I ended last week with a fun night of Bingo and then topped it off with a case of pink eye. Scott's high school had a fundraiser Bingo event. I have attended with the neighbor ladies for the last 5 years and usually come away with some type of win. Not so this year. But I had a great time. I just wish I had felt better.

Instead, I had to head over to the doctor's office on Saturday morning for eye drops. I was still busy filling up my days off with lots of activities. Again I had some financial issues to deal with for my mom on Friday(phone calls and office visits). I did manage to get to my water aerobics class though on Friday morning, even though my eye started burning.  On Saturday I was busy shopping for Thanksgiving Day dinner as well as buying new tires for my mini van. I left the van at Costco all day while I did some shopping. Tom picked me up and we had lunch together. We then spent the afternoon shopping until the car was ready. We started to pick up a few new Christmas decorations too. The Christmas Holiday decorations have sure gone up a lot earlier than in the past. I am still trying to enjoy the Thanksgiving Holiday! And Scott and I just got the Halloween decorations put away in the attic!

Scott was very busy with tests and projects since this was the last full week of school before the Holiday break. He is really looking forward to a break from school. He did get a small break last Tuesday when he participated in a field trip to a local computer company, Ciena, with his Robotics team. The group was treated to a tour of the company by the CEO, free lunch(designer pizza) and computer tote bags with polo shirts and pens.  He also managed to run another successful boy scout meeting. This week the theme revolved around music. He had the badge counselor for the Music badge and the Bugler. It made for an interesting meeting. He also attended a a planning meeting on Monday and volunteered on Thursday evening for their blood drive. I was busy making cookies to donate to their bake sale. Scott was also busy working this past weekend at the roller rink.

On Sunday I went in to work for a few hours to get caught up before the Holiday week. In the afternoon I picked up my mom for a hair appointment. Afterwards we went to church and then headed home for dinner. I also managed to get a few bags of leaves out to the curb. Most of them have fallen off the trees onto our lawn, so it keeps me very busy!

A very busy week. Just wish I was feeling a bit better. We are looking forward to seeing Allison when she comes home for the Thanksgiving Holiday! We are looking forward to participating in the YMCA Turkey Trot this Thanksgiving morning!

Happy Birthday to Me! I celebrated my big day on Friday the 13th. Actually, it was 11/13/15. A date that does not pop up that often(3 consecutive odd numbers). So it was extra special! Our family enjoyed dinner out on Friday night along with my mom at Olive Garden. I especially enjoyed my free pumpkin cheesecake while opening up my gifts. I also decided to throw my own birthday party and invited all our neighbors to join us for dinner out on Saturday night. Afterwards, we girls headed over to enjoy an evening of painting, cake and wine. I have been to the Painting Wine Bar before(painted in the dark when the power went out!). This time we took on Van Gogh's Starry Starry Night. (I think Tom enjoys the original better). But I really had a great time and enjoyed the company.   (And the presents!)

I was also looking forward to a bit of relaxation after spending the whole week with my mom in the hospital. She was admitted last Tuesday after throwing up(again). Looks like she has an issue with gall stones. She spent Tuesday night and most of Weds sleeping in the ER. Weds night she was admitted to the cardiac unit in the hospital for observation and then discharged Thursday night. It made for a very long week. Especially since I had two classes to attend on Thursday-one before work and one after. I had just returned home from a very long day and had to head out again to the ER. Fortunately she seems to be doing much better. Nothing really recommended for treatment. But now we know. I also spent most of Saturday at a class dealing with Alzheimers and dementia. It was a program put on for caregivers. Very nicely done. They served breakfast and lunch, I received a back massage and even won a gift basket! All in all, a wonderful (but tiring) day.

Mom was feeling well enough to join us for dinner on Friday night. On Sunday afternoon I picked her up after getting Scott from work. We went to church and came home for dinner(and more birthday cake).

Scott continues to stay busy at work on the weekends at the roller rink. He also is busy running the weekly boy scout meetings. And he had an added bonus of running a Video game tournament at his school on Friday night. The Business Club president asked Scott if he would help organize an event at the school. 60 kids showed up! Looks like it was a success. They are looking forward to working together in the future and running more tournaments. And then there is always school. He also squeezed in a dentist appointment and has been meeting with his robotics team. They are planning a Field Trip next week to a company that makes circuit boards.

I tried talking Allison into coming home and joining me in my painting class. But she was busy with another day of Ultimate Frisbee. I was surprised she could play since we had a very windy weekend. Scott even went out driving with Tom (on the freeway this time!). Scott was amazed how difficult it can be to keep control of the car in high wind.

And Tom headed out to Chicago on Sunday morning to work. At least his trip went smoothly. With all the chaos in Paris, the airports have been especially on high alert. Just glad he had a safe trip.

This was certainly an action packed week. I started Monday off with a phone call at work  from my mom's apartment complex letting me know that she was in the hospital. She had gone down to lunch and was throwing up. They were checking her out to see if she'd had a heart attack or stroke or was dehydrated. After spending the entire day with her in the ER and waiting for them to run lots of tests, they decided she had a stomach virus. They pumped her up with IV fluids just in case. I took her home, helped her get a shower, a sandwich and sent her to bed. They kept her locked up in her apt for a few days just in case.

As soon as I got home Monday night,  the phone was ringing. The boy scouts were looking for Scott for their Sr Patrol meeting. Back in the car. Scott has been running around about as much as I have. He did a terrific job running the Halloween boy scout meeting last week, and this week it was an Open House for the cub scouts with lots of work stations. I have been busy collecting permission slips and checks for the boys upcoming rappelling and zipline camping trip(which we are all skipping this year). Too many other activities. He also has to make phone calls and set up guest speakers for each meeting to present scout badges. It is keeping him on his toes. Plus his video club is participating in a county wide tournament at his high school this coming week. So he needs to send out fliers. And robotics is kicking it up a notch, planning each week in the evening for this year's upcoming tournament. He has also been working at the roller rink consistently every weekend and is really enjoying it. Oh yes, and in his spare time he does his homework. He is so happy to have survived his first semester which ended last week.

I also spent all day Friday assisting my mom with her finances. Pretty much every financial disaster that could occur did. I started the morning off with the IRA account for my dad from Charles Schwab. Mom and I had spent over an hour filling out paperwork two weeks ago to switch the account to her name. Guess it did not work. They screwed up the whole transaction and still wanted more ID on mom. After multiple phone calls(and advice from our broker), we straightened it out. Then it was on to their Huntington account. They just now switched the address(I requested the switch over a year ago). No one answered their phone. Next disaster. They have been overcharging my parent's account at the Sunrise apt complex. So much for automatic deduction. I was on the phone over an hour with their billing office. Needless to say, they owe mom quite a bit of money. And last but not least, we spent another hour at Bank of America, still trying to close out my Dad's account and switch it over to my mom only. Unfortunately most of these offices don't have the authority to do anything and the large corporation offices(mostly in Texas I found out) can't keep track of all the data. So you spend the entire day on the phone and pushing papers. Only a year and a half and I have not yet gotten my parent's business finished. Guess I never really will.

I was also busy making family dentist appointments and a PT appointment for my mom's arthritic knee.  At least I got in a water exercise class Friday morning. And I ended the day on a high note playing BUNCO with the neighborhood girls. On Saturday, Tom and I dropped Scott off at work and picked up my mom to go see the new James Bond movie Spectre. It is a full 2.5hrs long. Mom seemed to really enjoy it-it was loud and full of action. So it did not matter that she chatted away the entire movie. I don't think anyone could hear her! After picking up Scott from work, we all headed out for dinner at Longhorn Steakhouse. It was a great day to spend at the movies since it rained.

Friday the temp jumped up to 80! Tom was able to get outside and cut the grass and mulch the leaves. On Sunday I spent some time shoveling up the leaves while Scott was at work. It was a bit chilly, but very sunny. A good day to take Cookie for a walk too. Only after I did all my shopping errands. I am getting a head start on Christmas shopping! And I still have some Halloween decorations to put away and finish putting up the Thanksgiving knick knacks(before the Christmas decorations come out!). And our Girl Scout choir has started up another season of singing. I did not make the Monday night performance with the Pride of Baltimore Sweet Adeline singers. Fortunately they had lots of girl scouts singing. I have been too busy to make all the practice sessions too. I should be ok on the Christmas songs at least.

Another exciting Halloween has come and gone. I was busy running around last Friday and Saturday getting food ready for our neighborhood party as well as cleaning and decorating. I mainly spent Friday running errands for my mom(as usual). In the morning I had to meet with the estate planning lawyer to rewrite my Dad's trust. Afterwards I met with the broker to discuss the finances under the upcoming new trust. I finally made it over to my mom's apartment to pick her up for a hair appointment. When I arrived, I found all the residents sitting in the front lobby waiting for trick or treaters. There is a Goddard Day care program next door and the kids came over after their naps for trick or treating. There must have been about 50 or more kids! I think the parents picked up the older kids from school and added them to the toddler bunch. But the kids were so adorable! And the residents seemed to really enjoy passing out the candy and getting dressed up themselves. Mom was sporting Mickey Mouse ears. She had a lot of visits from Minnie Mouses!  After two hours of passing out candy, we were out the door for both of our hair appointments.

I decided to get my hair cut too. While mom was busy at the salon I finished running my errands. I picked her up and we headed home for dinner. I even put her to work helping me make chili for the party as well as an apple pie from the apples we had picked ourselves. Then I dropped her back home, only to pick her up on Saturday evening for our Halloween party. What a beautiful evening it turned out to be. We were running around the neighborhood in tshirts. I sent two small groups of guests out on a scavenger hunt. It was a great excuse to get out and see all the decorations and kids and dogs in their costumes. Our neighbors down the street had a bonfire in their driveway and were hosting a cook out. I was sporting my Walking Dead costume(the neighborhood kids thought I was Jack Sparrow the pirate). What do kids know. I was Michonne from the Walking Dead(she kills zombies with a ninja sword and has dreadlocks). I bought a wig. Everyone came to our party dressed in some type of costume. It was terrific. We ate tons of food and played Pictionary afterwards. Mom kept score. She said she just enjoyed watching all of us make fools of ourselves. We also had two cavachon puppies running around under our feet-Cookie dressed as a Ton Ton with Luke Skywalker riding her and Ripley borrowed our pumpkin outfit. They were adorable. Or as one guest pointed out, Cookie came dressed as Ripley and Ripley as Cookie(they really do look exactly alike). Anyhow, the extra hour came in handy on Saturday night. I dropped mom off around 11pm(10pm daylight savings time). And it was nice to sleep in on Sunday morning.

We were especially happy to have Allison home for the party. She spent the entire day playing Field Hockey at Uof Maryland. They were in the playoffs, but lost their 1st two games. So they were eliminated. But they were asked to play a 3rd game. Allison played incredibly well and they won. By the way, she was the only goalie playing for her team that day and each game is 1 hour long. They were asked to play a 4th game at 6pm and that is when the girls called it quits. They may have played all night and then would have had to play again on Sunday. The girls were exhausted and just wanted to go home.

It was so fun having kids at our Halloween party. It is nice that the different generations can hang out together and have a lot of fun doing so. Scott had tried to organize his friends in order to have another scary moviethon but last minute planning did not work out. They are rescheduling this coming weekend.

Scott was also busy working this past weekend at the roller rink, although he said it was surprisingly slow. Guess all the kids were off doing other activities. He finished his 1st semester of school on Friday and was so relieved to have a little break(very little). He still had lots of assignments to catch up on Sunday afternoon after work. He has also been busy running the boy scout meetings. Last week the boys enjoyed themselves with a costume contest and pumpkin carving contest. I picked up a few prizes for the boys and came dressed in my Star Wars skirt. (It glows in the dark!)  The scout leader and his wife were sporting their Star Trek uniforms. Guess we are all geeks! Scott is still trying to adjust to his new role as Assistant Sr Patrol Leader. Last week he had to run the meeting himself when all the rest of the boys came down with the flu. And he is still very busy keeping his video club running. I am also busy working with the boy scouts-attending the parents meeting on Monday and collecting money and permission slips for an upcoming rappelling and zipline camping trip.

Allison headed back to school Sunday afternoon(before it got dark). I packed her up with plenty of food and candy bars.

It was nice to end October on a high note. Last week was a bit depressing as I said goodbye to 3 wonderful people that recently passed away. On Thursday, Tom and I attended a wake for a good neighbor of ours-Paul Rehmet. He was in his late 80s. His wife Winnie is amazing and is staying on in their home. (must be that german heritage). After the wake, Tom and I decided to go out to dinner. I was also shocked to hear that the kids previous school nurse passed away last week-she was only 54. Not sure what happened to her. And then I received a phone call from my old high school pet store boss. Al and Bonnie informed me that our dear friend, Rochelle had passed away suddenly of a heart attack. She was 75 and living with her youngest daughter in Las Vegas. We used to all hang out together when I was in high school working at the pet store. And after going to the late Sunday mass, I was shocked to hear that one of my girl scout moms and fellow co leader was recently diagnosed with ovarian cancer. Not a great week.

On a good note, Congratulations go out to Tom for being accepted into an online University PhD program. He is studying Management and took his first online test this weekend. Only 3 more years to go! Happy Birthday to Stacey's husband Matt. Hope you all got to do something fun and special to celebrate. And Congrats to Eric and Sarah on the purchase of their 1st home! What fun!

Scott carves his pumpkin at Boy Scouts

 Lots of Decorations for Halloween

 Spooky house guests!

 Our spooky house

 Beautiful Fall Color

So we are getting closer to Halloween! I spent most of my Saturday afternoon out shopping for party items. We have agreed to host the neighborhood Halloween party this year. About 20 people. I told them to come in costume and I plan on sending them out on a neighborhood scavenger hunt. We will see how it goes. Meanwhile I had to start picking up food and am still trying to get the decorations down from the attic and put up. I am missing my assistance from Scott.

He has been very busy with school and scouts and work. His semester is ending next Friday, right before Halloween this year. So the teachers have all been scheduling lots of projects and tests. He is also extra busy with Boy Scouts since signing up for the Asst. Sr. Patrol Leader position. Extra meetings to attend during the week and lots of extra planning since they put him in charge of scheduling activities. This coming week the boys decided to have a pumpkin carving contest and talk about woodcarving. They are also having a costume contest, so I had to pick up some gift items for the winners. And on Saturday he had to attend an all day Leadership training event. He has gone to many of these programs, but they insist the boys keep repeating the class each time they sign up for a leadership position. He is also scheduled to work every Sunday afternoon so he needs a ride. I then need to make sure Tom and I are home to take him and pick him up. But we are working on that too! Tom started taking Scott out on the road to practice driving since he now has his driving permit. Scott has been very excited to start learning. Looks like we need to work on Stop signs!

Besides getting ready for the holidays, I have been busy helping my mom with her finances as well as making funeral plans for my dad. I have set up a church service down in Florida in Venice in Dec.-we used to attend Easter and Christmas mass at this parish. Tom's parents also are members of this church. The staff there are incredibly kind and accommodating. I have already worked out the mass, complete with readings and music over the phone with their volunteer coordinator. They think of everything.( Guess they have done this before). They even had a memorial mass for Dad already and put his name in their church bulletin. And if I wanted, I could have the whole service in Polish! Not that any of us would understand a word, but I think that is amazing. I did request an accordion, but I don't think they actually have anyone that can play. However, they do supply a choir and organist. Wow. I also had to settle on a cemetery which will be in Venice where most of my mom's family is buried. And then a place to have lunch and a memorial of our own after the ceremony-I plan on bringing lots of digital photos. Plus I printed up memorial photo cards so those need to be mailed out. And then there's the finances. I kept my mom busy all day Friday running to the bank, the broker's office and making phone calls. I still need to meet with their lawyer next week for their trust.  Lots of papers to sign and forms to fill out. And don't get me started about the bank. That is the most complicated, messed up service of all. Amazing how your life comes down to lots of forms.

I am also trying to keep my mom busy. She attends a program each week at our local Senior center, but I think I am going to bump her up to 2x/wk. We use a volunteer car ride program to get her around. There is a small fee for each ride, but the drivers are all volunteers using their own cars. What a great service. They also have outings each week to local restaurants with her facility. She has started attending regularly. Last week they went out west to Friendly Farms for a family style meal complete with fried chicken(mom's favorite). They also enjoyed the fall color on the long ride there and back. It has been rather chilly out here, we even had our first frost. A lot earlier than usual.

At least I managed to get my fall flowers planted and I was happy to get back to my swim aerobics class on Friday morning. Tom was  home on Friday which gave him time to cut the grass and put down the winter fertilizer. He also spent some time doing maintenance on the cars. And he drove over to Delaware on Saturday with our neighbor for an alcohol run at the Costco. They have great prices and don't sell alcohol in our Costcos in Maryland. We needed some beer for our upcoming Halloween party and our neighbor wanted to stock up for the upcoming holidays. We both enjoyed an evening out with our neighbors having dinner at the Ellicott Mills Brewery and watching the movie Zombieland on a big screen outside at the Wine Bin in their parking lot. The Wine Bin serves free popcorn to go along with their wine. Besides a few sprinkles, the night was very pleasant. I was surprised to see mostly adults there watching the movie. They have weekly movies all summer long and we have brought the kids and the dog. It is a kid and pet friendly wine store. And we especially like it because the owner is an MSU grad. He runs a lot of neighborhood activities and has fundraisers for local charities in olde town Ellicott City. We want him to have tailgate parties for MSU. Speaking of, MSU won again this weekend against Indiana U in the pouring rain. At least we have one team to cheer for since our Ravens have been very disappointing this year. We heard the poor UofM quarterback was getting death threats over last weeks unbelievable game ending. Shame on you Michigan. He can come play for the Ravens.

Tom and I were also out on the town on Tuesday night as we attended Tom's Northrop Grumman Leadership Award dinner at the Lord Baltimore hotel downtown. We attended an award dinner a few weeks ago at the Westin, but that was for local groups. This was for National groups. We sat at a table with several couples all from San Francisco. We also ran into Tom's previous boss who now lives out in San Jose, Karen Campbell. Tom often spends time working with Karen when he heads to the west coast. We would love for Allison to get a summer internship with Northrop and maybe even stay with Karen out in California. Tom got a big, glass trophy(he would have preferred tickets to Disney or even a day off work). And I took home the table flower arrangement(that was in a cinderblock base). I think Tom threw his back out carrying it out to the car.

Allison is still very busy with school and Field Hockey. She had two games last Sunday in Philly and will play today at Salisbury. Her season ends next Saturday at UofMaryland, so we are hoping she can come home for Halloween. As you can see, we all get into the spirit!

I have been busy doctoring the cat for the past few weeks. We found out she has pancreatitis. Apparently it is treatable in cats, but she was losing quite a bit of weight. She was fur and bones. Her appetite is back, but even pickier. She mainly will eat canned chicken now. But she also enjoyed pumpkin pie and muffins along with donuts. Chews right through the packaging if it is sitting on the kitchen counter. Appetite stimulants will do that!

Tom says the cat will outlive me!

So the football season has become very interesting. So far our Ravens are the worst team in the league. And MSU is pulling off some crazy plays to keep them winning. Tom and I couldn't watch either game-too stressful. At least the MSU game was a pleasant surprise-Sorry UofM. That game will go down in the history books. If you missed it, MSU scored against UofM in the last 10 secs of the game due to a UofM fumble to win the game for State. And the guy that did it played on a fractured hip. Had to get surgery at the Uof M Ann Arbor hospital Monday morning(very brave man).

Besides keeping up with the fall traditions-like watching football games, we have been getting into the Halloween spirit. I am slowly getting the decorations out. Mostly we have to be home to do that. Instead we traveled to Busch Gardens on Friday night to enjoy the Haunted mazes. We swung by Salisbury U to pick up Allison first. Scott was off on Friday from school so we had the extra time to get Allison. Sadly we missed Scott's Homecoming weekend. Last year his robotics team had a robot in the neighborhood parade that Scott helped design and build that threw candy at the spectators. This year the kids just put together a sling shot to toss out the candy. So we did not feel like we missed out out on too much. And Scott was not terribly interested in their high school football game or dance. Instead we had a wonderful time running through all the spooky mazes at Busch Gardens on Friday night. The park was busy, but apparently not as crowded as Saturday night. We met up with our neighbors that were spending their weekend in Williamsburg. They stayed over until Saturday but said it was even more crowded at Busch Gardens-traffic backed up on the freeway.  We spent Friday night at the hotel, but had decided to leave early and head back to Salisbury to drop Allison off Saturday afternoon. We had to take her car in to Mr Tire to check out the sensor that went off during the week. Fortunately it was only a loose sensor and not a flat. While they were checking out her car, we ran some errands and took Allison out to lunch. I insisted that the girls decorate their front door of the condo for Halloween.  Allison agreed to put out some flowers, a small scarecrow and spider webs. I also dropped off a few more apples and a bag of bread. Can't let the college girls starve. We had to get back to pick up Cookie from the kennel so we left early in the afternoon. .

Allison had homework to catch up on as she traveled to Philly Sunday afternoon to play a few Field Hockey games. They tied their first game and won the second against Drexel University. Great job Allison! And congrats on making it through midterms. (Midterms already?)

Big Halloween decorations!

 Allison and roommate Helena

 Outing to HollowScream Busch Gardens

On Sunday I was busy running errands after dropping Scott off to work. I picked up my mom so she could come along. We also stopped off for lunch. I  had some more paperwork for her to help me fill out for her finances. And we are still busy planning the funeral service for my father in December in Florida.  We stopped into the funeral home to pick up some prayer cards for my Dad that I had printed. There is still more planning to do and more paperwork to take care of-Tom helped me set up a new online payment system for my mom. It seems like it never ends!

Scott was very happy to take a break this weekend. Besides being busy with school, he had his video club and then had to help run the Boy Scout meeting as his new Assistant Sr Patrol Leadership position. And he attended a presentation with Tom on the Eagle Scout process Monday night. The Scout Leader was not too happy that he missed camping with the Troop this weekend for Weebelos Oree. Scott was not sad he missed it. Our temperatures dropped into the chilly 40s with our first frost of the year. There were actually a few snow flakes coming down when I picked up my mom Sunday afternoon! And we broke down and turned on the fireplace. Now that is cold! I did manage to get a few bushes trimmed, leaves raked, summer plants brought inside and Tom cut the grass in between Sunday football games. Time to get ready for another busy week!

We were busy again this past weekend. Scott had a full week of school and was busy with his video game club and his new role as Assistant Sr Patrol Leader for scouts. As his first official job he had Tom come to the scout meeting as a guest speaker. Tom introduced the Engineering badge with an engineering challenge. He asked the boys to build spaghetti towers. Whoever built the highest tower without it collapsing was the winner. I stayed home from the meeting last week so I could finish up my online scout Youth Protection exam. We have to get recertified every 2 years or the troop is not able to register. So much fun. I also had Boy Scout popcorn to deliver to our neighbors as it was sitting in the back of my van. And Scott started his Robotics club meetings last week too. Last year he helped design and build a robot for the Homecoming parade that shot candy out into the crowd along the route. This year we will be missing the High School Homecoming weekend as we are traveling down to Busch Gardens for the HallowScream event.

We also missed Allison's Homecoming this past weekend at Salisbury. We really enjoyed the Family event for the past two years, but Allison was not even going to be at school this year on Saturday. She had a Field Hockey tournament scheduled at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA. So instead of not seeing her at school, we decided to see her at the games. I really missed attending the Salisbury Homecoming-the football game, free food, free entertainment, prizes, parade. But it looks like the event was not as extravagant this year(I think they are spending all their funds on the new library and football stadium). However, we did love driving down to Fairfax to watch Allison play two games back to back(both tied games). Their team only played George Mason U as Virginia Tech dropped out. Fortunately it was a sunny but cool day-nice to sit outside and watch Field Hockey. Afterwards we coerced Allison into coming home with us for an overnight. Tom promised to drive her back to school on Sunday. After the games, we grabbed some lunch at a Peruvian BBQ restaurant and then did some supply shopping at Costco before heading home. The kids offered to cook dinner on Saturday night while we watched a net flix movie, Interstellar. Long and preachy.

On Sunday morning, Allison dropped into the hairdresser to get a hair cut before Tom drove her back to school. But not until after I loaded her up with lots of Halloween goodies. As she and Tom headed out of the house, Scott and I were on our way to sell Boy Scout popcorn at Lowes. We had the whole morning to ourselves and managed to make a few bucks before I had to take Scott to work. After dropping him off I headed over to see my mom. I was trying to get her into the hairdresser as well for a wash and set. While she got her hair done I was able to run to the grocery store and pick up some items for dinner. We picked Scott up after work and mom came home with us for dinner. Tom was home in time to grill us some hamburgers and I dropped mom off at her doorstep after dinner before it got too late. I had plenty of time to get back home to catch the season premier of The Walking Dead.

Mom and I spent the  whole day together on Friday too. I still had more paperwork for her to sign that also needed a notary signature. I dropped into our broker's office in the morning to start the paperwork, and he then followed me over to mom's apt. to finish up. Almost there. I then spent a few hours helping mom reorganize her closets and dressers. I still had some of Dad's clothing to pack up.I even started packing up some summer clothes for our upcoming Florida trip in Dec. After running some errands, we stopped into the local diner for lunch. We got home in time to catch Scotty returning from school. We then headed over to the Pick Your Own farm for some apples.  Mom mostly spent her time taste testing the different types of apples while Scott and I ran through the orchard. Apple picking has become a lot easier now since the trees are grown dwarf sized and vine like. They also grow in clumps, so very easy to quickly pick a basket full. I love to pick enough for pies and snacking. Allison got a bag full and so did Mom. We also stopped into the main barn so Scott could pick up a strange looking pumpkin. He picked one out that looks like it is wrapped in peanut shells-very bumpy. And I had to pick up a corn stalk to start my fall and Halloween decorating. Although we do have a few homes in the neighborhood that already finished decorating for Halloween! I just run out of time!

Happy 31st Wedding Anniversary Mark and Linda Seitz! Wow do I remember that wedding! Or actually, do I remember the day after that wedding! What is really amazing is how young Tom looked in the wedding photo and the fact that Mark Seitz had hair!