Stressing Out

I've made up my mind to visit my sister at least every other month.  October was a month for visiting.  This time I talked Layne into going with me.  He doesn't like to leave home, as I've mentioned before.  He likes to be busy and visits don't usually provide much of that.  But I reminded him of things he could do during our 4 or 5 days in Utah and he finally succumbed to my prodding.  So off we went Monday of last week.  He is good company.  He and Bob did lots of gabbing while Maryanne and I happily bonded over family history.  As usual, we found new things to copy and save.  I've got to find the time to organize it all.  And I will.  Sometime soon.  As soon as I get all the other stuff done that demands my attention.

Here's a picture of my sister, Maryanne, sitting in her study; the location for our family history sessions.

Bob loves Christmas lights.  He put lots of them up in the surrounding trees and turned them on for us while we were there.  He isn't ready to leave them on though.  Even he agrees it might be a bit early.  But, when the time comes, he will be ready!

Hence I've been feeling a bit stressed lately.  For the first time in awhile, there seems to be more to do than I feel capable of doing. At least on the time frame that seems to be demanded of me.  There's Christmas coming right up.  There's porn presentations, which have accumulated over the next few months.  There's family history to do, stories to write, art to compose, music to practice.  Oh the list goes on.

Halloween did show up at our house.  We bought a bunch of candy to accommodate the crowd we expected, based on last year when we almost ran out of treats.  But this year proved to be different as we received much fewer goblins.  So we have tons of left over candy.  Wouldn't you know, Layne is on a diet.  So I gave it all to my neighbor, Carol, who teaches piano.  It seems to me that it is just the thing to offer students after a well prepared lesson.  So I talked her into it.

This weekend Dean and Margo Layton are staying with us while they explore homes in Idaho.  They are from our California home but are dreaming of making a change.  Each of them has found a home to love.  Unfortunately they are two different homes.  Funny how that happens.  It'll be fun to see if they really decide to make the move here.  It would be fun to have some kids from home.  In the meantime its fun to get reacquainted.

Its getting pretty cool around here.  The leaves are beautiful as you can see from this view of our yard.  The seasons here put on such a show.  I love it.

Monday we are headed to Seattle, to help Jessica while Chris goes on a business trip.   I'm hoping to get a few of my own projects addressed while we are there.  We will see how that goes.