Relative Something

We entertained our first overnight guests last night! Our good friends, the Wilkus’, with son, Ryan, are here. And, we are expecting even more folks today, for brunch. Cyndie’s parents are going to make their first visit. This will serve as a bit of a test for our planned Thanksgiving holiday, as we’ve invited quite a few folks for that feastly event.

Last night, we built a fire outside and cooked steaks, in the dark. The temperatures were relatively mild for this time of year, and there was nothing more than a whisper of wind, so it was plenty comfortable to be out around the fire after dinner, melting marshmallows for s’mores. Wonderfully rustic.

The 5 of us easily fit around the old Hays family table for dinner, even though, for the table to work in the space available, we’ve removed all of the 5 center leaves. It will be expanded to full capacity for Thanksgiving, but doing so will block the doorway to our garage, so we will only go to that extreme on rare occasions.

Even though the time switched back to standard time last night, I feel like we stayed up a little too late, watching part of the movie, Koyaanisqatsi. It seemed like a good idea, at the time, but when I mentioned I was falling asleep on the flick, Cyndie and Ryan both echoed the same, and we called it a night. Barb and Mike had already retired to their new little camping trailer they brought to test. It is a pull-behind that is about the size of a 4-person tent, but with hook up for electricity like a full-size RV. Pretty cute.

Our guests are well-informed about many aspects of how things work. I got a lesson in changing the main water filter, Ryan tested an outdoor light fixture that isn’t working, and they showed me the house alarm system still works, even though we aren’t subscribed to a monitoring service.

It is really rewarding to host guests who provide valuable information! I plan to learn as much as possible from them during the remainder of this visit.