I wasn't going to write a
friday i'm in love post today….

I didn't think I was feeling it…
I was feeling all the feels today
but not really happy ones.

The truth is…well…you know
what the truth is.
I am still raw to touch
and too bruised to be in public…
I feel like my skin scraped dry
and my heart is on the outside
instead of safely hidden…

I try to protect it
but everywhere I go,
I am bumping it against
other people's stories
and the corner of my memories
and scraping it on the past.

So maybe today
I need a Friday I'm in love
more than ever….
even if it is just to remind me
that there are still things
to be in love with…

I have been meaning to share this
for a while so thought
today was a good day
to do just that.

At a very hard time,
a friend gave me something
I have been looking for
for years…Azrael the cat from the smurfs!
I had him tucked away
until tonight
but now he has been
happily reunited with
Gargamel and they are
happily plotting the demise
of the smurfs…

(thank you Lee Anne & Sandy,
though the smurfs are probably
annoyed with you….heh)

❤️ seeing a new-to-me video of dad when I was least expecting it…but needing it the most…
❤️ something in the orange…on constant replay
❤️ friends who have no idea how much I appreciate (and need) their support. I am not good at saying it…but I need them more than they know.

❤️ and finally…a hot bowl of chicken fricot
to end this frigid cold day off with…

I hope you had a warm and toasty friday!!

I don't like to cook. Not normally.
Usually Stirling does most of the cooking
and by most...
I mean most.
If left to me, supper would generally be
sugary cereal with
more sugar added....
or toast
with butter
and brown sugar.

But I do like to make chicken fricot
or what I consider to be my version of chicken fricot.
In my non-vegetable loving world,
chicken fricot is chicken, potatoes and chicken broth...
no dumplings, no carrots, definitely no turnip...
lots of salt and pepper...and maybe, a little more salt.
Onions are ok now (not so much when I was a kid).

Chicken fricot makes me think of my grandmother's
teeny-tiny house that was always filled with kids
and where we jumped on the bed
and ate home cut french fries (if one of the boys would go
to the basement to get the potatoes)
and meat pies
and ice cream
while watching the carol burnett show
and cable tv (a luxury we did not have at home).
When my grandmother wasn't holding one of my many,
many younger cousins, she was knitting...or cooking...
or laughing...or all of these things at once.

When I make chicken fricot,
I think of her english mixed with french and vice versa.
I think about how she was the most down to earth person
I have ever known....and how, even though there were SO
many of us, she was always able to remember the little things...
when I would come over she would let me go out to my
uncle's room to read archie comics and color in peace...
she remembered what we liked, what we didn't.
And she listened when you were telling her something...
like...really listened...really heard you...
even with so much going on all the time.

So yeah, I like to make chicken fricot.
:) It'll never be hers but it always makes me feel better.