The hustle and bustle of the holiday season is upon us! Already we are making Thanksgiving and Christmas plans and starting to mark up the calendar with activities. There is an upcoming Thanksgiving meal at church, as well as a Thanksgiving hymn sing (our second one)!

This year, Timex celebrates their 170th year of making time-keeping devices. In honor of that, they released a limited-edition watch that was made available for sale on the Timex website on November 16th at 10am Eastern. Laurel and I tried to get one, but between the website issues and there only being 1,000 watches available, we weren't able to make the cut. Still, it was a fun time trying to see if we could! In other watch news, I have been saving some "fun money" to see about the possibility of getting a nicer, more "high-end" watch in the future. Stay tuned!

My Cessna Caravan research continues. I have finally decided on compiling raw data into individual airframe files, so at this point I have over 3,100 files with data in them. I will store the bulk of my information in these, and then transcribe that data to the website.

Laurel and I have continued to go on several walks around our little town, and it has been so much fun to enjoy the mid-fall sites and sounds. I really do enjoy this time of year and am trying to take advantage of it.

Well, that's about all that is on my mind at the moment. How has your fall been so far?

Hey, hey! November is not even a week old yet and I am getting a post written. For some reason, it seems like it has been a busy summer and early fall, and I guess we truly have stayed quite occupied. Thankfully though, even with things to do we have been able to watch the changes in the season and enjoy the beauty of this mountain valley!

I continue to work on my online presence as I am able and inclined. You may have noticed the new fall-themed "hero" image here on the blog. It is derived from a Springbok puzzle called Country Home. I continue to compile and organize information on the Cessna Caravan and am working on growing my website.

This past weekend, Laurel's siblings came up for a "sibling weekend," so we had Aubrie and Ricky stay at the house. Hannah wasn't feeling very well and couldn't make it over, so the other three siblings went over to Theos and Hannah's and spent some time with her on Saturday. Aubrie was able to stay over Saturday evening as well and went to church with us on Sunday. Speaking of Sunday, it was fun to get to see Dave McCracken at church. Dave and his wife travel around speaking in different churches. It has been about nine years since Dave had been to Grace, so it was great to hear him preach again. (This was the first time that Laurel had met him). Also on Sunday morning, we woke up to a thin layer of snow covering the valley floor. It had melted by mid-day, but still was the first snow we've had besides what has already begun to accumulate on the mountains around us.

Yesterday after Laurel got off work, we took our ballots and walked down to the ballot drop-box. On the way back, we stopped in our local library for the first time! We have been meaning to get in there, but their hours and our schedule don't always line up. It is a fun little library, and we enjoyed our time looking at what all they had to offer. Also, when we did walk out the door, we did so with a shiny new library card in our possession! After crossing the street, we stopped in at K&B's and picked up a couple of coffees. There had been a few snow flurries that had come through during the course of the day, so the air was cool and the ground fairly wet. We enjoyed a great stroll homeward, sipping our coffees and marveling at the beautiful sunset coming through the clouds.

Well, I think that will do it for the moment. Who knows what adventures the next few weeks will hold?