A Sunday drive

Each Sunday when we drive to church we take a dirt road through the woods from Connecticut through part of NY state, then back into Connecticut. A lot of the time we get to see some critters like these in the woods. There are a lot of deer around. The local magazine we get in the mail said the population is about 60-75 per square mile. I haven't seen THAT many yet. The magazine said they encourage residents to allow hunters to hunt on their residential properties. I'm not sure that is such a good idea though. There are also a lot of wild turkeys. I think it is illegal to hunt those here.

a little deer in the woods on the road to the church

and a gobble of turkeys

Advent Calendar

The annual advent calendar has begun. My other one was a little hashed and I was sick of it, so I made one for this year. I wish I could take more time and make a more crafty one. I just print out both papers, then exacto the color christmas balls so they open up for a peek underneath, then write each activity in the empty Christmas balls. Stack the color copy over the outline copy, stick into a frame without glass, and voila! The first day we "put out Eddie the Elf". Today is "make a Christmas chain". It's becoming one of my favorite traditions! I'm not tech savvy enough to enable this to click for others to download in the right size, so if anyone wants a copy email me.

Christmas tree

On Friday we left Plymouth to drive back home. We planned a stop at a tree farm in Northeast Connecticut to surprise the kids and get our Christmas tree.


Rhode Island is wedged between Connecticut and Massachusetts, so we stopped by this beach at a lake in Rhode Island to take a picture. The kids wanted to stay longer, but it was chilly.

Then we drove on to the Geer Tree Farm in Griswold, Connecticut. It was perfect. There were acres and acres of beautifully shaped Christmas trees.

The kids went crazy running all over the farm, in and out of trees, pretending to be deer running from a hunter...

...while Kent and I decided on the perfect tree. It's a Fraser Fir tree. Isn't it pretty?

We cut it down with their saw, then a guy comes and picks it up in a truck to bring down to the barn area. They put it on the shaker machine and then bale it for you. They had complimentary hot chocolate and cookies. It was a lot of fun.

Now we have our Christmas tree!

Happy Thanksgiving!

What better way to celebrate Thanksgiving than with a trip to Plymouth where it all began? Plymouth is about a 3 hour drive from where we live. We stayed over at a hotel on Wednesday night and got a nice early start on Thanksgiving day at the Plimoth Plantation.

Plimoth Plantation is a historical re-creation of the Wampanoag native people and the Pilgrim settlers who arrived on the Mayflower on December 21, 1620. The first winter 1/2 of the colonists died. Who planned a trip to land in America in December?! Anywho...this place lets you explore the different cultures of the people back then. The native people (you're not allowed to call them Indians) speak in modern times and tell you about their people back then and today. They actually build/make everything at the plantation authentically. It was really interesting!

They burn out the trees to make their boats. It takes about 2 weeks from start to finish. Men were in charge of taking life (hunting, cutting down trees, etc.) and women were in charge of making/nurturing life.

Here is the Plymouth settlers village with a view of the cape behind it.

The workers here spoke as if they lived in the year 1630. So everything they said or questions they answered were as if they were those settlers. I wish I could have sat and listened to them longer, but little kids aren't really into holding still house after house.

Next on the ticket was a visit to see the Mayflower II. It is a recreation of the Mayflower that the Pilgrims came over on. The real Mayflower sailed back to England and is gone now.
The Mayflower had 102 passengers on it. My great-great-great-....grandfather Kenelme Winslow's brother Edward Winslow was a passenger on the Mayflower. Kenelme (my ancestor) joined the colony a few years later.

It was a chilly day. I wished I had brought gloves for everyone. Here is the Mayflower II in the background.

And here it is up close. Quarters were tight. Amazingly only 1 person died on the trip, and 1 baby was born. I can't imagine having a baby at sea! Let alone having to live at the colony in December building everything from nothing!

After that we walked over to view the "Plymouth Rock". There was an annual Thanksgiving day Protest going on. Whatever. Until one of them started talking to McKinley and pushing their propaganda on my child, then I was annoyed.

Here is Plymouth Rock. Kind of a let down. It's about 4-5 feet long. Not really the grand rock in the ocean I imagined.

Then we took a drive around Cape Cod, a looong drive. Some of my ancestors are buried in a small cape cod cemetery that has no address, just vague directions. We finally found it near 5 Monument View Road, Dennis, MA (that's for reference if I need to find it again with my GPS).

It is a small square of fenced land surrounded by homes. I had to cut through someones yard to get into it. It is the Old Worden cemetery, aka Homer cemetery, aka Winslow cemetery. But we found it!!

The cemetery was mostly comprised of Wordens and Winslows (my family) and Millers, and Homers.

The headstones are deteriorating which made it very hard to make out many of the names. This is one of my ancestors (one of the Kenelme Winslows) who died in 1715.

Here is a more modern plaque marking the three stubby worn headstones of Peter Worden (Sr), Peter Worden (Jr.) and Mary Worden. They died in the 1630's and 1680's. It was crazy being at the graves of my ancestors who lived over 300 years ago. I can't wait to show my grandpa and grandma these pictures.

After the cemetery it was 4:30 and dark. So we drove to a restaurant in Cape Cod that I had looked up online. There was no mention of being closed on Thanksgiving, but it was. So was pretty much every restaurant in Cape Cod. Darn small towns. So we ended up at McDonald's for Thanksgiving dinner. The kids got to get happy meals though, which they loved. For the record the cup in the picture is hot chocolate. It wasn't very good.

They have an authentic dinner at Plimoth Plantation but it was $60 a person.

That's a far cry from our little McD's dinner.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Manhattan

I made my official first trip to NYC early this morning. Some ladies in the ward went to the temple today while husbands watched kids. I woke up a 5 am to meet at the church at 6:15, to drive to NYC for the 7:45 session. I am so glad I went with people who knew what they were doing because it made me really anxious just riding in the car. I'm glad I didn't have to drive!
It was good to go to the temple and regain perspective on everything. Sometimes I need to reset my focus. The temple is a short walk from Central Park, so we drove by it and it got me really itching to go walk through Central Park in the spring. Now that my first visit is over I'm hoping to be brave and take myself there (by train---yikes!). There are a few Christmas things I want to see.





We found a Dutch store in Norwalk that we visited to pick up some things for the upcoming Sinterklaas coming in December (sneakily of course). We also treated ourselves to stroopwaffels (honey wafers sandwiched with caramel).


The kid's were excitedly pointing out the Sinterklaas' in the window. I really want some wooden shoes someday.

A peek of the house

For those who have expressed interest in seeing the place, here is a part of the house. I realized that I didn't take any whole room "before" pictures. I was too focused on capturing all the wrong things close up so we don't get held liable when we leave.

So here is the bathroom "before". It was a nice shade of peek-a-boo peanut orange with green (notice the door trim) peeking through. The worst paint job I have EVER seen!

And here is the bathroom after I painted it a lighter creamy-ish tan color and painted the trim white. That green haunts my dreams. By the way, this is the master. It's a little "cozy".

Here is the dining area before. I know it's a great shot of the floor. The walls here were also peanut orange. There were "touch-ups" on the wall they did so there were splotches of different shades of peanut all over.

Here's the before of the family room area. It was painted in this lovely hue of green. It was darker in real life than it shows in the picture.

And here's where we live "after". It's an open concept living area. So on the left is an entry table, then the family room straight ahead. Turning to the right is the dining area, then turning right again is the landlady's bookcase that we weren't allowed to move out, in a nook . And then there is the front door area. And there is your 360 degree tour.

that's our thankful tree on the side table :)

I hung the silhouettes of the kids in here. I'm kind of getting sick of the black furniture trend I was in...oh well. Things look very minimalist. But I hear that's all the rage now right?

Behind the bookcase is a little doorway to under the stairs storage.

Weird, especially since you can access it through the walk-in closet in the kitchen.

I painted all the walls, closets, shelves, baseboards, trim, and doors. Oi vay! It is certainly still not the condition we'd like, but since it is a rental we are just shooting for liveable. And I think we've finally achieved it. We feel comfortable, and we don't want to pour any more money into a house that isn't ours. So when people come to visit, just remember it is liveable, not 5-star.

Grateful

Today I am grateful for the journey.

Things are not perfect here, but I am happy. I am happy to be on this adventure. I'm glad we took the leap.

Here's to the next 2 years!