Journal

It was bitterly cold in Chicago when I arrived on Thursday evening, but the lovely weekend made up for it. The candle was lit in the guest room, the pine cone "bouquet" was on the bedside table and Leah had added wonderful, red, flannel sheets and a fleece blanket as well as new bathroom amenities. The shrimp and cheese and crackers with wine hit the spot.

As promised, the next day Leah had arranged for an in-house massage - my first ever. What a wonderful experience! It was soothing, relaxing and energizing all at the same time. Thanks, Leah!

The opera, "Il Trovatore" was excellent, especially the soprano. Many "bravos" for two of her arias. The scenery was spare but fit well with the time and the mood of the opera.

A great Chicago weekend!

Well, it takes a lot longer to do our usual trip "diary" when it is 7 weeks instead of 4 weeks but here it is - you can go to our web page and click on Fall Travels 2006 or go directly to our summary. For all of you grammarians in the crowd - there are no doubt numerous errors. Our abject apologies but please just smile quietly to yourself when you find one.

A lovely Christmas in Austin - it was a lot of fun to watch Kayleigh and Jonathan open their presents. The whole week was active and interesting - Christmas dinner with everyone from Houston, playing poker in the evening with Elizabeth and Dale, riding the Zilker Zephyr with Jonathan and Kayleigh, reading books to Kayleigh, playing games with Jonathan, visiting the Halls, ice cream at Amy's and much more. Elizabeth's dinner for our last evening - champagne with an early toast to New Year's, shrimp and lobster was excellent as were all the other meals.

We left Austin on Dec. 29 and drove through blinding rain to Ft. Worth to pick up Kitty Lou at Rita's. Sheets of rain flooded the windshield so one truly couldn't see for a few seconds; part of the trip Pat drove at 40 miles an hour. It was really nice to get to Rita's especially since she and Kathleen had prepared lunch for us. Rita fixed crab chowder with artichokes which was very tasty. After the great lunch, we headed to Wichita Falls. We went to bed early that night and got up early for our drive home. It rained most of the way but at least not as heavy the previous day. We're readapting to the quiet and miss E, D, J and K already! Today it is snowing.