John returned to Knoxville early this evening (after Thanksgiving with his family in Tuscaloosa) just in time to head downtown for our traditional Christmas kickoff -Christmas in the City. Christmas in the City is an annual event when the mayor turns on Knoxville's holiday lights and activities such as Christmas carole singing and marshmellow roasting take place. We love this event! We were a bit late for the official lighting but had a great time walking around and people watching!

Market Square Mall's official Christmas tree is quite impressive with thousands of twinkling lights, ribbons and shiny balls.

The city sets up and maintains an outdoor skating rink during the holidays. Not exactly Rockefeller Center but impressive in it's own right, especially when the temperature in Knoxville can get into the mid 60's during the holidays. But it was not mid 60's on this chilly night, more like low 30's. This is me watching the skaters go round and round!

John enjoyed watching the skaters too. We briefly talked about giving it a whirl but there were many people crashing on the ice and we figured, why add to the pile up by being out there ourselves.

We did take advantage of the free horse drawn carriage rides. We had lots of fun circling a city block, listening to the clomp, clomp, clomp of horses hooves and looking at the many lights in the city. The arch leading into Krutch Park is lit up behind us.

The city had numerous horses and buggies enlisted so the wait was not too bad but people continued to ride for hours. I bet the horses were pretty happy when it was time to go home!

Tomorrow night....Christmas lights in Gatlinburg!

Thanksgiving Day! What a great excuse to linger with family, to have some relaxed conversation, to laugh and to share a lot of love. And what a great reason to over indulge in a lot of good food (after a morning run, of course). Our guys were with their families (John in Tuscaloosa, AL and Mike with his parents in Knoxville) so it was just the five Smiths. We have been together as a fivesome for almost 50 years now and we consider ourselves very lucky to have each other:-)

Dinner was a family affair with Daddy in charge of the turkey and rolls. Carol, Leslie and I rounded out the dinner with mashed potatoes, green beans, homemade cranberry sauce, dressing, spinach maria, fresh fruit and Carol's pecan pie. Lots of leftovers; we are looking forward to turkey sandwiches for the next few days!
Daddy on turkey duty.

Steaming potatoes in the sunlight. The steam in the sunlight initially caught my eye but on further inspection I like the shadows and lines. Can a colandar of potatoes be artsy??!


Carol is in charge of knitting the "wedding shaw." The pattern is a bit complicated and Carol has to knit fast, after all, the big day is only 37 days away and she has just started! No question the shaw will be spectacular. So hurry Carol...knit, knit, knit!

Me and the potatoes. They looked great out of the pan (see steaming potatoes) but too much "Land O Lakes" and they were a bit too creamy. Better luck next year!

No pictures of Leslie and Mother to show. The only picture I took included Leslie's wedding dress and we just can' put it on display before the big day :-)

A photo hijacked from Will's collection....John and me in camp. No, John has not been in Will's banana rum :-)

Finally, a weekend backpack! We initially planned to hike Cold Mountain for the sunset views but were easily swayed when Will and Kim invited us along on their trip to The Cherokee National Forest. As an added bonus, they were leaving around 1:00 pm (we had planned to leave at 6:30 am) and planned to hike about 3.5-miles on a nice, level trail. Who could turn this down!!

The weekend weather was fabulous...40's at night, 70 during the day with a big dose of sunshine.

Will and Kim arrive at the trail junction, our turnoff from Trail 150 to Trail 98. Most of the leaves were off the trees and on the trail; we soon learned that unknown dangers lurked under the leaves...like rocks and roots and other slick stuff.

This dam is suppose to keep two types of trout from "intermingling." I asked John at what point the trout realize they are about to be swept over the dam and and exclaim to the other trout "dang, now we have to turn around and swim back." Poor John, he just shook his head and explained that the dam prevented the trout from migrating UPstream. I guess this was pretty much a "duh" moment.

The lower trees, along the creek, were almost leafless but we saw spectacular color high.

This is Kim navigating one of the seven crossing we made across the North Fork of Citico Creek. Will initially told us we had only two crossings but we know Will can't count where river crossings are concerned. The good news is that the creek was low enough that we did not have to don our water shoes and we only got the outside of our boots (and hems of our pants) wet.

Yum, blueberry crepes. We had dinner by firelight, it was dark-dark by 5:30 pm in the forest. Dinner was a tie as far as who was most creative....Will and Kim had veggie burgers and baked beans, John and I had shrimp, spinach and cheese quesadillas. Dessert was a whole different game! While Will and Kim spooned up a pot of butterscotch pudding, John and I dined on blueberry crepes! Hmmmm-butterscotch pudding or blueberrie crepes.

Sunday arrived after a great night's sleep. Another clear, beautiful day in the forest!

John and I were up a bit earlier than Will and Kim. John stirred the coals and got this great fire started. We lounged around camp for several hours enjoying a lot of laughter over a great breakfast. Well, John and I had a great breakfast (sweet potato pancakes and bacon). Will and Kim, on the other hand...well...just what can you say about Chef Will's creation of buckwheat pancakes mixed with last night's leftover banana flavored rum, blueberries and pecans. Did I mention burned on both sides? Their hash browns looked great anyway and Kim was a great sport, smiling as she ate the pancakes. Needless to say peels of uncontrollable laughter could be heard within the vicinity of our camp!

Our campsite in the woods, a nice flat knoll overlooking the North Fork of Citico Creek....two side creeks down from Indian Branch Camp. Perfect site selection, Will!

Will helping Kim across one of the seven crossings to get back to the car. Those rocks were slick!
John watching the river near the trails end and the end to a great weekend. Let's do this again soon!

Lots of laughter around the table tonight as Kim and Will hosted dinner. Will and Kim, Duane and Angela, John and Judy, and John and I gathered at Kim's beautiful home where we told stories and shared our late summer-early fall travels over vegetarian lasagna, salad, bread, wine and spiced tea. What an enjoyable evening...much thanks to our hosts!

Daddy and I wandered downtown to the East Tennessee Historical Society Museum this afternoon, to check out the TN Artists Association Annual Fall Juried Show. With some recent demands around the homefront, we had not had a chance to walk the show and admire the orange and white Honorable Mention ribbon attached to his painting! Congratulations Daddy!
The artist and his painting.

Another use for my delish basil pesto...pizza sauce. We made this pizza using boboli thin pizza crust, basil pesto (instead of tomato sauce), shaved garlic, mozzarella cheese, romano cheese, parmesan cheese, thinly sliced onion, quartered artichoke hearts, kalamata olives, bit sized tomatoes, turkey pepperoni and cracked pepper.

After canceling our weekend plans to go backpacking with friends (this becoming a bad habit for us), we had a weekend relatively free to do some things around town. On the top of our list...spending Friday evening on Market Square Mall watching "The Maltese Falcon " on the outdoor screen. We loved Humphrey Bogart as the very cool Sam Spade, working the clues as he solved the murder mystery of the Maltese Falcon. In it's 64th year in release, "The Maltese Falcon" is a timeless classic! Thanks Knox County Library System for making this legendary film apart of Knoxville's free outdoor movie presentation. Of course we began the evening with a #13 pizza from the Tomato Head. Yum, yum....as always.

Today we took our annual car trek to Carver's Apple Barn in Cosby, TN. As lovers of fresh picked apples, we sampled from Carver's assortment in effort to cull out the best of the season's harvest. Overall, we would not rate this a great apple year (in our humble opinion). A couple of our favorites, Pippin, Red Delicious and Fuji were either too tart or too sweet and mushy. I settled on a half bushel of an annual favorite, JonaGold (crisp with a nice blend of sweet and tart), while John couldn't resist the sweet (but mushy) New Galas. We are busy coring, slicing, freezing and dehydrating apples for the winter. In the meantime, I am looking forward to my daily chilled, crisp apple or two...until the half bushel comes to an end :-)


Bushel baskets of apples cover 1/2 of the warehouse. Carver's grows some of the best including Arkansas Black, Granny Smith, Golden Delicious, Red Delicious, Macintosh, Fuji, JonaGold, New Gala and Rome.

Fall pumpkins are also a favorite at Carver's...pumpkins for cooking, for decorating and for carving.

With this year's extended hot season in East Tennessee, it is hard to believe that fall has been here for almost a month. Carver's fall presentation of mums, pumpkins, Indian corn, corn husks, jellies and jams (along with the apples) made me anxious for cool, crisp fall weather.

John leaning against the wall of The Brass Lantern in Gatlinburg watching the crowd.

As usual, we capped off our trip to Carver's with a stop at the Brass Lantern in Gatlinburg for a bowl of vegetable soup and skillet of corn bread. With the exception of the dogwood and sassafras, the leaves on the trees in the Smoky Mountains are still as green as they were in August. Even so, Gatlinburg in October is a crowded place to be. We parked on the outskirts of town (to avoid the bumper to bumper traffic) and walked. The soup is always good so the effort was worthwhile.

With summer temperatures on the cool down, I was running short on days to harvest my patio basil for pesto. Web searches for the perfect recipe netted some uninteresting variations of the standard... basil, olive oil, Parmesan cheese, garlic and pine nuts. Previous experiments with the standard were just not to my liking, a mysterious ingredient always seemed to be absent.

Rescue arrived in the form of a recipe from fellow Travelzine moderator, Gail Norris (Eugene, OR). A longtime gardener and pesto maker, Gail has perfected her recipe over a number of years...and perfect it is. Yesterday I harvested, sorted and whirred basil leaves, carefully combining them with recipe ingredients in the order and quantity that Gail advised. Perfecto!! I couldn't believe my taste buds. My little patio pot of basil netted enough pesto for a winter of feasting on on pesto pasta, pesto sandwich spread and pesto pizza for me AND my family. I am one happy girl!

Oh and the picture above...John and my dinner tonight. Basil pesto made with walnuts, incredible :-)

Over the weekend, John and I took a long weekend in Albuquerque to experience the opening of the 34th Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta. Wow! Our 4:15 AM wake up calls were worth the effort, the early morning mass ascensions were spectacular! In between balloon events, we shopped in Santa Fe and Old Historic Albuquerque and took a tram ride to the top of Sandia Peak (10,380' br-r-r-r-r) to watch the sunset. We had a great time and think everyone should consider putting this event on their "Must See" list.

Early morning lift off on opening day of the fiesta. As first timers, we misjudged the traffic and were a little late getting to the balloon park. We watched the dawn patrol from the car and missed the opening ceremony. No problem, we were right on time for the mass ascension.

Although the Balloon Fiesta Park is quite large, the 721 balloons took off in two waves. As impressive as the number of balloons, the number of spectators is also to be admired. The week long event will draw over 800,000 people this year.

We loved the colors! Balloon patterns come in so many unique designs, each different from the next. Note the can shaped balloon in the above photo. This was Alpo's 1st year as a participant.

One of 91 "special shaped" balloons in the fiesta, Smokey Bear caught our eye. Gee, for those of us who grew in the 50's and 60's, who can forget that "only you can prevent forest fires."

Chili peppers are an Albuquerque favorite. This balloon was a crowd favorite! It didn't lift off during Saturday's opening ceremonies due to wind that picked up late in the ascension, but we were treated to this sight during Sunday morning's lift off.

These two drew the largest crowd and loudest cheering. Joey Little Bee and Lilly Little Bee were perfectly choreographed. They ascended together touching hands. As they rose , the balloons turned toward each other and appeared to hug. The crowd went crazy! But of course for those of us who had been up for 3.5 hours and were hyped up on caffeine, just about every balloon was cheer worthy.

This is biggest balloon we think, Airabelle from Canada. The balloon basket looks so small hanging from Airabelle belly!

Sunday night we returned to the balloon park to see the Balloon Glow, the most spectacular of all the events! The balloons are tethered (usually to the wheels of a large pickup truck and steadied by ropes and handlers) and remain somewhat stationary, moving only with the wind. The event was called 1/2 hour early because the wind picked up with enough force to blow some balloons almost completely over.

"Now pilots on the count of ten." This was the call from the announcer for the balloon pilots to "light" their balloons. About 350 balloons participated in the Glow, and 350 balloons lit up at once is a sight never to be forgotten!

Our trip was over much too soon! We had a great time in Albuquerque and an experience we will always remember!

Last night was our West Coast Trail wrap-up. Wrap-up meaning pot luck dinner, discussion and slide show. What a great group of cooks we have! Everyone brought the dish they signed up for and more. From Barbara's kitchen we had pork tenderloin, sour cream potatoes and roasted vegetables. From Kim's kitchen we enjoyed an incredible cauliflower, broccoli and poppyseed dressing salad, Italian bread and a drop dead delicious homemade German Chocolate cake.

Robin whipped up a yummy blueberry and lemon cake. It was a light, sweet and tart, all at the same time (I had a piece for breakfast after my run this morning...thanks!). Bill prepared an eggplant pasta that was so good, he may have reformed me into an eggplant eater. And Sean arrived with several pans of Chicken Marsalla that he had just pulled out of the oven...yum, yum! We cleansed our palates with Steve's fruit and lots of wine.


From left: Lisa, Sean, Will, Kim, Robin and Bill


From the right: Steve, John, me, Barbara (yes we got the yellow memo), and Sybil

If all this food was not enough, we spent several hours staring at pictures of the West Coast trail on my living room wall as we popped disc after disc into the projector. Most of us still agree that this is not a hike we want to do again!

We also enjoyed pictures from Steve and Sean's trip to The Wind Rivers (a week after our trip). John, Barbara, Will and I (plus several others) took a similar trip in 2003 so we thoroughly enjoyed the pictures. Wind Rivers, by the way, is a trip we WOULD do again!

So now we can put the West Coast Trail behind us and look forward to our future travels. For John and I, this will be the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta in just a couple of weeks!

Yeah!! Movies on Market Square is back. Last night John and I grabbed a Tomato Head pizza, set-up our lawn chairs on The Square and kicked back to relax and watch the film "Jaws." "Jaws" is celebrating its 30th year in release.

This was my first viewing of the film. I didn't see it in 1975 because I was still interested in going to the beach and riding the waves. Either my interests have change or I am not so easily frightened cause I couldn't wait to see what I missed! Richard Dreyfuss certainly looked a lot younger in the film...hmmm, guess we all looked a lot younger 30 years ago. Anyway, it was a great night to be outside, watching a flick under the stars!

I have been working on my interim pottery project...pinch pots. A simple concept really, start with a ball of clay and make small pinches until you form a shape, just like in elementary school art class. To do it right, the process can take a bit of time and patience. I thought I would get restless, instead I found it relaxing and challenging. I am proud of my first two pots, rough as they are. As soon as the pots are glazed and baked, I will show you the final product!


Pinch pot 1

Pinch pot 1, view 2

Pinch pot 2

Pinch pot 2, view 2

Today is the last in summer's trilogy of holidays. Labor Day means that fall's cooler temperatures cannot be far off. While a good part of this holiday weekend was spent doing yard work, yesterday John and I spent most of the day playing.


After breakfast at the Atlanta Bread Company in Maryville, we took a late morning hike in the Great Smoky Mountains. This was a stroll really, a short 5-miles to stretch our legs. We started on the Little River trail, circled back on Cucumber Gap and returned to the car on Jake's Creek. Lots of cars in the area but most people had picnic baskets in hand and were looking for a good spot along the river to relax. We saw very few people on the trail.

In the evening, we headed downtown to watch Knoxville's most spectacular fireworks display, aptly named "Boomsday." In previous years, the city held the celebration on the Labor Day Monday meaning many kids were very late getting to bed on a school night. Several years ago the city moved the show to Sunday night providing attendees a day to rest before the school and work week begins.


With attendance in excess of 100,000 people, our city police did not appear to have a good game plan for traffic. Cars, pedestrians and poorly timed traffic signals produced a lot of chaos but people arrived in mass, lined up to buy $4.00 funnel cakes, listen to the bands, hangout and watch an incredible fireworks display. The photo above is the view from the Gay Street Bridge, looking down on Neyland Drive, sight of the event.


As twilight fell, sunset in the city produced its own light show.

Boats of all sizes crowded on the river for front row seats to the show.

At 9:30 pm, the show began! John and I squeezed in the Baptist Hospital parking lot with hundreds of people. By showtime, there was little standing room left. Aside from the hospital building (left in the pictures), we had a great view of everything but the "waterfall" on Henley Street Bridge.


The fireworks came in so many colors and shapes. Each display was more beautiful than the one before.

Some fireworks were shot high into the sky while lower fireworks were launched from the bridge. The mix was spectacular and kept the crowds cheering.

I thought the bows were particularly beautiful.

Wow! A mass of red!

And lots of pastels!
We had a great time at the show and look forward to the 2006 Boomsday celebration!