Autumn-licious

Pumpkins for change!!



Here's a great hike we went on up on the Blue Ridge Parkway. We went with our homeschool group:

















We said good-bye to our foster kittens this November and the next day our house went under contract to close in February! woo-hoo!



Our lovely friends, the Sloans, have come to stay for a bit in their modified school bus. The boys LOVE having their 4 kids to play with, and I LOVE having extra help and company around the house... and the sloans have running water, electricity and friends to play with, so it's a win-win :) In this photo of all the kids playing, you can see their bus out the window, parked out front.



The kids getting busy cracking hickory nuts they gathered from the back yard:



My mom and one of my brothers came from Omaha, NE to visit for Thanksgiving... one day we took the boys and Leah (daycare) to the pool and had a great time!











For some "me" time this month I went to the Widespread Panic Thanksgiving shows here in Asheville, and got that rare opportunity to act my age and pretend like I have no responsibilities and cut loose for a bit :) (photo credit to Tater & Jackie)

Autumn Festivals!

After such a busy and drama-filled summer, I was GLAD to get back to our nice peaceful life this Autumn. Some of my favorite parts of Autumn are all the great festivals!

The first one is in September called LAAFF, Lexington Ave. Arts Festival. It's in downtown and brings out all the crazy freaks in Asheville, hence reminding me why I LOVE living here!! It's filled with street performers, bike jousting tournaments, car painting, arts arts arts, music, and all the crazy ashevillians you can imagine! Here are the boys with some friends doing body painting and just hanging out ... also we watched a local guy attempt to break the world record for riding the tallest bike (40 ft) - didn't happen this year (or last), but there's always next year :)









Then in October we went to LEAF - Lake Eden Arts Festival just down the road in Black Mountain. It is a camping festival, and luckily happened to fall on my 29th birthday this year! There are tons of artists, dancing, music from local bands and all over the world. It's at a location that is otherwise used as a Summer camp, so there is also a zip-line going down to the lake, swimming beach, etc.

These were taken early in the morning, before most people had set up - the fog was just so beautiful sitting on the lake and mountains.





One of the families we camped with, brought these beautiful eggs from her chickens:



Around the campfire (and the ridiculously raging fire one night!):