A Fabulous Weekend in Cincinnati

The last two days have been really fun. We haven't been able to get together with Walt and Janice in almost three years, but we were finally able to make it down to their house this weekend. We've had plans for this trip for a couple of months now, but we had to put it off when Elizabeth and Mom came down with a bad cold last month. Doom seemed pretty near when Elizabeth and I got another cold a week and a half ago, but we managed to get over enough of them to go down anyway. We were planning on staying over until today, but Mom sprained her back (that's from hefting too many book boxes), so Pop drove us down and we came home last night.

All in all, it was a really fabulous weekend!! Wow! We arrived at Walt and Janice's house at about 2:30pm on Saturday afternoon. That gave us plenty of time to just sit around and gab --- after all, there is an awful lot to catch up on after two and a half years. They had invited a few young guys over for dinner, so they all arrived around six o'clock. Dinner was pizza and salad (followed by one beautiful pound cake made by one of the guys). We all sat around the dining room table to play cards after the meal, and this was really a fun time. The three guys know how to play all kinds of variations of Poker, so they taught us all that (only using chips, of course --- no cash). Really thrilling. Elizabeth and I have always wanted to learn Poker, since we know a few tidbits about it from watching old Westerns. I mean, every cowboy runs across a Poker game! Walt seemed to do very well at this game. He's also a ton of fun to watch, as he really knows how to clown around. :) We didn't stop until after nine o'clock. I'm not sure, but I have a feeling that it was past everybody's bedtime --- we were all looking pretty tired.



Sunday morning dawned none too bright and way too early, but we all managed to tumble downstairs. It was dark, cold and windy, and with Mom's back being so sore we decided to stay around the house. Janice had bagels from Panera. Can't beat that, can you?! We spread those out on the counter, added some hummus dip, salsa and chips, cheese and crackers and just spent the day playing games and talking.

Janice had a really fun game called Eye Know. It was a form of trivia game along the lines of Trivial Pursuit, but it was different. The trivia was a bit modern for Elizabeth and me (you know, living in the 1930s-1950s can make it a bit hard when it comes to modern games), but everybody did pretty well. We all had fun with the pictures on the cards. We also played Set and Five Crowns.



Janice and I made a "Mushroom and Spinach" lasagna for dinner. Elizabeth and I have a low opinion of mushrooms, but this was actually a fabulous dish! Wow! What really intrigued me was the substitution of cream cheese for the typical ricotta. I really preferred it.

We didn't leave until about 5:45pm, which was a bit later than planned. It was kind of sad to have to go. There was a Whole Foods grocery store in Cincinnati, so we made a quick stop there to pick up things like olive oil and coffee. Arrived home shortly before ten, so everybody is pretty beat. We're going to try to make plans to get together one more time before the snow flies. More later.