a week's idyll

We arrived at Melrose Monday afternoon and have enjoyed a hodge-podge of activity. Ken has been busy fighting off an allergic attack of some description while finishing painting the house, a task that was interrupted last fall when an over-sized splinter got lodged in his finger joint while scraping. (Ouch!). Mom and I have been putting together plans for a partial kitchen remodel. A broken portable dishwasher has been kept for more than 10 years as it provided useful surface space for food preparation and other assorted kitchen jobs. Its location, however, has made access to storage impractical. The time has come to restore a working dishwasher to the kitchen and reclaim storage.

We spent several hours at Lowe’s on Wednesday and came home with a workable, although not entirely satisfactory, plan. Some rethinking that evening spurred us back to the design desk the next day, this time to Home Depot to compare costs and scope out additional prospective dishwashers. Although the design help at Lowe’s had been adequate, HD ruled the day with competence, patience, useful suggestions and thoroughness. We are pleased with the plan and will implement it in the fall.

Thursday night we joined our friends Jimmy and Barbara for a belated celebration of Mom’s 80th birthday. True to form J & B prepared a fabulous meal, complete with printed menu. After dinner Jimmy, Mom and I accompanied Hannah, J & B’s Sheltie, for a walk through that lovely neighborhood (oh, to have been there two weeks ago when the azalea were at their peak!). We returned to the house and settled in for a game of “Quiddler,” a specialty card game that incorporates components of scrabble and rummy in an effort to create words. It was fun as well as challenging, and a nice way to complete our evening.

We have had glorious weather thus far, and we have enjoyed the typical end of day ritual of happy hour on the porch delighting in the view, which never fails to disappoint. A few more days and it will be back to reality, but for now, this reality suits me just fine.