Moving right along through autumn....

Columbus Day Weekend is here and gone already....tomorrow is the 15th of the month. Crazy. Three more XC meets to go, and the season is over. It 'feels' like fall but also does not because, I think, of two major things:
a. It has not really been that cold yet....in fact, temps each day are in the 60s or even 70s...we
   not had a wood fire yet....I have not even brought in the cord of wood I usually keep in the
   garage--the one we 'start' with that I usually bring in this time of year to keep totally dry
b. Amanda has not made one Swedish apple pie OR apple crisp....

But, I would say, this weekend is probably peak weekend for color. The sugar maple is turning a brownish yellow, and, I think, the red oak will be a stark red in about four days or so...

Aunt June and Bob were up this weekend from NJ to hang blinds for grandpop...Amanda and the kids made a few trips over to see them...yesterday I stayed here to watch perhaps the most exciting Patriots game in years! With about 1 minute left in the game Brady started a drive that would score the winning TD with 4 seconds to spare!!!

Here is what 'pre-bedtime' looks like on our house.....reading books and stuff....in the old roquing chair....

Amanda is very pretty, dont you think? Also, I love the picture below because of both Callum and Maira's smiles. Callum looks so serious and focused. And Maira LOOKS like she is maquing a face...but she is not. This is why this is so funny. This is her 'camera smile.' In fact, yesterday, after church, we had our 'church directory' family photos taken by Don, one of the members of the congregation. He kept saying to Maira "now come on honey...dont make funny faces..." and I had to tell him that this is how she really smiles...it was kind of phunny.

And Callum adn some of his books. The kids have a ton of books, and we love this. I used to try to organize them (who, me???) but then Amanda, Callum, and Maira would just pull they off the pshelph and I decided it was not worth it anymo'

One cool thing we did yesterday was go for a small hike on the trails on the campus of Colby College. I run there with the XC team often, and, each time, I always think of how much the kids would love some of this terrain. Colby is only about 3 miles away from our house, and there are some awesome trails with bridges, streams, stone stops, and more. One of the things the kids love is when we put together a 'scavenger hunt' list for them to find on our hike...things like a red leaf, a yellow leaf, a bridge, a mushroom growing in the soil....and then we put some hard things on the list as well like a live squirrel, a four leaf clover, MeeMee without a health ailment, and a velocipede....