A RED MULE FARM Thanksgiving!

This year for Thanksgiving we were treated by a visit from my Aunt Cherie and Uncle Ken from California! Ken arrived on Monday night. I asked him if he would be interested in riding Sadie Mae on a trail ride and to my surprise he said he would love to! On Tuesday I got home from work early and we took a 2 1/2 hour ride! Ken even rode Sadie up and down the sides of the dirt hill that seems to scare most people! At one point I asked him if he was ready to go back or wanted to ride some more. He said, "Oh I can ride for as long as you want to!" I laughed and told him I would ride for 8 or 9 more hours if I could and I did not think he would want to do that. He agreed, so we took a trip around a few more fields before heading in! The weather was very pretty and no bugs, either! Both mules were really good and the only trouble Sadie gave Ken was her usual, "Time for a SNACK" move!

Later that evening, Ken helped me with some of the leaves in the yard, there were a lot of them too! We took several tarp loads of leaves out to the burn pile! Then while I used the leave blower he cleaned the gutters! Awesome! I thanked him and told him he was earning his Thanksgiving dinner! The next day is was very cold and super windy! Guess what, all the leaves that I had blown to the front were now back all over the yard! Oh well!

On Wednesday, Cherie and my parents came down from Virginia. We settled in and later that evening went to Chili's for dinner! Thursday, we visited and took lots of photos! I started cooking about 11 AM! I had some turkey breasts and a shoulder of mutton for dinner! Ken helped by making a great salad and some of the most wonderful mashed potatoes! It was such a nice day that I suggested that we eat outside under the oak tree! It took a few minutes for everyone to get used to the idea, but soon everyone was on board! I set up the picnic table with an extra chair and a mule tablecloth. I put it right in the middle of all the leaves, too! I set up an extra table to put all the extra dishes on.

Soon the food was all ready! Everyone took one trip out with hands full and we had a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner outside! I heard more than one person say,"I don't think I have ever had Thanksgiving dinner outside before!" The sky was so blue with not a single cloud and only one fly came to dinner. Hardly a car drove by and no dogs even barked during dinner! Definitely one to remember!

After dinner, I got the mules out again. Cherie rode Sadie around, and we even herded - or at least tried to herd - the sheep around! Ken rode again, too!
We were sad to drop them off at the airport Friday morning. They were headed to New York to meet their daughter for her birthday!

On Friday, Mom, Dad, and I went to the North Carolina Museum of Art to see a showing of Rembrandt. The paintings were amazing but I was not happy with the show because they let in so many people that is was hot and hard to get up to see the paintings!

But all in all, a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday!