it but it was rather iffy. The streets were slick in spots and I had to pick my way around. It's raining out there tonight. If it doesn't get to freezing we should be able to walk tomorrow. Probably when Dick and I get back from shopping though.

Choir got cancelled for this week because of a funeral. I can't say I am too disappointed. Things have been way to hectic lately and an extra night home is a blessing.

I went to quilt guild today. We doll makers from the class last Saturday wanted to share our creations. I finished my little doll this morning. When I get a picture, I will post it for you. The speaker today was from J& J Sewing in Sun Prairie. She collects antique quilts and brought them to share. She had a contract or something with the American Quilter. They feature her antique quilts (one at a time). She and her assistants recreate the quilts and provide kits to make the reproductions. A sweet deal. I must go to that shop one of these days. Sounds like a real treasure. She has about 70 quilts in her collection and showed a goodly number of them along with some of the repros. A nice program.

At the last meeting I attended, they had announced that there would be no quilt show this year. That has changed. The show will be on September 30. They got someone to come forward to chair it. Guess I had better get to work on my challenge block. I have to make three blocks for the Celtic Faire group quilt at church too.

I will share the quote from Cadfael's Book of Days by Robin Whitman today.

"Cadfael was not of the opinion that a man's main business in this world was to save his own soul. There are other ailing souls, as there are ailing bodies, in need of a hoist towards health."

Have a nice Thursday.

Mary

It was still snowing steadily when we woke up this morning. It kept it up until about 11:00 while I was on my way home from Bible Study. They are predicting thick fog from midnight to 9:00AM. I hope that we can see when we get the emission check on the car at 8:00AM. It may get up into the 50s by the weekend.

It was quite a nice bible study. The reading all tied around the story in Genesis about Abraham when God asked him to sacrifice Isaac and then at the last minute "stayed the knife." Something pointed out in the notes what that this was the first and direct command from God not to use human beings for sacrifice to honor him.

We filtered the Lemon Balm Wine today. Tomorrow we will do the second filtering of the Concord Grape. We should get both the grape and the Lemon Balm bottled this week and then we can mix up the wild grapes that I have in the freezer. I have a new recipe that calls for banana. I figure this should mellow it. The first time I made wild grape it was rather harsh. One keeps trying.


Less than two weeks until St. Patrick's Day. Dick and I are going to meet Jeff and Kathy at the Dairy Queen in Plymouth for a steak sandwich and then go listen to Blarney on the 16th. Then on Friday, I will go back to Plymouth for the Irishman's Walk and a nice craic with as many Irish people that I can fine.

Love

Mary

It is snowing again. We have a "couple three" inches out there. It is very fluffy and pretty but it IS March and I hope it clears up and gets warm by St. Patrick's Day. It would be nice to do the Irish Walk in sunshine and kind of warm weather.

I went to the 8AM Mass. Jim and I went shooting and I finally got a decent score on my last target (of course it doesn't count for league) I got a 69. WOW. Good for me.

We watched the Academy Awards tonight. It was a pretty good show. No one movie swept things this year. It seemed to be all over the board.

We did not see many movies this year and saw none of the five nominated best picture nominees, so did not really have an opinion. It is always fun to watch the awards for the stars and the dresses. Of course, some of the "stars" are completely unknown to me.

Have a good week.

Mary