GRAVETTE — Another cloudy, rainy week was capped with a beautiful sunny weekend. Colorful leaves continue to tumble down. Now that Daylight SavingsTime has ended darkness closes in early and our evening outdoor activities are curtailed. Martha Stewart says that crisp fall weekends are meant for leisurely walks outside. As you stroll along she suggests you gather tall grasses, colorful leaves, limbs with bright berries and lush evergreens. You can fashion these into lovely wreaths that preserve the beauty of the fall season. Take the kids or grandkids along to help in collecting nature’s treasures.

The week began with a rainy Monday so Jim was soon back home. I stopped at the grocery store on my lunch hour and bought a large head of cabbage. He had a big pot of cabbage and smoked sausage cooked when I got home from work. It was a tasty meal and I followed it up with a soothing cup of hot Red Zinger tea sweetened with honey.

I worked at the office a few hours Tuesday morning and cooked a few turnips and their greens when I got home. I took Mama for her six-week checkup at the clinic in early afternoon and she got a good report.When we returned home I baked two dozen cupcakes, frosted them with orange icing and placed a Kraft Ghostmallow on each one. We ordered burgers and fries from the Icehouse for our supper that evening.

I took a dozen of my cupcakes to the Senior Center for our October J.G.T. Club meeting Wednesday morning. We had a good meeting despite the low attendance and I visited Aunt Leta and accompanied her on an errand that afternoon.

Thursday was a busy day as I made several telephone calls to conduct some business for Aunt Leta andspoke with library commissioners to plan our November meeting. Jim and I attended a meeting that evening where we heard a couple of speakers and enjoyed cake and cut ghost cookies. When we got home I wrote letters to a friend in Florida and my aunt and uncle in Kansas City.

I went to work at the newspaper office Friday morning and found that a gardener friend had brought us some turnips. That afternoon I ordered a cake and bought a gift certificate for an upcoming party.

We made a trip to Siloam after breakfast Saturday morning and got back to town just in time for me to attend our monthly quilt class. I took a dozen Halloween cupcakes and joined friends for refreshments, “show and tell” and instructions on a Rail Fence quilt pattern. We were visited in late afternoon by the grandkids and great-nephew Austin, all in costume, as they began their rounds of trick or treating. We stocked their containers with candy and cupcakes and watched later that evening as a host of ghosts and goblins, even a couple of horse-drawn wagons, passed by the house.

We set the last of our clocks back early Sunday morning. We enjoyed coffee and doughnuts at a meeting in Southwest City before coming home to prepare a late breakfast and do a couple of loads of laundry. A friend dropped by for a visit and our neighbor walked across the street to chat as Jim worked on the rook he had built over the patio. I fried some green tomatoes to accompany our cheese hot dogs for supper. My friend in Tulsa called after supper to confirm plans to visit Tuesday and we watched the World Series game that evening.

Opinion, Pages 4 on 11/04/2009