November plans

Today has been fair....the normal weather seems to have returned, lows overnight were in the mid 60's and our highs have been in the upper 70's...I think it managed to hit about 78 degrees earlier today.

The boys both came out late in the afternoon, hubby was working on his truck getting the engine dropped back in so his brother could borrow our engine hoist. As usual, it seems to have been a 'bust' day for getting the younger one to work on his own junk sitting out back. I did let him know that I want it out of my yard and there will not be any future projects done by them in our yard.

My sister in-law called about the menu plans for Thanksgiving...the camping trip portion is cancelled. While we were talking, she was mentioning why they pick certain areas for this annual event. Seems it has to do with the family members who live in North Florida and trying to make things easier for them. That's all fine and dandy, but if she really thought about it, she'd realise that none of them give two hoots about making things easy for anyone else. None of the ones in that area think about anyone but themselves when it comes to making plans for holidays. Its fine for all of us down in this area to make the two hour trip, one way, to their home for holiday gatherings...but god forbid we should request them to make the same trip...doesn't seem right to me. Her reasoning was that none here have the 'house' large enough for all the family...well, maybe my 'house' isn't big enough, but we sure have the property that is large enough for forty plus people. None of the ones in North Florida have a house that large either, and only one has a yard of any size, but no where near the size of ours.

I told hubby the other week that he should suggest it for next year's Thanksgiving. We could throw an awning up in case of bad weather...wouldn't be any worse than being at the campsite area. We have made the 'mandatory' trip yearly to their houses for Christmas dinners every year. Personally, I'm to the point where I could care less whether I see these people or not. If they think they are too good to come to their brother's house for any reason, well, I can play that card myself...the highway runs both ways and their gas isn't any more expensive than ours.

My dinner contribution is usually a ham and a dessert...my sister in-law likes my hams. This year, one of the sisters requested to make a ham. Not a problem, there will be two deep fried turkeys, her ham and I offered to smoke a turkey and make applecrisp. My sister in-law had asked me about making an apple dish and thought the applecrisp sounded good. The extra turkey was accepted also. We discussed what out of the camping gear might be needed since we'll be preparing everything outside once we get to the site. Most things will already be cooked, but knowing how silly some of this family can be, we plan to carry the campstoves and an extra table. The final count isn't in as yet, but based on our 'normal' crowd, we're looking at close to fifty people showing up....one of the sisters brought an extra twenty people last year, without warning. This almost made my SIL catch a healthy attitude, the only saving grace was the girl made sure to bring extra food. It isn't that they weren't welcome, its just that SIL wants to make sure we have enough food on hand for everyone. Can't blame her for that, I'm not much into those kinds of surprises either...not to mention that the area we were in was tight to begin with and all the extra people had everyone elbow to elbow.

Ahhh, such is life with big families....

Happy Halloween!!

It's Halloween morning...our temperatures are much closer to our normal this morning...at 7 am the porch thermometer showed 64 degrees. The humidity remains fairly low, making the temps feel cooler. Its all good for me...I'm just glad to be warm again! I know, all I've done lately is whine about the heat...WAH!!! But the early cold was a major wake-up call for me! I am definitely NOT ready to live in cold country...yet...grin.

At the moment, our skies are heavy with dark, ominous clouds...hope it doesn't spoil the fun for the kids tonight. We don't have but a few little ones on our road and as the majority of the homes sit back off the road with 200 foot driveways, the parents tend to drive the kids up to the houses that are decorated. For only a very small handful of kids, I just don't feel like it's worth the extra effort....and then of course there are my dogs that would have to be dealt with.

When we lived in town I decorated the house every year...Halloween has always been my favorite 'holiday'...and we did the pumpkin carving and treats. We also usually had a gathering at our house to celebrate the night and always had a nice fire, good friends and food. The neighborhood kids were usually about finished by the time we began our celebration...I'd shut the lights off and we'd head out back once the candy was gone. Seems like every year the crowd got smaller as more parents either planned parties or took the kids to the more 'upscale' neighborhoods for treats. Just too many 'mean spirited' people in the world nowadays to allow the kids to roam the streets like we did many years ago. Of course the sheenanigans some of the teens have pulled like vandalising cars, businesses and homes has also created its own set of problems for Halloween. And then there are all of the 'religious' issues against allowing the kids to celebrate this so called 'devil day'. Puulleeesse...get over it already. That mentality makes me mental.

If you don't want to allow YOUR kids out, don't. But don't push your beliefs down everyone else's throat...it's for the kids, not you. Don't participate if you feel its against your beliefs, but don't try to keep the rest of us from celebrating the day. For some of us, this is a very 'special' time of year. Keep your religion out of mine. I don't make fun of your religion or even expect you to understand my religious beliefs...but I do expect the same respect be given to days I hold sacred as you expect for yours. Stepping down from my soapbox, now that I've 'outed' myself...yes, I follow a Pagan belief.

Now that I'm through with my thoughts on the day itself, I hope everyone has a very safe, enjoyable Halloween. We will probably get the fire going in the firepit tonight and spend some time outside enjoying the night, as long as the rain decides to hold off. I'm making chili for our supper tonight, with fresh, hot cornbread....mmmm, yum....just what the 'cooler weather' calls for.