Finally, we've had a few active weekends. I took off to Indiana on Thursday the 20th. I arrived an hour or two late for Luther's funeral, but got to meet the 30+ people at the farm for the wake. I bet the last time that many people were there was for Hugh's wedding. It was fun re-meeting several people I hadn't seen since I was a wee lad.

I was amazed at all the wind damage on the farm. Much of the woods seemed impassible due to the large number of blown down trees.


Dad kept himself busy burning brush piles and cutting up fallen trees. I got a little practice in with a chainsaw one day when we cleared the trails to the treehouse.


The treehouse escaped unscathed, which I attribute more to luck and a good location than anything else. I did stay in the treehouse each night even though the temperatures were dropping into the teens. Luckily I had a good sleeping back and several wool blankets.



We visited Pat's Swamp Shack one evening. She'd just gotten a wood burning stove installed, which seemed quite luxurious. It was a lot of fun comparing notes on shack building and seeing where'd she'd made different decisions.


The treehouse saw a lot of visitors this trip. After Luther's funeral we had 9 people in it at one point. Granted, three of them were children, but I'm still counting it as the record. Sandy and Tata made it over one day, as did Tommy.



The weather was all over the map while I was there. There was one nice day, several cloudy days, it snowed one day, and rained the next. The creeks would freeze over during the night, and all the water I carried down to the treehouse slowly froze over a few nights.


Luckily the main house stayed warm, and Ma kept the stoves fed with firewood. Lena spent a lot of time staying close the warmth. She would venture out for walks occasionally, but if we were too boring she's head back to the house.



It was a fun trip, and I enjoyed hanging out with the folks. Getting a wood burning stove in the treehouse got bumped up in the priority list a bit, maybe one will go in this next year.


The trip back was uneventful. It's no longer possible to get a direct flight from Denver to Louisville, but all my travel went smoothly, even with the layovers. I was glad to get back to a warm shower and bed.

Last week was a short week at work, then Thanksgiving preparations started. Kristen put on a good thanksgiving meal, she successfully fed 8 people, the Pumpkin Pie ice cream being a favorite. With the new couch and chairs the place wasn't too crowded, and everyone had a place to sit. We unfortunately didn't take many pictures.


Life will get back to normal next week. I have work people in town toward the end of the week, and Kristen is planning a big cookie making party on Friday. The weather should warm up into the 50s which will be nice.