Tis the Season

I find myself at a loss for words these days. Penland days go by slowly, but weeks are just racing. In just three of them, I'll find myself back home in Birmingham, after what will have been eight weeks here. I've been spending a lot of time journaling and talking with friends about my experience-how it's growing, changing and challenging me. Because of that, when I get to updating my blog, I'm plum out of things to say. Instead of giving a (perhaps redundant) wordy update, I'll paint the picture of what I've been up to with some visual aids.

This weekend marked the 3rd Annual celebration of the Day of Fall Fun, which actually turned into a whole darn weekend of fall fun. It began on Saturday with a trip to the local Amish market, where a classmate and I loaded her tiny little sedan with about 20 honkin' pumpkins, some of which are pictured here.

Here is the DOFF setup outside of the Pines on Penland's campus. It was so fun to celebrate with new friends here.

Here's the sweet Ellen Anne, designing her pumpkin. Artists have a special knack for carving. I must say, I was blown away with the ingenious approaches taken by some.

Me? I chose to carve a plaid pumpkin (see right).

Do you see us clad in plaid? It was required for participation. Also note that behind us is the full line-up o'lanterns.

On Sunday, I hopped in the car for a short trip to Asheville, where the autumnal beauty shone round about me.

I met with my sister and her husband, George, who are up here in the mountains. We moseyed into a bookstore, where we found a copy of this treasure. Oh, yeah, by the way. If you didn't know it, my parents wrote a book a while back about waterfalls to be found off the Blue Ridge Parkway.

And then! My deer friends, Deanna (pictured here) and Keri, arrived, bringing with them good cheer and belly laughs. We spent a good bit of time reading of this classic book of literature.

We walked our way to this park where we proceeded to make a ruckus and attract attention from every direction with our loud and crazy antics.

And rowdy card-playin. I lost. Lame.

We ended the day at the most delectable location with some thick dark hot chocolate. Nectar of the gods.

Friends forever.