Monday, July 30, 2007

Fell off the face of the Earth

Okay, I've been busy cleaning and hanging out in the woods. The family went to Long Island, but I just straightened around camp while they were gone. My son Justin is out of the Army and came to camp. We went to the Central Adirondack Art show opening together. It was cool to know several of the artists in the show and actually have people to talk to at the opening.
With all the time I had without the kids and hubby I still never started painting. My friend Leigh Ann just got here. Jet Blue cancelled my daughter's flight or she would have been here last night. She comes in late tonight now.
It's a beautiful day on the lake today, but we're headed for Old Forge Hardware. We did sit and knit on the dock a while and the kids swam and kayaked. We're all beat. I think it's a good nap day rather than party day.
Later...

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

Happy birthday Amelia!

My cousin's daughter April in Missouri had the most adorable baby girl today. Welcome to the family! Great job April! We love you.

Further adventures of Mr. Bill

Mr. Bill is a busy guy. As are we. The kitchen is almost usable.
Paul and the kids are heading to Long Island tomorrow and I am taking another painting class. More family and friends are coming in to camp within the week. Fun and games are beginning!


Sunday, July 22, 2007

Mr Bill's Adventures





Mr Bill has been busy at camp. Poor Mr. Bill. Mr Hand is not playing nice.

Went to Utica today to find a sink.
Okay, we found a sink and counter. It’ll work. It's actully a very nice sink. My goal for having the kitchen usable, the burn piles the contractor left cleaned up and hauled away and the garage floor graveled and all the stuff off the driveway and put away was today. We didn’t make any of them. Not only that but the septic and water guys seem to have us just waiting around. I think I’ll cancel. If I can’t start to make some of this back or at least get some tax advantage to all of this I don’t need to spend anything on it.
The family have started arriving, the Trouts from near Albany and the Sloans from Oklahoma arrived this afternoon and evening. It's supposed to be time for having a vacation, not just working and we're not done with anything.

Friday, July 20, 2007

What's new in the Woods



Wow, it’s been a few days since I’ve checked in. The watercolor class with Sondra Freckleton and Sally Baker was phenomenal. It is the best class I have ever taken! I have not finished my painting yet. Here is a picture of the still life set up.Here is how far I have gotten on my painting.

The kitchen is progressing. It is now too late to get my garnet granite countertop so I am designing a cement counter with inset tiles of garnet tile and whatnot. Hmmmm, thinking about murals and airbrush techniques for the refrigerator and wall paint… Someone stop me. I almost found a sink yesterday. If it wasn’t an undermount I would have brought it home. We also had a load of driveway gravel delivered to fix the floor of the garage. We filled in some mushy places in the driveway with the extra.
It’s been raining. I’ve done a little antiquing, knitting, cooking, reading, gathering interesting branches and such. My son made himself a copper wrist cuff and baked bread today.
My daughter and I visited Old Forge Hardware and found Mr. Bill. We decided it would be fun to surprise people with Mr. Bill in precarious situations. My son was in on it after we got him the first time. This is what Mr. Bill did today.



We have a visitor a lot these days. Don’t tell, we’ve been giving him popcorn. Paul has named him Gerald.

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Watercolor class started today


Today was the first day of my watercolor class with Sondra Freckleton. It was fantastic! I spent the whole day painting 3 apples. Here they are. Yeah, the middle one isn’t all that great. She actually went over the basics to change our bad habits. We started at 9 am and at 4 pm I barely knew the time had gone. When I went outside there was a doe and two fawns grazing right beside the parking lot. The fawns got as close as about 15 feet away. What do you know but I left all the cameras at home. I can only hope I get another opportunity to get a great shot like that.
Everybody went home this afternoon to get ready for their work week. Justin only has this week left with the Army!!! WooooooHooooooo!!! We are partying next weekend!
The boys are playing guitar on Innisfree’s porch and I am starting dinner. As soon as I finish knitting my first Ballband dishcloth I am going to town to blog you all.
Here's a loon that keeps popping by our dock.
7/14/07
Michael, Luann and Deborah came to camp today. They went with Claire to climb Rocky Point before dinner. I mixed up some nectarine ice cream and Paul used his machine to freeze it. We had some great blackberry pie Michael and Luann brought with the ice cream. Justin took Claire to the movies. Alex had Travis stay over on the porch.

Friday, July 13, 2007

Good Luck Friday


Friday the 13th… I've always felt they are lucky for me, while Saturday the 14th was unlucky. I always conduct myself with care on the day after a Friday the 13th.
The woods are cool today. Requiring a jacket in the morning and evening, but comfortable the rest of the day.
This morning Paul found this little cute orange salamander.
The kitchen is still in progress. Lots of drywall and green board in, the sink repositioned.
We did laundry. Or should I say my daughter did (waited for and finished) the laundry
I went to see about having a chair reupholstered. After I settled on what I wanted the lady asked how long I’d be at camp. When I answered she said she didn’t think she would able to do it in time since she already had a waiting list. I guess I should have asked that first instead of driving the chair all the way to Old Forge three times, calling several times trying to reach her, going to see her, and deciding on a fabric.
In town I found some Rubbermaid storage boxes. Went to the Knitting circle at Old Forge Hardware, but only stayed an hour since my daughter was still at the Laundromat. Found some sale yarns. One of which I needed to go with some I bought last year to make a shell. I wish they had had just one more ball. I need to plan things better next week so I can sit down and knit.
I did get a little info about the entrelac project I started. I kept starting the right leaning rectangles and I just couldn’t remember how to pick up the stitches right. After all I had done the same project before with no problem. I came back and was able to work on it without ripping it out any more.

Bought some raffle tickets for a cool bear quilt benefiting a local church. Friday the 13th is my lucky day...suppose I'll win?
Kids went out in the kayaks and swam at the island. They had a hard time getting back against the wind.
After dinner Justin got here. He ate, then went out in his kayak with the kids again. Alex got thrown into the lake. He’s not a happy camper right now. My daughter had better watch out. He’s not accepting her apology.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

New Kayaks for Innisfree



Today Paul started putting up insulation, drywall, and green board in the kitchen so that we can put in the cabinets after getting up around 4 am to chase mice for me. The kids and I went and tried kayaks. We ended up getting a pair of them. They are nice little recreational kayaks. They are Wilderness Tsunamis, one mystic blue 120 and one mango colored 125. The kids paddled from the dam at 6th lake to our dock about midway up 7th, then went across the lake to the lean-tos and went swimming and swung on the rope swing into the water. They are tired, but really happy.

Here are the cabinets when they got here Monday and my moving men.

Our engineer did the perc test for the leach field today too. Looks like it will be right before we leave before they start work.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Laid back days


Yesterday I didn’t do much. The boys ran off to help fix a train so my daughter and I ran a quick trip to town. We ended up going to a couple of shops, having lunch at Van Auken's Inn, and grocery shopping. I napped when we got back. It was a really laid back day. No working on the camp. Here’s my daughter outside the new Life is Good store. She LOVES moose!

Today I spent all morning checking for the right paint colors for my watercolor class starting Sunday. Then I came in to town to order the paints I need from Cheap Joes. I hope their rush service gets them here in time. Kids are sleeping really late today. Just as well, it's raining. I think I'll go scrape glue off the floor so that we can put in the cabinets that got here on Monday. Like I said, laid back...

Monday, July 9, 2007

Water Witching at Innifree

I finished the section of floor I have been scraping tiles off of. I am tired and my hands and back hurts. Just as I was sitting out at the picnic table saying I couldn't do all the steps I need to do to finish the floor, our well guy showed up. We located a couple of different places to put the well. He used the brass rods to locate the placement of the well. My son, husband and I all got to try it ourselves too. It works! Chuck says that it works with the electrical charge of your body.
So we have a place to dig and an appointment to drill in the next couple of weeks. We are waiting on the engineering of the leach field and septic system and a start date for excavation. I hope it's soon. I've got to start getting some money back for the Crow's Nest.
We took a drive down South Shore road and caught sight of a couple of deer across the pond near 4th Lake. I was just thinking we always see deer walking along the road or in town, but never drinking. Guess I was wrong.

Sunday, July 8, 2007

Happenings at the lakes

7/8/07
Woke up to a mouse in the bathroom. Then he came out into the hall ran up and down a broom I had against the bathroom door to keep him from coming out and ran into a couple of the bedrooms. They are cute and all and have lived in these woods much longer than me, but I don’t want to share my house with them. Paul set a Have-a-Heart trap for me. Last year one caught itself in one of the traps we had stored on the porch. Paul took it for a little boat trip to the beach near Eighth Lake and let it go there. What a guy.
The kids are still sleeping. I have been debating what to do with the strawberries and rhubarb. I was going to make a coffee cake, but decided we really like strawberry rhubarb pie best.
Trying to start a new knitting project, but can’t decide what to do. Am kicking myself I didn’t pick up this bag of fabric at a yard sale yesterday. There was one piece I would have liked to use for a knitting bag. vintage stuff…
May go to the Old Forge Arts Center and sign up for the classes I want to take. I missed the pen and ink class already.
7/7/07
Old Forge had their Antique Boat show today at the waterfront. Lots of wood hull old motorboats. They were really beautiful. My favorite was one that was built in 1903, “The Indian”. It had a cool shaped stern. Here are some details of my favorite

I remember my grandfather having a wood motorboat when we first used to go to camp in the 60s.



Of course everyone is always looking for this...
We walked around town afterwards. I need a bunch of odds and ends to get camp in shape, but couldn’t find anything I needed. At least we stopped to eat and had some Buffalo wings. I hadn’t had my first wings yet. I think that makes us officially here.
Justin got here late this afternoon. We’re at an Inlet 6th and 7th Lake Association meeting listening to a talk on invasive aquatic species in the lakes. We have Eurasian milfoil in the lakes and they are being really proactive in trying to remove it and prevent it from spreading. We have wonderful lake water quality and want to keep it that way.

Friday, July 6, 2007

Cabinets ordered

Here's for you Mark. Wish you were here!Today we made progress. I found some acceptable cabinets in stock in Rome, New York. They'll be here Monday. We also got concrete to make new footings under the supports holding up the garage and Crow's Nest. We received excellent advice when it came to what to do to get rid of the glue left after removing the linoleum tiles in Innisfree's kitchen. So we spent the whole day out of camp. We wanted to have all that out of the way for the possibility of family being here with us this weekend.
I did finish one knitting project finally. It's a long washcloth with handles for washing your back. I didn't block it...it's a washcloth. I like the pattern better on the backside. The bumps make it look like it will do a good job scrubbing your back. I adapted a pattern I found for a washcloth by addiing I-cord handles. It's a little bumpy where I connected the ends. Oh well, better next time...

Here's a picture from the other day, our big accomplishment on the 4th of July, gas powered ice cream making.

Tuesday, July 3, 2007

Update in the Woods

I thought I’d get here and do a lot of running around checking out yarn stores and knitting, but I guess I’ve really fallen off the end of the Earth. Every project I start seems to add a couple more that need doing. I have to drag myself into town to get near a hotspot to blog. I am working on figuring out how to use Dreamweaver to make web pages at camp and then come in to town to upload. I am doing so many other things it is probably not going to happen quickly. At least I have started journaling on my computer so that I don’t do all my typing in front of the library.
Today is laundry day. We are also going to drive over to Lowville to go to Miller’s for meat, fireworks, and hopefully some real vanilla(I can’t find ANY in town. The ice cream maker is going for a test run today. We’ve decided on vanilla for the first flavor and add fruit to parts of the batch. It is a 2 Gallon ice cream freezer!!! Talk about overkill. Can you guess the husband picked this one?
Here's the Lowville cow. She doesn't have her sunglasses on yet...I did find real vanilla in Lowville.
Drove to Miller's to get meat and groceries today. Still don't have the laundry done to have clean sheets...tired today.