October means Norsk Hostfest and Beautiful North Dakota Sunsets

Lots of "Red October"

Can't capture the beauty of these sunsets!

We celebrated birthdays:  Debbie (Oct. 22) and Rita (Oct. 20)

We saw ABBA

"You are my Dancing Queen..."

and ....

Mike Love is the only original Beach Boy

Lots of videos from the past.....

The "real" Beach Boys--Jerry Fritel and friends

and Mollie B has a terrific show, too!
Polka Party time :-)

Surprise! We headed to Iowa for Trina's birthday!

Of course we HAD to stop at the John Deere 

Tractor factory in Waterloo on the way down

and toured the Brucemore Gardens and estate 

around the corner from Tom and Trina's

Trina was definitely surprised! Tom very cleverly pulled it off!

We had a Greek dinner at the grocery store's restaurant!
Pope Francis blessed the meal :-)

Friend Kyle baked yummee chocolate caramel cakes..mmmm

All the kids were pretty excited

And the next night we celebrated Jett's ninth birthday

"I wonder what's in those packages....."

Mom and Dad went to the Garth Brooks concert in Milwaukee,
so Grampa was in charge of dinner after Mass on Saturday
Thank goodness for the Dairy Queen :-)

On Sunday we went to the Czech Fest in downtown Cedar Rapids

Annika wanted a butterfly

Ari got a rose

'Painted Ladies'

An apple a day for Jett and Caiden

Ari and Anni get to the core

Grampa Bob watches as Ari and Jett pretend to be brave

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeee...........

Gramma Diane gets dizzy just watching these things spin

We all needed icees to cool off

The kids all won some prizes and met a couple of scarecrows :-)

On the way back to ND, we saw the Lunar Eclipse

"Fall has Fell"--and also a lot of apples from our trees

Gramma reads to Lydia, Cecelia, Pope Francis, and Claire

Definitely not "common taters" :-)
Can you find the angel and Barney?

I know you don't really "carrot" all about my garden

Parsley ready for tabouli, beans for "lubee,"
and cukes heading for the yogurt

We have had a lot of BLT's and tabouli this year!

Oh, deer!  They love crabapples!