Tuesday, September 18th - first day of Community School - without my helper!

It's a cool 13' this morning and heading for a sunny 21' later. What fabulous weather, but we may get rain Thursday, Friday and Saturday but we'll have to see on that one. We likely will as I notice that Ontario is getting cooler temperatures and rain today. Time to put the open toe shoes away, Meg (1)!

So I think I'm ready for tonight's class. It just doesn't seem right not having Brenda to bounce things off of or to offer suggestions. We lost one of our previous students yesterday. Yolanda emailed that she's starting a new job and won't be able to attend all the classes so she decided to back out for this year and let someone else have her spot. That's really too bad, as we will miss her sense of humour and vibrant personality. She really added something to the class. But she asked if I could keep her informed with the recipes each week and I said I would, as well as leave her on the guest list for any after school extra curricular activities that might involve wine or food!

I'm going to do some food safety and knife skills with the new people and let the old timers previous students make a Sweet Corn, Leek and Potato Chowder (coming soon to a food blog near you!).  We're also going to do a bit of menu planning and ideas on how to organize our pantries and freezers a little better. I have to admit it's mostly for my benefit but if I tell people I'm going to do it, then there's a bit more incentive to actually get it done and it might actually be beneficial to the others as well. It's a work in progress so we'll see how we all fare by the end of the ten weeks.

It's good to get back into the fall routine again and I am enjoying cooking regular meals again. Last night I made a Mushroom and Leek Quiche that was in the Sobey's magazine this month and it was really delicious. Of course it didn't look exactly like the picture - it was meant to be made with Swiss cheese but I only had cheddar so that altered it slightly but it was still really good.

Lloyd is only likely working till around lunch time today as they are almost finished the project they are working on so he may have tomorrow off. That's not a bad thing as it will give him a chance to work on the garage walls. Then we are supposed to get rain - Thursday, Friday and Saturday so he would likely be off then anyway. That will be a good thing as he has a huge blister on his hand that really needs some time to heal before it gets infected. Guess he'll wear gloves the next time he uses a rake to smooth out the surface of the garage floor!