Monday Morning Sun and the Docks Come In

7:44

Paddling in the Fall

An Amazing Autumn Sky

Kinney's Arroyo

Hayden and Jill at the Finish

Mary, the Moll, Tom, in his Wife Beater

It's 7:40, a cloudless sky, orange glow off to the east as the sun rises, steam rising off of the warm lake. We may have had a freeze last night as it's 33 degrees right now, colder than I expected.  It's  supposed to start warming up some over the next few days.  It looks like our last beach day on the dock as Billy and Cris will be by late afternoon to haul the dock in.  Sad but we are the last house on Woodlawn to have our dock brought in.  I have included two great pictures, one of my daughter Jill and her daughter, Hayden, as they just finished the Paint Ball Run in Washington, D.C., great fun.  The other of my son Tom, and his wife Mary, at a Halloween Dress party, I hope.

Yesterday was a busy morning in the kitchen for Evie, getting dinner ready for our neighbors, David and Pat Jones.  She put together a cabbage, onion, tomato,and sauerkraut saute, smothered the ribs with it, then slow cooked them in the oven for three or four hours.  And our favorite pumpkin rolls, from the Chillingsworth Restaurant on Cape Cod were left to rise as we kayaked  late morning down to Whitney Bay, as it alternated between a sunny and cloudy day.  We started out with it sunny, but as we kayaked it clouded up, and when we returned it cleared again.  An omen, perhaps but that kind of day, often with white, puffy clouds off to the north and south.  Our neighbors, the Fox's, then dropped off a quart of clam broth, so Evie froze most of it, leaving out enough for lunch today.  Bacon, eggs, and toast for breakfast, as we watched our favorite CBS Sunday Morning, a perfect end to the morning.  I also got a short walk in, the Woodlawn/Victoria loop, a nice easy way to enjoy the morning.  We were able to relax much of the afternoon, watching some football, and enjoying the outdoors.

Pat and Dave Jones came over around 6:00 and we had a good time with them.  They raved over Evie's ribs and pumpkin rolls and the salad, of course.  David had just arrived on Friday, in time to basically close up their cottage till New Year's.  They drive to Houston, their home, leaving on Tuesday, so we may  likely not see them again till next June.  David is on a Board at RIT and it was fun listening to him talk about how they are trying to anticipate the new world of education with so any courses being offered free on line.  In fact, the web and computers have changed our youth culture to such an extent that RIT has a required freshmen course on socialization skills because so many kids come in as loners having spent much of their young lives inside, I suppose, on their computers and playing games, rather than socializing with other people.  Interesting.  They went home around 9:45, so we stayed up and watched The Good Wife, a bit silly we thought.  I did notice Ted Humphrey's name, as Executive Producer, a former student of mine at Reserve.

The leaves on our trees have mostly fallen, though Leonards are always late, so it's still in full leaf.  I am going to chop up their leaves today and Evie will chop ours, getting the lawn ready for the docks, for our trip to Bristow, VA, on Wednesday.