WINTER RECESS FAVES

Here it is...the end of the week off from work due to Winter Recess.  It's been a good, productive week although the weather has been typical eastern NY winter weather:  first warm and sunny, then cold and sunny, then rainy and dreary and warm, then snowy again.  But there's always blessings to find even in the grey days of February!

I'm sharing five of those blessings with the community over at Susanne's site.  Check it out and share a fave of yours in the comment section!

FIVE FAVES

• IN HOME DATE NIGHT!  Last Friday being Valentine's Day and Dave fighting a head cold, we decided to re-create our first Valentine's day as a married couple (2/14/1991).  Back then we went out after work and bought a VCR (we only had a small tv at that point) and this movie because he had never seen it and it's considered as one of the top 5 movies of all time. Anyways, we were so broke after buying the VCR and movie, that we had to get dinner at McDonald's (yes, we used to eat fast food...EW!!).  Anyways, last week we used Grub Hub to order our fave quesadillas ("the tanya) from this place and sat on the family room couch together having our meal and watching the beloved flick.  It's romantic and every year that we watch it, we discover something new. I'm thankful for simple pleasures.

• RELAXATION: I've been fighting some weird cough thing all week. No other symptoms other than an on-again, off-again headache and this cough.  So the not going to work has been a true blessing.  I've finished two books and started another historical fiction one.  I'm taking an online course (for free!) called World Religions and how to relate to people with a different belief system from Christ-followers; I've had time to blog some "word of the year" thoughts, time to work on little projects around the house (one was to shred about 3 years worth of papers and the other was to clean and polish the hardwood floor in the dining room).  I'm thankful for the extra time to run errands and work out, too (during the work week, all those things have to be done after teaching and it gets very tiring at this age!)  Although I'd rather we have school this week and get an extra week off in June, it has been nice to be relaxed all week.

Tiny Nature Preserve right in suburbia
17 February 2020
The Dutch were the first settlers in the Albany, NY area
so many of the streams and towns have Dutch names

beginning of the very easy flat trail

a side trail led to this pretty stream
 (a.k.a. "kill" in Dutch)

• SOLO HIKE!  On Presidents Day, because my husband had to work, I had arranged for a friend from the central part of NY to meet me in Saratoga (to the north of me) and we would head to a new to us nature preserve a bit north of the city.  Well, that friend became sick so I did Plan B which was to hike in a closer to my home nature preserve.  I was the only person on the trail for the entire 25 minutes.  There was a young guy at the traihead who had just finished walking it and he said it was icy in spots but not too bad.  Another couple was pulling away as I pulled in.  What a glorious day.   The sun was warm and the air had that early spring scent to it.  I chose these three pics as they capture the hike very well.  It's only a small loop with a very short side trail.  I might go back in early summer and check the entire loop out...I couldn't get up the one hilly section due to the ice amount. I'm so thankful for time in nature! And now I have hiked 4 out of the 10 new to me hikes I want to accomplish before June!

brunch food and macchiato!

• BRUNCH!  My dear sister in Christ (and sometimes hiking buddy, and former work colleague and former member of my small group and somtimes double date with our spouses) and prayer partner friend Cindy R picked me up Tuesday morning and we started heading north to a restaurant neither one of us had been to in years.  Well, the snow started coming down and the further north we went the worse it became. So we stopped at the Saratoga exit and I suggested brunch at Spot Coffee.  (it's a fave of mine and my daughters)  There were hardly any patrons at 11 a.m.  I ordered the Pesto Chicken Panini with field greens and a small sized Caramel Macchiato with Almond Milk.  It was divine!  Cindy had a coffee and a breakfast egg sandwich.  The food and fellowship was awesome. We were able to catch up on all our work news and our prayer requests/praise reports.  We made plans to go hiking come summer.  I'm so thankful for good friends and for safe travels coming home as we saw six cars/trucks off the road in the ditch!

Ginger Noodle Soup

• SOUP!  On Wednesday evenings my husband goes right from work to grabbing something at a restaurant to volunteering with the middle schoolers at the Youth Center.  That leaves Courtney and I to get whatever we want. Usually Courtney comes home closer to 6:30 from work and I want dinner by 6 due to small group at the house.  But this week my small group was cancelled due to Winter Break so I decided to surprise her and cook for both of us.  I had tweaked a couple of recipes earlier this winter and made this soup from a combo of those recipes.  It's absolutely delicious.  It's especially good if you are fighting a cold or cough (we both have had coughs all week).  One magazine article I read even said ginger is great for fighting flu.  You can find my recipe here. I'm so thankful for easy, delicious soup recipes!

That wraps up my week!!  I leave you with a quote I really enjoy about gratitude.

Happy Weekend!