Finding the Balance (aka Magnaball Trip Part 3)

After days of concerts and driving, city adventures and tourist attractions, it was time for some downtime.  We found an Airbnb rental in the Finger Lakes region.  We had our own walk-out basement apartment surrounded by a lovely farm, hikes, a pond, a pool, and even our own full kitchen.  For only $50 a night it was a win!


Our room happened to also be a lego storage room (the kids of the house were all teenagers, so these weren't played with anymore).  Both kids had a blast getting into those plus the shelves of board games.  The wildflowers alone were enough to keep Blossom happy!

I had a chance to re-freeze our ice packs, do laundry, dry out and re-sort our gear and basically get ready to be at a festival for 4 days.  A farm decompression time was just what we needed to regroup.
The hikes were especially nice, and one of the farm dogs even tagged along!

Of course the kids found treasures, even some live ones.

Doesn't that frog look like he's begging to do an obstacle course?? The kids realized his needs, and built him some challenges to encourage his athletic side.

Finally, they let Frog go by the pond as we headed out on a boat ride before calling it a day.

to be continued ...

Waterfalls to the West (aka Magnaball Trip Part 2)

After the Merriweather Phish show, we drove straight up through Pennsylvania and into New York, and straight to Four Mile Creek Campground on Lake Ontario.

None of us has ever been to a Great Lake before, and it was quite beautiful. 

If you squinted, you could see Toronto across the lake.  The campground has a small rocky beach, perfect for skipping rocks and gathering wildflowers.

We spent a couple days on the western edge of NY.  Reed is really into architecture, and we got to take a house tour of Frank Lloyd Wright's Darwin D. Martin complex in Buffalo.  So cool!

We ate buffalo wings at the Anchor Bar, which is the bar that invented them.

We found a swimming beach on Lake Ontario.

We saw the powerful Niagara Falls!

We rode the iconic Maid of the Mist and felt the waterfall's rush at Cave of the Winds.

After 2 fun days, we packed up our tent, took a final walk on the rocky beach of Lake Ontario, picked out a rock to take home, and headed on our way...

Headed North (or Magnaball Trip Part 1)

Whew - we just came back from a fantastic week and a half on the road!  There are too many photos to put into one post, so I'll post bit by bit.

On a Friday, Reed, ZB and I packed up into the minivan and headed East to Raleigh to see my fave band, Phish.  It was a great show!  We hung towards the back of the lawn with lots of other families, so all the kids could run around together.  Once it was dark, glow toys came out, and the kids eventually fell asleep on the blanket to the sweet sounds of Phish.

On Saturday, we headed North to Baltimore to catch the next Phish show.  On the way, we stopped in my old stomping grounds of Richmond, Virgina.

Reed was uber impressed with their fantastic park system.

We eventually wandered over to Maymont, which is right near my old house, and has huge, beautiful gardens, as well as petting zoo, aviary, aquarium, etc.

It was a real challenge to pull them away from all the loveliness of Maymont and get us back on the road again!  It was really fun to take them to places I remember so well bringing Clay as a baby over a decade ago.

A few more hours in the car got us to Merriweather Post Pavillion in Maryland.  The kids helped me sell $1 waters before the show to fund our trip... well, Reed helped while Blossom dug holes :)

The show was again great.  The lawn at Merriweather doesn't have the best sound, but there were lots of other families there, which was very fun!  We danced the night away!

to be continued...

Time for New Adventures

This week is one for new adventures!  The whole family has actually been greatly looking forward to this week all Summer.

 Bobby left for AGI, which is a summer camp of sorts, for glass blowers.  He was really excited to go spend a week with other talented glass blowers, meeting famous artists of the trade.

Clay left for his first sleep-away camp at Camp Woodward in Pennsylvania.  He saved up the tuition all by himself.  Such a rock star!  There are many different sports tracks to choose from there.  Clay chose skateboarding, and rode up there with 2 of his best friends who chose in-line skating and parkour.  They reluctantly let me take their photo before piling in the car for the 10 hour drive.

Blossom, Reed and I are still in Asheville for most of the week.  We are busy packing and planning to leave for our trip on Friday.  We are taking a trip up to Finger Lakes, New York (Watkins Glen specifically) to go to a festival put on by my favorite band, Phish.  We'll be seeing the band play a couple times on the way up, as well as hitting some tourist spots like Niagara Falls, Watkins Glen State Park and Hershey, PA.

As a little warm-up to all the live music we'll be seeing, Blossom and I went to see Dark Star Orchestra (a Grateful Dead cover band) play at one of my favorite venues in Asheville, Pisgah Brewery.  It's a very family friendly venue and Blossom had a great time dancing and playing with all the other kids!

Keep an eye on the blog for our adventures of the next couple weeks!!

Family Camping

We just came home from a lovely weekend camping with some other sweet families!

We were at the Briar Bottom Campground near Micaville, NC.  The kids loved exploring the woods and finding all sorts of mushrooms and creatures.

We all went on a waterfall hike.  The little ones stayed at the bottom of the falls, while the older kids hiked to the top.

Reed even got in some push-ups and a refreshing shower!

A neighboring campground offered ranger programs, so a few of the parents and all the kids walked down to learn about "skulls and skins".

General resting and silliness was had, late night rummy and spades were played, campfire songs and good food were shared!

I was sad to leave and I'm already looking forward to next year's campout!

Fire Station!

I started a Young Homeschoolers Play Group a couple months ago and it's going really well!  I find around age 4 and 5 that it's hard for homeschoolers, as most of the friends they have made go off to school.  So, I started this group to build community for Blossom's age group.

We do a couple park days and a couple field trips each month.  One for this month was the fire station!

Kids got to climb in and explore the various trucks.  Then, they saw a firefighter put on all his gear so they won't be scared of him if he's in their house to rescue them!  This was everyone's favorite part.

This fire station was downtown.  Afterwards, we walked across the street to the big park and splash pad.  Blossom hasn't been here in such a long time, it was seemingly all new to her, and I was surprised that she jumped right in!

Great way to cool off on a hot July day!!  Hope you all are having lots of fun Summer adventures as well!