Tuesday, December 23, 2014

BG 2014

A generous grandfather sent us tickets to the annual Labor Day celebration in Blooming Grove.  

The kids are veteran travelers at this point.  


But still kids.



We landed in Scranton, picked up the rental car, and Alexe immediately took us here, to this amazing outdoor farmer's market.  We loaded down the rental with bushels of peaches and apples, (yes, bushels,) and headed on to BG.  Can you see Alexe's smile?  It's huge.



Straight to Lake Laura.  u.Ted and a.Judy are beyond gracious hosts.  



Story time around the fire after dinner.



Alexe has been coming to BG her whole life, and loves it.  We've been lucky enough to have the same be true for Annaliese and Caspian.




Cousins! a.Jenny and her five daughters.



Lovely.



Dressed for dinner, and then a game of tag started.



I just missed the hand-holding cousins.



The Labor Day festivities include the Tomato War, and a number of other competitions.  Caspian in the green hoody, his cousin Nina from LA in the black tank top, and that may be Aureila in the blond-almost-white ponytail



Annaliese and Libby on the left.  Since coming back from this trip, Annaliese has started signing her homework with Libby, because it's her nickname.  After her teacher requested that she also include her own name, most work comes home with Annaliese-Libby at the top.




Caspian completing a not-so-long jump in the background.



Caspian finishing the obstacle course, Nina waiting on him.



He was feeling good about himself.  I think he took first on this one.,



Annaliese and Caspian both spent lots of time on the winner's podium.  My phone battery died, so this is my only picture.



Caspian headed our for a fishing trip with his uncle/aunt from LA and the 5 and under crew of cousins.



If you want to have your heart explode, get your six year old daughter to row you around a lake.




This place is chock full of moments.



c.Teddy, swarmed by the next generation of cousins.



Preparing for the Declaration of War.



What Wasps do when left alone in the woods.  Divide into Red and Black armies, and war on each other with tomatoes.



a.Eliza and her godson.



All the cousins! 



This year the war was a lot of waiting in the bushes for the Red Army to appear.  a.Mary took the kids after the kids war, (if you have to ask...) so Alexe and I had child-free-hangout time.



The kids were completely overwhelmed with all the cousins and activities.  They were exhausted and not on their best behavior, and then we managed to sneak away for a nap.  This is our little man waking up to his cousin, impatient for him to get up and rejoin the fray.  



u.Laurent lighting sparklers for the crew.



Kayaking.  Not sure who's in the seat, Annaliese is paddling, Caspian is on the front.



Mama and daughter swimming out to the buoy together.



Such a handsome man!



A fine kayaker in his own right.



And then, after a smooth and lovely trip, we headed to the airport.  Where our flight was cancelled.  We rocketed to Philadelphia to catch a different flight, a 2 hour mad dash, where the flight was again cancelled, in the middle of the night.



We found our way to a hotel, slept a little bit, and the next morning...



had an unhealthy breakfast...



and made it back to the airport in time to wait for a delayed flight to eventually take off and get us home.  u.c.Nick, who was meeting us in Memphis the night before and was traveling without a cell phone, had his own set of adventures.



August 2014

We took a little time to restock the family food reserves.  


Day 2 of school, Annaliese is more resigned to the idea of her brother being in her school.





She's a funny duck.


A care-package from the grandparents included a nerf shooter...



And a helicopter.



Not sure where these came from.



Annaliese and Billy have known each other since they were born.  He turned 7, and despite the huge water slide outside, these two were on the Wii.  (I had no idea Annaliese knew how to play a Wii.)



Jerry, my mason who worked with me for 10 months on the Blu-Buck buildings, is also a prize-winning watermelon grower.  This year the strange weather upset his melons and they stopped growing early, but he still brought them to work and parked them on Main Street with the tailgate down so people could admire them.



Two front teeth lost!



A rare occasion where someone else made the pancakes.  



Alexe put a lot of effort into Annaliese's lemonade stand.  Annaliese turned out to be a grumpy, shy, and self-conscious sales-girl, and grumpily served out her lemonade as quickly as possible.  She also left out the best part of her sign, because it was too frivolous.  It was supposed to read "Annaliese's Fabulous Lemonade Stand."



Pretty girls at the pool.