Random thoughts and activities from the weekend:

• I had quite a mess of leaves in my yard. My neighborhood looks like one of those scenes from a romantic comedy where the couple is walking and talking, maybe there is a dog on a leash, sweaters are being worn – and it is snowing leaves! I took a moment to look up and watch the leaves fall.

• The neighbors on both sides of me have cleaned their yard several times. One bags them and the other hires a company to vacuum them up. I do not have the time or money to keep up. Their yards look great! Nice and green, void of any leaves. Half a day later, their yards look like mine. I took about an hour to mow the lawn and mulch the leaves into tiny little pieces. My yard looked great, nice and green. No bagging, no money spent other than gas for the mower. A few hours later, my work was all covered up. I hope my neighbors noticed, briefly.

• I have gutter guards to keep leaves out of my gutters. I also have a locust tree that has tiny golden leaves that find there way past my gutter guards. I clean out my gutters by climbing a ladder onto my roof and then taking a garden hose and spraying the leaves down the drain. That technique works pretty well, but I wonder if the gutter guards are worth it.

• This has been the best Fall season ever. The weather has been perfect and the trees are beautiful.

• I know it’s not cool to like Christmas music and all the commercialization of Christmas, but I started listening to Christmas music this weekend. I love to belt it out in the car. I see the decorations being prepared on the streets and in the shops and I am excited for my favorite time of the year. There’ll be much mistletoeing…

• I went to one of my absolute favorite stores in town. The Moon Marble Company. Well, actually it is in Bonner Springs, but that makes for a fun drive. There is nothing flashy about the store that is by the tracks and would be easily missed if you didn’t see the sign. But what is on the inside will delight and keep you busy for hours. Every year for my boys’ birthday, we go to the store and pick out a hand-made marble. I want to leave them with a gift that has lasted through the generations and will still be a classic toy for future generations. They have in-store demonstrations of how they make this big colorful marbles. The store itself comes from a different era, before the kay-be toys and the Toys’r’us. The walls are crammed, the aisles are tight, and navigating seems like going through a maze. The toys and games are very retro. My mom even said she hadn’t seen one of those since she was a kid. The have a great collection of brain-teaser puzzles like Rush Hour. Moon Marble is great place to stop before a long roadtrip – to have the kids pick out a travel game or two. Much fun!

• Saturday night all of my family watched my cousin-niece, Laina perform in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It was a fun time, maybe someday my boys will want to act in musicals. It looks like fun.

• I have been reading Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire a lot this weekend. When I start a new book, I read it casually. There may be a few days that I don’t have time to pick it up and read. But once the story gets going (about half way) I have a hard time putting it down and find myself grabbing the book before I turn on mindless TV.

• My cousin Sean and his wife were in town, so we all went over to Seminole and Magrelo’s house for dinner. Always a fun time when we get all the family together. My sister Lou Lou and Seminole who is Greek are going to start teaching some family dances for our family culture, so when our kids get married, we’ll have one big party going on. I asked if we could start with the electric slide.

• My VCR broke this weekend. We are still behind the times. We don’t have cable nor Tivo, so we tape all our shows, because they are on when we put the boys to bed. I bought a new VCR last night at Wal-Mart. They only had one to choose from. $40. DVD players are cheaper! Wal-Mart was cheaper than the other stores. Don’t worry we are now caught up on Lost and Alias.