The Blessing of Friendship

Today I am thankful for many things, but especially for friendship.

Natalie and I. We met in college.

I am so thankful for the cherished friendships that have been able to transcend their origins (dorm life in college and bike racing, specifically) to become full, rich and satisfying. I am thankful that they are the kinds of friendships that thrive, but do not reassurance on a very regular basis, that we can pick up after not having seen each other for an extended period of time and they are just as if that gap of time never existed.

I am thankful that they have been able to survive, even thrive, even though our lives have evolved with the changes that accompanying getting married, having a family and having our kids approach adulthood.

On Monday I spent the day with Mike. She and I met through biking. We've come to find that she share many things in common, including the joy of cooking. I went to her house in Monument on Monday. We had intended to make a cornucopia of pie crust dough, but it did not work out. It turns out that you must use bread dough. It was fun to make the forms from foil, to visit and to go window shopping.

On Tuesday Natalie, Camille and Ben visited. We were on a mission to get some Christmas gifts made. I love making things with other people and the kids seems to like making things with me.

We got Ben set up in the craft room using my Cricut machine. He and his mother are making paint chip bookmarkers for the kids in his class.

(This photos is from Tumblr. I included it here to give you an idea of what was being created. Imagine names spelled out instead of images.)


He used the Cricut to cut out the letters to spell each person's name. He is a boy who like clean, crisp lines and has an eye for detail. I was sure that he would like using my fun machine.

I pulled out my jewelry making tools to teach Camille how to make earrings.
She was a fast learner and seemed to enjoy it.

She created great earrings. Like most people who make jewelry, I think she is a bit tempted to keep what she made.