Pie

Vermont is an unique kind of place, in that people will actually leave money boxes out for people to pay for products they are selling.  Take this place for example.  Near the library we frequent there is a house, with a tiny little shack on the far end of their yard.  In that shack are really good pies stored in refrigerators.  You go in, pick out your pie, and leave money in the box attached to the wall.  There are several places that I know of in Vermont where this is the case. I have not lived in any other place where that is even remotely possible. Any other place that I have lived not only would the box be gone, but so would the pies. I love Vermont!

Bloom Continued

Task 12: Fort Ticonderoga

Visiting Fort Ticonderoga was actually not on my bucket list of places until last year.  When I went to a flower show, I found out that they have beautiful King's Gardens in addition to the fort.  Perfect, I thought, bring Little Man to see the fort and venture to the garden after.  Not only was that a perfect plan, but it was planned for a perfect day and we managed to get in just ahead of the tourist groups. 

 

For those who know nothing about it, Fort Ticonderoga is a Revolutionary and French and Indian War fort that is situated between two major bodies of water that controlled the northern access to the colonies.  It played a pivotal role in both the French and Indian and then the Revolutionary War. There is a lot more to the story than that, but that gives you the basic gist of where we were. 

Little Man had a blast pretending he was back in the Revolutionary War and occasionally would ask questions of the eager re-enactors situated throughout the fort just waiting for someone to ask them questions.  Little Man was in his glory.....right up until the musket demonstration.  Loud noises do not go over well in our family.

Off to the King's Gardens we headed to escape the firing of guns. 

 My real reason for wanting to visit the garden was to get ideas for my own garden. I loved this little section of the children's garden: the chairs are surrounded by sunflowers.  I am going to try really hard to convince Andy that we need this for next year. 

Just before crossing back into Vermont we stopped at Crown Point State Park, another war site overlooking the lake.  It was supposed to be a quick walk around the ruins stop, but when I realized that the keys were locked in the car, it became longer then expected stop, while Andy drove an hour to get the keys out of our car.  They have a very cute inexpensive museum with a 15 minute video that you can watch, that was not all that bad.  A quick summary the French Built: a fort they later burned to the ground so the British would not get it, the British built a much larger impressive fort, and then during the Revolutionary war the colonists stormed it stealing all the artillery and shipping it to Boston, thus winning the Revolutionary War.  Or if you would rather, there are some really cool ruins at this site that are fun to walk around.

 

After looking at every possible thing we could at Crown Point, we walked across the road to a really cool lighthouse.  Cool, but a little on the high above the ground make your heart jump side.  Don't be fooled by the calm face on Little Man in the picture, once the picture was snapped, he quickly went back into the lighthouse.

 

Despite needing to be rescued by Daddy, we had a wonderful day and I am glad we went.  Even the wait was not all that bad, it gave us a chance to explore a little more than I had planned on.

Ready To Go

A couple from our church recently passed down their adult/teenagers child backpacks to Little Man.  He knows that there is a plan for the summer to take him backpacking and he is ready to go.  He actually came home, packed it with his sleeping bag and other essential items and placed it by the door.  Thankfully, school ends next week and while we have Vacation Bible School our first full week of break, backpacking will be coming soon.  Wish us luck because I have a funny feeling I am going to end up carrying both backpacks up the mountain once the thrill wears off.

Local Wine

We live in an area in which many local wineries are popping up all over the place.  Apparently everyone has figured out that there are some grapes that grow well in our colder climate and that ice wine is a wonderful thing, and everyone seems to be jumping on the bandwagon.  In fact, as I type, I can hear the gurgling sounds of my own wine happily fermenting in the next room.  Because of this it should come as no surprise that we know a few people that own vineyards in our area.  Here are a few things I have learned about Vineyards over the past few years. 

 

1. I have yet to travel to an ugly Vineyard.  The ones I have been to both in Vermont and Virginia are always beautiful and slightly on the dreamy nostalgic side. 

2. The ones in our area tend to host a variety of events to get people to come and visit these dreamy places, as if that were not enough.  On these wonderful occasions there tends to be great wine, good food, and wonderful company. 

3. The next one may be something unique to Vermont, but they tend to be surprisingly kid friendly in this area.  The one we went to this week has a great rock wall for boys to run and jump on (it is encouraged by the owners who are grandparents). In addition to this, they had hula hoops and soccer balls out for the kids to play with in the field, while the parents sat and enjoyed dinner and good conversations.  It was wonderful, although when traveling outside of Vermont, I would make sure the vineyards are kid friendly before taking your child.  The ones we have traveled to outside over Vermont have been more on the romantic/refined kid-less side. 

 

Task 11: Try a New Restaurant

I had a wonderful evening of actually trying two new places the other night and checked off my eleventh task with bliss. 

 

The first location I have to admit was not really a restaurant; in fact no food is served there, just wine.  I was meeting some of my runner friends there to make plans for a race we are all doing in August.  Oak 45 is a wine bar close to where Andy and I used to live.  When we lived there it was an empty building with nothing inside.  Since that time they have turned it into a wonderful wine bar with great wine.  We had such a great time that when our two hours were up in the parking garage, we all scrambled to move our cars to other parking locations and moved on to our second destination on the other side of the traffic circle.

 

The second destination is one of the restaurants that caused me to put "try a new restaurant" on my list of 35 tasks for 2014. Misery Loves Co. is this great restaurant where they think outside the box with their cooking.  Or at least outside the mainstream. To this point, we have not gone because we knew that it would be someplace that would end up costing a lot.  Plates come when they are ready and people share what they have because whatever you are eating is probably something the other people at the table have never eaten before.  While I ordered the "Smoked Potato Ravioli- green garlic, sea urchin bottarga, shrimp broth", I tried a little bit of everything.  It was wonderful and a perfect place for a group of friends.  I now understand the draw to sea urchin, or at least the aged stuff that I had.  It tastes a lot like bacon, which completely caught me off guard.  It was great! So check another successful item of my list for 2014. 

Why I Love my Yard

Just a taste of what is in bloom.



 

 

Task 10: Break 2 Hours in a Half Marathon

Yet another task for 2014 checked off; this one was a hard one.  My goal was to break 2 hours in a half marathon.  A two hour pace means you have to be running at 9 minutes and 10 seconds or less per mile.  Believe it or not, I managed to hold myself just under for most of my miles and came in with a chip time of 1 hour 58 minutes and 44 seconds.  Of course, I am still annoyed with the guy who kept stopping to wait for his girlfriend who was just behind me for most of the race and was texting the whole time.  If I were her, I would have dumped the man at the finish line.  

 Of course, the best part was the ice cream at a quirky ice cream shop afterwards.