And on the 5th day...

we caught our breath. What a great weekend it has been. As I sit here enjoying coffee with an overcast sky I am so glad to have it cool knowing that most of the country is baking in 90+ temps this day. We are to possibly hit that here by the end of the week. So I am just glad to have an AC in the window ready to go when I need it.

The potato salad I made yesterday was a true success. Yukon Gold potatoes are wonderful and the whole process of making and melding the flavors. Do try substituting 1/2 the mayonnaise for sour cream. Nice flavor. Also used cucumber chips for a bit of a twist. Massaged a mustard & pickle juice mixture into the potatoes after they were fork tender and that also gave another layer of flavor. I was so happy when Rob just smiled and asked to keep some of the leftovers. I even think it passed Jodie's taste test and she is one to please, she is such a good cook.

We enjoyed Brats and coleslaw plus the potato salad and crab stuffed deviled eggs - oh my how rich and tasty! Watermelon and Dutch apple pie a la mode capped off the feast. Fireworks from Washington, DC to New York to even a stereo visual viewing of Seattle's fireworks gave us plenty to watch. Once home about 11:20 or so, I was able to watch and here fireworks well into the wee hours of the morning.

So have to share a funny quote out of the paper. There is a old cruise liner in Philadelphia and a group is trying to convert it into a hotel or some mixed use thing. Well, one of the committee members is the granddaughter of the original designer, Susan Gibbs and shares a memory of riding the SS United States from her grandmother:

"The elegance, the champagne, the light and speed, the scotch-and-sodas at 10am. Oh what a majestic symbol this ship was."

I don't know why but that quote just cracks me up to say the least! But then I do have a strange sense of humor. So besides reading, which I did a lot of this weekend, I also did some more letting go of stuff. But I also took time to enjoy a documentary on old amusement parks in the US and a great program on the good old Hot Dog! Even Markie hanged around and watched that one with me.

Another project I have begun is to take all my journals and begin to consolidate all the ephemera that I have collected and basically do a three volume scrape book. This is going to be a lot more of a challenge than I initially thought, but that is OK, it is good to have an ongoing project. So I am going to go through all the photo boxes and I want to release at least one box worth of photos. Then going through all the cards and then the memento boxes and finally get a nice layout for the scrape books and begin to assemble. I am thinking the first 30 years and then the next decade or so and then the rest of the story. Kind of like the scrape book from Ya-Ya Sisterhood. We shall see, but what I thought would be a simple weekend project could well take me into the fall or even the winter.

So going to get along and get a few things handled and get ready for a game of Settler's of Catan set to kick off at 1pm. Enjoy your day as I know I will do the same here. Cheers!