Adirondacks 2010

Jack and the boys and our friends, Brian and Brandi, spent two days of last week camping and hiking in the Adirondacks. The boys have camped out plenty of times with Jack, but carrying a pack and being out for 2 nights was a first for them. All of it was new to Brandi. The weather was not good. The region had experienced some serious rain the day before the crew arrived and then it poured again during their first night. All of that precipitation made the trail a sloggy mess. The intrepid hikers were often hiking through ankle-deep mud. Jack and Brian were forced to abandon their original plan of bagging three of the high peaks. And while they did get to the top of Colden, it wasn't easy. Both Jack and Brian said it was some of the hardest hiking they had ever done. Given those obstacles, it is even more remarkable that the kids did amazingly well. They just hiked on without complaints. I'm sure the mountains of candy and chocolate the dads brought helped. I think this may be the beginning of a tradition.....

At the trail head


Jack had three sleeping bags in his pack, but the kids' packs weren't so light either!


Corban demonstrates some of the hiking which was required to summit Mount Colden.


Avalanche Lake


Success!

Lauren at 17 months

Little LuLu. What a little monkey she is. Even though Lauren is our 4th child, I am still delighted and amazed by the new things I see her learning all the time. Her communication skills are increasing - so many new words and understanding so much of what we say. She surprised me the other day when Annie was learning to walk like a duck. Hearing the word "duck", Lauren waddled into the bathroom and proudly emerged with a rubber duck in her hand. She is even reforming her bullying ways. Instead of relentlessly pushing her friends and siblings, she now moves in for a gentle pet while saying "Niiiiii" (for "nice") as if to remind herself about how she should treat other kids. She loves to play outside, to play around water and to give zerberts. She does not like any food that has color. An emphatic "NO!" is her response to our offers of fruits and veggies.

As her hair grows, it is starting to flip out and curl the way mine did when I was a little girl




She loves the kiddie pool, but she won't keep her hat on anymore. She's on to us now and won't even let us put it on her head.


Reading books

The house at the end of June

We may not have electricity, but just look at those stunning architectural details!

Arches on the back screen porch




Brackets under the gable ends

Corban's 7th birthday party

To celebrate Corban's birthday last week, we had a bonfire at the new house. It's hard to describe how wonderful it was to have friends celebrating with us at the new place. I was beaming the whole time.

I think Corban enjoyed the night. Running around with his friends and eating hot dogs and smores - can't go wrong with that party plan. Then a few friends joined Jack, Jakin, Corban and Annie in sleeping out by the fire that night.









Lauren had a run-in with a marshmallow

Mother's Day/Father's Day

When asked what gift I might like for Mother's Day, my response is always the same: a nap. I usually take naps on Sunday afternoon, but there's something different about the Mother's Day nap. I don't feel guilty even if I sleep for 3 hours. I love the nap.

Jack, on the other hand, chose to run a half marathon up Mt Greylock for Father's Day. While I was napping on Sunday afternoons, he was doing long trail runs to train for this race. I knew he was pretty serious about it when he checked with me a week before the race to make sure the clothes he wanted to wear would be clean on race day. That, and all of those 2 hour training runs. His hard work paid off. His 2:16 time was good enough for 23rd place (out of 157 finishers!). And all of the driving around the kids and I did to cheer him on worked out perfectly as well - we saw him within 2 minutes of arriving at both destinations. whew!

After the run, Jack did enjoy laying on the couch and reading the paper for the rest of the day. But, I don't think he napped.







The day was super hot. Jack's time included a stop at every stream, brook, puddle, or drinking fountain he saw along the way. There was a little pond just short of the finish line. He said he didn't think he would be able to cross the finish line without turning right to soak himself first. He managed to hold off, but he did enjoy cooling off with Lauren as soon as he finished the race.

The summer begins

Here are some pictures that show some of the things we did in June to begin the summer.

A big part of beginning the summer is ending school. A group of home schoolers did a field day to end the year because home schoolers need to have field days too, you know.



June means berry picking! Even without Jack, we picked 29 1/2 pounds this year. That worked out to be about 9 batches of freezer jam, a bag of frozen berries for smoothies, one night of strawberry shortcake and about a week of all you can eat berries.





And the summer doesn't officially begin until we do THE Bonfire. I posted about it last year - this year was our 7th annual bonfire. Good times.



The adults above and the kids below.