I don't have a whole lot to say, but I can at least get this week's thread started. I spent most of the weekend sewing. My best friend's daughter Jessica is about the same age as my neice, and since my family is in another state I've sort of adopted Jess as my neice too. This year she wants to be Ariel from the Little Mermaid for Halloween so I'm making her costume. I found some great teal colored irridescent fabric with sequins to use for the tail, she's going to be so cute. Keith wants me to make him a Jedi costume for Halloween, but I told him that the 6 year old gets priority over the 36 year old. :) The weather here has been just great the past few days. Sunny and high 60's to low 70s during the day, down to the 40s at night. The trees are about a week short of being at their peak. I keep seeing trees where most of the tree is green except one branch has turned bright red, I wonder what's up with that. I hope everyone has a great week!

-- Anonymous, October 08, 2001

Answers

Had a wonderful 4 days with family down in Dayton, OH for my niece's wedding. My Granddaughter Olivia was the flower girl and quite a little princess and her brother Jeremiah was the ring bearer. We were all enjoying being together for the first time since my mom died 2 years ago. It was strange being in a military town with so much going on and my neice married a fire fighter so the wedding was somber and joyful at the same time. Some of the military side of the family is already "gone", including one of my sons; which made a lot of last minute changes in the wedding party. Putting so many on airplanes as the bombing was beginning was scary; the airports brought me in mind of Haiti with the heavily armed military presence.

We had a HARD freeze, unexpected, while I was gone so I am having to put up some squash that I had planned on root-cellaring. Sunny and warmer today and we are cleaning off the garden. love and hugs to all.

-- Anonymous, October 08, 2001

Hi all,

Things have been busy here. Church was very interesting on Sunday...we had a guided meditation on peace...how timely as the bombing in Afghanistan had started right before the service. We shut our eyes and envisioned a world full of peace plus listened to "Imagine" with John Lennon singing (on tape of course...we're not *that* spiritually connected!! LOL) It was really positive to get into a meditative state and consider how much of what we fear or react to has to do with how we *think* about things. I found it a very good experience. (Of course, part of the congregation probably found singing "America" more moving.)

Rainy and kind of dull today. Gotta get the last of the corn and beans up tomorrow (my day off.) The house looks like H-E-double- toothpicks again...Mr. S. is rather busy with his 18 credits of school and I'm just a little pooped coming home from Animal World all day (and into another "animal world" when I get here!) Actually, our bedroom looks like laundry world, with creative flinging of everything decorating it all!

Time to get the wood in for the wood stove in the living room (I have palms in pots on the hearth!) and we have already started hanging the laundry indoors (too humid and cool here.)

My hubbard squash must be getting ready to pick but we haven't had a frost yet. Maple leaves are just beginning to turn. Alders look kind of dried up but no color. (Mild climates and boring fall colors!) We have been picking apples from every tree of everyone we know. Our next door neighbors have very old trees that must be 40 feet tall...literally bushels and bushels of apples. Time for cider. Mr. S. built the apple press out of CS magazine last year (has a garbage disposal, etc.) Seems to be okay!

Gettin' too chatty and I have emails to catch up on. Hope you are all safe and warm.

God bless you all.

-- Anonymous, October 08, 2001

This was our Thanksgiving weekend in Canada,and also marks the last fall fair I have to drag my butt out of bed at 5am for!IAM THANKFUL!! Saturday we bought a new wee horse at an Auction,there were 60 horses there from Alberta.She's a little buckskin only 28 inches high.We showed the mini horses with 13 special needs folks on Sunday,and it snowed!They were all given lovely trophies,they were so proud.We had a rough week prior,with our friends funeral.The service was awesome,his dad,brother and sister played violin,and guitars in the worship band(ian was a drummer)and they had made a video to a song called come up higher,at one point the song is singing"I WANT TO FLY" and there's Ian about 6 years old standing with water wings on flapping his arms,it was sweet!WE are really gonna miss him.My husband the great white hunter has caught a mouse every night ,but I beat hIm I caught mine in the toaster,I may never eat toast again.We had a heavy frost last night and The garden looks pretty sad now.Cleaned out the chimneys and started the wood cookstove to cook the turkey.We leave for the north Tuesday,Wayne has a job interview for a new hospital,in Parry Sound,4 hrs from where we live now(very north,very cold,very rugged)He has a great job here but we have always loved that area.Its a big move,our oldest is 21,and we have elderly parents here,lots of roots here,but i love adventure!!I wish for you all a great week,stay warm,.. be blessed....teri

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001

Still waiting for a good hard frost here to kill off the last of the flies and parasites. The goats do so much better during the winter when they're not being "bugged" inside and out!! It's a beautiful Fall day here, 58 degrees, brilliant sunshine and very colorful leaves.

We've been cleaning up the last of our garden...giving all we can to the pigs as this is their last week :-). Next week we'll be harvesting the Brussels sprouts, and that's it for gardening this year. Can't really say I'm broken-hearted 'bout that! It's great to be finally done with canning and freezing then I can sit back and pat myself on the back!!

Sherri...sure wish I had the talent that you have (and others on this forum) for sewing. I have my mom's 1947 Singer and I'd love to be more proficient with it!! I even flunked my Home Ec. course way back in high school!

Not much else going on here today. I plan on going outside and relaxing in my hammock with a good book. This will be one of the last times...have to bring the hammock in soon. The trouble is that I go out there to read, but get so distracted watching the birds at the feeders, the grey squirrels chasing each other or the goats fighting over the green apples on the ground in their pasture!! Guess I'll be leaving the book inside...too many wonderful things to watch and enjoy!! Have a good week, everyone.

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001

My Lotus has been designing a tatoo for four years, waiting till she's legally old enough, having fits cuz she isnt, perfecting the design, and all the while trying to gently convince me to join her! I keep hemmin and hawin about it, (don't know where to put it, can't stand pain, can't decide for sure what I'd choose, askin her to design me somethin I might love, concerned I wouldnt like it when it was done, etc). So she made her appointment for her 18 birthday, which is on the 18th of this month, and we went downtown for the pre- appointment to discuss the design, and by the time we got out of there, I had an appointment too! HA! I'm gettin a peace dove tatooed on me arm. So there.......

The kids from all over the country, and Canada, start arriving this week, for the annual Halloween bash. Gonna have lots a fun with all these wonderful teenagers around. Hey, I had one tell me last week that I was the coolest middle age woman he'd ever met in his life! HA! They love me! I must admit the middle-age reference stopped me short for a minute.......never been referred to that way.......but I guess its better'n old lady..... Okay, I'll stop now....

Well maybe not....

Lotus had her biggest compliment for her musicianship Sunday night (at least to her it was way cool). Somebody came up to her after she played and asked if he could have her pick! She was thrilled and amazed!

Since we are suburbanites now....ouch......we have to have a proper receptical for our compost......the city has provided us with a very nice one, from smith and hawken for $15...retails for 80! Very cool....very neat and tidy like. We must be neat and tidy you know, even though no one can see us back here in the woods.

So my kids told me the weirdest thing......that a big part of em is glad we probably will no longer have an orchard of our own, cuz over the past few years they had missed making those Fall trips to the commercial orchard! Said it was lotsa fun takin wagon rides and smelling all the apple pies and watchin the cider being made and looking at the 'apple art' and such. Appaently MY apple pies aint as smelly, and our wagon dont ride as good......or something......Also said the same thing about the Pumpkins! They'd rather go pick out pumpkins in someone else's patch than our own! Well if that don't beat all! Somethin about a feeling of anti-climax, lookin at and tendin the plants all season,as compared to the sudden thrill of instant abundance or somesuch. Interesting.......I'm gonna hafta give this some thought...

Have a great day everyone.....

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001

Teri, I know virtually nothing about the Canadian Thanksgiving Holiday (except that it's in October, which seems a more sensible time to ME!) Maybe the problem in the US is that October is too early for a harvest festival for many parts of the country. It sure isn't too early up here in Wisconsin. I've thought for many years that BOTH Thanksgiving and Halloween should be celebrated at the end of October or beginning of November, give everybody Thursday AND Friday off (everyone wants to take Friday anyway).

Anyhoo, Teri, can you tell us about Canadian Thanksgiving? It sounds like turkey is traditional there as well? You don't have the Pilgrim and Indians stuff do you?

Hmmm. I'm going to start another thread about what everyone's "traditional" Thanksgiving consists of, even if it is early for Stateside.

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001

Auntie EM, tattoos aren't that bad, especially if you're just getting it on the outside of your arm. I have a Celtic knotwork armband that goes all the way around, having work done on the underside of your arm is not fun! What sort of design is Lotus getting? I've been wanting to get another one but I"ve been holding off because you can't donate blood for a year afterward. I"ve tried to donate blood twice in the past 2 months and both times I've been deferred due to low hematocrit, so I'm going to give up and go get the tattoo. Anybody else here have any body art? Maybe we should post pictures in the photo album.

I once had one of the young teenage boys down the street tell me that I was the coolest old person he knew, so don't feel bad! He was all excited because he had seen a music video on TV by this new band called Black Sabbath, and he thought that the lead singer was Ozzy Osborn's son. I had to explain to him that Black Sabbath was Ozzy before he was Ozzy. Kids these days! :)

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001

No body art here. I've spent my whole life changing my mind about what I like, and I figure eventually I'd be sorry for anything I chose! For what it's worth, EM, I know someone with several extensive tatoos who said she found the pain to be a good time to meditate . . .

HEY! If every cell in our body changes every seven years, how come tatoos are permanent? I never thought to wonder about that before. I have a mark in the palm of my hand where a pencil lead plunged into me and then broke off. The mark is still there, about 40 years after the fact, despite the "lead" having been removed.

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001

EM....thats a hoot!!We must be the same age!My 21 year old son got a tattoo of the celtic trinity on his shoulder and I was debating...hhmmmm were could I put that same tattoo on my body????We had a good laugh too,cuz the trinity or a trillium is our provincial symbol,and an award given to people who have immaculate gardens.So I tell people this is my son ,we won a trillim award for him,and yes he was born in ontario!!!

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001

Ouch! It took me until way into my 20s before I even got up the nerve to pierce my ears!! No body art (permanent-type) for me. But some of it looks cool!

-- Anonymous, October 09, 2001