Hello Monday ~ July 24, 2023

 Good morning & happy Monday!

  In line with so many news stories from around our country, our area has had our fair share of storms this summer.  Thankfully, we aren't affected too often by power outages.  Thursday night, there was another bad storm we could hear during the night.  Friday, I did some catching up at home then went to visit some distant cousins who I haven't seen in over 10 years.  These cousins served with the International Mission Board living in Singapore, Indonesia, India and then the San Francisco area.  They have just moved to Mississippi to retire and are the sweetest people.  I thought the storms were over, but another rainstorm came through in the afternoon.  While I was visiting with family, things were happening at my house I wasn't aware...namely a lightning strike to a tree.

A neighbor texted me to let me know what happened, so I wasn't shocked when trying to pull into my driveway.  Needless to say, we spent Saturday morning cleaning up the driveway.  I also took advantage of mowing the grass because it was below 80 degrees until noon! I was so thankful for a cooler summer day to be dealing with this. Thankfully, our home didn't get too much damage, but the new truck did.  We will wait to see what the adjusters say as to any upcoming repairs. This could have been so much worse, so I was thankful.

Saturday afternoon, I spent some time putting away groceries after a trip to the grocery store and did some baking.  I tried making a bundt cake, which looked so pretty in the pan.  After cooling for about 30 minutes, I went to flip it and it all just fell apart.  That was a bust, but thankfully, my other dessert, Oreo Delight, seemed to have turned out well.

I also made the tomato pie that Jennifer had made recently.  I adjusted the recipe and combined it with one I found in a Southern Living.  It was really good. I used greek yogurt instead of mayo and I made my own crust using saltine crackers.  The recipe for that crust can be found here.

On a beauty note, I am a fan of using daily sun screen on my face and is a habit I wish I would have begun back in my teens or twenties, but we just didn't think about things like that then!  I have used Super Goop and really liked it.  I found an ELF dupe at a much lower price and received it in the mail on Friday.  I still have some other product to use up first, so once I begin using this, I will try to remember to give an update on what I think.  Have any of you used this?  I use ELF for other beauty cleansing, so I am hopeful for this product as well.

Sunday morning, I heard this great song on  Elvis radio on XM.  The Elvis channel plays his gospel music on Sunday mornings.  Did you know that out of the 14 Grammys Elvis was nomiated for, the only 3 he won were for his gospel music?  Yes, I spent 3 summers as a tour guide at Graceland!

Some of you may have seen Shay's blog last week about cable options.  I am one of those who has utilized cable because it provided all the channels we watched and was about the same price as streaming platforms once I included my internet as well.  The price has recently gone up for us, so an online cable chat agent had me switch unkowingly to a streaming device they offer.  Well, I am already regretting it and spent Sunday afternoon trying to research other streaming platforms and how to get back the channels and DVR I had become so accustomed to using.   These are such first world issues.

I did laundry and then we went to have dinner with a few other couples from church.  Once a quarter, we have something called Dinners for 8.  They mix and match couples to have dinner at someone's house and we all bring food.  It is a fun time to get to know others better within our church and eat good food!  I took the Oreo Delight dessert I made on Saturday.

It is a busy week ahead, but I am hopeful for a good one. I hope yours is off to a good start!

Thanks for stopping by on the Monday friend!

Linking up with Holly and Sarah