November is a month with a lot of "set pieces" — Thanksgiving, of course. And Veterans' Day, with it's concert presented by the Cloverleaf Middle School 8th-grade band and the "flag of photos" Andrew puts up each year along the back of the gym where the concert is held. It's also the time of the semiannual District 7 Conference of the United States Power Squadrons.

This year, in addition, was one sad occasion: the memorial service for my friend, former employee and mother of one of my closest friends (Ken Schleger, whose daughter's wedding was such a wonderful part of June), Ellen Schleger, who died from complications of Alzheimer's Disease. She never really knew that Sara had married, I expect.

But there was also another Grand Reunion of friends from Warren: John Hammel, Peggy and Ed Sapino and Dr. Janet Shiley.

For Thanksgiving, we made a flying trip to Vermont and had the best turkey we've ever had!

The local Boy Scout troop presents the flags of the United States and of each branch of the armed forces at the Veterans' Day concert in Lodi.

Andrew, at the Veterans' Day concert, which was wonderful.

Not a very good picture (the flash was acting up and I had to really play with the photo to get the back row to show up at all!), but this is the group that gathered for Thanksgiving Day dinner. You can tell by the dirty shirt in the foreground who was doing the cooking! In the back row, (l to r): Bob Fowler, a neighbor of Mom's and good friend; Penney; Betsey Penney Snipes, Penney's cousin from Rhode Island); Mom; Rose Fowler; and Seth Holden, Penney's nephew.

A much better photo of most everyone.

Taken from the curve at the top of Mom's drive, you can see Bob and Rose's home just down a little hill.

"The meadow" this photo taken about 45° to the right of the previous one.

OK, there's a story behind this one, but it's so long and convoluted I can't remember it. Something about the person who gave Penney the dress wanting to see that she wore it. Whatever. Suffice it to say, this is a "gag" photo; no real birch trees were harmed in the making of this photo!