Date Night

You know that joke about what people do in a small town on Saturday night and the answer is "long division"?  I just want you to know that it isn't true.  I'm in North Dakota, have been here since Thursday night and tonight I'm babysitting two adorable grandchildren while the parents have a date night.  No long division.  My lovely six year old granddaughter is asleep upstairs in a charming Raggedy Ann bedroom and tiny Dreygan is asleep in the swing in front of me.   When he fusses one of the dogs goes over to check that the baby is all right. 
Until Wednesday afternoon I really wasn't sure if it would be okay to leave my husband for a week but he began to feel a little stronger and I wasn't quite as concerned.  I appreciate his sister staying with him and keeping track of all the details. However conversations yesterday and today make me feel like I should be home fussing over him, but it has been so nice to spend time with my daughter.  It has been almost two years since we saw each other!  That's a long time for anyone but she is my only living child and these are my only grandchildren.
Celestina and I have been busy cooking - she has literally helped with every meal I've prepared - washing carrots for minestrone, helping make omelets in a bag for breakfast this morning, crushing cracker crumbs for topping on a seafood dish for tonight, and so on. 
We had a slight accident in the kitchen this afternoon - I broke their stove.

This is a Victorian era house and the ceilings are very high, so the kitchen cabinets are quite high as well.  I reached for a glass on the top shelf of the cabinet but it slipped out of my hand and crashed onto the ceramic top stove which shattered like a rock hitting a windshield.  All the masking tape is to hold it in place until they can move it.  I believe we'll be shopping for a new stove on Monday morning as soon as the only applliance store in town is open.  The stove was OLD, probably one of the first ceramic top stoves ever made, and I cannot find a brand name on it anywhere. 

This morning I saw a sun dog but didn't think to grab my camera.  Clear air, sunshine and cold weather were a perfect combination to be able to see them.  I did take one interesting picture out the window of the guest room on the 2nd floor though.  Next to the fire hydrant is a long red & white stick.  It has two purposes - to show snow depth at the hydrant but I imagine it's also a marker for the snow plow so it won't hit the hydrant.  Every street in town is plowed and they even sanded the intersection by the house.  But for some reason blogspot won't let me add more pictures.  Maybe there will be a second post to show that.  But I also want to add pictures of Dreygan and Celestina...

I'll see what I can do.