yakjournal

Late spring and early summer...

2011-07-01T09:59:00.003-04:00

The end is near!

2011-05-28T06:47:00.004-04:00

Laird pond burst the dam and washed out the bridge.

Roadside washouts almost made this section impassable by car.

Pretty crazy. Washed out roads, bridges and driveways. I have seen cars sitting in craters made by erosion. We are up high so it didn't affect our place. However, if it rains too much more the second way out of our road could be washed out too.

A winter afternoon making...

2011-02-06T07:53:00.002-05:00

Work truck with dumper.

Wacky truck.

Lego action on a winter afternoon. Lego is a whole different world now. Wheels, windshields, wrenches, gas pumps and in a couple of years when the manual dexterity increases, probably bionicles. Tons of fun.

Cross country...

2011-01-15T14:13:00.003-05:00

Got out after it warmed up post-lunch!

Downhill...

2011-01-08T20:20:00.002-05:00

Zooming down the "mighty might" at Cochran.

Nice sliding snowplow turn back to the tow rope. Keenan had a blast, in fact, we all did. We are doing a program through his school where we get 10 weeks of skiing on thursday with lesson and ski package for about $10 per week! It is a really nice little friendly ski hill called Cochran's. Winter fun!

Sledding with jumps

2010-12-26T15:26:00.002-05:00

Today we went out for some sledding jumps on our neighbors hill!!

Something worth watching...

2010-12-19T13:52:00.005-05:00

This is what we watch during breakfast or lunch.

Random pictures...

2010-12-19T13:49:00.004-05:00

shake mama's head

keenan and his buddy wyatt

making cookies for road party with sugar treats and hot drinks

Holiday activity...

2010-12-19T13:43:00.003-05:00

Michelle and Keenan worked on this project together, making felted balls! They are soft, colorful and thanks to Michelle's artistry very decorative. The general process in make ball from yarn or something like cloth scraps, wrap in colorful felt and chook chook chook with the felting needle for a long time.

canadian thanksgiving?...

2010-12-05T20:41:00.004-05:00

We went to Montreal for thanksgiving. Had lunch at a French-y restaurant. Lamb and french fries and whitefish and calamari and wine were consumed. Dessert was a raspberry light cake thing. No crowds and no clean-up!! After we went to the botamical gardens. Granny was waiting in the cafe of the botanical gardens when we had the camera snapping away.

6 AM...

2010-11-09T08:22:00.003-05:00

It was 6 in the morning. I had just made a cup of coffee. Keenan emerged from his bedroom fully prepared to defend our castle.

treehouse...

2010-11-07T14:59:00.003-05:00

Here is the treehouse that Keenan and I have slowly pieced together from scrap wood over the last two years. It has been a process where there is no planning. We just gathered materials from our yard and started building. First we put the upper platform up. Then the walls. Then the stairs and lower platform. Still to come are the bucket on a pulley, telescope and door. He has done some hammering, some obstruction and some design.

dio de los meurtos halloween scary toes...

2010-11-03T19:04:00.005-04:00

Our wonderful pumpkins and Keenan/papa action. We enjoyed the surreal Plainfield parade and trick or treating. Then it was off to Granny's in Montpelier for a bit more trick or treating and candy consumption. Keenan was a fire dragon and I was ugly and scary.

exciting cardboard box video...

2010-10-30T13:30:00.002-04:00

october ride...

2010-10-30T13:26:00.002-04:00

Went for a lunchtime ride this past thursday. Too beautiful to resist! Rode along the back roads from Waterbury to Camels Hump and somewhat beyond. Stopped at the dam.

monarch action...

2010-10-02T09:16:00.004-04:00

A few weeks ago Keenan found a Monarch caterpillar on a milkweed plant at the end of our driveway. We brought it inside and watched as it formed a chrysalis and then a few weeks later...pop!

nice tomatoes...

2010-09-15T14:36:00.002-04:00

Wouldn't you agree? It's our first good tomato harvest so far...Yum.

garlic harvest 2010!!!!

2010-07-25T20:10:00.012-04:00

built some drying racks

pulled up the garlic

yum

more yum

wheelbarrow full of yum

peeling off the outer/lower leaves

peeling off more outer and lower leaves

yum 102 times

close-up garlic yumminess

Did I happen to mention the idea of yumminess yet? Today we built some drying racks and did the big ol' 102 heads of garlic harvest. Almost enough for the whole year! Tonight for dinner we had pasta with tomato sauce that had, yep fresh garlic. We also had some Cyrus Pringle bread (an entire loaf to be precise) spread with astounding amounts of aeoli.

4 years and 4 months and two wheels...

2010-06-14T20:03:00.003-04:00

Here is a video with audio of Keenan on his pedal bike after 10 minutes! I cannot sing the praises of the Strider balance bike enough. For the last 1 1/2 years he has been scooting around on his balance bike. Essentially a bike with no pedals. It is supposed to be much easier for them to learn to balance without pedals. Once they learn how to balance, riding with pedals is pretty simple.

fish and green things...

2010-05-26T05:04:00.009-04:00

Summer has arrived with it's glorious heat and explosion of greenness and mowing. The strawberries we planted last year are blooming like crazy. Keenan holding up the first brook trout of the year. He has on face paint from an earlier event, he is a snow tiger. Asparagus but we can't pick until next year. And, of course, peas!

I had a great birthday. It was spread out over a number of days. Michelle and I had a real stay out until midnight date while Keenan had a sleepover at Granny's place. The morning after our date I went on a nice bike ride all morning. All of my birthday cards arrived exactly on my birthday, don't know how everyone pulled that off.

amazing sunrise...

2009-12-29T11:55:00.003-05:00

Amazing and 100% photoshop free. Yum.

ski action...

2009-12-26T16:18:00.002-05:00

New skis for the little one. Yesterday we slid down the driveway for a while. Today he asked to go down the road to our neighbors field and we went down a good sized little hill with him between the legs! Much fun. Had a wonderful holiday with Michelle's sister, brother in law and nephew and her Mom.

the polar express...

2009-12-16T09:08:00.003-05:00

We recently met up with Keenan's 2 buddies and their families. There is a train ride/Santa adventure in White River Junction that is themed after the book The Polar Express. Fun and hot chocolate was had by all.

unimog birthday...

2009-12-16T09:02:00.003-05:00

At a recent birthday party up on top of a grand sized hill in Washington, VT there was this wonderful beast. The unimog is a very impressive German vehicle. These folks are some of the only people I can imagine who live up such a crazy road that t hey actually need one. Check them out...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unimog

halloween...

2009-12-16T08:52:00.006-05:00

Posting a bit late...but here are some Halloween pics. Went to Montpelier and then to Granny's after for candy eating and hanging out. Keenan decided the next day to trade most of his candy for a toy!

chaga...

2009-10-23T09:35:00.003-04:00

Chaga is this big gnarly fungus that grows on yellow birch trees. It "...contains large amounts of betulinic acid in a form that can be ingested orally, and it also contains the full spectrum of immune-stimulating phytochemicals found in other medicinal mushrooms..." We were walking through the woods and knocked a big piece down, brought it home and smashed it up (it is like wood). Michelle ground it up and makes Chaga Chai with it. I add it to my coffee. Yum.

warren falls...

2009-10-23T09:26:00.005-04:00

The parents/grandparents are visiting. Having a great time so far. We went to Warren Falls and ate lunch at the Warren Store. Have also made the journey to the Montshire Museum. It is an unusually well done kids/natural history/ecology place near St. Johnsbury, Vermont. Keenan always loves it when the size of the family expands. It is really nice.

s240 camping...

2009-10-20T13:22:00.007-04:00

Went on a little s240 (sub 24 hour) overnight bike camping trip with Mike. We stayed at a lean-to in Little River State Park in Waterbury. The general idea is to get out wherever for a bit. Was nippy, 21 degrees overnight. Nice fires and down jacket inside the sleeping bag to stay warm. I was actually quite comfortable except for numb toes at 5 AM. Might need to add down booties to winter camping list. We encountered a doodling porcupine on our way in!

more pictures from this year...

2009-10-13T12:39:00.010-04:00

falling...

2009-10-01T16:11:00.006-04:00

The season has arrived, we have proof! Beautiful colors this year. The garden is mostly closed up. Still need to plant garlic at the end of the month and dig under the winter rye. The garden was much more productive this year than last. Lots of eating from the garden. Lots of meals composed mostly of food from the garden.

Keenan is in his first year of "preschool". He is spending the day on monday and tuesday at Orchard Valley Waldorf school. He is really into it so far. The other day a kindergartener said "I'm in kindergarten", to which he apparently replied, "Well I'm in preschool." The school is located on a gentle hillside that was an orchard/farm six years ago. It is a beautiful setting. Last weekend we went for a festival, gathered apples and made juice in a cider press. Fun. There was a play with a giant dragon.

Lots of bike riding and walking lately. Also playing bat. (whiffle ball) Eating cold weather foods and enjoying woodstove action.

fishing...

2009-08-06T08:53:00.002-04:00

In case you didn't know, fishing is very serious business and not to be lightly disturbed.

summer garden...

2009-06-25T16:35:00.003-04:00

Some recent garden activity. The plants are huge this year. Three yards of compost in the fall and three yards of composted manure in the spring! Michelle has done most of the work. I like gardening but work is so busy in the summer.

pancakes for breakfast...

2009-06-10T11:12:00.002-04:00

Keenan cracking eggs for breakfast. It has been a good summer so far. Lots of gardening, canoe and working. As always summer in Vermont is so short and sweet. Just enjoying every minute as much as possible. Check out my new business website at sticksandstonesvt.com

access to upper levels...

2009-02-07T08:40:00.004-05:00

My current happy home project is building stairs for our house. Our floorplan has a loft on each end of the house to be connected by a catwalk. I finally have time to build our stairs to get up. We have a loft ladder but with a three year old it is no longer a great thing.

So the stairs...the stringers will be these two big live edge slabs. They are 9 quarter by about 20 inches. The stairs will be set back in them so you are down in the live edge a little bit.

winter biking again...

2008-12-14T08:53:00.003-05:00

Here is the current winter ride. Trek 950 mtn bike with road bars. Had it powder coated this spring so it wouldn't fall apart from rust. Nokian studs and fenders. Tons of winter fun with the dog runnnning behind!

wet day salamander play...

2008-10-16T13:40:00.005-04:00

Rainy day today. Cleaned up a few odds and ends. Did some estimating. Cleaned some clothes. Then I saw this little guy on our road. He was out for a very leisurely stroll. A very cooperative subject.

bikation and causation...

2008-10-13T04:17:00.006-04:00

Saturday in Burlington biking. We met up with Mike http://littlecircles.blogspot.com/2008/10/cut-via-bakfiets.html and Eva for a fun little ride out on the causeway in Burlington. Later Michelle and Jen and the rest of us met up for some food at Stone Soup in Burlington. Now Michelle and I are all set for our big city experience for a while. Since we are accustomed to the sensory experience of a dirt road and the woods it seemed like a lot of sensory input even to be in a small city on a Saturday evening. Funny, huh? It was lots of fun, Keenan was totally wired and stimulated.

wild foods hike...

2008-09-29T04:37:00.003-04:00

apples which were made into applesauce

Rosehips which were made into rosehip syrup, full of vitamin C. Yesterday Michelle and Keenan and I hiked up bald hill. The fall colors were amazing. We gathered wild apples for applesauce, rosehips and hawthorn berries for medicinal syrups on the way. It seemed as if our rainy weather was great for the wild foods if not for our gardens. I have never seen rosehips quite as bright and bursting as these. The Hawthorn trees were so full of berries that you could pull them off in giant clusters! It has also been an amazing mushroom year. Michelle made the food and syrups from them.

fall harvest...

2008-09-25T05:49:00.003-04:00

The garden has been put to bed for the winter. Michelle and Keenan harvested the pumpkins and put everything in the compost bin. Keenan informed us that this is the mama pumpkin, papa pumpkin and baby pumpkin.

lunar observations from Maple Hill...

2008-09-17T07:52:00.003-04:00

Barn's burnt down

Now I can see the moon.

-Mizuta Masahide

summer updates...

2008-09-11T19:41:00.012-04:00

It has been a good and busy summer. The boy is getting big big bigger. Gardens are beginning. The new work situation has worked out well. Spending time riding the bike and in the woods and training the dog. Also check out what Michelle has been doing as extra summer work...http://gardensforlearning.blogspot.com/

The young artist at work en plein air.

Work in progress. A partial octagonal deck, partially complete.

A variety, if not a quantity of heirloom tomatoes, finally.

There were bazillions of mushrooms in our woods this summer with all of the rain.

Flowers from our wildflower garden.

early...

2008-08-12T15:59:00.003-04:00

Some pictures from my morning bike rides and walks with the dog. Looking across the road from our driveway above and looking across the hills from the other side of the field later in the morning. This summer I have had more time in the morning since I no longer have a long commute. I have been going out with the ten month old dog. I also have time to spend with the family and cook breakfast instead of being gone before they wake up.

emergence...

2008-05-22T03:48:00.004-04:00

It has been a busy late winter and spring. New job closer to home with less driving. Carpentry and remodeling. New big garden. Busy outdoors springtime with 2 year old son and 7 month old dog. Not many posts lately because we have been so busy and our internet connection so slow.

time stamp and ski

2007-12-16T05:33:00.000-05:00

A multi-topic post. Yes, the time stamp setting on this blog is set to the correct time zone. I really do most often post between 3 and 6 AM. The reason? My toddler wakes up some time in this zone and I often cannot resettle myself. I went for a good ski yesterday. It was -1 F but didn't feel too bad between being bundled up and moving about. Took some photos when I was out today on a trail I cut on our land this fall. It was a lot of fun. Once I get it tracked out good it'll be even more so. The section in this image is actually an old road that I cleared out. Other sections are more single track size. I now find myself wishing that I had finished up the loop. I can get all the way through it, but the sections with the 2 ft. tall fir trees are sticky. It is so exciting that we are getting snow again. Up to my knees and we are still supposed to get another foot or so. My buddy Mike (littlecircles.blogspot.com) and I went for a little adventure up Mt. Philo last week. It was beginning to look like winter, but now I can truly say that winter has returned after a three year hiatus!

the bike

2007-12-14T05:19:00.000-05:00

The plan is that this will be THE bike. The one that does it all. It pretty much is already. Yummy lugged steel. An old mtn. bike frame converted to roadness. My current focus is on fit and comfort. I have solved my elbow pain issues which caused me to stop riding years ago. So simple. Stop putting 70% of your body weight on your hands! And yes, that stem is safely installed according to the max. height line. Now I am working on my butt which seems to give out somewhere around 60 miles. My plan is to 1) lose 10 lbs. 2) get a new seat(s) 3) pedal harder and 4) ride more. I decided that last year I was practicing excessive moderation in my riding efforts and have since modified that to moderate moderation. The harder I pedal the less my weight is on my butt. Amazing. I am looking at these tires http://www.universalcycles.com/shopping/product_details.php?id=10156 as all time tires except maybe using my WTB slickasaurus for century rides and such. Where I live it is pretty much all gravel to dirt to bad pavement to gravel to dirt. The road shoulders are not so good either. So I plan to stick to back roads and roads less travelled. I think that will make all the difference.

no snow, i can still go...

2007-12-03T05:24:00.000-05:00

The last few years the cross country ski experience in Vermont has been very skimpy. It seems like there are only a few days each year that have been any good. SO, in come the winter bike tires. I must get out and be active. I have gotten old enough that the winter pudge does not come off easily any more, therefore I aim to prevent it. I understand that this change is part of the 30 year warranty on the human body.
These excellent custom tires took 2 hours to make. Ingredients: one old pair knobbies, 180 3/8" sheet metal screws, cloth tape and viola! They work awesome!! Just like riding on non-ice. Fun.
Double row in front, triple row in back. Vroom!

fresh turkey

2007-11-28T07:54:00.000-05:00

They really don't get any fresher. Watching turkeys does not rate nearly as high on the 20 month old kid's wowometer as deer do. I thought it was fairly interesting though.

Commute...

2007-07-06T05:14:00.001-04:00

Rolling along Rt.2 between Montpelier and Middlesex in the foggy morning.

aliens vs. wolves...

2007-06-25T12:17:00.000-04:00

My theory on aliens is as follows: Back in the olden days everyone liked to make scary etchings of wolf/goat/animal beasts of many different configurations. Europeans and other agricultural folk were genrally scared of the woods and their fears were expressed through their depictions of what scared them. Now that people think that they are the most dangerous and scary things around how do we depict our fear? The creatures look a lot like a certain point in human embryonic development and have amazing technological powers.

less is more unless you always want more of less...

2007-06-20T07:32:00.000-04:00

On a recent trip out of town Michelle and I were in the midst of travel exhaustion and noting how fortunate we are even in the most difficult times we face. I made the observation of how we were so grateful when I started working less hours (at my old shop 50 hours was normal), but lately how we had been feeling like we still work too much. I realized that less becomes another form of wanting if you always want more less.

a wee thaw

2007-02-26T19:22:00.000-05:00

Spent excellent time with Keenan all day. When his mom got home I hopped on the bike for a quick muddy/icy/slushy fun time down our road and the VAST trail. Good fun!

2007-01-10T05:11:00.000-05:00

This is a photo looking down our road from our driveway from this past weekend. Unreal...it was warm and no snow. I actually bundled up and went for a bike ride on Rt. 2! Absurd! I don't really think you can call it a January thaw if there is no freeze. I have to admit, it was very enjoyable.

step aside

2006-12-04T05:44:00.000-05:00

This is a photo of our basement floor where a leaf fell on the wet concrete last fall. I honestly feel it is one of the most beautiful parts of our house. All that was necessary was to step aside and allow things to happen.

giant bonsai tree

2006-04-06T06:50:00.000-04:00

125 foot tall bonsai red pine tended by a 900 foot tall

little ancient person on my walk this morning.

ikebana

2006-04-04T07:35:00.000-04:00

Sunday walking along Laird Pond Rd. with a friend after a delicious breakfast with friends. Collecting beautiful pre-spring plants. Sun that was bright and delicious to the skin.

Yummy day.