November already

Can you believe it is already November and actually we are almost halfway through. What a whirlwind of a year it has been so far. Life has been quite busy with school, work, and house duties during any free time...hence the lack of blogging, sorry friends.  During this short hiatus, it has snowed very lightly and nothing stuck of course...I can not wait for the first real snow, you know those big flakes that you can catch with your tongue and it most definitely sticks to the ground and the trees. I love that kind of snow. We tried to have a fire in our fireplace for the first time and found that even though it was completely open, the house still smoked up quite a bit. I will talk to the landlord, but it looks like we may unfortunately not be able to indulge in the warmth of the fireplace in this house. We have enjoyed hot chocolate and hot tea.  Oh and this was all before the end of October, so during this short hiatus we also enjoyed Halloween. I have been dreaming up gift plans for the holidays, but in reality have just been too tired to start any of those plans. We also enjoyed an Appalachian Night at my children's school and I received some ornaments from my ornament exchange partner. The ornament exchange is something I signed up for through another blog and let me just say that I am totally impressed that my partner has finished and sent me the ornaments already. This may be just the inspiration I needed to get my butt moving on all of those holiday plans and the ornaments. Life has been busy, but good. I am hoping that I can work less in the future and concentrate more on family and school. Hopefully I can make that happen next year. Anyway, here is Batman and a masked lady.

No matter what I told my son, he put his head back for the pictures. I think he was having a hard time seeing through the mask. They enjoyed trick or treating and showing off their costumes.

These picture are from the school's Appalachian night. The first two are of my daughter and other fourth graders singing some old timey songs. The people dancing are from a local clogging school and they were actually quite good and entertaining. There was a ceramics display, a basketry table (the school's art teacher made that beautiful basket), a homemade dulcimer, and leaf plates that the fourth graders made. I love the history and old timey ways of Appalachia and feel blessed everyday to be able to live in these beautiful mountains.

 

Here are the beautiful ornaments that I was gifted. A homemade ceramic bird and a mitten with the words "believe". She also sent me a smaller bird with a magnet on the back and a little handwritten note in an envelope with her initial on the outside. I thought the whole package was very thoughtful and if you are reading this, Thanks Nan! I am looking forward to hanging those ornaments on our tree this year.

I also found a new favorite snack...Dark chocolate and sea salt on popcorn, yes please. Hopefully we will be enjoying a lot of this during the holidays. Is everyone else as ready for the holidays to be here as I am? I love this time of year.

Ta ta for now,

Yasmin