Big Box shopping

We bought a new chest of drawers for the Girl today.  Whether it will lead to a tidy room unstrewn with clothes remains to be seen...

What was really good about this new piece of furniture is that it came in a box. 

A BIG box.

Is it possible to not have fun with a big box?

Scrabbling around

It's beginning to look (and feel) a lot like autumn round here.  A British-type autumn, that is - chilly, dank, drizzly - rather than what we want, which is a glorious, sunny, blue-skied Fall.  However, I read somewhere that we do need some rain now to keep the leaves on the trees long enough to do all their colour-changing.  And the colours (already turning) are expected to be especially magnificent this year thanks to our dry summer.   I guess there's plenty of time yet for sunnier days.

Oh, but it does get dark early.  No more late evening strolls around the block, or (perish the thought) after-dinner dips in the pool.  We're into hunkering down season.  The Boy is drawing while listening to an audio-book.  Man and Girl are playing Scrabble, their second game of the evening (but the first game came to a premature end.  The Man put down all seven letters - 50 point bonus! - in his first move, for an opening score of 70, and the Girl refused to continue). 

And I'm struggling to write a blog entry.  How about you?  How do you amuse yourself now the evenings are drawing in?

Punched out

We have bought the Girl a new (second-hand) pair of skates.  She was growing out of the old ones, and anyway as she's progressing towards more difficult jumps and manouevres her coach is keen for her to move into the next level of skate.  These have a slightly different blade and offer more support for her ankles.

The new skates seem to be fine, but one of them rubs slightly, so the coach has lent us a curious medieval-instrument-of-torture-looking thing to "punch out" and soften the leather in the tight spot.  We've clamped it on and screwed it in place and now we're leaving it overnight.   Tomorrow we'll see if it has made a difference and if the Girl can once again skate blissfully blister-free.

Shots, and spots (lots)

A relatively quiet day for me, with a head full of cold.  I made a trip to the doctor's, but for the Girl's sake, not my own - and she was just having a routine "physical", required for school. 

Is that the case in the UK, too?  Every other year or so you have to submit a medical report and an up-dated list of innoculations?  After our Green Card application this summer and all the medical appointments that entailed I thought the Girl would be bang on track with all her shots.  But the doctor today took the opportunity to give her a couple more, plus a flu immunization (a nasty nasal spray - though having flu would be even nastier, of course). 

At least this year we won't be given the third degree by the school nurse about whether or not the Girl is immune to chicken pox.  She's been tested and we have written proof, signed by a doctor, that she's had varicella.  Not that I ever had any doubt about it.  I remember too well her itchy misery, aged three, and her woeful complaint:  "I don't want spots!  I want stripes..."

Farm report

No school today, in observance of Yom Kippur.

Wednesday is when I generally visit my refugee friends in Albany, and I did so as usual this morning.  Since they had no school either, it turned into an opportunity to take some of the kids and their mum over to Indian Ladder Farms. The Girl came along, too, of course - she never misses an opportunity to visit her favourite farm.  The Boy was out at a friend's house.

The Karen girls didn't give too much away - were they over- or under-whelmed by the whole experience?  It was hard to tell.  But I hope they enjoyed the change of scene, and at least they came away with a stash of apples.

The highlight for my own Girl was meeting Rosebud, the gorgeous Highland calf who has recently made Indian Ladder her home.  Photos next time we visit, if I remember to take the camera...

Tootie-flutie

The Boy had his first flute lesson at school today.  It's a little early to say whether or not he'll be the next James Galway, but he enjoyed the class and managed to get a sound out of the instrument - so far so good.

I used to take flute lessons, many many years ago.  I'd better take this opportunity to apologize to my parents for never practising and therefore wasting their money - I didn't get beyond the first exam.  I was also a great disappointment to my French penfriend, a budding harpist who had looked forward to playing flute and harp duets with me when I went to stay.  I think she imagined something like this.  Well, like I say, I was a bit of a let down, but as that video shows, she does seem to have found some more than halfway decent musicians to hang out with since then.  Salut, Marie-Pierre Langlamet.  I was never worthy.

Meanwhile (feet back on the ground) just think:  next time I go to hear an orchestral arrangement of "Hot Cross Buns", my own son will be right in there, puffing away!

Signs of trouble

I mentioned the other day that the apple crop had suffered this year - bad news for apple growers and consumers alike.

I realised today, gently hiking around Five Rivers during an Animal Signs refresher class, that it's not just the apple trees that were affected by the unusual March weather.  At this time of year a whole lot of trees and bushes should be covered with fruit and berries, enabling birds and animals to fatten up or fill their food stores for the winter.  But this year there are hardly any berries, few acorns or other nuts, and of course no apples in the orchard.

So whether the coming winter is harsh, or mild like the last one, it looks like it's going to be tough for local wildlife.  I'm making a note at least to fill my birdfeeders generously come the season.

Air return

The Girl survived her camp-out in the rain, and with more sleep than anyone had anticipated.   Apparently they had to share quarters with some third graders who needed an early night, which put paid to any midnight shenanigans. Their leader was delighted, the 7th grade girls not so much.

Even so, our Girl came home feeling rather tired (over the course of the camp they'd been kayaking, cooking and...playing bingo?  All quite exhausting, anyway), and she joined me in spending an uneventful afternoon at home.  Meanwhile the Man took the Boy and his buddy to the Empire State Aerosciences Museum near Schenectady.

The Man adds...it is a couple of years since our previous visit, but little has changed. Sadly the "landing a model plane" challenge which occupied the Boy for a good while before was  not working, but there were plenty of other buttons to press and quaint models to look at, crammed into two small galleries.  The exhibits ranged from balloons and pre-powered flight through to lunar landing, and included large displays on Amelia Earhart and (my favourite) Antartica.   The fine weather allowed us to linger outside among the twenty or so post-war US and Soviet military aircraft (not forgetting one Royal Navy plane).

As is often the case in such places (stop me if I've said this before) we had the whole museum to ourselves.  

Apples limited

The Girl was out of the house before 8am and on her way to Scout Camp.  It was a beautiful day for an outdoor adventure, but this evening the rain has been bucketing down, so the group of girls and their noble adult leader probably have quite a soggy night to get through.

Meanwhile, the Boy had a fun morning with his sleepover friend.  We all eventually ended up at the Farmers' Market, where the friend was returned to his own family.  The Boy then immediately arranged to go and spend the afternoon with his best buddy - so, a sociable day for him.

The Man and I spent our afternoon getting the safety cover on the pool.

 

Then we visited Indian Ladder Farms.  In common with other apple farms in the region, ILF has had a minimal crop this year thanks to the unusually hot weather in March, which brought the trees into bud too early and was followed by a killing frost.  So there have been limited apple-picking weekends this season, and trees have been quickly picked out.  Today was a picking day, and happily-appley the crowds had turned out in force to support their local farm.  They came to buy not just apples but pumpkins and gourds, and to line up for the famous cider-donuts ("Orders limited to 2 dozen").

Give a little whistle

This evening I took the Boy to a family picnic on his school field.  We didn't go to dine al fresco - there was nothing on the pizza/hotdog/burger menu that appealed to the world's pickiest eater (or me either, to be honest) - but the Boy wanted to spend some time with a good friend who is no longer in his class.  They did plenty of running about and rolling on the grass etc, like you do, before deciding that a sleepover was in order.  So we now have an extra child under our roof.

But tomorrow we'll be minus one: the Girl is going off camping with her scout troup.  She has been instructed to take a whistle "in case of emergencies", which hints at all kinds of woodland derring-do and survival situations.  Judging by previous camps, however, all she'll actually be required to survive is a sleepless night of nattering and too much candy - and frankly she could already write a book about that.

Meet the teachers night

Tonight the Man and I have been meeting the teachers at the Girl's school.  As last year, the evening was formatted as a compressed school day, and we shuttled from classroom to classroom, ten minutes with each teacher, and just time to exchange brief smiles and hellos to the other parents we recognised in the hallways.

And as last year, we were generally impressed by what we saw and heard from the teachers - they all seem enthusiastic and positive.  Most of them genuinely seem to like 7th graders, which has to be a plus.   The Boy's new teachers at his schools' open house event last week seemed similarly full of bounce and enthusiasm.  There'll no doubt be highs and lows along the way, but I think both our kids should have a pretty good year.

Cold plunge

I spent a fair old chunk of the afternoon hauling leaves out of the pool and vacuuming it so that we can "put it to bed" tomorrow.  It has gone sadly unused since we got back from Maine nearly three weeks ago. Something about the change over from August to September, from vacation to back-to-school, drives out all desire to swim (something about the temperature suddenly taking a dive at night, leaving the water frigid, probably contributes to the lack of enthusiasm too).

Though actually there has been one swimmer among us.  The Man was the last one in, on Sunday, for a few brisk laps.  Strangely enough, he came down with a cold the next day - surely no connection?

Working on a retainer

The Man writes...an early start to get down to the Y for the Girl's skating lesson. She and her coach got stuck into preparing a new program for her next competition, skating to an orchestral version of "Eleanor Rigby".  I sat groggily in reception nursing a polysterene cup of hot, black, vaguely coffee-ish water, watching a man on "Your" Local News warning of flooding and tornadoes in an unnaturally cheery way.

The Girl left clutching an ice pack to her knee, but nevertheless elated and energized. We drove on to the Middle School in heavy rain, only to find that the parents of all the 1200 other students had decided to drive their kids in today. A consequence perhaps of the wet weather together with new policy of "central bus stops" (as opposed to collecting kids from their doorsteps). As I left the queues of cars waiting to drop off their kids at the front doors were threatening to bring gridlock to the surrounding area, and the police were arriving to try to restore order.

Meanwhile, it seems that despite having his braces finally removed after over year,  the torment for the Boy is not yet over. Today he got one of his new retainers, which seem if anything to be even more uncomfortable and hard to get used to.

At the other end of the day, the Girl helped the Boy with his Math homework. She patiently explained how to convert fractions to decimals and vice versa.  Help willingly offered and gratefully accepted - it was a scene of remarkable harmony.

Not too amazing

The kids were off school today for Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year.  The Girl spent the afternoon with a friend, and I took the Boy and his buddy to the Crossings at Colonie, to revisit a maze we last explored several years ago (if I wrote a post about it at the time, alas I can't find it now).  I remembered the maze as being rather good, but today it was very disappointing.  So many people have pushed between the trees that make up the walls of the maze that there's really nothing 'mazing about it - all routes lead directly to the centre.

So we gave up on that and took a bit of a walk around the Crossings, which is a big public park with an extensive children's playground and then mostly large areas of tired-looking grass divided by tarmac [blacktop] paths.  It's rather uninspiring if you're used to the more interesting scenery of, say, Five Rivers, Thacher Park or the Huyck Preserve (but fair enough, you can't very well rollerblade at any of those places).

Eventually we gave up on the Crossings altogether and repaired to a Stewarts shop for ice-cream.  Both boys chose chocolate, but I've rediscovered a liking for mint-choc-chip.  What's your ice-cream flavour of choice these days?

Retail jungle

The Girl went on a hike with her Girl Scout group today, through a preserve round the back of - of all places - Glenmont Walmart.  Apparently a condition of the building permission for Walmart was that thirty-some acres of land behind it should be left "forever wild".

And wild it sounds!  Our intrepid explorers followed unmarked trails (they were being led by one of the girls' dads who does this sort of thing for a living) and the whole experience was, by all accounts, rugged and jungle-like. 

The purpose of the mission was to put up an owl nesting box.  So I expect there'll soon be a satisfied owl settling in to a comfortable modern residence, handy for shops and restaurants.

Fall Festival to remember

Once more we had a lovely, fine day (if a little breezy) for the Fall Festival at Five Rivers.  As ever and always, it was an excellent event, well attended by lots of happy visitors.

Paper-whipping breezes notwithstanding, things went smoothly in the kids' crafts area.  Like last year, I had an able assistant in Exile #3, plus several other good helpers.  We made cardboard owls with newspaper wings and bottle-top eyes; bracelets from sections of cardboard tube; and crayon-decorated yoghurt pots and bottles.  Loads of kids came through and seemed to have fun.

An additional event today, timed to coincide with the festival, was the official opening of the new Guided School Program building.  It's named for the late Wendy Repass Suozzo, who in 1978 founded the outdoor education programme still run by Friends of Five Rivers.  Since then, a quarter of a million school children have had the opportunity to explore Five Rivers' trails and wildlife habitats with the programme's volunteer instructors.  A new building created specifically to carry on Wendy's initiative is a great way to honour her remarkable legacy.

The day in brief

Highlights of the day:

• morning coffee and catch-up with Exile #2;
• getting all my crafty activities in order for tomorrow's big event at Five Rivers;
• an after-school there-and-back hike to our local diner, including (but of course) ice-cream;
• watching the Girl working hard on the ice during her skating lesson, ending with a rather impressive burst of speed-skating.

Tomorrow will be full and busy - I'm aiming for an early night tonight.

Ping pong

It says something about my dedication to housework that it has taken me five years to realise it's possible to lift up the whole stovetop in order to clean it properly. 

But to my credit, I think, having discovered this fascinating trick I've devoted a large part of the day to giving the whole cooker a good old scrub-down.  To my discredit, instead using nothing but healthful lemon juice and elbow grease I made full use of a range of stinky chemical cleaning products.

The Girl assures me that the cooker now sparkles with pinging cartoon-style brightness.

Time trials

I tend to look forward to the end of the summer - It'll be good to get everyone back into a routine, I think.  I'll be able to get lots done.

Forgetting, of course, how crazy September always turns out to be.  Before and after school activities to schedule around.  Endless school paperwork to wade through, including of course the first wave of year-round PTO fundraising requests.  Inevitable emergency school supply requirements (I need a composition book! By tomorrow morning!) necessitating mad dashes to Staples.  And meetings, meetings, meetings for this or that kid's school, or whatever group - between the Man and me one or other (or both) of us is out every evening.  Sigh.

Good news for the Girl this week, though.  As of today she is assigned to a different bus schedule, giving her a whole 15 minutes extra to play with each morning.  Snooze buttons are go - hooray!  Though not tomorrow, of course, when we'll be setting the clocks for 6:30am to get her to an early skating lesson.  Urgh.

Fascinating facts about boring insects

This morning I was at Five Rivers for the start of a new season of volunteer instructor training. 

While new volunteers got the lowdown on basics for teaching outdoors, the rest of us were given a presentation on invasive species.  The main focus was the Emerald Ash Borer (EAB) which is becoming quite a scourge in some areas of New York and in many other states.  It chews its way up and down ash trees and kills them.  It's difficult to detect until the damage has already been done, and it's pretty well impossible to eradicate.  Ultimately (our presenter from the Forest Health Diagnostic Lab sadly predicted) EAB will most likely wipe out at least 95% of this region's ash trees.

The main cause of the spread of EAB is human movement, particularly human movement of firewood.  To slow EAB's progress (and perhaps give environmental scientists enough time to find a way of halting it altogether) laws have been introduced to prevent people from transporting untreated firewood beyond a 50 mile radius.  So, if you're planning on camping in New York State or quite a few other places in the USA, reckon on buying your firewood at the campsite - bring your own and you could end up paying a hefty fine and/or spending a couple of weeks in jail.

If you're interested, there's a whole lot more about the regulations (and the reasons for them) here.  Read to the end and you may be relieved to discover that it is absolutely fine to transport Christmas trees as far and wide as you want.

Unbrace yourself...

The Boy's braces came off today.  Yaaaay! 

It has been a long year and a bit.  Removing a mouthful of metal proved to be an uncomfortable process, but it was worth it (though
you'll have to take my word for it. Lendl-like, the Boy won't crack a grin for the camera, even on such a momentous day).

A long year...without popcorn.  Guess what was on the menu tonight?

Sanctuary

It's a while since any of us have been here.

The Girl and Boy were busy with other activities, so the Man and I popped over to Hollyhock Hollow for a quick hike through the woods.  I think we were the only people there - we didn't see anyone else on the trails, only squirrels and chipmunks.
 
On our way round we admired some quarried stone reputed to be the same as that used to build the Brooklyn Bridge.

Though nowhere near as challenging or view-tastic as our recent hikes in Acadia, we enjoyed the trees (noisy with birds) and the river and having this rather lovely place to ourselves.

Wise owl

So of course I haven't spent the day cycling around town with a megaphone promoting Five Rivers Fall Festival. 

I didn't want to look silly...

Long and drawn out

The car was due for yet another service so I took it in this morning.  It was only supposed to take an hour, but it turned out it needed some work and I ended up being stuck there for three and a half hours.  Grrr. 

On the upside, I spent some of that time at the nearby Salvation Army Thrift Store, where I managed to pick up a Pictionary set for under a dollar.  This resulted in some quality family time this evening.  Well, some family time, anyway.

Poster poser

Today I've been schlepping round putting up Five Rivers Fall Festival (Sat. Sept 15, 12-4pm) posters.  Whereas postering somewhere like Linton consists of a nice walk around the village running into neighbours, in my current suburban setting everything is just too spread out.  I've been hopping in and out of the car a lot and running in and out of cafes and shops, school and church lobbies...anywhere that I knew I could find a noticeboard.  Of course, the only people who are going to see the posters are the ones that choose to jump out of their own cars and visit these places.

In previous years we've also put posters up on telegraph poles - an effective way of reaching a population of motorists - but a new town law has been introduced restricting the placement of posters and lawn signs on public property.  I can understand why (too many tacked-up homemade posters can start to look a mess; lawn signs at junctions and on roundabouts etc can be distracting) but on the whole I think it's a pity. Community events organisers have lost a cheap and easy way advertise what's going on.  The community has lost those handy ("Ooh, is that tomorrow?") reminders of what's coming up. 

I don't know what the answer is.  Any suggestions?  Plaster my car with posters, maybe, and just drive around with a megaphone? Or better still, cycle?

School year resolutions

Back to school. 

For the Girl, an unaccustomedly long walk to a school bus stop: due to district budget cuts, those yellow buses are no longer offering door-to-door service.  Naturally our Girl is outraged, though frankly it will do her NO HARM AT ALL to have to walk further than the length of her own driveway each day.

For the Boy, a new classroom, schedule and classmates to get used to.  In previous years he has found so much change at once quite a challenge, but this time he seems to be managing it all quite cheerfully.  There you go, he's growing up.

For me, a backlog of projects to work through.  Five Rivers Fall Festival is just a week and a half away, and I've a lot to do to prepare for that.  But there are Fair Trade things to think about too, not to mention numerous jobs to attend to around the house and yard...  I'm full of determination and resolve to get things done - and I think I'll start by overhauling the calendar and redesignating September as the real New Year.

Going green

Well, it's happened again - two months have concertina'd up into nothing and the summer vacation is at an end.  A bittersweet day for the kids.  Well, mostly bitter, really.  However both have seen school-friends today: the Girl has found out that she'll be sharing most of her schedule with at least one good friend, and the Boy has found out that there are definitely going to be two people he likes in his class, and that his new teacher is reputed to be "really nice". 

Though we certainly enjoyed our holiday in Acadia this summer, we did all miss our annual trip to the UK, and we're sorry not to have seen family and friends.  Travel plans were complicated this year by the fact that we had entered the Green Card process.  That was, at times, a rather stressful business, involving a great many medical appointments to ensure that we had all had chickenpox, weren't carrying TB etc etc.  Anyway.  When we returned from Maine this weekend we found our Green Cards waiting for us. 

Disappointingly, they are not very green.  But having them does mean that we are now "permanent residents" of the USA until, I suppose, such time as anyone changes their mind.

Hair-raising experiences

Here, a little later than promised, are some photos from Thursday's climb up the Beehive Trail. 

I found it a bit hairy - several sections were pretty much vertical and required the use of metal supports set into the rock. 

But the children took it all in their stride and seemed to have no qualms at all. 

As with many of the trails we took in Acadia, there were great views from the top.

Alas, we have no whale photos to share.  What with the light challenges caused by the sunset, the unpredictability of the whales, the motion of the boat and the increasing seasickness of the photographer it proved difficult to get pictures.  You'll just have to take our word for it that we saw what we saw.

Seasoned travellers

Today has mostly been about heading home.

Our route was rather scenic - New Hampshire is pretty much all trees, we seemed to drive for miles through forest.  Over the border into Vermont, we detoured through Brattleboro, which looked like it might repay another visit some day.  Likewise I plan to return to Bennington (apart from anything else, the Lil' Britain fish and chip shop was closed today - ngg).  Between those two towns, here's a view taken during a brief stop on Hogback Mountain, VT.

From Bennington we were suddenly back in New York state, where we were reminded to turn our thoughts to autumn - pumpkins on sale at the sides of the road, and signs for those seasonal "mums".  And to think just a week ago here it was still full summer...

Then only an hour more in the car, and we were home.  Sad in a way - this has been one of our best ever family adventures - but there's also plenty to look forward to once the fall really gets underway.

Must (butter)fly

We checked out of our rented cottage just after 10am, ready to crack on and get a few miles of our homeward journey under our belts.  But first we thought we'd drop in for five minutes at the Charlotte Rhoades Park and Butterfly Garden, which happened to be just across the road from where we'd been staying. 

It was so lovely that we ended up staying almost an hour.  The kids had fun taking photos of flowers and butterflies, and the Man and I sat thinking how great it would have been to have brought our books and coffees with us here each morning, if only we'd known...

Ah well.  We finally tore ourselves away, and set about getting those miles under our belts.  Except that the Boy announced that he'd really like to swim in a lake, and we were so near Echo Lake, and the Man fancied another swim himself, so...

Ninety minutes after leaving the cottage, we had, oo, fully a mile of our journey under those belts of ours.

We did, however, push on after that.  Down through Maine on the I-95 (we stopped off near Portland to stretch our legs in Fort Williams Park, where we admired a lighthouse and chatted with a friendly ice-cream seller).  And eventually we made it to Concord, NH, where we are overnighting before finishing our journey tomorrow.

Highly adventurous

After brunch at Cafe 2 in our little seaside town, we drove up just north of Mount Desert Island so that the kids could have an "aerial adventure" at the Acadia Fun Park, which we'd noticed on our way here last Saturday.  A huge high ropes course by the side of the road was too tempting to pass up...

In the event the Girl had a fabulous time, and the Boy was, quite frankly, scared witless.  They were required to stick together the whole time as "buddies" (it's a safety policy for the course, plus the Boy couldn't reach high enough to clip his own belay ropes).  So kudos to the Girl, for setting aside her frustration and patiently helping her terrified brother; and bravo to the Boy, who showed real courage in pushing through his terror and keeping going for nearly two hours (though he couldn't quite dare to try out the zipline).

The children took a break after their exertions - the Man and I left them at the cottage while we explored Bass Harbor Lighthouse and the very pretty Ships Harbor Trail.  We then collected the kids for a last mad dash to Sand Beach.  Yes, Man, Girl and Boy swam in the sea again, even though the sun had set and the water was chilled - bonkers they are, the lot of them.