Leaves, leaves, leaves!

There was a whole lot of leaf rakin', blowin', and pilin' going on at the two Dorrell residences today...also all over the neighborhood. That pile that Woody is standing behind is absolutely huge...wide and long and tall...about lost a couple of grandchildren in it (just kidding!). Although, yesterday there was a cell phone lost in it. The pile that is pictured in the bottom left snakes along from in front of Nathan's house down to our driveway (well, there is a space where a car can park...as seen at the top...the pile about hides the car! That's a lot of leaves!!!!!!!! Nathan is enjoying Woody's last year's Christmas present (a leaf blower)...but, it is still a tremendous amount of leaves and a LOT of work. And, the trouble is that in a couple of days the yards will be covered again...probably just in a day...as you can see, some of the trees have just barely started losing their leaves! Woody raked a little up close to the house getting some leaves out of that garden. Graham and Abigail really got busy in their front yard...raking leaves onto a plastic sheet and then dragging them to the road. Kathy used the blower in their back yard while Nathan pulled big loads of leaves to the road on a plastic sheet. I guess most everyone except the very youngest and me worked a bit in the leaves. I did pick up some gardening tools and put them in the garage...and picked a few leaves out of a couple of my plants...so guess I had a "hand" in the leaves too! At a point the children "took a break" and proceeded to tunnel through the leaves in front of our house...it was funny to see them disappear and then pop up again. I'll bet their bath water was dirty tonight! Joy and Graham came in to play for a while in our house. Graham was sneezing...wonder why!!!! Abigail went back to her house to clean her bike with my spray bottle (for misting flowers) and then came to pick up her brother and sister on the Barbie battery powered 4-wheeler! Been a lively day! Lots of work and lots of playing!

Woody really hasn't felt the best today. He got up early, had trouble taking his morning chemo pills but finally got them down (today he only had to take five in the morning instead of eleven!). He went to the library and got apples at the fruit market. He took care of Joy and Elijah while the rest of Nathan's family went on a short bike ride. He and I took a walk this afternoon. We walked around the perimeter (read that as a BIG block) of the neighborhood that is next to ours and also around our block. He has read, watched football and library DVDs this afternoon and evening, and just rested. And, he got his evening pills down...so now he just has one more day of taking chemo pills for this cycle! I made another of our favorite soups this morning...Spicy Vegetable-Beef.