Bits of November, Before My Trip!

I fly out today to meet Lindsey and take a trip through Utah for the week.  I am both wickedly excited and terribly apprehensive.  The last time I flew by myself was when I flew to Alaska in 1997.  It's been a while.  Lindsey had planned this trip to use up a ticket she had from the year before, and I decided to crash her party.  Evan had the week relatively free so he could watch the kids, and we're haven't-reached-the-winter-doldrums rich right now, so it all came together.  After we bought the ticket, Evan got a job he wanted Dana's help on, so it turns out Dana and Marilyn will be out here for the week, but I'm impressed Evan at least was willing to be the only parent for a week!

I'm hoping to return with a jillion beautiful pictures of the scenery, so I figured I should upload a few of the ones from normal life before I left.  I don't know if I'll ever get around to posting the pictures I have from October, but here are the November pictures.

 We went up to Vaughans' last weekend.  Owen and Ashley are building a house up on the hill behind the maple trees.

 Second story walls going up.

 Livie and blue sky.

 I think Ashley is tired of the paparazzi.

 Tori.

 Livie standing around while other people do big and important things.  But I've heard she redeemed herself and single-handedly built the stairs.  Or something like that.

 The view to the southeast from their house.

 The village of Moira, to the west.

 And east to the farm!  I never did really see the view to the north, since the windows weren't cut into that wall yet.

 The 886, doing it's part.

 My handsome, and sawdust-y, husband.

 I was "helping" put that wall up, so I didn't get a picture of all the people pushing it up, but it was a cool sight.

 Ashley handing lumber up to the second story.

 To the right of the front door, where the kitchen will be.

 The lovely view Owen will have from the kitchen sink as he does dishes.  Alas, the view will probably be missing Evan then, but at least there will be the maples.

 The temporary stair arrangement.  By evening, they had the stairs finished, but I was corralling kids through baths at that point and didn't have a picture.

 There are kittens at the farm, and Cheyenne is just a tad obsessed.  All of her clothes came home with a nice layer of cat hair, but at least we escaped having a feline passenger.  The poor kittens stoically lived through endless holding and petting.

 Lots of young whippersnappers hanging out that Saturday.  I believe there was 11 kids there at one point.

 My little Carrhart dude.

 Our burning bush this week.

 Beautiful colors.  The leaves fall in the basement window well, which dresses it up quite nicely.

 Weatherproofed!  Now we just need siding.  And trim.  And insulation.  And drywall.  But we (meaning Evan) are getting there!

 I spent a glorious Saturday in October tidying up the yard.  I found these landscape timbers entwined in the grape vines in the back of our yard, so I moved them to next year's garden location.

 If you look at the upper right hand corner of this picture, you can sort of see all the old wood, and cement blocks, and bricks, and pure trash that were piled around the old shed's location.  (This picture is from July.)

 I spent hours pulling trash out and cleaning it up.  I took the jumble of cinder blocks and lined them up on the edge of the lawn.  I may find a project for them, or I may try to get them to grow moss and leave them there.

 Before one of the previous owners decided it was an excellent place to dump their trash, someone obviously maintained this area.  There's a rampant ballerina rose bush, and there are slate tiles laid out here.  I want to prune a lot of the bush back, and thin out this area.  I don't know whether I'll keep the slate there (after I cut some of the insidious grape vines) or move it nearer the house, but it seems silly to leave it half buried.

 Our leafless catawba tree.

 Our October Glory maple.  It was such a mild fall, this tree didn't change colors until November, and then the leaves fell quite quickly, so it wasn't as glorious as usual.

 I had planned on buying a bike for Rilla's fourth birthday, but soft-hearted Daddy didn't want her waiting that long, so he bought her one this month.  She spends hours riding around the driveway by herself in the morning.  And yes, the pink heart tights/black and yellow flowered skirt/completely different flowered shirt is a clue she dressed herself this morning.

 Wednesday, it was so ridiculously warm, I walked over to the school and picked the kids up at dismissal time.  It seemed crazy for them to have to sit on the bus for an hour when they could be home riding their bikes.  This was on the trail on the way home.

 Beautiful kids!

 Lincoln found out this stuffed animal plays music, and he is in love.

 He's also in prodigious amounts of snot.  I had to take him to the doctor Thursday, thanks to a double ear infection.

 Cheyenne is still excited over her training wheels-free bike.

 Rilla had to pose like Cheyenne.

 Chalking up the driveway.

 The frogs on his shirt are appropriate-- he's always on the go!

 The Great Book-Reading Tree Frog.

 We ordered these glasses for Elliott from Zenni.  He is absolutely in love with them.  He says, "It doesn't even feel like I have glasses on, but I can see!"  He's been sick for the last couple of days, but even when he's laying down, he wants the glasses on!

 Watching the first snow Friday morning.  It was a late first snow-- for a place famous for its big snowstorms, we've had nothing!

 The Vaughans were here that morning, enroute to see Aunt Emma in PA.  Tori stood on the deck to catch a snowflake on her tongue. 

 Of course, it snowed everywhere else on her, too!

 Serious little sick man.

 Silly boy!

 Elliott, showing me the rash on his belly.

And the rash on his neck.

That seems like a fascinating place to end-- on a slightly blurry picture of someone's neck rash.

Now, to go finish packing.  We'll be doing some hiking, maybe some camping, so I have no idea if I am packing the right things, but I figure I can't go wrong with great quantities of socks and underwear. Cheyenne went to PA with the Vaughans, so she won't be back until I'm gone, which is sad-making.  I'll have to hug the other three extra long and have them pass the hugs on!