Celebrating!

We have lots of summer birthdays in my family so we've had lots of celebrating to do the last few weeks!

The most recent round of celebrations started on Thursday for my birthday...I didn't take pictures but we had a delicious dinner at this restaurant.



It was delicious!

I did take a picture of one of my gifts - how beautiful! I've been spoiled this summer with our garden flowers....it'll be a sad day when the flowers are finally gone and I'll have to resort to grocery store bouquets again....



This weekend Matt was off doing celebrating of his own at a bachelor party in Atlantic City so he missed the rest of the family birthday time :) Saturday night we honored all the birthday girls (me, my mom, sister, and cousin!) with a big family birthday dinner complete with chocolate cake - yum. No pictures of this event either - I'm getting lazy with my picture taking - I'll be better I promise!

Sunday was my Mom's birthday. We spent the day at the lake - it was gorgeous. Summer is giving us her final hurrah with sunshine and temps in the high 80s! Sunday night we headed to a special dinner at my favorite place...Shelburne Farms.

Don't mind the squinting - as I said, summer sunshine was abundant!





The family minus Matt and my brother John - we missed you! I can't wait for you to visit in a few weeks :)



Hope you're having a good week - I can't believe it's almost September!

Busy, Busy

Sorry for the lack of posts! I've had several things keeping me busy and lacking blog inspiration :)

1. My iphone. It's addicting! I love it, love it. My favorite thing about it (aside from email) is the "Words with Friends" app. I'm not very good at scrabble but I'm getting practice.



2. School started this week. AH! Where did the summer go?! Wow - I've been busy tracking down teachers, setting up my desk, and figuring out how in the world I'm going to see all 40 of my kids in just a few short days a week. I've also had to learn a new assessment so that I can help with preschool screening - wish me luck!

3. Scabies Outbreak at my other job. You read that right. Scabies. The rare, extremely contagious kind too. Ew. When you work in health care you have to expect these types of things, but it didn't keep me from freaking out. I'll spare you and not attach a link or a picture. Google it if you dare and you will see why. Don't worry - Matt and I have both gone through treatment so we are hopefully scabies-free (unless I was recontaminated - ah)!

Luckily I have fun things coming up to keep me distracted!

- My birthday tomorrow

- My mom's birthday on Sunday

- My sister and dad come this weekend

Yay!

Upgrade

I finally made the jump to a modern day phone. As an early birthday present Matt decided to get me out of my Verizon contract ahead of schedule :) Goodbye sidekick, hello iphone!

It takes pretty good pictures for a phone too - check it out!



The only drawback is having to memorize a new number. I think it's a small price to pay.

Matt's Parents Visit

Matt's parents came to visit us last week. We had lots of fun and I think they got a good taste of why we love Vermont so much :)

We started by acting like tourists on Church Street...



Spent time hanging out at the lake...







Did some hiking...







And tried to get a few family photos :)







We're excited to see you guys again soon! Thanks for visiting!

xoxo

Oh yea - that makes the score now Travelers 5 - Airlines 1.

Cousins!

We've had so much fun this past week with lots of our family in town :) First, Matt's parents were here...a post on their visit is coming up next!

A lot of my extended family was in town as well. Aunts, uncle, cousins... We spent a lot of time at the lake, participating in all the planned events.

First up was the regatta...We had a big crowd this year.



6 of us participated in the canoe race - here were are in preparation...





We looked pretty good on the way over!




Sadly, one of our boats come in second to last and the other came in last. It wasn't for lack of effort! My grandpa and uncle stayed strong to the end...



Up next, the ice cream social! I didn't get any photos of that but about 18 cartons of ice cream were eaten - yum! There are still about 4 leftover in our freezer :)

Then came the Addison County Fair and Field Days!

4 cousins + 1 girlfriend :)



The cutest car riders that ever existed...



I mean, come on, could they be more adorable?!





We rode lots of rides...







Including running through the fun house.



We had a great crowd to cheer us on....



No trip to a Vermont county fair is complete without a visit to the maple house!



To get a maple milkshake...



We also visited the Demo Derby...



And Goatutopia....



The kids ended the evening with a ride on the Ferris Wheel - the "big kids" rode a few of the more scary rides before we left :)



They all left yesterday and things feel pretty quiet around here now....

Soap Dispenser DIY

My mom and I did a fun DIY when I was home a few weeks ago...making a soap dispenser out of a Mason Jar. It looked cute and so easy! We sent one of the finished products to Meg for her birthday so I didn't want to reveal it until she opened her presents :)

My mom came across the idea on another blog...you can find the full set of directions here.

As I mentioned, it looked easy. Find a Mason Jar with a metal lid. Drill a hole in the top. Place an old soap dispenser pump in the hole and seal it with epoxy. Fill the jar with soap.

I'm sorry that I didn't take pictures of the project in progress. It was a humorous one that included hammers, drills, a vice, many bottles of soap, and trips to several different stores! After all that plus a few other snags...who knew you had to buy a special hole driller AND drill "centerer" for making holes in metal?...we had a finished product!



Beautiful right? Here is my Mom's in it's new home at the lake.



Mine sits by my kitchen sink.

One other funny thing...we were out downtown one night and walked by a cute store on the way home. I've been wanting to check it out so I made everyone stop to browse in the windows. Guess what we saw? That's right - an identical soap dispenser!



I just had to know how much it cost so I went back the next day and checked the price....$23. After the process we went through, I'm not sure if it cost us more or less to do it ourselves! It was fun though, so that makes it worth it!

The furniture has arrived

The new porch furniture has arrived! It sure is nice to relax outside on the screen porch in such comfy furniture.





Willow is enjoying the new chairs out on the deck the most :)







Hope you're enjoying your week!

Battle of the Skies

One reason we decided to move to Vermont vs. our other options in the West, such as Jackson Hole or Denver, was because it was an easier place for our family and friends to visit. It's a 12 hour drive (Wyoming took us 33). If you fly from DC, it only take about an hour and half to get here and considerably less $$.

It's a sad fact of air travel these days that you don't expect things to go well. Actually, I expect to be delayed and rarely believe that I will arrive on time. In our years of travel to Vermont, we've learned to avoid connecting anywhere in New York City during the summer and to opt for long layovers.

Since living here, we've flown home to Virginia twice and have had 2 sets of visitors fly up without a problem. I've been amazed at how easy things seemed! If we're keeping score, that's Travelers 4 - Airlines 0.

Until Thursday.

We had an amazing weekend planned with 2 of our best friends from Virginia - sunny, cooler weather perfect for boating, swimming, and relaxing. We've been looking forward to it for months! They were scheduled to fly out of DC and arrived to the airport with hours to spare, ready to board their late night flight to Vermont. We thought they'd be here by 10:35pm. We thought wrong. Thanks to a day of southern thunder storms their flight was cancelled! US Air was of course not helpful in re-booking and couldn't get them in until over 24 hours later...too late to make coming to Vermont much of a vacation. They received a refund instead (at least they did get this). I would blame things on US Air, but I think they all have this problem...as illustrated below.



The airlines finally lived up to our expectations and won this round. The score is now Travelers 4 - Airlines 1. The battle continues today as we expect Matt's parents around 3. Wish them luck flying the "friendly" skies!

Summer Recipes

There is no way we could eat all those summer veggies without finding some new recipes! I've been blog stalking :) to find some great ones. I thought I'd share my favorites...

1. Creamy Corn Salad - I found this one on Fly Through Our Window and it is delicious! I used a little less mayo and added pickle relish instead of pickle juice but this one would be good however it is adapted! The only downside is that Matt hates cucumbers. I was hoping the taste might be disguised by the other ingredients but he wouldn't eat it - I had to find some others to share this with!

2. Summer Zucchini Bites - This one is from The Naptime Chef - yum! Matt did love these - what's not to love? Cheese, zucchini, breadcrumbs...

3. Skinny Turkey-Spinach Meatloaf - This one has been a favorite for a while now. This time I used shredded zucchini instead of spinach and it was delicious! I also leave out the regular ground beef and use all ground turkey.

If I'm being honest, I like to act like we're eating pretty "healthily" with the fresh vegetables and all, but we usually enjoy the meal with some of these as well :)

Garden Extravaganza

This post is dedicated to my friend Barrow because I know he so enjoys a garden update.

Our garden has been overflowing lately. We can't keep up! Each time I go to the lake I come home with delicious tomatoes, squash, zucchini, beans, and FLOWERS! I haven't bought produce in weeks now and it's so amazing.

Here are the pics...

Tomatoes





Squash



Beans



FLOWERS!













This is what our counter looks like these days...

I'm a little worried about how I'll keep up now that my Mom has headed back to Virginia....