Winter Concert at UNCG

Hi everyone!  Can you believe it's December?  I like it when Thanksgiving falls a week earlier on the calendar because it gives us an extra week between the two holidays to prepare for Christmas.  I've really enjoyed seeing everyone's Christmas posts so far; I've seen some wonderful Advent wreaths this week as we enter into this holy season.

I don't have a Christmas post for you today.  I'm still decorating, and I'll have some pictures to show very soon.  In the meantime, I'm sharing some pictures of our son's winter band concert yesterday evening at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

Christmas Music

I've been decorating the Christmas tree in our den today and listening to Christmas music on the CD player.  Music is one of the things I truly love about the Christmas season.  We like to listen to a variety of Christmas music at our house, and thank goodness we have a pretty good collection because they play the same old tunes over and over on the cable music channel and the radio.

A few of our favorites are the soundtrack from "A Charlie Brown Christmas," performed by the Vince Guaraldi Trio.

source

This old favorite airs on CBS tonight at 8:00 p.m., by the way.  :)

Picking Out the Christmas Tree

The turkey and dressing had not yet become a fond memory when we took off to the mountains to the Choose and Cut tree farm to select our Christmas trees for 2012.  Friday was a beautiful day with mild temperatures and the sky was full of Cirrus clouds -- those wispy, trailing clouds that we call mares' tails.

We have driven to the mountains to choose a fresh Christmas tree since the very first Christmas we were married.  Most years, the weather has been kind.  However,  I do recall one year before our son was born when it was drizzling rain and the mud was so thick, the tree farm employees couldn't drive the wagon up the hills to collect the cut trees, so we had to manhandle our tree down the hill to the baler.  And more than once, there has been a biting wind that whipped through our clothes as we stood exposed on the mountain, facilitating a rather speedy selection of the tree.  In fair weather (or not so fair), I'm just very thankful that for 26 years we've been able to carry on this family tradition.

The Last Roses

Fall seems to be well and truly here now, in our part of North Carolina.  We definitely had an Indian Summer this year, because after a cold snap around the middle of October, we then went back to temps in the 70's later in the month.

Our David Austin roses have been continuously putting out a few blooms all through September and October.  We've had this Gertrude Jekyll rose for three years, and this is the first year it has bloomed  into autumn.  In addition, there were buds, promising more blooms to come (as long as they didn't get caught by an early freeze).  You can see previous posts on our David Austin roses Here and Here.

Well it's been cold and windy here this week, folks, and yesterday I was amazed to see two beautiful blooms still on the stalk, along with several unopened and partially-opened buds. The temperatures have been dipping into the 30's at night, but apparently they've stayed just above freezing, so these flowers were still healthy and intact, rather than brown and drooping.  And best of all, they still have their wonderful fragrance.

Southern Bloggers Conference 2012

Hi folks!  Is it cold where you are tonight?  The sun has shone (for the most part) the last two days, but it's still been quite chilly here in our part of North Carolina.  Brrrr.

I was very excited to be able to attend the Southern Bloggers Conference 2012, which was held in Raleigh, NC, October 12th - 14th.  I was only there for one day, Saturday the 13th, but it was a busy day.  It was great to meet other bloggers (from near and far), as well as get lots of good information and tips on how to grow my blog.

Fall Fireplace

Hi all!  I haven't posted in a few weeks, and I'm determined to show some fall scenes around the house before we start decorating for Christmas.  I cannot believe Thanksgiving is next week -- Yikes!

I have so many things to share with you; I still haven't posted on my trip to the Southern Bloggers Conference in Raleigh back in October.  I'll be doing a post on the conference very soon because I got to meet two bloggers that I've really wanted to meet in person -- Barbara from Two Birdies and a B. and Shirley from Housepitality Designs.  These are two very sweet ladies!

Autumn on the Blue Ridge Parkway

I'm writing this post as a follow-up to my story on Holy Trinity Church of the Fresco.  We drove along the Blue Ridge Parkway after touring the church, and the leaf colors were really gorgeous that day.  Sometimes I save my pictures and material and wait weeks (or months) to write about them; but I wanted to go ahead and get this out because the leaves are being blown off the trees faster than I've ever seen before.  There have been years where some of our trees in the area still had pretty leaves as late as Thanksgiving.  I'm pretty sure that won't be the case this year.

Not only were the leaves spectacularly colorful, but the sky was colorful as well, and full of interesting cloud formations.  I love the different layers of sky colors in this picture.  There are violet, pale rose, white, pale blue, and then the smokey blue of the mountain ridges in the distance.