Wild Mushroom Soup and Best Friends

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I am taking a break to blog while simmering my wild mushroom soup which I am making for my dear friend Julie. My friend Leah is a wild mushroom expert, and I am graced with gifts of morels, chanterelles, and tonite hen of the woods. I have gone "shrooming" with her for morels, what a great time that is. It is like a treasure hunt, only the last time I went I ended up with poison ivy so badly for a month and looked like a burn victim.

I love to make soups so tonite's fare is Creme of Mushroom soup, and homemade Pesto. Even the onions are from my garden that I put into the soup! I don't have much, but it is amazing that I can make a dinner from what grows in the woods and in my little piece of paradise.

Julie and I go back 20 years. I had left my husband with a two year old and a 3 month old. Our lives were in danger and we packed all we could fit in our VW Dasher, and lived in the mountains for a while, chopping wood to keep warm during the worst months. At night the wind would roar through the pine trees sounding like a train descending upon the house. I needed a place to live after the tenant came back home from his tour in California (Mark was playing in Pump Boys and Dinettes) and I desperately needed a place to live. I could not go back home.

Another friend's mother was a real estate agent and told me about a woman who was working in Westport and needed someone to live in her house during the week while she was working. I hooked up with Julie and the rest is history. I actually lived with her a second time when the man I was engaged to DUMPED me and I had too much pride to live in the house with him. So once again I packed up my stuff and headed to Julies. There is much more to these stories; that is for another time.

Julie is here as her mom died this summer and she is preparing the memorial service. Due to some very complex family issues, she is staying here with me where I get to nurture and keep her safe, like she did me. Isn't it amazing how the universe works?

I cherish the friendships I have with my friends. Money can't buy the love and devotion that we feel for one another. And, what is beautiful, is I keep making new ones as I travel along on my path through life. Amazing, special, strong, brave women.

This is a new card on ebay. Click on the word ebay for the link to the card if you are intersted in it! It is made with an antique Victorian die cut, art paper, and embellished with vintage bronze colored rhinestones. It is a PERFECT girlfriend card!

Off to do my lesson plans. I did not do them and I need to get in touch with what I have to do........so that I can walk in there prepared. Till tomorrow! Patti

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