by Judy Handley | Oct 12, 2022 | 2022 Life Logs |
2022 Life Logs, Day 285: Lunch by the Dock, Wine Group Evening
Date: Wednesday, October 12, 2022
Weather: Sunny and Warm; High 71, Low 56 degrees
Location: At Home in the Cottage, Falmouth, MA
Today was a beautiful Cape Cod fall day. I invited Karen Baranowski over for lunch and we ate down by the dock. We had Quiche Lorraine, with artichokes added, and a fall salad of Brussels sprouts, bacon, pecans, and dried cranberries. All delicious. After Karen left, I made Leaf Pie (Swiss chard and Manchego cheese) to take to my late afternoon wine group. It was my pairing for my Southern Right sauvignon blanc from South Africa. It was a beautiful day and a great day visiting with good friends.
by Judy Handley | Oct 11, 2022 | 2022 Life Logs |
2022 Life Logs, Day 284: Book Club, Rowing, Shadow to Groomer
Date: Tuesday, October 11, 2022
Weather: Partly Sunny; High 65, Low 51 degrees
Location: At Home in the Cottage, Falmouth, MA
Sunday night’s full moon is still hanging big in the sky above and the last couple of days have been ‘model’ fall days—mostly sunny, a little cool, just delightful. Today was doggie beauty shop day for Shadow, so we were up early and on the road to Pampered Pets for Shadow’s 9 am appointment. I dropped him off, stopped at the grocery store on the way home, checked email when I got home, and then it was time to head to my month book club. I came home, had a late lunch, and then headed into town to pick Sam up and head to Harwich for rowing practice. We left 10 minutes early so we could pick Shadow up on our way. It was a busy, but delightful day.
by Judy Handley | Oct 10, 2022 | 2022 Life Logs |
2022 Life Logs, Day 283: Sailing Day
Date: Monday, October 10, 2022
Weather: Partly Sunny; High 64, Low 46 degrees
Location: At Home in the Cottage, Falmouth, MA
Heather and family headed to their sailboat late yesterday to spend the night aboard and go sailing today. I was invited to sailing with them today, so off I went. The drive from here to Marion was a beautiful reminder that autumn is in its pride here on the Cape. We don’t get the the bright colors found further north, but the subtle colors of fall were beautiful.
It was overcast early with very little wind, but just after I arrived at the boat, the sun began to burn through the clouds. It became partly sunny, and the wind picked up and we had a great sail.
There was enough wind that the captain actually had to roll in the head sail and put out the jib to keep us a little more upright. We sailed south through Buzzards Bay, down around Cleveland Light,
and back to Wings Cove. The wind was behind us on the way home and we sailed wing and wing for most of the return trip.
It felt so good be out on the water.
by Judy Handley | Oct 9, 2022 | 2022 Life Logs |
2022 Life Logs, Day 282: Quiet Sunday
Date: Sunday, October 9, 2022
Weather: Partly Sunny, Cool; High 60, Low 42 degrees
Location: At Home in the Cottage, Falmouth, MA
Honestly, I didn’t do much of anything today. I did go to into town to run some errands and took Ollie to the skate park for an hour. I took Shadow for a walk early and played ball with him in the afternoon. And I watched a movie. That was my Sunday.
by Judy Handley | Oct 8, 2022 | 2022 Life Logs |
2022 Life Logs, Day 281: Celebrating Autumn with Ollie
Date: Saturday, October 8, 2022
Weather: Mostly Sunny, Cool; High 61, Low 42 degrees
Location: At Home in the Cottage, Falmouth, MA
There was a chill in the air today and the leaves are showing their fall colors. So, it was the perfect day to celebrate autumn with Ollie. When I picked him up last night to bring him to the cottage to spend the night, I asked him what he wanted for breakfast. His answer was crepes. I don’t think I have ever made crepes, so I looked up a recipe. It called for milk, which I never have, but I told Ollie I’d run to Family Foods in the morning to get some and attempt making crepes. My attempt went well.
The crepes were delicious, but what wouldn’t be when smothered with chocolate syrup and whipped cream. I had some Reddi Wip in the refrigerator left over from a dessert I made for the Goldpebbles a while back. But Family Foods had heavy cream, so I bought that as well and made fresh whipped cream. Yummy.
Our decadent breakfast gave us the energy we needed for making fall-shaped (pumpkins, apples acorns, and leaves) sugar cookies and pumpkin cookie cut outs,
and for decorating small pumpkins with acrylic markers.
Then we went outside and worked together to do some fall garden clean up and clear the briars and fallen branches from the paths I walk in the woods around the house with Shadow. Ollie cut while I pulled and carried wearing my heavy suede work gloves. Mid-afternoon we went to Heather and Jed’s. Jonah was home from his morning soccer game, but Jed was reffing a couple of local afternoon games. Jonah and Ollie cut the grass and gathered up any leaves that had already fallen. Then we ended the day with a trip to the skate park. The boys haven’t been on their scooters at the skate park for months and they really enjoyed it this afternoon. By the time we got home, Heather and Sam were home from Sam’s regatta. They left at 5 am this morning and both of them were exhausted. Sam’s boat didn’t do as well as he had hoped, but I didn’t get to talk to him about it as he was napping in his room. I’ll have to wait and hear about this when I take him to rowing practice on Monday afternoon.
by Judy Handley | Oct 7, 2022 | 2022 Life Logs |
2022 Life Logs, Day 280: A Day with Grandkids
Date: Friday, October 7, 2022
Weather: Mostly Sunny and Warm; High 69, Low 47 degrees
Location: At Home in the Cottage, Falmouth, MA
Today was the first day of a four-day vacation weekend for Falmouth students. I invited the Goldpebbles over to do some paid yardwork and two of them took me up on the offer. Jonah got an invitation to go spend the afternoon with his good friend Joey, so I had only Sam and Ollie. Sam’s job was to pull some aggressive weeds in Shirley’s lawn and then cut the grass. Ollie and I were the trim and clean up team, plus we worked in my gardens getting rid of some monster weeds, taking out some of the tomato cages to store them, and a long laundry list of other chores. At 2:30 pm, I left to take Sam home as he had some things to do at home before he and Jed took off for rowing practice. Ollie stayed at my house and when I returned, we spent another hour outside and then came in to start one of our planned fall arts and crafts projects. We are using acrylic markers to decorate small pumpkins. We barely got started when it was time to go pick up Jonah and then take both boys home to see their mom and have dinner. Heather returned this afternoon from a couple of work days in Boston and she will be gone all day tomorrow with Sam. Ollie is returning to spend the night with me as Heather and Sam leave at 5 am in the morning for a full day regatta in Worcester which is about two hours from here. At 8:30 am, Jed and Jonah head to Harwich for the first game in a tournament this weekend. There are two more games on Sunday and then one on Monday if Jonah’s team makes the finals. Ollie and I will stay here and hold down the home front. We will continue our pumpkin decorating, make some seasonal sugar cookies using our autumn cookie cutters, and finish up one last outdoor project. We should still have some sunshine for our outdoor work, but the temperature is dropping overnight–not getting as warm tomorrow as it was today and yesterday. But as long as the sun shines, I’m fine with that.
