It's Weekender Season
Rae, Dale and Fred making pasole
Thank you, everyone who entered the drawing on Friday in celebration of Earth Day. Congratulations, S.A.B.L.E., you're the winner we drew for the $20 gift card to K9 Cuisine! Please contact me at fivecoat@ozarkmountains.com to claim your prize by 5 p.m. on Tuesday, April 13. I need your full name, email , and mailing address. Thanks!
Stay tuned, readers, for more cool drawings this month!
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I don’t think there’s any better of a weekend than spending time with good friends and neighbors.
On Saturday, we planned a meal with our friends and neighbors who also happen to be from Kansas City. Fred and Rae have been trying to sell their home in the city now for a year and although they are here every other weekend, they would like to be here permanently.
We’ve spent the past three years developing a friendship that extends to spending the holidays together.
On Saturday, Rae made some of her famous Pasole, a Mexican recipe she picked up in the Southwest. We went down Saturday morning to help with some of the prep work and then came back in the evening with my special homemade guacamole and a few lime beers.
Their home overlooks the lake and it was the perfect evening to sit out and watch a couple of boats zip in and out of the cove while enjoying our appetizers.
Although Fred and Rae are here at least every other weekend year around, most of the homes on their end of the road sit vacant for most of the winter months. After the fall foliage season, most people, even if they have homes here, hunker down in their full-time home for the winter.
Even when we used the Little House as a getaway home, we usually closed it up after we stayed a week between Christmas and New Years, sometimes not getting back into the every other weekend routine until May.
We can always tell it’s weekender season when the road becomes a little busier and we actually get visitors at The Little House.
On Sunday, another neighbor, who has a weekend home next to Fred and Rae’s was out as we took the dogs (now the Fearsome Five, even if temporarily) for their evening stroll.
Gary lives with his wife in Pennsylvania, so he isn’t here as often, but spring and fishing fever got the best of him, so he came down for a couple of weeks.
We sat on his deck, again with the view of the lake, on another picture perfect evening in paradise getting to know Gary a little better.
Spring is here, the trees and flowers are coming back to life and it’s weekender season!
Do you enjoy visiting with your neighbors and do you see more of them in the summer?
Yep, with the return of sun we all emerge from our caves/houses and lazy lunches on the terrace start to seem like a good idea again. Barbecues, pizza parties (with our wood fired oven), al fresco dining watching the moon rise over the sea. Good friends, casual visitors, neighbors returning from the city and Northern lands, they all come by sooner or later! We make sure that we are well stocked with coffee and cakes or cookies, wine and "mezes" (Greek for tapas): olives, feta cheese, home cured anchovies, sun dried tomatoes, pprosciutto, mozarella.… we never know who is going to drop in!
I LOVE summer!
Wow, Vida, you make me wish WE could drop in on you! Enjoy!
Kerri, you can be sure that if you are EVER in Pelion, Greece you will be more than welcome to drop in and stay!
I just may take you up on that someday!
Mmm. campfires. I think I need a firepit again.
I love ours, Kim! Good times!
During the winter we hardly ever see a neighbor as everyone is indoors, but now that spring is here they are venturing out, but everyone keeps to themselves, not interacting much. I have often wished for a neighbor who would enjoy a cup of coffee with me like my grandmother used to have. I remember her neighbor would stop in and visit, have coffee. Her husband would even cut my grandmother's lawn as she was a widow. They became family friends.
I wish you lived closer, Shebear, I would have coffee with you!
We are actually among the "weekenders" when spring comes along. Our land is about an hour outside the city and is our haven once temps warm up and birds start singing. We have neighbors out there who join us around the campfire nearly every weekend we spend at our property. They have become dear friends. Our cabin is a tent and our bathroom is an outhouse, but we don't miss modern amenities at all once we're there. We just got back from our first weekend of summer camping there. Wild turkey are breeding and nesting, and their "gobbling" starts at sunrise, so we don't need an alarm clock. Spring flowers are blooming and frogs are croaking. Indigo buntings and bluebirds are busy staking territory and seeking mates with their songs. We go to sleep to the sound of barred owls, wake to turkey gobbles and spend the day walking, bird watching and doing chores. Our hope is to someday be permanent residents, but for now, we look forward to each weekend. Nature always provides something new to see, hear and experience. My husband pulled a large black snake out of a shed where we keep equipment. We don't mind black snakes, they keep the rodent population under control, but it can be disconcerting to reach under a table for a tool and end up grabbing a snake! David relocated the snake so that we could use the shed without fear of getting bitten (their bites are harmless but painful!) I look forward to many more weekends there this summer, and many nights around the campfire with our friends.
Oh, I love those nights around the campfire with friends!
Most neighbors, here on Cape Cod, are not year-rounders. I often think about how I wish there were more neighbors about, whom one could call on in emergency, car-pool with when shopping, socialize with …
Yes, Alexandra, it does get a little lonely here too in the winter. I love weekender season as long as it is just our neighbors. It's when they bring people down who aren't respectful of our surroundings, or allow people to use their homes that I get frustrated. The road being a little busier is ok, 4-wheelers running up and down it for an entire weekend, not cool!
I have enjoyed reading about the seasons on your blog. Here in the part of so Cal where we live it's never too snowy to drive and the neighbors are very close. There is something very nice though about a road getting busier and that marking the arrival of company. It reminds me of stories I heard growing up about family visits and Sunday dinners.
Thanks for your continued reading! The change of seasons here is remarkable, as the leaves and foliage not only changes, but the people do as well!