Our October

It's hard to believe this month is gone already!  We've been staying busy getting ready for our neighborhood yard sale next weekend, Larry repainted our deck a couple of weeks ago while I pulled up the last of my sunflowers and weeded flower beds, we went to the fair and I changed jobs, again.  Hopefully, things will settle down for me at work now and I can stay put!

A week or so ago, during a very windy day, we lost our glass top patio table.  I got home from work first and found it like this:

Glass was everywhere!  I'm still getting pieces stuck in my feet.  Our patio set was one of the very first things we'd found when we started estate saleing a couple of years ago.  Oh well.  Larry had an idea to replace the top with wood and that's what he did today!  We wanted it to look rustic and I really love how it turned out.  

I threw a couple of burlap Mexican coffee sacks over it and added a pumpkin.  :)

Twenty-five or so years ago, Larry's brother, Steve, visited Israel and brought us back this mezuzah and Larry hung it on our door today to honor the Jewish side of his family. 

 

And now we are ready for all the little zombies and princesses who will be here tomorrow night!

We have moved!

Whew!!  What a crazy week.  We closed on our new house Tuesday, started moving in Wednesday and we have been nonstop ever since.  We have pretty much gotten the big stuff in place and now we're tweaking and fine tuning and putting pictures up and stuff like that.  We are wore slap OUT.  And sore in places we didn't even know we had, our backs are stiff and cranky but our hearts are full and content.

We had such a fun Halloween!  There are tons of kids in this neighborhood and we sat out on the porch and Larry gave out the candy. 

Here he is waving at the neighbors.  And eating Troy burgers.  Thanks, Mama and Daddy!

My favorite trick-or-treater, sweet little Lion.


 
And his sister, Dorothy.

I took this shot of Larry and Banjo that I absolutely love.  

We had a cold front blow in Friday night and I do mean blow in.  Like 30 mph winds!  It was so cold yesterday but has warmed up a lot today.  We suffered our first damage from the wind, too, a slat blew out of the fence and Larry's out there now repairing it.  And talking to neighbors.  :)

We're taking it a little easier today, resting up from four exhausting days, and decorating a bit.  I put the German cuckoo clock up.  And sure enough, it's set at 2:24.

What a week!

And I sure am glad it's over.  This has been a very stressful week for my family.  A very stressful ten days, actually.

Ami and Brian's kitty, Augie, who had his big boy surgery the same day as Tabbie Hoffman, died on the 17th from some as yet unknown illness.  The very next day, their kitty, Simon, came down with like symptoms, terrifying them and throwing their lives into a tailspin.

After a week of fluids and antibiotics for Simon and sleepless nights for all three of them, Simon is showing some improvement.  His extensive distemper test results should be back Monday.  We continue to pray that he will fully recover and soon.

Because we suspected distemper, and since none of the kitties had been vaccinated for it, I took Tabbie Hoffman to the vet Thursday just to make sure.  He wasn't showing any symptoms at all but I thought if he tested positive as well, then we'd know for sure that the boys picked it up at the vet's office that neutered them.  And then hell hath no fury...

Tabbie's preliminary parvo virus test was negative and I went ahead and got all his shots right then and there.  

There were some bright spots to the week, though!  I was taken off light duty so now I can get back on the plane and work and then I went with some friends Thursday night to a private screening of Jeff Foxworthy's new movie, Crackerjack.  It was such a cute movie!  Faith-based and absolutely hilarious.  I loved it.  It should be in theaters by next summer.  Larry and I had a pretty big and exciting day Wednesday, too.  Gettin' closer!

This week, I'm looking forward to things settling down.  Simon will get better and stronger and my sweet exhausted sister and brother-in-law can get some rest.  Halloween will be here Wednesday night and I'm all candied up.  Well, except for some Reese Peanut Butter Cups that didn't make it.  Tabbie Hoffman has a cute Spider-Man costume to wear (IF I can keep it on him!) and I have classes all week so no work.  Yay!!

Oh!  And we have cooler temps coming!  In the 30's at night.  I'm really looking forward to that and to some boring, normal, uneventful, glorious days.

Happy Halloween!

We had SO much fun today at the office!  It was our Halloween party/birthday party for Dr. Niebaum all rolled into one good old time.

I dressed up as a hippie chick.  No real stretch there!  :)  It was Larry's idea for me to wear his Army helmet liner.  I added the peace sign and daisy.  I thought it turned out so cute!! 

I think this is all us girls except for Michelle and Dr. P.  Left to right, it's me, Lisa S as Spiderwoman, Shannon as a hippie chick/Diana Ross, Lisa P as a GOOD witch, Cheryl and Norma, AKA Spongebob.

We had lots of yummy stuff to eat!!

 Chicken and dumplings

 

Norma made Mississippi Mud for Dr. Niebaum.

It's his favorite!

 Witch's Brew

(a really good cider that Norma makes!)

 My personal favorite, Norma's cheese straws.

 Cheryl's yummy cheesy apples!

 Caramel cupcakes

 Popcorn balls!

 Lisa carving a pumpkin

 Norma getting ready to carve hers

 

Lisa thinking Norma needs a little help!  Ha!

Lisa's jack-a-lantern that she gave me to put on my porch tonight for my little trick-or-treaters.  I had 22 tonight!  And enough candy for 82.  I had zombies and vampires and a princess and a clown and Mario and Luigi and more zombies and vampires.  No ghosts, witches or Spideys.  

I enjoyed every second of it and it was over waaaaay before I wanted it to be.

Halloween Weekend

I spent this weekend at Ami and Brian's house sitting for my kitty nieces. We had so much fun together!! Those four girls are a hoot!! I had a quiet, peaceful, restful weekend filled with candy, scary movies (thanks, Brian!), a few monsters and cuddly kitties. Saturday, I participated in Lake Wildwood's Trunk-or-Treat and I LOVED it. That was the first time I'd ever done that and I really enjoyed myself. It was a blast and we had such a great turnout! Here are a few pics from the day!

The loot!!

Trick-or-treaters, young and old!

The good folks out at LWW offered haunted boat rides around 6:00 and since I was out of candy, I got in line to go on one!

Beautiful view from the boat

They had the boats decorated so scary and they played spooky music for us on the trip!

As soon as we got out to the beach, we got attacked by three scary monsters!!

But they weren't really scary. They gave us candy!!

And then they waved goodbye to us!! They were so cute!!

Hope all of you had a great Halloween!!

I Guess Even Monsters Can Take A Sick Day Every Once In A While

I saw this cute sign today at the American Legion post on Watson and just had to share it. It cracked me up! Too funny!!

Nom Nom Chocolate Peeps Nom

Looky what I found today!! I hope I'm not the last person on earth to have seen them. Were they out at Easter?? I LOVE LOVE LOVE Peeps and just the thought of them wallerin' in chocolate makes me all atingle and stuff.

Halloween Eve

I am SO ready.