My Tireless Retirement – Week 167

 

Hello!  It was a great week in my retired life.  On Friday I worked all day at the senior center and when I got home my BFF was here having flown in that afternoon.  I was super happy to see him and I got the best hug I’ve had in a good while.  I took the rest of the week off from work and we had fun.  Usually when he is here he is working, but not this time.

 

Saturday & Sunday I had the days to myself because I don’t golf and you don’t want me to.  I headed upstairs to my craft room and spent some quality time doing something I’ve wanted to do for a really long time.  I sewed myself an apron and it turned out so darn cute.  I was just tickled.  Not only will I be stylish while cooking meals and canning food for my LTFS shelves, but it should help me preserve my clothes as well.

 

Love! 💖

Once I had the apron made I went ahead and installed the hook I had purchased several years ago for hanging my aprons on.  It was in the garage waiting for me to actually have an apron to hang on it and now I do!  Then I got busy and worked on a few more projects I had in mind.  It was so much fun!

 

Monday we headed outside early in the day to wash the vehicles and do a little bit of cleaning in the garage.  It was HOT and we ended up after nearly three hours coming inside to cool down and hydrate.  We were so hot, sweaty and exhausted that after we showered and put on clean clothes we ended up taking a nap.  Declaring the day shot we ended up staying indoors where it was cool and not doing much else.

 

Pretty!

Tuesday I got outside early ahead of the heat to put some final touches on the Subaru and finish organizing the shelves in the garage.  That evening an unexpected storm blew in blowing dirt and debris everywhere and then we had just a spit of rain to make a mucky mess outside.  So much for our hard work, it was so discouraging.  No good deed goes unpunished.

 

Wednesday we had more stormy weather which put a damper on our plans for an outing.  Since we’ve already had a few wild fires here it was hard to complain about a proper downpour.  It made for a good day to play cards, read a book and make soup.  I wasn’t entirely sad about that.  However, because of all the debris that came as a result of the storm I ended up going back outside after dinner to blow off the driveway and then I ended up blowing out the garage too while I was at it as some of that debris sucked itself inside when I opened the door (sigh).  I mush admit, it did feel like I was chasing my tail a lot trying to get things done around here.

 

While I was at it I had the opportunity to get the cargo mat that goes into the Subaru super scrubbed with a touch of dish soap and my drill brush.  I rinsed it off and laid it in the sun to dry for about an hour.  When I went outside I noticed there was a sticky residue still remaining in one section that looked like raspberry jam.  I’m going with that anyway.  I went back inside and grabbed my kitchen degreaser and a roll of paper towels and managed to get that off once and for all.  It looks so much better now.  No more mud, gunk and whatever else was on there.  It is now nice and clean!  I went ahead and put it back in the car and I am very happy to have it out of the garage.  Another task checked off the list!

 

On the final day of my retirement week I started my day nice and slow with hot coffee, kitties, chickens, hummingbirds and more conversation.  It was a cooler morning than what we had so far this week so it was nice to simply enjoy the fresh air and sunshine outside in my backyard and just be present.  My flower pots look lovely and my daylily is blooming.  I harvested some rhubarb and put it away in the freezer.  Then, taking our time, we headed out to run a few errands.

 

The front porch after power washing

It may seem like I had a very busy week and looking back in was, but it didn’t feel that way because we worked at a slow and steady pace with lots of breaks in between tasks.  It was a week with no sense of urgency, no rushing around.  It never felt like work either, we were simply doing stuff.  Just being in the moment and enjoying each other’s company.  It was about as perfect as it could be.