When I left for work on Wednesday Eric and Kathryn were cooking up a storm. Eric was tearing up bread for stuffing and Kathryn was dicing celery and onions for same. Below Eric shows the perfect size bread chunks for stuffing.

Later that day Kathryn made pies: French Apple, Cranberry, Peach and Pumpkin Roll.

We had 15 for Thanksgiving Day dinner; Billie Jo & Dakota, Ed, Kelly, Phoenix and Izzabella, Barb & Joe, Christian, Beth, C.T. and Nathan. Due to work and return schedules it was our earliest Thanksgiving Day ever. People came between 10 and 10:30 and we ate at noon. Just before dinner we posed for a family picture.

Left to right: Izzabella, Ed, Phoenix, Kelly, Jim, Eric, Kathryn, Dakota and Billie Jo.

I have all my tractor equipment tucked away for the winter. It’s a little trick I learned from a friend that used to buy and sell commercial trucks for a living. He sure saved me from having to learn this the hard and expensive way. So basically what I did was get the pop-up camper loaded with moth balls (to deter mice) and set up inside the barn along with the pickup truck and tractor itself. I like to keep certain tractor parts in hand just in case it breaks down on me halfway through getting the work done. It’s worked nicely since I started doing it. Tractors undergo plenty of wear tear even if they’re built well. The parts along with the equipment will be stored in there so that I know they’re in good condition when I need them.

When the weather turns really bad I will start parking the Volvo in the barn, right now it is too convenient to just tuck it under the lean-to.

The Volvo, snowblower, two bottomplows, back blade, discs, harrows and wood chipper all fit under the lean-to off the barn.

The brush hog and 3-point hitch boom occupy 1/2 of the run-in shed while the other side contains two slip scoops and an extra metal gate. Unfortunately, the wagon sits outside all winter. This spring Kathryn gave it a good painting with the left over deck water treatment.

We are expecting 15 for Thanksgiving with several kids. We spent much of the weekend moving furniture, picking up, creating play spaces and cleaning. But all work and no play is no fun, so Sunday afternoon we took a short walk, sat in the sun and enjoyed being outside.

A tree branch with interesting orange fungus and snow topping.

Eric enjoys a fruit roll-up treat during our break.

Kathryn and Trey enjoy some face time during our break.

Trey is a frame-filler.

The weather was so nice on Saturday that we decided another cook out at the far corner of the 40 acre wood lot was in order. We loaded food, drinks and lawn chairs into the pickup truck. We were joined by Bob, Skip, Rhinda, Molly and her two boys: Matthew & Micheal. Eric and Matthew went over early with me to build the fire – although mainly they just whacked stuff. Kathryn and Molly walked over with Michael, who at 3 years old needed to be carried part way. We cooked hot dogs garnished with Bob’s homemade sauerkraut. We drank hot cider and hot chocolate. The boys cooked marshmallows. The temperature took a tumble from the 30s into the mid-twenties as the sun set and we returned home.

We had snow Saturday morning and it hung around for quite a while. This was our weekend to get the house in order prior to having Thanksgiving Day company, but Eric, the dogs and I couldn’t resist getting outside for a snowball fight.

Trey checks out the interesting tracks while Eric queues up a snowball.

Don’t trust that kid – he has a snowball behind his back!

This could be trouble.

I went back to work full time on Tuesday. I was really getting used to the ‘retired ‘ schedule.

I had a EKG on Tuesday morning with everything checking out OK. I had my list of things to ask my cardiologist. Can I: swim, use the hot tub, hike, backpack, cut wood, play volleyball? And I got OKs for all – so I cut wood and went to the Y twice during the week.

On Friday evening we took Ed and family out for dinner to celebrate Ed’s 30th birthday. We went out for pizza and the kids were all good. We had a good time until we left. The snow was squalling and it was a little nasty leaving Syracuse. We drove out of the storm and had no problems until we came up the hill to our road, which was covered with ice. I almost fell twice going across the road to get the mail.

I could get used to this schedule of not working.  Unfortunately, Eric caught chicken pox and had to be held home from pre-school and the baby-sitters all week so I ended up caring for him- mixed blessings.  It was frustrating as we took him to the doctor’s on Monday, didn’t get the any test results until Friday and still there are uncertainities about his diagnosis – why bother taking him to the doctors.

Tuesday I went for my follow-up meeting with the surgeon who approved my return to normal activities with a gradual build up.

We received measurable snow.  A little on Tuesday night and more during Wednesday afternoon.  When Eric saw the snow squall on Wednesday afternoon he was like a fireman exiting the station for a 4 alarm – he was dressed so fast and out the door to enjoy the snow.  He played outside for a couple hours while I took the cap off the truck in preparation for taking our lawn mower in for winter servicing.

Thursday evening we took a quick walk around the ponds when Kathryn got home from work.  The boys are done trapping muskrats from the pond and Trey found an old dead skunk that he carried up out of the water.  I wonder if the skunk had encountered one of the muskrat traps and been discarded.  Fortunately it didn’t smell much, but at first sight in Trey’s mouth it gave  us a start.

We had our first flock of geese land  on the new pond below our house. The pond was beginning to ice over and the geese didn’t stay long, but gave us a foreboding of flocks to come.

This evening we loaded shovels and rakes and implements of destruction into the back of the pickup truck and went across the road to the far corner of our 40 acres.  Eric and I scratched out an area for a fire and soon we were joined by Kathryn and dogs.  We had a nice fire as it got dark and the temperature plummeted into the lower 30s .  Eric toasted an appetizer of cheese doodles; which by the way, get surprising hot surprisingly quickly. We had hot dogs and marshmallows and sat in lawn chairs watching the fire die down and the stars come out until 6pm. It wasn’t winter camping, but it was nice.