Weekend Food, Farewells & Fun

29-30Sep

Saturday is Sadderday as we bid Farewell to Heather. She, Jess and Lyndsay come for a Welcome Lynds & Hasta Luego Heather dinner. It was a beautiful late afternoon, so they decided to push Jess up the hill in the wheelchair and I would drive them home at the end of our evening.

Saturday morning I happened upon Michael Smith (Chef at Home) when I turned the TV on for Carman. This was a stroke of luck for me (not so much for him) since I had the remote, I checked out what he was making and decided we’d have that for dessert. Extra Virgin Olive Oil & Rosemary Cake with Basil Whipped Cream - yum! You can check out the recipe at: Foodnetwork - Michael Smith

The ladies brought a garden salad, which we enjoyed with some balsamic vinegar, herb & olive oil dip and rosemary focaccia bread (ok, so that could be my meal right there). I had done warm quinoa, oven roasted vegan veggies (recipe, thanks to the Podleski sisters) and a roasted portobello mushroom for Lindsay along with some bread crumb & parm veggies and marinated pork tenderloin for the meat eaters.

After dinner, Heather asked if we could get in a game of Cribbage before she headed back to NS. I love crib and haven't played in many months so jumped at the chance. We broke out the board and cards...I was off to a roaring start (I won the break so had first crib). Heather turns to Jessica and says, “just what I thought, she’s going to beat me!”  I told her not to panic, it was only the first hand and sure enough...she whooped good. By the time all was said and done, I had barely crawled over the skunk line and she was plugging her peg into the winner’s spot! Well done Heather and I demand a rematch...!

Pamela, Lindsay & Griffon, Carman, Heather & Jessica

Sunday morning, Jessica and I drove Heather to the ferry landing for Billy Bishop Airport. I got Heather's bags out of the back while she went around to the other side to chat with Jess and say her goodbyes. Then Jess decided to get out of the car (to sit up front with me on the way home), so there she comes, (lower lip first I might add) and I know what’s coming next...

...so after we all shed a few tears and share some hugs, we watch as Heather drags her bag (it had wheels) to the ferry launch. It turns out she only made it part way home, and was forced to stay a night in Saint John, NB as Halifax was the scene of torrential downpours, cancelled flights and closed airports that night!

I decided a Tall Blonde Hazelnut was in order to cheer Jess up, so got her settle back in the car and hadn’t yet clicked my seatbelt when she asked if we could maybe stop at a Starbucks on the way home. Now this might scare the average person, the fact that we were thinking alike...but neither of us could be called average by any stretch!

We grabba java each, text Lindsay for her order, then make our way to pick her up and head out for a girls trip to IKEA. This could have played out differently, but Carman decided that the Ryder Cup and football edged out IKEA by just a slight margin (i.e. he refused to come along).

We were able to get the end tables I had spied for Jess in August (a steal at $9.99 each) along with a few other essentials. In the midst of our trek thru the various studio set-ups in the store, I received a text from Dj so we did a short video to share our trip with her.

We had a fun couple of hours touring the store and did well to not break the bank with our purchasing power!  The drive home was rather circuitous, as we neared the junction of the 400 and 401, I saw a note on one of the illuminated sign boards saying that all westbound collector lanes to the the 401 were closed. We ended up switching lanes carefull from the far left to the far right and took the Black Creek Drive & Jane St. exit, then travelled over to Keele and had no problem merging with the communters on the 401!  Lindsay was very complimentary on my ability to not freak out or be scared to death and just calmly get us home - thanks Linds!