Chris is a country girl

This is Brenda, with my first ever blog posting (yay!). I wanted to put something in about Chris, because I know she won't ever do it. When I first met Chris I didn't know she was a country girl, but I am finding out now. When we bought our house in July, it was already too late to plant a garden, but Chris went ahead and prepared the land for next spring. She cut an 800 square foot garden area (by hand) and rototilled it. Recently she has started trailblazing a path through our 4-acre woodlot. Here is a photo of her and Emily getting ready to work on the trail (love those camo pants!).
Chris has also been very busy canning. She has put up green beans, corn, tomatoes, chicken soup, beef stew, pears, pickles, and many other tasty things. I can't wait to see what else she will do!

Ah, the little things...

Little things are very exciting when you are a toddler (and stay at home Mom). Sometimes a flock of starlings comes through and lands on the lawn.  Fun!  Farmer Steve mowed our field a few days ago! That was an exciting time!  

Even Connor was interested.

Hippies Unite!

Yes, it was time for the Common Ground Country Fair again. Oh, don't know it? This Fair celebrates rural living emphasizing organic, local, environmental, sustainable everything. So you could learn "Dances of Universal Peace" then attend "Deep Fry Turkey Safely" and "Process Acorns into Flour", while later checking out "Chainsaw Safety and Directional Felling". A little bit of something for everyone, though no rides or games and all the food is local and organic.    

The Fair has a great kids area.  Here the girls could whip paint at sheets of paper. Eventually, Kate's hair was blue.
Chris demonstrated to the girls how to jump off the hay bales in the kids play area.

Some Favorites

Emily and Kate love to wear dresses.  As you can tell, they don't sit still for long!

Kate loves to "drive".  Here she is on the lawn mower.

Whenever Brenda goes to the Home Depot, the girls wear their aprons.  They made a bird house at the HD kids workshop.  

Yes, A Blog!

Unbelievably, we are starting a blog (time consuming and self-involved as they seem). Inspired by our friend, Renee, who keeps such a great, witty blog, we thought it may be a good way to keep folks updated on the family.   So how about a summer recap?

Below is the house we bought in Maine this July.

Emily and Kate got to see their cousins a lot throughout the summer.

Chris and her father did the Trek Across Maine, which is a 180-mile bicycle ride from Bethel to Belfast to support the American Lung Association of Maine.  Love those medals!

Chris' brother, David, was up from New Hampshire many times during the summer. We all enjoyed spending time with him!

Emily and Kate went to the "beach" in Belfast often.  

The pool at Nana's was lots of fun also.

Mid-July, Emily and Chris went to Prince Edward Island to visit Shannon, Jack, and Lucy. Brenda and Chris worked with Shannon's husband, Shawn, on the Tacoma Narrows Bridge Project.

In late July, Chris' Dad, brother, David, Brenda, Leann, and Chris did the Lobster Ride in Rockland.  Ok, we only did 16 miles, but we were chowing on lobster rolls by 11:30am.  Yum!

In August, we held a house warming at our new home.  The main event was the slip and slide on the front yard.  The stars of this slip and slide were David and Melinda, who excelled at hurling themselves so fast down the plastic that they created a lovely mud pit at the bottom.

For live action of the slip and slide check out the video below.

To end the summer, we hit the Windsor Fair.  We watched some harness racing, ate a hot dog, then hit the rides.  Emily (though an old pro from the Puyallup Fair) was not interested in rides.  Kate came out of her shell and flew spaceships and drove a bus.