Fall Festival with the Dews - Trick or Treat!

And a wonderful time was had by all!

It's A Beautiful Time to Be Outside!

Fall is quickly becoming one of our favorite seasons...breezy, cool and crisp! We've spent quite a bit of time outdoors lately with the grands, centered around playgrounds, friends, lakes, hikes and leaves. We are blessed to live in an area that has beautiful parks for us to enjoy, and during the week, we are often the only ones there. Oh the joys of retirement!

 My good friend Kim joined us one day, with two of her five grands!

One day it was quite chilly, so hats that Nick brought home from Peru were in order. The kiddos had a great time exploring the woods around our house and collecting leaves in a big basket. It really doesn't take much to entertain these four creative little ones.

Stay tuned for some fun indoor activities we enjoyed when the rain and wind from Hurricane Sandy rolled in!

"W" is for Wooly Worms, Wonderful Friends, and Worries

In mid October, we had a few free days to head to Boone, so we decided to see what the leaves were doing, look for wooly worms, and get together with friends. It was gorgeous, as always, and we enjoyed almost every minute of our stay (you will find out why in the last paragraph). EZ is now able to sit on the front porch swing for a bit, with his trusty sidekick Milo joining him. He LOVES the mountains! The fall color did not disappoint and the weather was beautiful.

Our good friends, Butch and Shelley, were also in town and invited us over for a delicious dinner one night. We had a great time, loved the view, and watched one of the Presidential debates together.

And lastly, I can't forget my mother's 4 hour stay in the ER at Watauga Medical Center.  SHE IS FINE, thank goodness, but had experienced a few pains in her chest off and on for a couple of weeks, so her doctor's nurse advised us to get her checked out as soon as possible. An EKG, chest x-ray, blood work, and a nuclear medicine lung scan all showed that there was no heart attack, stroke or blood clot. We visited her family physician when we returned home, and it is believed that her pain was muscular skeletal (as in a pulled muscle). She hasn't felt any pains since we returned home and has been busy as a bee! Love you Mom and it is always better to be safe than sorry.

If It's Fall, It's Time for the Fair!

Every year when October rolls around, we start anticipating the North Carolina State Fair! I can only recall two times since 1989 that we have missed it, and one of them was when EZ was two months post transplant...definitely not possible to be eating fair food while being surrounded by hundreds of people carrying millions of germs! This year we were thrilled to be going with our kids...well with the exception of Nick who was entrenched in his studies (oops, as EZ reminded me with his comment below, it was a NASCAR race that kept Nick from joining us!). It was a gorgeous night and we had a blast.

 The six of us loaded up and headed down to Raleigh for our night of family, food and fun at the fair!

 First stop, the roasted corn and lemonade, Big EZ's favorite!

 Next we decided to split a pizza. Surprisingly good...brought me back to my days in Italy!

Kyle had to have some homemade chips (loaded) and of course we all helped him finish them! Tara loves the fried Snickers (We all know this stuff is pretty awful for you, but once a year we'll forget about that!)

 This gentleman has been making us root beer floats in his red and white striped tent/truck for as long as we've been going to the fair (he does normally smile).

Are you getting the picture here? We LOVE fair food and look forward to our favorites for a whole year! Its just part of the experience.

Time to ride the swings with my girls!

And here are the couples:  EZ and I, Tara and Jamie, and Kyle and Leah.

What's the fair without bringing home a caramel apple from Miss Debbie's to cut up and share later? Already looking forward to next year!

Many thanks to Sophie, Suzanna and Gigi for entertaining and watching over our five grandchildren so that we grown ups could be kids again!