Change is in the air

I love how busy-in-a-good-way this past month has been for us. So much to do, to see, to soak in... As soon as temperatures drop just a few degrees, and I can sense the sun shining just a little different, the instinct of enjoying warm days and good weather kicks in, and I can't help but want to spend more time outside, pack as much living into these days as possible.
(photos were taken either with iPhone or my manual-focus-only D200. I'm loving unintentional blur of some photos, and find myself doing it on purpose occasionally)

Inspiration from friend's garden...


Labor Day weekend. Sheepdog competition. We had a blast...




Visiting family at the farm. Moody skies. Smell of hay...










After a looooong break, knitting again, gifts (this one is for my mom) and such...


Hiking again. This time we reached the lake! But on a different hike, Twin Lakes Reservoir...






















Drawn to simple comfort foods at the first hint of autumn. It really is in the air...

Hiking in the rain

We did it again, braved beautiful rocky Mill B South trail, in the rain. Almost every time we hit this particular trail, it rains on us. I can't complain, I love rain. And rain on this hike is quite a treat, the colors of leaves get so brilliant.

Kids weren't too thrilled with rain at first (I guess bringing rain jackets would've helped), but after a while they perked up and took off. Ivy was quite a hiker too, wanted to do it on her own terms, no hand holding, climbing on every rock (did I mention that the trail was *rocky*?), touching them with her 'hiking' stick, and yelling 'a bug! a bug!' every time she saw an ant. Needless to say, we didn't get to reach Lake Blanche as we hoped to, but we had good time nonetheless. We will most certainly get back on that trail again, and some day, hopefully in not-so-distant future, we'll reach the elusive lake.

Family vacation [success]

Our long anticipated (and feared) family vacation came and went, and I am happy to say that we are left with many wonderful memories this time (last year's vacation was quite a disaster that I tried to suppress in my memory for months after we got home, maybe it's time to look at some pictures I took back then). Unintentionally, our 'theme' turned out to be all about visiting beaches, and it ended up being just right for everyone. Refreshing and calming for Mark and I, fun (i.e. wet) for the kids. We brought swim suits for them, but every time we went to visit a beach, we though it was too chilly to wear them. And yet, in the end, at least half of the kids would end up being completely soaked, purple lipped, shivering, yet looking forward to repeat the experience again. So we just made sure that we always had a set of towels and dry clothes for all the children, and accepted the fact that our car would be full of sand for the duration of our trip.

This was our third trip to North West, and even last year, when we encountered so much stress and trouble during our vacation, I still carried with me the lasting impression of the beauty that we witnessed in the NW. I love going back there, and hope that some day we will live close enough to that area that our traveling will only take a couple of hours instead of a couple of days. Until then, I'm going to hold tight to my memories of all the wonderful adventures we had together as a family.