An Old Friend

Yesterday evening I found myself in the company of an old friend. This friend has been absent for a while, but decided to show up last night and we had a great time together.

My friend? The absolute tuning out of everything around me while wrapped up in a good book.

I used to read all the time, and once I picked up a book, it was very hard to pry me away until the book had been read cover to cover. But I haven't read any books for a while. Well, I've read some Russian novels, which are great, but they don't grip me the way some books do.

Last night's culprit? The newly-released fifth book in a series that I started reading at my parents' house. The series is "The Great and Terrible" by Chris Stewart, about "The Epic Conflict of the Last Days." I read the first four while living with Mom and Dad, and was anxiously awaiting the fifth. When we went over yesterday to do an emergency load of laundry (Zaylee had nearly run out of clean underwear and pants), I found that they had bought the fifth book, and Dad offered to let me borrow it.

So I took the book home, and stayed up reading it until it was completely finished - it took until 2 in the morning! I just couldn't put it down. My old friend had returned; I was caught reading this book to the exclusion of attention to any physical needs. I was sleepy, I had to use the bathroom, my muscles were cramping from sitting in one position too long, I was getting hungry, but I couldn't put it down!

It was fun!

Anyway, that's why I didn't post anything last night, or comment on anyone's blog. I was busy with a friend!

So here's the post I should have done last night, with lots of fun pictures I took yesterday.

I made homemade hamburger buns yesterday. This was a really simple recipe, and they turned out perfect for the sloppy joes we had last night, as well as the burger Mom made when she got home from class. We hadn't left her enough sloppy joe meat to make a full sandwich, so she cooked up a burger and topped it with the small amount of s.j. The verdict from everyone - great hamburger buns! I'll be making these again for sure, and posted the recipe on my recipe blog.

Marie has been working on making a quilt for her Young Women Personal Progress. She's supposed to make something for her future home, and she chose to make a really cute purple and yellow quilt. She finished the top yesterday while we were there, and I got some great pictures. Thomas really liked it when Marie spread the quilt top out, he would crawl up on it, and Marie would wrap him up in it. He was having a blast!



And Zaylee found these tiny little books that were just the right size for her little hands. She really enjoyed looking at the little pictures.
Anyway, all in all, it was a pretty nice day. I'll be really tired today because of my late night reading, but I'm in a pretty good mood, so hopefully the fact that my eyes don't want to stay open won't keep me from enjoying today as much as I enjoyed yesterday.