Family Visit

A few weeks, I was absolutely delighted, over-the-moon, (etc) that my sister, her children, sister-in-law and her daughter came to visit us!  Since we've lived in New York (almost 5 years now) and even in Baltimore (2 years before that), not many family members from my side have visited us.  

On Dan's side of the family, his mom has come to see us both in Baltimore AND here at least 4 times.  His dad came once in Baltimore and twice since we've been in NY.  His brother and sister-in-law have come once in MD and once here, his Sister and brother-in-law have come once in MD and once in NY...

But on my side of the family, my sister Sarah and her family came once in MD and NY, my parents came once to MD and NY, and Martha came once (though it was a very short trip, only one quick day) to MD and NY. 

I'm not complaining because I understand it isn't easy to make trips with little kids.  

That's why we feel so honored and privileged each time any family makes the long trek up here.  

6 1/2 hours is no ball game with 6 children in the car! 

  

We had pretty nice weather while Lydia and Elisabeth and the kids visited us, so we tried to get outdoors! 

Took them to the Fort William Henry Fort in Lake George.  I'd never been there, but it was the only fort in the area that was open (most of them are seasonal for tourism).  There were lots of aspects that were closed and unavailable (like the cannon and musket demonstrations and the living history portion of it), and it was raining the whole time we were there....PLUS the water pipes had burst, so there were no bathrooms, save the one jiffy John.  But besides all those strikes, it was still nice!  I will probably go back again in future.  

My nieces and Nephews love history, and I think that is so cool, because of course...I do too.  :-) 

There were some wax figures behind glass windows inside the fort, depicting soldier life, etc.  One place had a man having his fake leg being amputated.  My poor niece was quite frightened.  I didn't know it at the time, but Gwen thought it was scary too.  Later that night and for subsequent nights, she prayed that God would heal the man's leg.  :-) 

They stayed for 2 nights.  One day, we showed them the farm, and then came back to the house and made sandwiches and took our picnic down to the waterfall.  The water was super high and roaring. 

After our meal, Dan took my three oldest nephews and niece (and Gwen, who loves to tag along and won't take naps anymore) back to the farm to explore/work. 

Then they went to the tire place to get the truck inspected.  Annnnd from the looks of the photo, they got some orange cream bars :-)

Earlier that day, we went to Whitehall quickly to see the birthplace of the US Navy, the hull of the USS Ticonderoga, and the Skene Manor up on the hill. 

The next day, we drove them to see the house we finished and sold last year and then hiked up the slate mound in Pawlet. Each of the kids were gathering hunks of slate to take home for their treasures.  Gwen and Lucie tried to also collect some, but I made them throw it back because slate is everywhere here and we can get it anytime. 

We saw the cave on our little hike/walk.  The hill was too steep to climb down though, with little children. 

That afternoon, Lydia and Elisabeth treated us to lunch at Ambrosia Diner in Queensbury, and then they loaded up and headed home.  

It was a refreshing time for me.  I love to be with family, and I miss family, being so far away from them.  Anytime we get to spend with family is a treat.  This was one of the first times that family came and visited when the weather wasn't absolutely freezing/icy and snowy.  So being able to go places was also really fun.  

We were grateful that they made the long trip up here and already look forward to there hopefully being another one in future!

Family Photos on the Lake

Hello friends!  I am very behind on posting on my blog (what else is knew, right??)...so I am finally posting these family photos we had taken back in JUNE.  Yes, June.  So in the 2 1/2 months that have gone by, our children have grown a lot, and these are outdated.  But hey, I figured I would share them anyway.   

 

We went to Lake George to take these.  The battlefield there was a nice place and of course, it was nice to get the lake in the background in some photos.

 

 

 

As always, Gwendolyn was being a little ham.  She did great with the candid pictures.  Most of the posed ones though, she struggled with.  :)

 

Lucinda and Dan

 

It was during my mother-in-law's visit that we had these taken.  I thought it would be nice to get a few shots of Gwen and Lucie with their mimi.

 

 

It didn't take Gwen long to realize in this pose that she could have a little fun with Dan's hair!

 

 

Oh, and then mine!

 

 

 

It was a fun time and we got several good memories to keep from it.  Hope you all are doing well!  I'm going to try to post again tomorrow.  The best time to get on my laptop is when both children are napping...which is very rare!  Unless it's nighttime...and let's be honest...when both children are in bed, I'm also more than ready to fall asleep myself.

 

So hopefully, you'll see another post tomorrow...or whenever I have both children napping and all my other duties finished. 

Cruising on Lake George

Well, it's so hard to believe that September is here already!  I had so many things to post about in the month of August, but kept forgetting. So these next few posts will consist of our August adventures.  It works out perfectly too, since we have nothing planned for the month of September except work, work, and more work on the fixer upper. 

 

 

We went to a sporting goods store a few weeks ago to see if we could get an infant lifevest for Gwendolyn so we can take her out in our little row boat.  While we were there, we found this decapitated mannequin sitting in a kayak outside the store.  How odd...

 

 

 

A few weeks ago, we were able to go on an island cruise of Lake George.  We have been on the Minne-ha-ha multiple times, but this was our first time doing the island cruise.  One of the ladies from our church gave us the tickets. 

We cruised right on passed the Sagemore hotel.  It's a pretty beautiful place.  We enjoyed guessing how much the mansions along the lake must cost.  It's a pretty ritzy area.  

 

This new woodcarving depicts the settling of the Adirondacks. 

While we were on the Mohican, we were surrounded by strangers who kept giving us baby advice.  They must have thought I was a bad mother, because nearly the whole trip they spent telling me I should hold Gwendolyn a certain way or should have had a hat for her, or we should be inside the boat rather than on the deck in the shade....etc.   Aside from that, it really was a very nice boat ride. 

 

Right before we came back into Lake George, it started raining. 

 

 

Another thing we've done lately is to attend our town band concerts in the park.  The local, free newspaper comes out every week with a calendar of events (free or otherwise) and I've begun trying to find different things to attend in the community for free.  For such a small town, Granville really has quite a nice band!  They performed in the park three Sunday afternoons in a row.  We were able to go to 2 of them.   

 

 

Sadly, they are poorly attended and most attendees are over the age of 65.  Gwendolyn was the center of attention each time because people are so happy to see a young family attending. 

 

 

And the last bit of news...our garden! 

 

I know I've posted a bunch of times about our garden, and some of you all grow huge gardens (or you even farm for a living!) so feel free to skip this part as I'm sure it's somewhat repetitive. 

We are proud of our garden for several reasons.

1. It's our first successful garden

2. Everyone told us our garden wouldn't do well because of our location

3. I haven't had to buy (and won't have to buy all winter) any vegetables from the store. 

 

 

Our tomatoes are basically one gigantic shrub.  They were planted much too close together, so it's impossible to walk between them.  We attempted to string them up with stakes and twine, but they're so heavy that the plants are all laying in a heap anyway.  Despite all this, we've already harvested about a half bushel of tomatoes and there are still a TON of green ones. 

 

Our watermelon, again, was planted WAY too close, and its very difficult to find the watermelons.  Also, they don't get much exposure to sun because its so bushy.  But we've already eaten three watermelon and there are about 13 more still!

I honestly thought the cantaloupe wasn't even close to being ready because they were all super small and green.  But something started eating one of them, and we saw that the inside was nearly rotten.  So we went ahead and picked three of them.  

 

This scarred, cracked one tasted terrific!

 

 

And the zucchini and squash....well....

 

 

 

 

 

We went out and bought a new chest freezer, and its completely full of squash and zucchini.  We have over 75 bags of it.  We started selling it for 25 cents each in town because we already gave some to everyone we knew and still had too much. 

 

 

And our corn did well this year too.  We planted two rows of one variety and then three weeks later, decided we wanted to plant more.  The second kind of seed, Dan got at Tractor Supply.  That second variety didn't turn out great, but I froze it anyway.   

 

 

That second variety (I don't remember the name) had purple silky stuff, not brown.  It was weird. 

 

I picked everything that was decent and spent one evening husking it all and cooking it and freezing it.  We have about 40 bags of that. 

 

This was the first variety, which looked and tasted much better...

 

 In July, Dan told me he wished he could have some okra, so I planted one packet of seeds and it came up SO well.  This picture was taken about three weeks ago, so its much bigger now.  It's almost ready to start picking.  I just have no clue what we're going to do with it all.  There's no way Dan can eat it all! :D

 

 

And of course, the chickens are still laying every day.  I started posting the eggs for sale on facebook marketplace.  Now I have a few regular egg-buyers, which is good.  We also give them to people at our church and we eat eggs every day.   

 

 

So there you have it!  Some of the things we've been doing in the month of August!  I'll post again tomorrow with news of the other adventures we've been on.  I love this time of year!