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Friday night with bff, her sis, her BIL and her niece. The food ranged from outstanding (the best clam chowder I've ever had...though I'm not normally a fan of clam chowder so it might not have been the best ever...) to "pretty good", and there was plenty of it. The place was packed; I got some razzing from the others for practically sprinting to a table with 5 open seats but hey, it was either nab those seats or sit on the floor. The place was packed and I was borderline hangry.

Saturday morning, I took my good church friend and my aunt to Middlefield for a craft supply swap and a little shopping. The supply swap was great--this was the biggest one yet--but you know you're rural when most of the supplies are related to making clothes or cold weather accessories. Still, good church friend, who likes to knit and crochet, got an unusual size crochet hook and some yarn, and Auntie got some very pretty, and very realistic looking, fake flowers, and I nabbed some pre-mixed pour paints some pour medium, a bag of beads, a piece of pretty paper (that I will make into beads) and few fake flowers for myself, plus three rolls of ribbon, a pot and some wood adhesive for bff to help with the crafts she makes. From there, we went to a place that's part cheese store and part museum dedicated to the Swiss master cheese maker who began the business many years ago. Interestingly, bff's cousin used to run the place; his mother is the daughter of the Swiss master cheese maker (his dad is one of bff's uncles), and the cousin is himself a master cheese maker. I found some hard to find ginger jam there and also got a bag of mixed cheese cubes. Within walking distance (though we drove anyways) is a pretty good size family market that has some of the best fry pies you could ever want. We all got items there; I brought Dad some coffee, a bag of grits (they sell a lot of stuff in bulk) and an apple fritter from the bakery, while I got myself an apple cream fry pie, a bottle of birch beer, a bottle of sarsaparilla, some homemade ham salad and a jar of maple onion bacon jam. Afterwards, we ate lunch at one of Middlefield's destination restaurants: Mary Yoder's. I would say it's like a scaled down version of Hartville Kitchen...but that would mean nothing to those outside of NE Ohio <g>. MY is part gift shop and part large restaurant specializing in "Amish" food...which most of us would consider comfort food. Dishes like roast beef, roast turkey, stuffed cabbage and something that sounds gross to me but is a best seller: noodles over mashed potatoes. Just...why? I opted for the tuna melt with a side of (absolutely delicious) mac and cheese and had to laugh when, after I ordered, the waitress came back and asked me if I wanted cheese on my tuna melt. Um...yeah, that's kind of implied in the name. I think she really meant to ask me what KIND of cheese; I opted for Swiss cheese, as it's one of Middlefield's specialties.

I had all of three hours at home before I met bff at my church's parking lot so we could carpool out to Mary's Diner in Geneva to meet our mutual college friend "J". I was in NO mood to socialize further, but J lives in NY and was back in town to visit her mom, so I couldn't ask to move dinner to next week. I wound up having a great time anyways, as I knew I would. Mary's Diner is a cool retro place, located in an actual silver rectangular building; I don't know if it's the original diner housing or an exact replica. The inside is amazing as well and very authentic. I opted for the creamed chicken and biscuits (delicious!) and washed it down with the place's "famous" grape milkshake, which was also delicious. Props to J...she is a wonderful conversationalist, always listening and asking questions, never dominating the conversation *coughbffcough* but never just sitting silently either, and always finding interesting things to discuss. She also very kindly brought both bff and me jars of red raspberry jam her mom had made. That alone was worth the drive out.

And then Saturday night, I screwed up and instead of going to bed early because of the time change, I got caught up in a show and actually went to bed later than usual. I barely stayed awake through church and debated not going to choir practice last night. The weatherman had predicted we'd get "3-6 inches of snow"...my phone said today that the town right next to us got 7" of snow but we could still see the top of the grass all day yesterday (and by 4:00 today, it's supposed to be over 50°). I'd hoped the weather could get me out of choir practice but no joy.

Today, I'm dressed in comfy "not leaving the house" sweats (well, a sweatshirt that's too stained to be seen in public and leggings) and have absolutely no intention of going anywhere or even doing anything all that important 😁