Life at Kyle's Kottage, April 8 - 12

Wednesday, April 8th

Another lovely day. Did not manage to get outside though as my project was to make some surgical masks for Kristi. She had dropped off some scrap material and elastic and said "go to it Mom"! You can get a pattern online. Ha Ha... This material must have been from Halloween ... very bright! Kristi needs the masks to put on her patients when she has to see them in office. Took me 5 hours and I had 9 made. I will be much faster now that I know what I am doing! :) First one was a bust until I figured out an easier way to make them, so she will have 8. I have more material and elastic on the way to make more.

Thursday was glorious, I had to go into Duncan and pick up Freya's meds. Finally I have a supply that will last a while so we can start weaning her to a lower dosage of her immunosuppressant medication.

At 1pm, Kristi showed up with a couple of my Amazon parcels and we were able to have a little visit in our driveway, 20 feet apart before she headed back home. The rest of the afternoon was spent on the dock or the back lawn enjoying the sun.

Flat calm.

Friday, another warm sunny day. I had to go back into Duncan and pick up my grocery order at Superstore and Save-on-foods at 10 am. First time ordering from Save-on so we shall see how that works out. Update ... it worked well with them delivering my order to the car but I only received 1/4 of what I ordered! Fortunately Superstore gave me almost everything I ordered including TP. Don't know if I would bother with Save-on-Foods again.

Tonight's dinner on the Traeger was Prime Rib and Yorkshire Puddings in the oven.

Saturday morning we were up at our usual time and had our weekend treat ... Carolan's and coffee. By 8:30 it was off to the races. Ray downstairs and I started my big driveway pressure washing gig. Darryl decided his washer was bigger than mine so hooked me up to his lol. Three and a half hours later I had the driveway done. It took three washes to get all the "green" off of it. After I did the front part, Ray moved the motorhome onto the cul-de-sac so I could do the rest. We also managed to get the boat out of the garage ready for launch tomorrow. A very successful day of chores.

What a job ... After some ibuprofen and a hot tub I was still feeling pretty sore. Ray made me a margarita for some "internal medicine" which definitely seemed to help. lol

The rest of the afternoon we sat outside on the sitting area on the driveway out of the wind. Got up to 17C today. After a couple hours rest I came in and made the dressing for the turkey and roasted the neck and innards with vegetables for the base of tomorrow's gravy. 

Sunday, April 12 ... Turkey Day - Easter Dinner with the neighbour with driveway social distancing. lol

I had the turkey smoking on the Traeger by 10am after it was brined for 24 hours. Followed the directions with the different temps at different times and finished with a "boat load" of butter after putting it into a roaster and tightly wrapping it in tinfoil for the last hour and a half. It turned out fabulous.

While the turkey was smoking, Ray and I got the boat launched. Nice to get it out of the way. We moved the coach ahead and were able to push the trailer back into the garage so we have lots of driveway space for dinner tonight.

The rest of my day was spent cooking the rest of our meal. For those of you that care: ha ha, Dave and Cheryl, here is the menu.

Smoked Turkey

Sausage and cranberry dressing

Mashed potatoes

Honey and ginger glazed carrots

Roasted asparagus

Gravy and Cranberry Sauce

Cheesecake for dessert with Raspberry Dessert Wine.

Everyone gathered around 4 pm and dinner was served about 4:30 pm once everyone had themselves set up to eat with their own tables, chairs and utensils.  Roy had the jazz music running quietly in the background. We all went separately to the set up food table, sanitizing before touching utensils and sanitizing after to make sure our hands were clean to eat. No one talked or coughed while filling their plates. :) I had Ray take a "group shot"  before we started.

Roy and June, far left, Pat and Darryl in front and behind Ray and I.

Pat's picture

Pat's picture

Pat's picture

Superstore, with my last order, gave us 3 small frozen cheesecakes due to our large order.  So I gave each person one so they could cut it up themselves and we would not contaminate it. 

Pat's picture

Pat and June discussing making masks

Dinner was a success and we all stayed outside for about 3 hours talking. The turkey turned out fabulous and moist. Definitely a "do again". Everyone had a second helping so they must have liked it too. Roy and June gave us a couple bottles of wine and 1 dessert wine. Thanks a bunch guys. We shared the wine out with our dessert with everyone bringing their own liqueur glasses backing off so Ray could pour and then coming to retrieve their glass. We all have this physical distancing thing down pretty good. lol A great get together.