WHERE DID OCTOBER GO??

Kids in school, Emily playing soccer, Andrew singing in Church Youth Choir, Tom playing bass with "Silver Heads and Nimble Fingers" at various nursing homes, Carol quitting her afternoon job to be home when the kids get off the school bus.

BUSY month that just FLEW by.

With many wonderful in-betweens and gratitude for wonderful people in our lives.

One of these is Peggy Wright, who is the leader of "Silver Heads and Nimble Fingers." She asked me to join them last year when they were invited to play at the Blue Ridge Folklife Festival sponsored by Ferrum College. I guess we were a hit because they invited us back this year. The only bad part was that again this year it was a weekend that Carol's ex had the kids so they missed it. But WE had a great time, didn't embarrass ourselves too badly AND GOT PAID TO DO IT !!!

Ferrum College is a small (1000 students) college in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. It's a beautiful campus. Last year it rained most of the day. This year we drove down in the rain but by 10:30 the sky turned blue with white puffy clouds and sunshine.




Again this year we played in the Chapel, which was the venue for Gospel.

This is the bell tower.



And the entrance to the Chapel




We were listed as playing "Carter Family Gospel." And we did several old Carter Family songs, but added some newer things as well.





Carol thinks THESE are the pictures of the band that you should see







THEN CAME HALLOWEEN !!!

I know I've talked over and over about how great the people in Salem are.

But here's just one more example - the very first visitor we had on Halloween night was Mrs. King, a neighbor from two doors away. She said that she and her husband were going to spend Halloween with their grandkids. They wouldn't be home when Andrew and Emily came trick-or-treating so she brought little bags of candy to them.

Rhiannon, a friend of Emily's from Elementary school joined us for trick-or-treating. Carol took them around our neighborhood while I watched the first half of the Penn State/Northwestern game. Then we went to an older neighborhood in Salem where they really "go all out" for Halloween. Up to and including haunted houses.

Andrew was ScoobyDoo, Emily was Sally from "A Nightmare Before Christmas" and Rhiannon was a Prom Queen.



Earlier in the day Saturday, Salem did it again with a fantastic Pumpkin Festival at the Farmer's Market. Lots of activities for the kids, free pumpkins, cheap eats, kids of all ages in costume.





My BIG disappointment of the day was - I wore my Airline Pilot tee-shirt and carried a laptop bag and nobody "got it". So maybe Salem is full of wonderful people who just aren't as sick as I'd thought.

Life is good in Salem.