Beautiful views

Sunrise! What a beautiful spot to live. We are constantly in awe of the world around us here. This is a common site in the morning and our east-facing kitchen windows are the right spot to view it.

We have been finding all sorts of beautiful spots in NH through our geocaching adventures.
This is the Abenaki Tower overlooking Lake Winnipesaukee in Tuftonboro (near Melvin Village.) The kids have been up this tower several times in the past and this time was just as beautiful as we remembered it!


The view from the top was photo worthy on this blue sky, crisp fall day.

We went from this location to do a few caches (after grabbing the one here) and it was an adventure we will not soon forget. The "short" walk was much longer than anticipated so we were hoofing it back to the car at dusk, trying to beat the growing darkness.
I will bottle the moment toward the end when I passed our only flashlight off to Daddy and our youngest who were going to continue walking and then jogged up to the older boys. At my jogging approach they began to run. It was just like cross-country races from high school--only a little more giggling than I recall. We were certainly racing each other through the scrub pines on a single-track trail with uneven footing and laughing the whole way.
This track star mom could not catch those young teenagers who had wind enough to run, laugh and chatter while I had to concentrate on breathing just to keep up! They beat me to the car in the end, and I found one flat out on the moss to my relief as I would have taken the spot to rest too!
Muscles warm and a bit achy we stripped off the extra layers of clothes, popped the backpacks and walking sticks into the trunk of the car and then got in to warm it up. A moment to bottle for sure!

~Rachel

November

November! What happened to that month?

It seems like it just flew by. We were busy with schooling the kids and preparing for winter and lots of geocaching.

This first photo is of Brian working with a NH Fish & Game Biologist during Salmon Sunday. On this day the lake-locked Salmon which have been rounded up are "stripped". The process is very interesting.

Andrew was learning about density in science during November and this is one of his experiments of solution stacking. He was able to stack 4 solutions in the straw by their density. He also floated eggs and watched videos and there have been too many "dense" jokes going on!

Benjamin and Andrew got their awards at the end of soccer season. It's Ben's first trophy. We had a nice pot-luck with all the teams and said goodbye to soccer season in a bittersweet way!

Other November happenings in our homeschool involved the book club book "The Scarlet Pimpernel". We really enjoyed the classic and it sparked a whole study of the French Revolution. So much for my earlier history plans! 'Cest la vie.

We had a great group activity of making mouse trap cars, theater class has been going well, music lessons too and lots of excellent writing projects. Ben is finally turning a corner with learning to read and it has been a really neat experience for me as teacher to see him get excited about learning. We're sort of unschoolish so we have waited for Ben to be ready to learn. When he decided to learn or matured enough or whatever it was...this time is when he got *ready* to go and wow! the progress is astounding! He also lost his first baby tooth and learned to power slide his ATV. Important things in the life of a 6 year old!

I think that's a good recap of the month of November!

~Rachel

Trail Ride

What a beautiful day for a trail ride! This is my absolute favorite trail ride in the state. I have either ridden or volunteered on this ride for the last 8 years. Without a riding horse of my own this year I didn't think I'd be able to go. My friend Suzie called up and wanted a buddy! Yea! This is her beautiful mare Emily who I got to ride through 11 miles of the most beautiful scenery in fall foliage.
My friend was on her other horse Wind Dancer under this canopy of color.

We had so many beautiful spots to stop and take some photos. It was wonderful to meet up with friends out on the trail and back at the lunch. I feel so very thankful to have had such an incredible opportunity this fall.

Thanks Suzie! Thanks to Peggy Sue who puts on the best trail ride in NH too!

~Rachel

More Summer Activities - Yea!

This summer has been full of neat, fun things so far. We bought a used 4-wheeler and the kids have been having a blast with it in the field. All three of them are light enough to ride it and it gives them some more balance and driving practice (and is a blast to ride). Ben's been using it to drag branches out of the woods (with a rope tied to the back handle) and to the brush pile. Every once in a while we get a chance to get both 4-wheelers out and play follow the leader (in a slow pace way).



Another first for the area is our semi-large Trebucet (about 7 1/2 feet high from the deck to the axle of the throwing arm). We built it to throw pumpkins this fall and had a great time building it and throwing 1 gallon water jugs into the field. We also gave a class to 4 home school families to teach physics principles associated with this type of catapult (force, moment arms, inertia, radial velocity). It was very exciting and we had a great day with it. We loaded up the weight basket with 300 lbs, then 400 lbs and finially 500 lbs of rocks and threw the jug of water 67 yards - what a great splash when it landed! At the end of the day with our final shot, the bottom of the weight basket finially fell out (great timing) which was our "school bell" to release the class.



We've also gotten involved with the local soccer groups this summer. The recreation teams are great and we have a great forum for the kids to learn how to play without a lot of stress. They've all increased their talents wonderfully over the short 4-week timeframe. Benjamin is playing for the first time (it's great to see him progress) and Andrew is continuing his annual fun. Rachel and I are helping to coach Andrew's team and it's plenty of fun for all (we both get a chance to work with the kids).



Well, I have to go to work now. The leaves are turning beautiful around us now and we get a chance to experience another beautiful fall, and my commute becomes a treat for the eyes. More pictures and text on that later. Love to all.

Visiting Friends

What a wonderful weekend we had. We spent time relaxing (maybe not the right word) with friends in the Berkshires. We squished 2 huge suppers, 2 large breakfasts, a campfire, several geocaching expeditions, an ATV ride, a pontoon boat ride plus swimming, a horseback ride, a long stroll around Hancock Shaker Village and cave exploring all into about 42 hours...between thunderstorms!

WOW!

It was relaxing. We were keeping up our usual pace with friends who understand fun.
The first shot is of one of our long conversations on the back porch. The second is to capture a "first" in geocaching. We had 2 GPS units to work with and ours was clearly the lesser of them! This cache was tricky, it's near "Balance Rock and what a beautiful spot.




Night boating between thunderstorms had us a lake to ourselves! The pontoon boat was a highlight for the boys. Our captain, with a little chiming in from the first mate, anchored us over a really cool sand bar. The water was just 2 feet deep over the bar and the kids hopped off to swim and play until the storm started to light up the sky. Then off we headed for the dock with the first fat raindrops hitting just as we tied it up and headed for the cars.



This is a cave with one of the many Hidden Brooks in our friend's neighborhood. The boys are not much on spelunking but they were amazed at the rock formations and seeing the brooks disappear into underground places.


Hancock Shaker Village, the city of peace, was a wonderful field trip. We learned a ton and found it to be a city of peace. We watched their hydro powered mill work and toured many of the buildings. We watched a fabulous thunderstorm move across in the distance with clear strikes seen behind that round barn. Stunning. The gardens were remarkable and we all enjoyed our time at the village.

We all agreed that we needed to stay for at least a week to do all that we really wanted to do. Thanks again to our fabulous hosts. They run the best ever bed and breakfast in the Berkshires!


~Rachel

Caching in the Berkshires

You want me to go up where? We did a couple of caches out here on this road in the Berkshires. The first one was "One for the Boys" and it was easily found right along the side of the road. Our boys were enchanted with the idea of climbing up this big hill from the moment they set eyes on it.

I was a little less excited about that idea.


We parked the trusty Subaru at the bottom and started to check the GPS. Only 300 feet from the car! We're close. The GPS wanted us to go a little right of the easy trail and a little left of the big hill. Which way to go. While I'm deciding the kids have already moved on. And UP!
John held my hand while we ascended this hill. My sandals were not the right choice for today! But what a view from the top! Maybe even worth it.
At the cache we found the typical fare of items, signed the log and headed back down the "easy" trail. The cache was named "Jeepin' cache" and it is obvious why!
Great fun.

~Rachel

Bird

Okay, so monday is Nature Journaling at our homeschool. We had a fun one last week where we went out to the back field for a sort of "picnic" and then were joined by a very curious horse! We had to cut that one short and head back to some land on "our side" of the fence. Sheesh. She found our animal crackers to be delightfully yummy. (personal note: don't feed the wildlife...especially when you don't want a 900 lb visitor on your picnic blanket.)

Today, it was wildlife of the bird kind.
The boys had been outside after lunch for a little while now. (long enough for me to move the laundry, check the e-mail and prepare a NetFlix for sending.) Tide and I finally are getting out the door and we find this Phoebe flapping around the front porch. It lands on a nearby bucket. Tide goes over to investigate and it doesn't even move. After a quick "no" and "lie down" to Tide, which he does follow in an obiedient way...good dog, I called the kids to come over quickly and quietly. Not quite as obediently they arrive to find this Pheobe. It certainly was a bit stunned. We decided that it could see us and the boys offered it a finger to rest on so that we could place it "up" out of the reach of cats.
Okay, that spot was hard to find. We did a little searching around and then settled for a spot on our big rocks. While there we fed a few bugs to it. (Need I refer to the note of last week? The Phoebe decided to stay for a bit.)

After searching around for a good branch to shift it to we decided to give it a moment on the birdbath. The boys hurried into the house to grab their nature journals to catch the event on paper. We began to record and the bird flew onto us. Time and again. Once on a shoulder. Another time on the paper. Again to an arm
Even to land on the dog! Stay still Tide, there's a good dog.
Phoebe did decide to fly away to a tree after we returned it's little weightless body to the birdbath for at least the 6th time.

What fun! I'm certain that not all of our nature journals will involve such active and willing participants!

~Rachel

Busy Fun Weekend

We had back-to-back events this weekend. On Saturday we were at the Moose Mountain Regional Greenways "Trail Day" event. A good time was had by all. I went ahead of the rest of the family as I was volunteering for 1/2 of the day. This first photo is of the boys down at the estuary learning about the wildlife that lives on and in the river. There are fish in that case. It was a neat hayride down to the river too. The boys also saw a wildlife demonstration by Squam Lakes Science Center and went on a tree identification walk too. I was not on those as I was by then in a 2 1/2 hour GPS workshop. I know more about our GPS than I thought I ever would! Very informative.
There was even a little "cookie cutting" going on. The kids activity of painting a tree cookie also involved cutting some too.

The next day had as at the NH Farm Museum for their "Olde Time Farm Days" event. We made little sheep, hammered tin for candles to shine through, husked corn etc. Another good time was had by all. We were out on another hayride here to see the trails and cider mill. We were certainly enjoying the local events this weekend. Back at home we got some more work put in on a few projects. It was a pleasure to be outside in the beautiful fall-like air.

Here's hoping your weekends were as good!

~Rachel

Trip to VT

We're on our way. What a fun trip to Vermont! We stuffed 6 people in the truck and drove for 4 hours to visit some of the extended family (about 60 of them) at a family reunion. Cory brought along "Betty" which is her new Garmin device that gives you blow by blow directions on how to get somewhere. We thought we had upset "Betty" several times as we did not take her advice in NH. She wanted us to take a shorter route which we knew to be longer in time. But in her defense, after we took all of those "wrong" turns and she proclaimed "recalculating" then her time estimates were right on track. It's hard to read in this photo, but she's telling us to go another 108 miles on Rte. 89 with an ETA of 12:09. That's before we stopped to do a quick geocache in Milton VT.

This cache was one of the most interesting we've done yet. The cache container is an old Fleetwood Cadillac! It's the Fleetwood Arts Center and the request is to leave a piece of art behind. We left a poem and a drawing. What an interesting find.

After the reunion we stopped by the farm for a short visit with Gramma and Grampa before hitting the road for another 4 hour drive in the truck to get home. It will be a trip to remember! The kids are far too big to stuff into the truck for 8 hours in a day!!

Our month of July just zoomed on by with parties, cookouts, trips and lots of swimming. I don't know where the time went!

~Rachel

Visitors and Summer Pool

We've been blessed with some very special visitors over the last month. We had an excellent visit from Chris & Rosie and Dad & Mom at the end of June. Rachel had a good time showing them the house and land and letting them get out and stretch on their trip through New Hampshire toward home. We're so glad they stopped in for a visit!

Last weekend we had another wonderful couple from Vermont stop by for a visit. John & Annie stopped by Saturday and got a chance to view the home and area. It sure was nice to have them over and we enjoyed their visit. They also got to see us put in the leveling pad for the above-ground swimming pool. Thanks again for the visit!

I thought I'd also include one of the flowers we've put into the "butterfly" garden at the top of our driveway (directly opposit the vegtable/flower garden that seems to finally be growing).

Well I have to go for now and get the kids into bed for the night. Hope everyone is enjoying their summer as much as we are. Love to all.

Higgens Museum

We went to the Higgens Museum in Worcestor, MA yesterday. 2 of the boys are in their renissance shirts which we made at home.
We met up with 2 other families there for an educational treat.

We learned all about the armor and weapons of the middle ages here. The boys enjoyed a program on arms and armor in which 2 of them were called up to volunteer in the show. Here is one pointing out all of the vulnerable spots in field armor.

We especially enjoyed the hands on "discovery" room where we could try on helmets and play chess. "Rook threatens Queen," or something like that. Chess had a whole new dimension here with at times 9 children on the board for pieces. John lost this match to his oldest son who cornered him with 2 of his highly opinionated pieces. Lots of the game sounded like, "rook, move back 3". To which the rook replies, "What? Retreat?" Pawn chimes in, "Can I move now?" while Knight leans in to whisper his/her attack ideas. The good king listened to his pieces and got the game won. We're thinking up how to have a life size chess game at our upcoming birthday celebration in August. Our 13 year old would like a middle ages theme. We'll decorate goblets, challenge each other with staff on a bridge. (staff: styrofoam noodles, bridge: balance beam) There will be crossbows and trebuchets. (Marshmallow flinging devices.) And of course food and swimming in our new backyard pool.

~Rachel

Canada Lily

This is the Canada Lily in bloom. What a spectacular wildflower. We have probably 12 or so plants around the property. They do not grow in a group the way day lilies do. They seem to come back each year in the same spot too, so transplanting might work. This one is over 6 feet tall and growing in one of our larger patches of poison ivy. It will stay put!

I've also found a few plants of clematis vining along our stone bridge and near the wood pile. My father has transplanted these in the past and now has a beautiful and well established vine on his trellis. Spring brought loads of Jack in the Pulpit. Some of those were over 2 feet tall this year! The flowers were about 6 inches in length. What fun to go finding wildflowers.

Summer...yummy

Summer is a yummy time. The little wild bushes are producing the most tasty of snacks.

We are in a race with the wildlife for our share!

Each trip across the bridge starts a chorus of alarm, flapping up to the nearby pines; birds heavy with bellies full of berries.

Last night's walk included our first monarch caterpillar sightings on the milkweed. I think of Nina Towne breathing in the sweet smell of the milkweed in bloom. I'll try to get some photos of the Canada Lily that is in bloom...spectacular. Summer....yummy! ~Rachel

Caching

Look who came to visit!! Cory had a couple of days off in a row from her job as a waitress at The Wentworth and she decided to come play with us. John could not get the time off from work with such short notice on that Thursday and Friday, so we were almost happy to find that her car had a flat tire when she was preparing to leave Friday night. She stayed another night. John got the tire plugged for her in the morning and enjoyed his "bonus" time with her too. We went to the beach on Thursday as well as a short visit with Ken & Louise and another short visit with Laurie, Rob & baby Hannah. Cory proved more daring than I as she did get swimming with her brothers. I only waded out to my belly. It's so much more difficult to get in these days!

On Friday I asked the kids if they'd like to do a "quick" cache on the trails near our house to drop off a Jeep Travel Bug that we had. This 'easy 2 mile walk on level trails' ended up having an unintended bushwhack when we realized we were on the wrong trail. The kids had great fun teasing me about that!! Note: now I'm very thankful for all those bushwhacks through the woods with my dad. I have no fear of doing that, and a very good sense of direction from his teaching it over the years. The boys are now developing this skill.
Andrew found the cache and grinning, carried it to us . We all traded trinkets with the cache and enjoyed this beautiful "beach" spot way out along the branch river. The cache would be very easy to arrive at by canoe or kayak (or correct trail).
Large rocks attract boys, naturally. Cory was "good" on the ground and I took advantage of the photo op. Tide enjoyed wading around in the river. We were very lucky that he did not see the deer cross the trail in front of us on our way in. Cory & I did. Another went crashing through the woods on our way back out, but Tide was on the leash for that one. He thouroughly enjoyed the walk. In case you are noticing in the photo...Benjamin has a granola bar in his mouth. He refused to take it out for the camera.

We are really enjoying caching together (geocaching.com) whenever we can. I'm pleased that we were able to bring Cory along for this one. It really was an easy walk...even if it was more than 2 miles.

~Rachel

Crayfish

The brook has been a fun place to play lately. The boys enjoy netting crayfish. There are little brook trout swimming around too. Yesterday Benjamin was asking for "teatime". This is something we have been doing this year out of our BraveWriter activities. We decided to sit down for a time together and read about crayfish...which lead to thinking about drawing crayfish, and then they boys had to catch a few...









Once we had 2 in a couple of jars on the table we all were able to do some Nature Journaling about them. It's fascinating to see the boys want to do schoolwork during summer vacation. Okay, maybe schoolwork is a harsh word, as with BraveWriter they have not felt so much like they were doing schoolwork: just loving writing activities. I did a nature journal too. Reading aloud from Anna Comstock's book Handbook of Nature Study we learned the names for all of the parts of the crayfish. Andrew was taken with the swimmeretes under the tails. These are missed on first glance...but noticed and drawn when carefully observing. Benjamin was happy to learn that all of the pieces of crayfish which he had been finding were not from dead crayfish, rather from molting ones! He kept a claw and examined it under the magnifying glass. We learned that one of our prisoners was female and one was male, and that the male's missing claw would grow back. We released them along the bank to watch them move awkwardly across the ground on legs and pincers even. Then so gracefully through the water with their swimmerets.

I hope the boys continue to enjoy the natural world their whole lives. What a great way to grow up.

~Rachel

Summer has started (really..)

Dear friends and family, it's been quite a while since Rachel and I last contributed to our Blog. We've packed in a lot of living since May and we just wanted to share it with you.
We finished off the Shakespear play "The Merry Wives of Windsor" and got through the stomach virus that seem to afflict the cast and families like a plague (sort of in-keeping with the Shakespearian times).





The boys have now finished school for the year and we're just getting into the summer routine. Brian and Andrew finished their music lessons (Brian on piano and Andrew on guitar) and they are only practicing every once-in-a-while to keep their fingers and mind active. It's been a good school semester and each has done very well. Ben is learning his letters and numbers and is enjoying school (like his brothers). Cory has finished her Junior year at UNH and is working at the Wentworth By The Sea banquet hall again.

Rachel is activly choosing curriculum for next fall's school year. Brian will be in 9th, Andrew in 7th and Ben in 1st grades this fall (homeschooled) and will continue taking music (at the Music Mill) and theater (at Perform It!). I propose we give Rachel an honorary degree in Teaching for the amount of work and dedication she puts into getting the boys a wonderful education.

We have taken time to enjoy life while we accomplish the items above. Cory joined Rachel, our boys, and other Homeschool families for a Geocach outing near the Powder Mill Fish Hatchery (New Durham, NH). We've had many other Geocach outings at the ocean, in the mountains and into Maine (Freeport, ME). It's a neat way to get out with other families for a common, inexpensive outing in a nature setting (and gives them a bit of treasure hunting and geography at the same time). I can see us doing this for many years.


Brian and I got to go with family (Ken Shields & Rob Vachon) and friends (Lois Crowley and Dick McCormack) for a half-day deep sea fishing this month. Great boat ride with plenty of sun, sea, and smiles. Oh, Brian, Ken & I also caught soume mackeral (as bonus points to the ride), but all of us had fun and hope to do it again soon.







I've finally got my new home computer working well now, but it was a struggle. I bought a Dell Dimension E521 with the new "Vista" windows operating system. My advice to those interested is wait a few years before any "new" operating system is released to allow all the bugs (and new drivers to be developed for printers, etc) to be worked out. I'm getting used to it.

I'm enjoying playing each week in my works golf league. I've played at 4 different courses already this year and am having fun with the folks I play with. My scores aren't great (47 best game, 54 worst game so far), but the walk on a golf course each week is well worth my time. My trusty clubs (actually, they are the clubs Chris and I bought in 1978 timeframe) still seem to hit the ball well. Our sons hit golf balls from our house down our driveway now and I'm glad we have such a beautiful long distance to the road (over 400 feet).


Work is going well for me at Tyco Integrated Cable Systems (TICS). We are very busy and are ramping up this year with contracts through next year and bidding jobs for the follow-up years. I had trained a technician to support me on evenings, but he has since given his notice and we're looking for a replacement now. Eventually we'll find the right person and it'll take much of the load off me.

Rachel and I are establishing our new garden, lawn & field this year. Our main objective is to map-out where everything will go (eventually) so we don't have to relocate things too many times. Our fight against poison ivy is ongoing and will be a long-term thing. Ken's tractor is at our house at the moment and we're making good use of it for moving loam, sand, manure and possibly small rocks (although I've not been very successful on the rock thing so far - seem to be "big" ones around the back field).



We also had some sand delivered to our place and we've built a sandbox for the boys. We missed our big sandbox at the old place and the kids have really enjoyed the new one. I even put sitting benches around 3 sides so we/they can sit down when they want to.








Of course, there has to be a picture of a horse. Lady is enjoying the back field and the large cherry tree with it's shade.












Also, we have to show pictures of the local wildlife on our front lawn. A snapping turtle was looking for a "quiet place" to lay her eggs - poor choice if you ask me.










Anyway, I'll have to sign-off now. Ken invited the boys and myself to go sailing on his boat this afternoon. There will be pictures of that on the our next blog.
Summer has begun. Love to all,

Rachel, John, Cory, Brian, Andrew and Benjamin