May

Okay, this is my usual view of the woods.  I attempt to see this view on a 3 times per week basis.  Sometimes it is only once a week.  This was the view from here Mother's Day.  I've been out riding in 3 states and with so many friends this year I hesitate to list them all.  What a great time it is!  But yesterday found us out enjoying the world from this view. Mountain biking.  :)  We've started geocaching again after taking a long break from it.  No reasons why.  Just what we've been doing with our time I guess!  

We went up the highway about 45 minutes to find  some caches in a town forest.  What a great day for playing outside.  The last 3 days have been rainy and wet so we really enjoyed the sunshine.  I loved the red shade of this lady slipper, or indian moccasin...whatever you call it.  

This boy had to take his shoes off and play in the water.  Nice to cool your feet off after a couple of hours on the bike.  We ate our cliff bar lunches here by a nice beaver pond at the edge of an abandoned airstrip.  Cool place.  Lunch was not as filling as we'd have wanted...of course the cliff bars were just meant for a snack...but when your one hour jaunt becomes fun...and you find you are in the woods for 3 or 4 hours...it becomes lunch.  So on the way home we found an ice cream stand and it really hit the spot!!  Coconut ice cream.  I'll be back again for sure!

~Rachel

Boys

Here is the little guy with a selection of Cub Scouts projects that he made.  I am especially fond of the cribbage board.  He was very busy working on projects on his way to "scout graduation" which is the Crossover.  The Webelos crossover into Boy Scouting and are then wearing a new uniform which has none of their Cub Scout achievements on it except the Arrow of Light if they earned it as a Cub.  All of the boys in the den earned the Arrow of Light.  Some of them went on to earn an even higher award--Super Achiever.  It is finishing all 20 activity badges and this scout did it.  Quite a lot of work.  We're very proud of him.  As I type this he is still away camping (dad too).  I'm so glad the weather turned out to be good.  The last outdoor campout was in the snow...come to think of it last October's campout was too.  They also had an overnight at the Museum of Science this spring. The troop is very active and they boys do so much together.  Sometimes it is fun things too, such as laser tag for an evening.  Next Saturday there is a Hike-A-Thon and this scout intends to walk 10 miles with the boy scouts.  Isn't he cute at the end of Crossover with his face all painted from the Arrow of Light Ceremony?  

School's out--or should I say outside...for 80 degree days.  Here we were finishing our April read "The Long Winter" on a hot, hot spring day.  Irony.  The new tent seemed to be the best place to do school that day!  We have had a lot of fun reading this year.  History and Science have become big interests now.  Math is still his "easiest" subject.  He is a Towne after all.  :)

Here is our middle boy hamming it up with a gecko at the Boston Museum of Science.  John & I took the 2 boys down there for a vacation day in April. What fun we all had together.  They make me laugh so much when we are out and away from all the usual distractions.  This boy is often very busy with friends, gigs, and school and I don't often get a whole day with him anymore.  I really enjoyed this day.  ~Rachel

Cats

The cats are so much fun.  This is our old lady cat doing what she does best.  Finding a sunny spot and napping.  She's turning 14 this June and still quite healthy.  Especially for a cat with a bad heart...the vet originally gave her a life expectancy of about 5 years.  :)

Here are the young cats working on their stalking skills.  Jester is the calico and she is telling Charlie, the black and white cat to stay there...he's not so good with stalking yet and she's been doing her best to teach him a thing or two.  Moving the wild turkeys around gives Jest a huge ego boost and she comes back to the house a very proud girl.

Jest thinks, "I'm not scared of anything...even water."  

As proof she brings home frogs, snakes, mice, chipmunks, birds.....

We love the cats!

More fun from the camera

I'll get around to blogging something else soon...but we're still having fun with the wildlife camera at present.  Spring is sort of like this.  The world out there is waking up.  The swallows returned this week.  They come and entertain us each year with their beautiful swooping around in the sky.  The minute I saw them I felt both happy and sad.  What it means is that they are feasting on black flies.  The horse is quite aware of the arrival of the black flies too.

We made another "mad purchase" with our LL Bean coupons.  A screen house!  We've wanted to have one since we moved here in 2006 but it has always felt like such a temporary thing and a potential waste of money . The "right" thing to do would be to build a wooden screen house somewhere on the property to sit in for picnics or to just "get away" on our own property...during the months when the bugs will carry us away if we try to sit outside.  That's the downside to living on a brook/stream/beaver pond lot of land.  Lots of bugs.  But the upside of that--lots of wildlife coming to the water, bluebirds and swallows, incredible dragon and damsel flies too.  So I guess we'll take it all.

The turkeys are here so often now that we could practically name them.  As I type this the little group is working it's way back to the woods through the horse paddock.  He's quite unphased by the turkeys now which is a good thing when out trail riding.  Turkeys can be quite alarming to horses but King is very desensitized by them now.  

I was so excited this morning to see the gift on the camera for Easter.  Here is the first bunny we've captured on film.  During the winter we have followed their trails all through the woods but we had not yet seen one.  We know they are there and the coyote scat is filled with rabbit fur, but we had not yet actually seen one.  I've seen plenty of rabbits while out riding the trails but not on our property yet.  So cool to see this one!  Sometimes it's the little things in life.

Wildlife Camera

We have a new wildlife camera as our old one stopped working some time ago.  This one has a video option so we tried it out.  There were a lot of coyote photos from a few weeks ago and we were hoping to catch a video of them this time.  Last night, (or in the first minutes of today) we caught the pair coming through.  The first video is the pregnant female marking her scent on their territory marker.  Then the male follows along and adds his scent to the spot.  You can see her eyes up the trail as she's waiting for him to follow along.  I wonder if they will travel this way with pups later on.  

We also have images of squirrels, turkeys and this raccoon.  We smell a skunk from time to time but have not seen it yet.  Probably a good thing!  Oh, and our cat, Charlie who often follows us all over the property has been on the camera too.  He follows us there when we swap the SD cards and then hams it up for the camera while we attempt to get him to follow us back home.  Silly cat.

~Rachel

What a pretty fall it's been.  The sunrise has been this gorgeous many a morning as John & our son are leaving for work and school.  I wave goodbye to each of them as they drive their cars away in the near-darkness that fall brings with it's shorter days.  The foliage seemed to come and go quickly this year but maybe it was due to being covered in snow at times...

The Halloween storm brought a good foot+ of pretty snow.  The foliage covered leaves held onto it and there were widespread power outages.  Our generator was humming for part of the day on Halloween.  Our kids still went trick or treating that night for "beggar's night" here in the Mills.  The snow did nothing to dampen the spirits around here.  We saw several snow sculptures with jack o lantern heads or other snowballs made into huge jack o lanterns themselves...complete with orange paint!  Our middle boy went as a Christmas caroler as a way of enjoying the strange weather.  

All of the snow melted in about a week but we had another storm just in time for Thanksgiving.  We got to play in that snow too!  

The boys love it when we pull them around for this kind of sledding.  No, it's not warm enough for a tee-shirt really, but on another of these days I did watch a rousing snowball fight which had one child sporting shorts!  Tall boots, gloves and yes, shorts.  No wonder I'm having trouble with the seasonal shift in clothing around here.  Each time I think we can pack something up--rain gear, shorts, light coats---the old season pops up again!  

The bluebirds have been sticking around this fall.  We've watched 2 families all year and I've been quite surprised to still be seeing them around.  I've finally been enjoying time in the yard again.  I must admit it has been a hard fall for me to spend time outside due to the loss of our beloved Border Collie, Tide.  Tide was diagnosed with Lymphoma at the beginning of the summer.  We were prepared by the vet for "2 days to 2 months".  Well, he stayed with us for close to 4 months but it was in a steady decline during that time.  I am learning to live without a constant shadow of a border collie now and it's been a little tricky.  For over 20 years I've owned first CJ and then Tide as my constant companion dogs.  It is just plain weird to live without one but I'm not ready for a new dog just yet.  

This cat in particular is trying to do her best to help.  Jester goes all over the property with us.  If we're taking a walk and she realizes it, then she's along in a hurry.  Cats don't walk with us like dogs.  They sprint ahead and climb up a tree.  Or they hunker down somewhere...far from home even and make me worry.  When I've about given up looking and calling then a streak of color will race by me.  Not so very companionable.  But she's doing her best.  

I've managed to do a lot of horse back riding and a lot of knitting too.  It's been a good fall!  

~Rachel

September

The days are much shorter now.  The leaves are just starting to turn to their autumn colors.  This is how I found the back field last week when I went to fetch King in for the night.  The ground fog was beautiful as it rolled in.  I loved the crisp feeling in the air.  The setting sun was just getting it's show going.  Fall is a funny time of new beginnings around here.  I know so many feel like it's an ending time but for us it is the start of college for our oldest boy.  The start of 11th grade back at Cocheco Arts & Technology Academy for the next boy.  The beginning of a new homeschool year for our youngest one.  Cub Scouts Den Meetings begin again.  Knitting classes get started.  Knitting Club too.  LEGO Battlebots and soccer begin.  The trail riding season (bug free) begins.  Okay....trail riding season never begins or ends for me...but it feels like the time of the year we wait all year for!  The beginning of that wonderful season!  Bug free rides.  :)

We took time last Friday between rainy days to go hiking with friends up at Castle in the Clouds.  You can see the castle on the next hill at the top right of this picture.  This is the spot where we stopped for lunch.  Castle in the Clouds is also home to the tallest horse in the world (or at least that's what they told us) so we had to go and see Zeus.  The pond that had rainbow trout to feed was a highlight as well.  We found the hiking trails to be beautiful and numerous.  I, for one, would like to go back and walk along more of them!

Our silly cats have been up to new antics lately.  Today I pulled on my knee high black muck boots to head out to the barn and there was something wrong with the right one.  I pulled off the boot and tipped it over.  Out popped a dead mouse!  Eeek.  Eewww.  Jester!  I think she is finally living up to that name our oldest son wanted.  He called her Jest for her calico coat.  He thought she looked like a court fool.  Well....now she's getting her revenge.  

Last week she brought in a live chipmunk to entertain herself, Charlie and our old dog.  I knew something was wrong when I heard the sound of clicking toenails, click-click-click, excitedly across the wood floor in our bedroom.  He is in the final stages of lymphoma and spends most of his time sleeping.  I wondered what the clamor was.  In the room I see both Charlie & Tide chasing a frightened chipmunk back and forth under the bed.  Jester was atop the bed watching the action.  My youngest son and I worked with the dog to corner the chipmunk and I popped it into a trash can with a towel over the top to carry it back outside.  The next evening while I was out teaching knitting Jester brought a garter snake into the kitchen for my husband.  Our 17 year old was able to catch it and return it to the long grass outdoors.  Then on Thursday morning with the rain making the day dreary Jester comes through the cat flap again with her own entertainment.  I was baking and noticed a new dark leaf on the floor.  Then it hopped!  A frog.  Poor thing.  Thank goodness for little boys who are just as fast as year-old kittens.  He grabbed it up and cradled it in his hands to take back outside into the wet world...where a frog belongs.  Not hopping about on the tile below cookie making women!

Charlie in contrast to his sister, has been spending many a morning finding himself new places to sleep.  This has become one of his favorites so far.  He's the only cat to ever explore up there and he likes it.  6 and a half feet above the floor is a peaceful place for him to take his nap.

There are endings in September too.  The pool is put away.  The garden is mostly done (except carrot and potatoes.)  John's golf league is done.  Gone are the beach days and farmer's markets for one of the boys to earn money playing guitar at.  Gone are the long teenage Dungeons and Dragons gatherings.  For now.

~Rachel