The heat has broken, and every single resident of the city of New Orleans is out on the town, enjoying a breezy, bluebird day. The kids go to a private episcopal school and today was their day to go to the attached episcopal church and perform for the congregants. After they had played handbells, recited Bible verses, and sung dona nobis pacem and a few other Sunday school classics, we all retreated to their playground area for a church cookout. It was about as glorious and perfect a scene as you could imagine – kids running wild playing soccer and basketball, large foil dishes full of grilled hot dogs and baked beans, ladies in dresses and heels sitting as daintily as possible on the ground, paper plates of food perched on their laps. I chatted to several friends, drank about five gallons of lemonade, and enjoyed the feel of the sun and breeze and perfect, perfect weather.
Last night the Prof and I went to a party thrown by colleagues of his – a tiki party, where we all dressed in Hawaiian shirts and wore leis and drank rum drinks out of large plastic cups. It was a really good time, though this morning when I took some of the communion wine and realized it was actually wine and not grape juice like we Presbyterians do it, I got very woozy and nearly made a scene in front of the entire congregation. (I’ve since napped and drunk plenty of water, so I’m feeling more human!) Before that party, I’d attended another party with the boys, a little birthday party at one of those kid places that is a warehouse full of trampolines. Craig trundled right into the dodgeball area with Jack, and was perfectly happy to be pelted with dodgeballs and get knocked over again and again. No toddler trampoline area for this boy – he hangs with the big kids. Meanwhile, Liam found a giant pit full of foam chunks and jumped into it about a thousand times in a row. I just wandered around keeping an eye on them, talking to all the other moms and dads, occasionally hauling Craig out of trouble (my back is not happy with me today . . .)
Now we are all lounging. Craig is napping, the big boys are watching tv, and the Prof and I napped and puttered around and napped some more. I have another big week full of almost impossible deadlines, but I’m resisting the urge to try to ‘get caught up’ today. I think I need rest more, and so I’m resting (well, doing hours and hours of domestic chores, but also resting). We ran errands yesterday, too – getting some items framed, getting my wedding rings sized up at last – they haven’t fit for about a year, and I finally gave up on the belief that my fingers would shrink back to normal, but then it became an issue of making time to drop them off at a jeweler. There was one close to this kid birthday party, so that worked perfectly! I’ll run to the grocery store in a few minutes – we have zero food, as my kids keep whining and reminding me. This is what we plan to have this week:
Sour Cream Noodle Bake, green beans and crusty bread.
PW Perfect Potato Soup – I made this a few weeks ago and froze half, so we’ll defrost that and heat it up. Bread, apples, and cheese will go nicely with this.
Leftover honey mustard chicken and vegetables – that made a TON and we’ll be eating on it for a while!
Chicken patties, mac and cheese, and mixed veg.
Smothered baked chicken burritos. These things are so good. I’ll slow cook the chicken this afternoon and then assembling these will be a cinch.
Have a great week, all!