I was reminded this morning...

Only 49 days until Christmas! Doodlebug informed me when she woke up this morning. Are you getting ready? All I can say at the moment is, whew! Where did this year go to? I know I listened for years to parents and grandparents talking about time flying by as you get old but man, they were not kidding. I don't know about you all but, I had just gotten use to writing and typing 2011 on checks and such and now, the year is almost over with.

Well, I have bought a couple of Christmas gifts for the grand kids and have been picking their little brains for ideas. Doodlebug is being so helpful coming up with ideas for her little brother and I can bounce ideas off of her too. Now, I only hope she can keep a secret.

Yesterday we went to the toy store to look around and just see what sparked interest and of course to pick up the Big Book of Toys catalog. I have decided they each should have one. I ask them to write their names on them and circle photos of items they may like or items their sister or brother would like. Hopefully it will help me do a bit of shopping for them.

At Thanksgiving the adults will draw names. It just seems easier thing to do rather than rack our brains and stress out over trying to figure out what to get everyone. I am pretty set on knowing exactly what to get depending on the name I draw, so it should be fun.

Last month went by in a flash and I never seemed to get time to just sit down to catch up my blog. So, below I will post a few photos from last month as a catch up. October was a good month and our fall here in east Tennessee was very pretty. We had lots of beautiful colors and believe it or not, we still have a bit of colorful leaves and tiny reminders of fall around us now. The leaves will be gone in a few days with all the cool weather we have had. It has been a lovely fall and is my favorite time of the year.

Doodlebug's Birthday at the first of the month.

 The afternoon of Doddlebug's birthday, we left for a 10 day trip to drive up the coast through the New England states. We left after the party of course. It was a wonderful and needed time away. It was nice for Papaw and I to spend good quality time together.

The harbor in Salem, MA

On our drive up, we went to see a few of the light houses.

Papaw ate lobster and or clams at every single meal except breakfast.

Acadia National Park, Bar Harbor, ME

We got home from our trip just in time to attend one of our son's friends wedding. It was a beautiful wedding. We also took Doodles with us. It was kind of bitter sweet for her. The fellow getting married was her very first crush. He had always been so very sweet to her and he made a bigger impression than I think he knew at the time. She would ask her uncle Joe Joe about him from time to time. I wished we would have taken a photo of her when we told her, he was getting married. She finally said, she would be OK with it and have no objections as long as his wife was pretty, sweet and good to him.

Joey, Nick the groom, and Cory.

Nick and Ashley are a beautiful couple and Doodlebug approved. She really did like Ashley too. Ashley was very sweet with Doodles and teased her a bit. It was so sweet and kind of them both to include her in several of their photos.

We took Doodles to a story telling night for our Halloween fun at a local historical site. It was really lots of fun. They had a costume contest. There were some very cute and some very scary spooks there too.

They had several storytellers and a bonfire. We went into this little cabin for the very scary tales. The gals telling the stories in there were very good. I truly enjoyed it too. There was even a release form we had to sign because the stories were so very scary.

The stories were truly, nail bitting scary.

It has been a very busy but wonderful month and we know, it won't slow down until the new year. Hope you all have had a very blessed fall too.

Many blessings to you all!