Eight Days, Fifty Cookies, and Greener Mountains

It's amazing to watch an entire forest grow.

I think I might have found the hardest thing to enjoy and love without being able to share: The sky at night. I wish that I could take a picture of the stars here, because they are breathtaking. I just hope that the stars wherever you find yourself at night are just as amazing. Or, even better, that one night you may be able to lay with me in the grass and enjoy the same sky.

Activities here have hit a pretty happy medium, and I've become very comfortable with the schedule that I've unknowingly made for myself. I have been waking up somewhere around 6:42 every morning. Immediately I have a minor anxiety attack, I breathe, and then I eat two bowls of cereal. (Usually on the back porch.) This is followed with a trip to the greenhouse, and a couple of hours on the swing set or in the sand box with the kids. Then I bake cookies, or cakes, or lunch. Go back to the green house. Go looking for minnows in the creek... and so on and so on. Lunch, Dinner and tea all take place somewhere in the midst of all that and then by 9 I am completely ready for bed. It's amazing.

I got myself a very part-time job (only 10 or so hours a week) at Yestermorrow doing some basic cleaning to fill in some time and make a little extra money when I'm not busy here or gardening with Faustina. It's not the most exciting or rigorous job I've ever had, but it does pay the same as my job in Boston (which is unheard of here...) and I get the most amazing benefit- Free classes! I am aloud to take any and all of the 1-3 day courses and 1 full time class for free while I'm employed there. Incase you don't know, Yestermorrow is an amazing design/build school in Warren that has classes like rooftop gardening; igloo, clay home and yurt building; and basic tool instruction. (Click here to go to their webpage.)

My dad came for a visit today. I was actually very pleasantly surprised, he took a red-eye in from California this morning, slept for only 2 hours, then got in his car and drove 3 hours to get here. After giving him the grand tour of the grounds here we sat down by the river, then took the back roads to Warren and went to Warren falls. He, just like me, loves the hypnotic roar of the falls and could probably have sat there in the sun all day. He stayed for some eggplant and got to know the McHugh family a little better, then headed home. Not a bad way to spend my first full saturday here. Tomorrow I'm headed back to Boston to clean up the mess I left behind and maybe give the city the farewell it deserves. I have to admit, part of me really misses the city. More on that later. After 8 days of amazing, sunny, warm and even hot weather... we are preparing for a cooler, rainy, indoor week. It should be interesting.

Where some of the magic happens: the "real" kitchen.

My first fudge cakes............A Dudash legend.

Strawberries and chocolate with the extra fudge frosting.

Some of the fifty hand-sized cookies that I baked the other night.

This morning we got to hang out with some ducklings and chicks!

Carly and Peeper.

Dymphna found her walking cane hidden amongst her harley davidson t-shirts and "hippy dresses" up in the barn.

What will soon be an amazing help-yourself road-side vegetable stand that Pat and Eric are constructing! Eventually complete with birch log posts, cedar shingle roof, and a ton of fruits and vegies.

Lots of ladders.

Josh still loves tractors.

The irony of Josh watching a video of himself watching a video of him jumping on the bed. It entertained him for a very long time.(Get it?)

Dad enjoying the falls.

Bailey helped me with the first batch of mint sea salt scrub. I'll use it in the shower tonight for the first time.