‘The Vandalia-Butler Fall & Holiday 2006 Tours’ toured a house on Oakwood Avenue at ten AM, two days before Thanksgiving.  And it was all thanx to Dr. Bill Cassel of Ridgeway Road – who told his sister, Mary Ellen Case, a Vandalia resident, who’s the organizer of this fund-raising-for the Vandalia Historical Museum, who was looking for ‘houses’ that he had friends who hadda good old house…

Mary Ellen sent a list of house-sites on her tour – West Milton’s oldest stone house, two B and B’s in Xenia, Oakwood Ave., A house featuring a collection of ‘automatic music makers’, a Queen Anne in St. Anne’s Hill – Dayton, and a new retirement home in Tipp City!                  

What the ‘tour’ of the Oakwood Avenue house did was necessitate a house cleaning and ‘pick-up furor’ that would never have been done just for the twenty-two family members coming for Thanksgiving dinner two days later. The fifty-some tourees toured everywhere – except of course the basement and cellars. Those areas are un-pick-up-able! The owners kept saying: “This is NOT a Decorator’s Showhouse – it’s a lived-in-fifty-years-beat-up-by-five-children- dozens-of-dogs-
pet-snakes-cats-plus…”

When the first-of-the-family started arriving from Minneapolis that same afternoon they were heard to say”  “Wow, we’ve never seen our old ‘digs’ looking this nice!”
So, it made all that scrubbing, and polishing worthwhile.

Sally Hahn, a friend and neighbor who teaches “English as a Second Language” in the Dayton system, had a ‘new one for ‘Round Town’.  Sally just lives across the road, but RT only gets a chance to visit with her at George Sier’s Beauty Shop at 6:30 AM on Thursday mornings.  Her first ‘funny’ was told as George was ‘touching up the color in her hair’.  “The last time I had my hair dyed one of my little students asked me the next day …’Mrs. Hahn, do you paint your hair?”

Last Thursday, Sally said: “I’ve got a new one for you.  Ezequl is about eight years old and he’s Mexican.  We were teaching him the English words for ‘colors’. We had a large paint-by-numbers-turkey and Ezequl had colored pencils with the name of the ‘color’ on each one. We were working on ‘orange’ and we pointed out ‘orange’ printed on the turkey, and then the we told him to pick-up the ‘orange’ pencil and that the pencil had ‘orange’ printed on it… and we weren’t getting through to him at all. He was shaking his head – ‘No’ – and he finally held up his pencil and said ‘China!”   - and sure enough ….”

Every Recognized Hunt in the Masters’ Association, there are l70 in the US and Canada,  has a Thanksgiving Day meet. The Miami Valley Hunt met at Bower’s in Champaign County and had a turn-out of over fifty horses ‘n riders, and lots of ‘car followers’. It was a beautiful day – much too beautiful for good scenting and hunting. Three area Pony Clubs were represented – and a few of their parents also joined us. Mr. Bowers had told Diedre Koik, MFH, and Huntsman, that he’d seen several fox around his wood pile – but the fox had obviously heard that hounds would be coming – so they ‘went south.’  

A terrific luncheon followed the two and a half hour hunt.  Everyone had brought super Turkey-Day left-overs!  Plus Eric Koik had grilled a wonderful pork loin.
Honey Hammer was there from Camargo.  Rob Lewis came from Cincinnati.

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