Family, Food, and Fresh Air

Earlier in the week Hubby Tony sent a text to Son Donald asking if he would like to bring his dogs and join us for a picnic dinner tonight. It took a couple of days to get a response, but the answer was yes. In the meantime, I learned that today was National Eat Outside Day, which encourages people to enjoy the sunshine (or moonlight) while enjoying a meal. Our outing was obviously meant to be.

Tony is in charge of Sunday dinner, and for our picnic he put together quite a spread-rotisserie chicken salad with cashews and grapes, marinated cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, and potato chips. Dessert was watermelon chunks and grocery store apple pie.

Yesterday I was discussing our plans with a neighbor. She recommended we head to Simpson Park, about ten minutes from the house, because it was shady and had a lot of picnic tables. As a bonus, the park has several short trails where we could walk the dogs.

It ended up being a great time. The dogs (a Chihuahua and a Chihuahua mix) were excited to ride in the back seat of my car with Donald, and then excited to be at the park. We decided to walk before eating and took a path that followed the bank of the lake. The dogs tend to get wound up when they see another dog, but they are so small it's easy to control them.

Back at the parking lot, we found a table and set out the food. Donald attached the dogs' leashes to the table leg, where they rested quietly unless another dog walked by. After dinner we took another short walk, then agreed that both the humans and the dogs were ready to be done. Both dogs were subdued on the ride home, and happy to transfer to Donald's car for the drive back to their home.