New Gear

We drove to camp yesterday. There is very little snow here and relatively high temps. It was above freezing for the entire drive. This afternoon we joined some of our friends for a hike on the trails between Church and Osgood Ponds, across from Paul Smith's. Since there is little snow and what there is is icy, we needed some new equipment. These are microspikes and they worked quite well.After the hike we had a nice dinner at the St. Regis Cafe, the student-run restaurant in Paul Smith's, and then went to John's talk at the VIC.

Another Quilt for the Show

Miami Beach, Everglades, Etc.

On Friday we all went to Shark Valley and as usual enjoyed the large selection of birds. While I tried not to take too many photos of things I'd taken plenty of pictures of in the past, sometimes one cannot resist. Here is a snowy egretand a great blue heron.Yesterday we went to the main section of the Everglades and walked on the Anhinga Trail and saw lots more birds and alligators. Today we went to the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Gardens. We saw this turtle in the water near the parking lot.The garden has lots of beautiful tropic foliageinterspersed with various neat sculptures.We fly home tomorrow.

In Orlando

We, plus our younger daughter, flew to Orlando yesterday and spent the evening at Epcot.Today we headed for the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Universal's Islands of Adventure. This is the entrance to Hogsmeade,and the Hogsmeade skyline.We drank butter beer and pumpkin juice and bought a chocolate frog and every-flavour beans. Needless to say, much of the attraction has to do with shopping. We toured the castle, but bailed before the ride at the end. And W rode the Dragon Challenge roller coaster. It was neat, but definitely not worth a trip by itself. We had to walk through the Dr Seuss portion of the park to get to Harry Potter and stopped there afterwards to ride the Caro-Seuss-el and see the Lorax. Later in the day we drove to Miami Beach to meet up with the rest of the family.

First Quilt of the Year

I love paper piecing.

Happy New Year

What great friends and neighbors we have. We managed to get 20 people in here for the appetizer portion of the neighborhood progressive dinner. W's penquin appetizers were a hit.Then after more courses and more visiting we headed for the get-together with our paddling friends in Saranac Lake for more good food and company. We left too late to get to any of the First Night activities but one of these years I'll get there. We did go out and see the fireworks at midnight and they were especially neat. The warm temperatures - it was in the mid 30's all evening - combined with the little amount of snow that is still left resulted in a lot of fog. It made the drive a bit of a challenge but it made for some great effects with the fireworks. The higher ones disappeared up into the fog then floated down out of it. And many lit the whole sky, reflecting off the fog. A great way to start the new year.

We're headed back to New Jersey tomorrow.

At Camp

We drove to camp today in order to be here for the usual New Year's festivities. The drive was uneventful, but cold. The temp here when we arrived was 16 degrees and going down. There are a few inches of snow on the ground, but not enough to be plowed.

Tallis Scholars

We saw the Tallis Scholars in Princeton last evening. Wow.

King-sized Quilt

I finished piecing the king-sized quilt for our bed in NJ. Of course, this is just the top. It still needs to be quilted, but I'm hiring someone to do it with her long-arm. So it may be a while before it is complete.

Hawk Mountain

We all went to Hawk Mountain today.We didn't see many birds but it was a nice get-together.