Dairy Daze...and Now Beyond

Ha ha. Ellen went to a cousin's birthday party last night. Well, I took her there of course. The cousin turned 8, but she has a younger sister who is Ellen's age. They had hit it off at a family reunion back in May. There were quite a few older children there, mostly family members and friends of the teenaged sister, so Ellen was quite shy at first. However she got her bearings, after a little cake and keem, and ended up having a fine time with her cousin. This is a picture of them. This cousin's birthday will be in Sept, so perhaps there will be another party to go to soon. And it has been revolving around in my mind that since Ellen's next birthday will be year number FIVE, perhaps we should have a party for her. We shall see. Where to have it is the question.

In early summer those 13 year cicadas came out. They had red eyes and were quite loud. I think I had mentioned them on my Facebook account, but not on here. Anyway, they were gone, had run their course...whatever, by the time we got back from our CA trip. But they left behind evidence. Here is a pic of the damage they did to the trees. The females cut little slits into small twigs at the ends of the limbs and lay their eggs. These twigs subsequently die, as shown here. You can tell which types of trees they prefer by the amount of damage. Hubby said it's mainly the white oaks that have the most dead twigs.

This is the husband's favorite photo of Ellen from our trip. We are out on Clam Beach. Ellen was rabid to go buy a shovel and pail and play in the sand on the beach. So the 3rd or 4th day there, off we went to the store and got those required items. Then we headed to the beach. Clam Beach is the closest beach to where we were staying so that is where we went. It is a nice beach, but it is quite a hike to get down to the wet sand and the waves. Ellen was a bit leery this time of getting too close to the waves, so we stayed well away. We filled the bucket once, made the pictured "sand castle" and she dug in the sand with her shovel once or twice. I took 2 pictures. Then she turned around and announced; "I have to go potty." The restrooms were, of course, a 50 mile hike back to the parking lot. (OK maybe I exaggerate the distance, but when you are walking through sand it seems like it.) When we got back she announced, "I don't have to go."...

I was going to tell our 2011 Calfornia trip story from the beginning; but how boring is that? So I will start with one of the funnier pictures I took. The Saturday before we left my mom (from here on out referred to as Mom) Ellen and I went over to the place where I grew up, Mom had had to sell it after my father passed away. The folks who bought it own a landscaping business and have fixed it up so nice. They have a garden, numerous fruit trees (most of which were the ones my father planted there many years before he died), berry bushes...etc. Down in the back they have a pen and raise a couple of pigs to butcher every other year I believe. They happened to have 2 fairly small porkers this year. So we went down so Ellen could see them. The lady gave them a couple of dog bone treats to get them to come out. I had Ellen stand in front of them so I could take a picture. Well, Ellen complied, but not without a certain dubiousness, which shows up so well in her expression in this p...