Time has flown by this year. It's hard to believe we are already into October. I haven't had as much time to dedicate to this blog the way I originally wanted to. I'll get there. Anyone who does read my post, thank you for your patience.
Autumn in my small town, Parrott Virginia, proves again to bring breathtaking scenery, festivals being held everywhere, mild weather in the mid 70's, and Halloween soon to come. Saturday my oldest daughter went to Carowinds in N.C. with a friend. My youngest daughter and I attended the annual Newbern Fall Festival in Dublin, Va. Newbern holds a lot of history as well as most areas throughout The New River Valley, in Va. Right in the Appalachian mountains, with the Blue Ridge Mountains filling this area with beauty and wonder, and The New River flows through my town on to others. The name 'New' doesn't actually fit. The New River is the second oldest river in the world, second to the Nile. It also flows upward instead of downward. So, it flows from N.C., some through Tennessee, through parts of Va. before it finally empties into another larger body of water in West Virginia.
The Newbern Festival is just one of the many Fall Festivals that are held in this area. Every year, rain or shine, vendors are there for two days to sell food, drinks, snacks, and homemade sweets. The entire street is blocked off so booths can line each side with crafts, candles, homemade foods, homemade soaps, candles, antiques, clothes, handmade quilts, and the people that reside on the street always have a huge garage sale. Bluegrass music can be heard playing from anywhere on the street, decorations are everywhere, they hold a Civil War re-enactment, and The Wilderness Road Regional Museum holds amazing history. This is my 4th year attending the festival. Each year the museum has a guest book so people can sign that they were there. Once inside, there are glass cases surrounding the rooms holding antique beauties. I took a photo of one booth holding an old camera. I also purchased a poetry book from a local whom was in World War 2. It's called 'Poems For Rainy Nights -Original Poetry From The Mountains - by Lloyd Mathews'. I'm going to get started on reading that later today.
I always leave the festival with gorgeous photos, homemade soy candles, (this year's scent I chose was Lavender and Autumn Magic), handcrafted jewelry for both my girls, and pumpkins for them. The pumpkins are grown by the local farmer that lives in Newbern. He has gigantic pumpkins, baby size pumpkins, medium size, and gourds. They are never expensive and I like the fact the pumpkins come from a local man instead of a chain of Super Markets. The parking area is near the fence to the farm. So, we always purchase our pumpkins when headed to the vehicle. It started raining some Saturday but I didn't mind at all standing in the rain to get the perfect pumpkins.
Tuesday, my youngest daughter's 2nd grade class are going on a field trip and I get to chaperone. It's about an hour away from our small town. The Wolf Creek Indian Village in Bastain, Va. I also have a tradition of going around my town and taking photos of the leaves turning every year. Though I have lived here 36 years, the beauty of Autumn still amazes me. Hopefully, I can begin to keep up on She Writes. When I first joined this site, I didn't understand what a link was or HTML. Finally, after Blogger and WordPress, I have the hang of things. So, hope I meet a lot of amazing people on this blog as well.
