http://www.blogger.com/html?blogID=1755139666841541603 about a dream: October 2014

Friday, October 24, 2014

What a birthday!!

Such a big day! It started with some amazing presents in the morning:

Presents and cards and presents oh my!
 To Des! Frume Maggie! So darn cute.

But she wasn't so cute any more after school, when she transformed into....

SKELETON BRIDE!!

Man, that is one creepy little kid!
 The dead flowers were her idea. Perfect!

Adorable, sweet Nina was a cheerleader. A ZOMBIE cheerleader!!

I made the shirt, but the skirt is the one Karen made Anna years ago.
 She made the zombie leg tights all by herself. They both looked great.

Then, I've neglected to mention this, but Maggie's had her first wiggly tooth. It's gotten really loose lately, then today she bit down on something and it got really loose.  Sure enough, we picked her up from the party, and look!:

Egads!!
My baby lost her first tooth!!!!!! What a day!

Saturday, October 18, 2014

Damariscotta pumpkin festival

Photos! The pumpkins were SO COOL! And it was a banner year for growth, holy moly. Check them out!

Kissing pumpkins, so Maggie joined in on the love!

Medusa! Scary! This was probably a 300 lb pumpkin.
 Look at the mastery on this bad boy:

This is a painted pumpkin. So big I couldn't even get far enough away!
But the winner is...
 Can you see that tag? It says this pumpkin weighs one thousand, six hundred, and ninety-five pounds.

Just, wow. Let that sink in for a minute. One THOUSAND, six HUNDRED, ninety-five. Just a ninety-five pound pumpkin would be ridiculously big, but this!!

We didn't catch the regatta, that was on Monday. What's a pumpkin regatta you ask? Surely Mainers aren't crazy enough to hollow out a pumpkin, attach an outboard motor, and race them, are they?



Yup.

Marley has been all about mommy lately

It used to be that Moxie was my mommy's boy, but I dunno, what do you think?


This has been us every day this week. It would be easier to cuddle if he wasn't bigger than me!

You can't see Moxie here, but he's curled up at my feet. They can't handle it when I'm back to work. I'll have to quit to be a full-time stay at home mommy to my fur babies!

I'm not the only one getting the snuggles though...



He loves to put his arms around her and give her big hugs! They may be hairy and make a ton of work, but what can I say... we love these guys!

Monday, October 13, 2014

Some apple picking.

Yeah, some. Ha! We've taken home about 50 lbs of apples so far this season, which primarily has been turned into 50 lbs of apple pie and apple crisp. Yum!

I think it was last weekend that Mom, me, and the girls met up with our old friends the Mosses at Hope Orchards. It was a lovely drive and beautiful, sunny fall day. And of course, yummy!

Pumpkins!
We sat on these pumpkins, but didn't buy any. They were pricey pumpkins!!

Here's some teenager we found there.... oh wait!! OMG it's NINA!
 We walked a bit to the pickin' trees, and picked ourselves some apples. Not too many apples, because they were nearly as expensive as their pumpkins.

Happy kids, happy-ish grandma. She doesn't love the farm scene.
Some other friends of ours were there too, so it was  fun time. We ran around the trees, jumped over puddles, and generally had a good, old-fashioned, farmyard kind of day.


But we didn't get that many apples, so I convinced everyone to hit up a second orchard in Damariscotta. See, Biscay Orchard's apples are only 80 cents per pound, and they give FREE drops. Free. That means the apples lying on the ground under the trees are yours for the taking. So we bought a few more pounds, and got maybe 10 more pounds of drops. By then we were super hungry too, so the girls got some cider and snacks at the farmstand.

And see how beautiful their apples are?
Wonderful fall we're having. Today I baked up one apple crisp, one apple pie, and one pumpkin pie. Is it summer vacation yet, because I need a break!!

Busy weekend!

First, more photos from homecoming:

Walking. Like an Egyptian.
 Fantastic costume if I don't say so myself. I pulled that bad boy together in about 15 minutes. See, Thursday was a super hectic day. The high school ran a short day that was over at 11, to give the kids time to get their floats and bonfire together. Maggie had her final cavity appointment at 1:45 in Brunswick, so I picked up the girls, visited mom and grandma, fixed the cavities, hit up WalMart for another 50 lbs of dog food and some gold fabric, then raced home to make the costumes. Then the three of us ran out again, oversaw the kids on the float, and then watched the bonfire.




The bonfire was mostly brush, so it burned up fast and hot, then burned down fairly quickly. But it was a lovely clear night with no wind at all, so perfect for a bonfire.

Finally we got home around 9 or so. The girls had Friday off but I had to be at work. Sheesh, no wonder I'm still exhausted on Monday!

Saturday, October 11, 2014

Homecoming!

What a fun week we've had! On Thursday was homecoming at the high school, and this year they resurrected the Homecoming Parade tradition. I'm a junior class advisor, and the kids asked if I'd chaperone their float during the parade. I said no. But then I said Yes, if my kids could ride on the float too. They said absolutely!

The theme was ancient Egypt, and here's the final product:

Such cuties, all of them!!
The girls and I put those costumes together in about 20 minutes from an old sheet, some fabric we'd bought earlier in the day, and a few odds and ends from around the house. Not bad!

The girls had a blast riding on the float. I rode in the back of the pickup pulling the float (the teenager at the far right of the photo is an absolute doll, and she watched the girls on the float). Then we went to the bonfire, always a lot of fun.

Erik, Isabelle, Joey, and Chester had arrived around 5:00, and all of us plus Grandma and Grandpa and Isabelle's mom and aunt were there, so super fun family time.

Then yesterday I had an inservice day, but the girls got to hang out with everyone. They even went on a hike and picnic lunch to Oven's Mouth.

This morning Nina and I made pancakes and applesauce for breakfast (with a little help from Maggie!), and soon we'll head out to the Fall Foliage Festival. I'll have more pics, especially of Joey's adorable smile, I promise!

Saturday, October 4, 2014

Millions of peaches

Peaches for me
Millions of peaches
Peaches for free

And they really are free! Just when I was ready to give up on our limb-dropping, branch-dying, trunk-cracking peach tree, it goes and produces a bounty of sweet, delicious, free peaches for us! Hooray!!

Look:

32 peaches, about 1/3 of what I've gotten thus far
 Some of them look utterly perfect, like peaches from the grocery store. Others have blemishes, but they're only superficial. They taste heavenly.

This morning, I blanched these 32, peeled them, and cut and froze about 20. The rest I cooked into this gorgeous peach cobbler:

It tastes amazing...
 I thought it'd be dessert today, but with the way the girls are already eating it, it's not going to last until lunchtime.

This is the second such peach cobbler we've made, and I think all of these delicious desserts are starting to show up on Nina's figure. What do you think?

She's looking a little bigger, isn't she?
 Especially right there in the hip/butt area..


Kidding! It's a pillow suit!
Ha!

Aside from the peach preparation, life here has been busy but good. Wednesday were our high school parent-teacher conferences and open house, so that was a super long day for me. That was also the day Nick got in from Austria, so dad picked him up at the bus stop at 9 pm and he got home around 10. The girls were out for the night, but they had their joyful reunion in the morning.

On Friday Nick chaperoned Maggie's field trip to Squirrel Island (an island which, in spite of its name, has no squirrels living on it), and they came home exhausted.