Weekends with Friends

We've had three nice weekends in a row, and I want to jot down the highlights so I'll always remember them.

September 12-14
Friday night Evelyn and I splurged and ate out at Embers restaurant in Kenwood (or is it Madeira?). We called it an early birthday dinner, because it's such a nice place, but we couldn't wait till her birthday because I had a Groupon that was going to expire September 17!
The food is good. The presentation is wonderful. The portions, at least for my short ribs and macaroni and cheese combo, were huge. And I felt compelled to eat every bite. It's been a long time since I've been that full, and it will be a long time before I allow the memory of such a good meal to be spoiled by how uncomfortable I felt for nearly 24 hours afterwards!
Saturday night Shirley and Terry Wuske came over for a simple supper on the grill in anticipation of helping us with a service project in Mason later in the evening.
About the supper: I cooked chicken with a teriyaki glaze on the grill, along with pineapple and green peppers. Evelyn made an Oriental rice dish (from a microwave pouch), and I had bought frozen egg rolls and fortune cookies at Kroger. Our dinner was simple, but it was also fun.
About the service project: Christ's Church at Mason provided most of the volunteers for the city of Mason's annual Heritage Festival. I cajoled several fellows from my small group to help; I chose the assignment of clean-up. We were at least a couple of people short, though, which is why I asked Terry and Shirley if they could help too.
The tasks weren't difficult. The evening was chilly, but dry. We were finished folding tables and chairs and putting away the arcade games by 9:30 (we had arrived at 9:00). But they needed some help with more tables and chairs after the 10:00 fireworks display. So we hung out and laughed with Dave Wick and Mike and Jessica Browning till the big ka-booms. (Evelyn was in charge of turning off and then on one of the large generator-run light banks, and Terry and Shirley each "manned" another generator-light combo.)
Collapsing the large metal and fiberglass picnic tables on the grounds was the hardest part of the evening. But we had a good crew working on it (some city employees as well as us volunteers), and we were on our way by around 11:00. It was fun!
Sunday morning, for the second week, I stood at a book table where we were distributing each attendeeI Am a Church Member. The whole church is considering the book as our preachers preach through each of the chapters. I was one of six folks who wrote a week of devotions to accompany the study; we wrote 6 days of devos for each chapter of the book. We were giving away the devotional books with Rainer's book.
family a copy of Thom Rainer's book.

Next entry: September 18-22: Road trip with Bill and Verna Weber to Levittown, PA where we had a fun reunion--and a birthday party for Miles!--with the Johnsons and Taylors.