Risotto, Redecorating, and Real Friends

Waaaaaaaaaay back in the fall of 1994, on the second floor of Cathcart Hall, a friendship began. Elissa was not on my wing (I was an RA, she was a freshman) but I saw her a lot during room checks. She was really nice to the RAs and since she went home a lot – she let us watch TV in her room! What a treat!! We had master keys, so we made ourselves at home in her room, always making sure we had blankets because she kept her room so COLD. I didn’t really get to know her that well during the year. But at the end of the semester, we knew she’d be coming back as an RA. I met her dad (Mr. George) when he came to get her. Elissa lived about an hour and a half from where my parents lived near Mobile, so during the summer I called her. We got together in Long Beach, MS (where she lives) and had a great time. When we got back to Harding in August 1995, we naturally hung out with all the RAs since no one else was around. And when school started, Elissa & I were still hanging out….and becoming good friends. We were blessed to become such good friends in college and after. Picture - RA Christmas Party 1995. We were RAs in 95-96 in Cathcart with Aunt B, and then in 96-97, Aunt B moved to the New dorm – Searcy Hall and we followed. We were apartment-mates for a semester before she left to go to HUF. Elissa even made it back to Harding for my graduation. Through the years, we’ve kept in touch and traveled together even though we’ve lived hours apart (from 3-8 hours). Our first big trip together was April 2002 – right before I moved to Searcy. We’ve enjoyed our travels together!
April 2002 – Williamsburg, Virginia
April 2003 – Asheville, NC
October 2003 – Hawaii (we got to stay with Aunt B) Picture - at a Luau at the Polynesian Cultural Center
April 2004 – Savannah, Georgia with our moms
March 2005 – short trip to pre-Katrina New Orleans
May/June 2005 – Europe with my Mom
May 2006 – Alaskan cruise
September 2006 – Caribbean cruise
April 2007 – Washington, DC

Elissa arrived in Searcy at 2:00 a.m. Friday morning. What a drive!! We finally went to bed and slept late Friday morning. We messed around, ate breakfast, talked, drank coffee, and finally got dressed. We went to Little Rock to meet Mom, Patti, Laura, and the kids at Macaroni Grill for lunch. It was an enjoyable lunch catching up with each other, playing tic-tac-toe with Emily, watching Ethan, and eating yummy Italian!! Elissa and I went to Walgreens to stock up on poison oak remedies before heading to the nice west LR Kroger. We got Arborio rice among other things. We had to stop at Barnes & Noble – bathroom and coffee break. We were getting tired after the long night and the big pasta lunch! We got back to Searcy as the skies were turning an ominous gray…….and the rain came down just about the time I was going to the store to pick up a items for our risotto. I got wet, and then I couldn’t find dried tomatoes and fresh asparagus. So I improvised…..I just decided to try another recipe with ingredients I could find! We made risotto with blue cheese and bacon – it was delicious!!!!!!!!!!! But it’s not for the impatient or the short-on-time! We even had enough left over for Saturday lunch.

We got up Saturday morning, dressed, and picked blackberries at Anita’s. YUMMY!!! Elissa went to Heart & Soul to shop around while I ran a few errands. We finished off the risotto before heading back to LR, stopped in Jacksonville on the way at Starbucks! We went to Tuesday Morning, Garden Ridge, and some other shops. Elissa was helping me redecorate my living room a bit – just tweaking some. We didn’t buy much but had fun shopping til we dropped. By then, just driving around sounded good since we could just sit…….so we did a little of that and finally went to Murry’s Dinner Playhouse. We got there early and stood in line for a little while. But we got in, found our seats, stood in line some more to get food, and sat down! Ahhhhhh. We had plenty of time for more great conversation before the show began – Steel Magnolias. It was wonderful – funny, touching, sad, yet good. And the exciting thrills of conversation continued on the way home………..didn’t it Elissa?!?!

Sunday, we made it to worship service and then helped with the cradle roll class. Good thing Elissa was there to help corral the kiddos!! After a gas stop and another stop at Walgreen’s, we ate a good lunch at Los Montano (we’d already had enough Italian….). I napped for a while and Elissa took care of Gumbo (the cat got outside to run off the excess energy she’d been using to mess things up in my kitchen!). We got to church early so I could run the powerpoint and Elissa could check out our system for that. Noel had a great lesson on truth & lying. Thought-provoking. We went to Arby’s for a quick bite to eat before heading to the theatre to see “Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix.” It was pretty good, even though I’m not up on Harry Potter! Elissa had to leave Monday morning, but it was a wonderful visit – full of great conversation, laughs, fun, and togethertime.