A Visit to the Farm

Thursday we decided to meet up with my sister and visit a local farm together with our kids.  Each week the farm does a “Toddler Time” and studies something on the farm that begins with a different letter of the alphabet.  This week the letter was “M” which could mean nothing other than the excitement of mazes.  At the end of the story the children got to go through a corn maze… usually we go through the dried ones in the fall but this one was still green and growing.  Then the children could do a paper maze with some crayons.

 

Kaitlyn enjoyed this activity with her cousin very much while the rest of children were overjoyed by other activities available.

Kaitlyn enjoyed scooping up fossils she found under the slide and stuffing them in her pockets to bring home.

There was a large playground with lots of wooden things to climb on.

Nathan is a great climber and loved going down the slide over and over again.

Weeeeeee!

Busy boy didn’t seem to realize that his little cousin was right nearby to play with.

Cousins Greg and Lindsay are both 12 years old: not too old to have fun on the playground yet old enough to help out with younger children.

Nathan LOVED the goats.  He stuck his hand in to pet them and excitedly pointed them and called for me to come and look with him. 

Nathan’s cousin Porter joined him briefly to pet the goats.  How fun!

One goat had climbed way up high and was waiting for more food to come up the conveyor belt.  Kaitlyn finds yet more stones.

Cousins reacquaint themselves with each other since last time we saw Porter he was just five months old; most of his life.  Tristan loves having another little boy around. 

Down by the Bay

Whenever I come “home” I always make sure that we spend an evening on the Bay at our favorite diner and walking the pier.  This little diner is a place I visited as a child, occasionally made visits to after I moved here with friends as a teenager, introduced my new husband to and one by one brought my babies to for their first ever pickles.  It’s legendary for char-grilled burgers, white hots and onion rings… not to mention frozen custard.

Family is always more than ready to join us for an evening out on the sea breeze and this time 13 of us managed to take over most of the back room.  Sometimes our crowd is larger.  We have a ball.

Nathan sat on the tall stools to help his Dad order and to watch the grills.

Then Nathan got re-acquainted with his cousin who was just a newborn in the hospital the last time we saw him 12 months ago and 1/2 of Nathan’s life ago.  They had fun smiling and poking at each other.   They are within a half inch of each other in height in spite of the age difference.  Nathan is on the low end of the charts.

Loaded plates of pickles are always served, and I ordered my favorite onion rings in the whole wide world. 

The star of the show; a well done cheeseburger with everything, yes even the hot sauce, on a hard roll.  This visit has to last me another year.  The wafting savory smells make my mouth water.  Nothing compares to this burger.  Nothing!

Nathan has a red hot; what I believe to be the best hot dog in the world.  He likes his fries but determines to steal my onion rings at any chance he can get. 

After dinner a walk is in order and we head across the road to the pier.  It is a beautiful evening and my kids are astonished at the refreshing breezes coming off the lake.  It’s warm but they can see why we might keep our sweatshirts out in the summertime.  Not tonight though; it feels great out there.

Views from the north coast at sunset.

Everyone is enjoying being out and being together.  Kaitlyn gets Pops to agree to take her out on the rocks.  Nathan is impressed by the rocks, the spiders, the boats and the light waves.

Here’s my cute little nephew and my kids out with my cute big nephew; all enjoying themselves.

Cousins!  Yay!  My kids don’t get to hang out with cousins very often.

As I was heading back in I caught an image of the National Coast Guard patroling the waters and a couple of the fires up on the beach at sunset as people climbed out of the lake from their swim.

We walked right along the water’s edge along the rocks and back to the car so we’d catch sight of the swans, geese and ducks that were clamoring around in hopes of getting some bread crumbs.  The masses of sea gulls must have already been tucked in for the night.

Tristan and Kaitlyn were loving the birds coming right to them and being out on the rocks.  Another lovely evening down by the Bay.  How can I ever get enough?