Where does it go? We have been all so busy that I am having a hard time trying to sneak posts in.
We spent a lovely weekend in
Olean with Tim's dad and new mom. It was an action packed weekend of going from one event to another. Laurie graciously offered her home to us again and I'm looking forward to going back over and start working with her on a garden. I have to do some research on her growing zone. It's much wetter and grayer there than it is here.
Speaking of weather. Spring, hello? Where did you go? Waking up to 18 degrees this morning got me to grumbling again about our weather. The sun has been beautiful and the skies so blue, but it's been so flipping cold. We had to go out and get Tim a sweatshirt this weekend because I stole his jacket.
The cold doesn't seem to be stopping the crocuses from popping up. It's just keeping me from putting any of my plants out. All of my peas have officially died now. Note for next year, don't start them in January. Nancy did clean up one of the garden plots over the weekend and if the temps break 50 in the next couple of days I'm going to go plant a row of seeds. I know that they can go out while it's still cool out. Thankfully my tomatoes seem to be doing great on my dining room table. I'll be glad when I can reclaim my dining room table though and the grow lights can go back down into the basement.
Ok, back to the weekend. After a long ride over to Olean we took advantage of an empty lot across the street from Laurie's and had a baseball game. It was great fun, even though it was chilly out. The kids got to burn a lot of energy that had accumulated in the drive over. Patchy played first base for us and Aidan pretty much made up the rest of the bases. Grampa had to do a lot of running around to herd him back into the "field". Both Connor and Aidan are pretty good at the bat. Connor has a very good pitching arm on him, but needs to get over his fear of getting hit with the ball when he's catching. It's kind of funny to watch. That and his running. We laugh every time we see him run. He puts his head down and kind of shakes his head when he's running. I don't know where he's learned to do this, but we are going to have to put him on a track and show him how it's done.
Perfect pitch.
Keep your eyes open!
After that we went to a couple of fund raising functions. We enjoyed some most delicious Lebanese food at one of them. It makes me want to try my hand at some of that cooking.
Sunday was a fun day. We went to a maple farm. We were lucky enough to be there on a special weekend. There were a couple of different demonstrations going on. It was fun to walk through the woods and see all of the trees tapped and the sap running like water on some of them. We went into a barn like structure where they were boiling the sap down. The place was filled with smoke/steam that smelled so delicious. I know they were talking about how they produce it but between me trying to keep Patchy behaving and Connor from wolfing down little cider donuts I missed a lot of it. Then there was a demonstration about how the Native Americans happened to find out that the trees had a sweet sap in them and it showed how they harvested the sap from the trees and used rocks that had been heated in fire to boil the sugar. I think my favorite part of that demonstration (besides the warm fire that was burning) was tasting the maple wine. We asked where we could buy some but apparently the guy makes it in his basement and he wouldn't cough up an address. I immediately came home and googled it though and have found a couple of recipes. Me thinks I'll be trying my hand at that.
Connor checking out one of the taps.
Aidan waiting for the tractor ride up the hill.
Enjoying the view from the wagon being pulled by a tractor up the hill.
Maple smoke/steam made this tin punch lamp look really neat.
The color changes in sap from one season of tapping.
My new favorite coffee mug that I got at the farm. It doesn't have a handle. It has a hand cozy and when you hold the cup, you cup it in your hands to keep your hands cozy. LOVE it!
After that we went back to the house and had an amazing dinner cooked by Laurie. This is the person who says she doesn't cook. She did a pretty good job. =) We got home late on Sunday night and yesterday was spent running around town. I had to run to the dentist to get some paperwork filled out for the kids. I had to go to the dairy to get some milk and cream. I think we are going to do an experiment and try to make our own butter. Then I had to go find out where I'm taking Connor tomorrow for his PSSA testing. Then, last but not least, was food shopping. Oh, and a couple of loads of laundry, make dinner, clean the kitchen. Yeah, I went to bed beat last night. I feel pretty good today. Today we Connor and I are going to do some last minute studying for his tests and then I have to get a backpack ready with snacks and a book. If he finishes his test early he has to sit quietly while everyone else finishes. This should prove interesting. At least the Warrior book set from Nana and Papa showed up yesterday. Thank you Nana and Papa for the books for the kids. They were thrilled with them. We read Aidan's book last night at bed time.
I have a bunch of pictures to post and I'm trying to how to link them from my Flickr account. I've done it twice and I don't see the pics in the post. I'm going to have to play with it some more. If I can't figure it out, I'll have to go back to the laptop and just load them directly from there.
I hope everyone is having a fantastic week! Thank you dad and Laurie for hosting our little family and providing a weekend of fun. Can't wait to do it again!
