Monday

Well this will be my final post from the cabin this year as we spent the day getting the cabin ready for winter and packing as we head south early in the morning. Its been a bittersweet day as we totally love our little mountain cabin, the great friends we have made here and of course our church family at Cornerstone. We are looking forward to some grand baby time as well as seeing Nancy's mom and of course our kids.

The morning started with a heavy frost and temps down into the high 20's as we rolled out around 7 AM. After our quiet times we cleaned out the freezer of some small tidbits of bacon, a couple frozen biscuits and topped with a couple cackle berries. I also heated a leftover buckwheat cake to top off the breakfast. I started outside after the sun warmed the frost off the roof with taking my seedling out of their pots and rolling them in wet newspaper. I also dug up my beets and saved the small ones for replanting when I get my garden in shape later this week in Florida.

I moved all my gas powered equipment into the basement as the temps stay around 50 degree in the winter months. I piddled around outside as the sun really warmed the air after the cold morning. We both had a good start over the past couple days of getting ready for this move after being here for over 5 months. We had a bite of lunch by cleaning up the leftover spaghetti and garlic bread. We decided it was time to take our final hike for this year. The temps had really warmed up to close to 50 as we headed out and it seemed even warmer on top. The air was so clear and visibility was almost 3-D like. We stopped and visited with Norm. Dean Todd was also there assisting Norm with his yard clean up. We then headed on down to return a book and some some ear muffs to Joe and Jetta. They unfortunately were off the mountain and we didn't get to say good-by to them except later by phone.

We took the golf cart out to the mailbox for our last trip in it this year. It was a beautiful day but out of the sun it was rather cool. We came back and said good-by to neighbor Gerald as he too is leaving the mountain tomorrow. Several others phoned to say good-by as well. Our "mountain mom", Helen came by to say good-by also. We finally packed up our clothes and I loaded the truck while Nancy baked a couple salmon filet's, cooked some frozen broccoli and leftover Cole slaw. I cleaned out the fridge in the basement and defrosted it as well.

Our good friend Andy called about 7 PM and said he killed a deer this evening and he had some meat for me. I headed over to his place and while Andy butchered the carcass Caleb's and I ground up several pounds, cubed steaked several pounds and had a couple pounds of whole back strap(tenderloin). We will have some good eatin' this winter along with the package Gerald gave us from his kill on Saturday. Many thanks to those who keep us supplied with venison as there is no better eatin'.

Well its time for the shower as 3:30 comes early. I want to be through Charlotte before the rush hour as we plan to leave around 5 AM. I understand there is the possibility of bad weather from a storm that maybe replicate Hurricane Sandy from last week, LATER