This might be the last day of playing in the many, many leaves we have had!  For one thing, Jim is blowing them away as I write this!  And we are expecting bad weather beginning early next week, with a combination of the hurricane coming and the cold weather blowing in from the west.  It will be wet and chilly.  Who knows, though, the wind might just blow those leaves back down toward our house!  We can put leaves up on the street, and the city takes them away, but I don't know if they will get here before the storm!

I had the kiddos again today.  I try to keep them once a week for Amanda so that she can do whatever she wants to, or needs to!  So, today was it again, and we were outside for hours!  Here ya go -

I took some pictures of the leaves around our house and on the driveway.  It seems like it has been raining leaves these last few days, and I know that Jim will be blowing those leaves up soon, so I wanted to remember how they looked!

And my grandchildren, who are growing up so fast, were here one day last week, and I want to always remember how they look at these ages!  We had lots of fun!  Outside, playing with balls -

And inside - eating those messy orange cheezy snacks -

Very intently following a dot-to-dot -

Putting together and playing with, Marbleworks -

And the Lite Brite picture they made!

Many of the women of my church are wearing these bracelets, in honor of one of our members who had surgery last week for Stage 2 breast cancer.  It says, "Imagine life without breast cancer."  I am also wearing it in honor of another young woman who is battling Stage 4 breast cancer, as well as my many other friends who are breast cancer survivors, including Betsy's mother-in-law, who is a 20 year breast cancer survivor.  And then also in memory (although I never met her), of Jim's mother, who died of breast cancer more than 44 years ago, at age 36.

And for Gwen, my friend from church, I made this prayer shawl.  I couldn't show a picture before I gave it to her because she reads my blog!

Not a great picture, because you can't see all of it, but you get the idea - here is another view -

It is about 25" x 65", and Gwen tells me that she loves wearing it around the house, as she recovers - I can just imagine her with it on as she watches her favorite football!

Meanwhile, Jim had a coyote skin, from a coyote he shot, that he had made into a hat.  The kids love it!  Me - not so much.  

The mystery of the hummingbird feeder is solved!  Many of you know that we have had a problem most of the summer with an animal getting to our hummingbird feeders, emptying them sometime during the night.  We have tried to get pictures of them, but never saw anything on the camera.

Jim just told me that he was up very early this morning, and it was still dark out, so he turned on the back lights to check the outdoor thermometer and see if it was raining.  He saw an opossum at the feeder!  He said it looked like a young one, who, when the light went on, just walked off like he was making his rounds in the neighborhood.  

Hummingbird season is over here, but I hadn't taken the feeders down yet.  Guess I better do that!  The only solution we have found is to bring the feeders in every night, onto our porch, then take them out in the morning.  I guess I might have to keep that up next year when the hummingbirds start coming back, because I sure don't want to change the sugar water in those every single morning!

I love making applesauce!  It is one of my favorite things to do!  I bought a bushel of seconds at a nearby orchard, and Amanda had some apples left from when she and the kids picked apples a couple of weeks ago.  Here are the jars, all washed and ready -

The lids and rings -

No pictures during the actual process, but here is what we have to show for our work - 10 quarts, 11 pints.  Doesn't look like a lot, but that is about what we usually get from one bushel.

And I have these left over to make apple crisp for dessert for a church dinner tomorrow night - 10 people will be here!