Always too much to tell. A slower pace in the country? Occasionally, but not often. The first half of May has been very busy here. Rather than tell you all about it, I’m offering a photographic retrospective of the last two weeks. Hope you don’t mind – there are quite a few pics here…Starting with a surprise visit one morning by Phil on his tractor, who’d come by to plow our garden. He’s doing it for nothing. Just being a kind neighbor. I told him I felt guilty about his helping us like that, but he responded that Mr. Sessleman had done it for him once upon a time, he was just passin it on. Hope I too am able to pass on some helpful kindness one day.

(This is earliest May – note how few leaves are on the trees, then compare to similar shots just a week later)

I like this shot – tractor, Elihu, goose, all in motion…

Elihu runs down the driveway after the tractor

May 3rd, the fourth graders dance around the May pole while singing (in harmony parts!) and weaving very intricate designs with the colored ribbons. This is a rite of passage for fourth graders at the Waldorf School.

Elihu and Dierdre bow to each other before the dance

Grandma and Grandpa were able to join us…

My mom remembers dancing around the May pole when she was in fourth grade, too!

A nice looking group, these wonderful fourth graders.

Goofburgers!

Elihu enjoys a little picnic with his grandparents

We take a look at the weaving job

Lovely up close

Then Elihu helps carry it off…

Now for a quick family picture…

Before zipping off to catch a duck…

 Notice Elihu, to the right…

No bait used – nothing but extreme motivation and a finely-honed technique

Duck time

A fine end to May day!

…and a fine start to our Merck Forest field trip as Elihu chases a turkey vulture across a field…

Visiting pastured sheep, Elihu dashes off in hopes of seeing birds…

The view was gorgeous. All I can think of is how much labor was involved in clear cutting the old growth forests and making them into farmland – at this elevation and nearly three hundred years ago, no less. Boggles the mind.

We visited pigs that lived out in the woods. !

Kids feeding kids.

Too cute!

Now to see the beautiful draft horse

The class sang a song about horses (in a round!) as they admired her

Ben found a B on the horse’s side

Elihu and I head up the hill to the barns in search of swallows

Bingo! Such striking markings and color

What’s this? A pigeon’s nest…

With eggs! Hope mom comes back soon to brood… think we scared her off

We watch the horse get hitched up to her gear. They really do farm with the horses here at Merck Forest.

On the trail to the car everyone fills the ‘elevator’ tree

Nora and I are having mint chocolate chip! This girl’s amazing – she used a balled up piece of tin foil from lunch to make a baseball, and found some sticks… within minutes she’d started a full-on baseball game.

We’re at the local Battenkill Dairy – our ice cream was made right on the premises. All of it. !

Ah, the apple trees…

And the flowering Quince, too

Look who’s returned one week later to till! Thank you Phil!!!

While Phil works, Elihu picks violets..

and picks…

and then makes ‘Violet Angels’ in them…

Next on the agenda, some Cinnamon fiddleheads from our woods for supper. They’re fuzzier than Ostrich ferns (and slightly more toxic) and take a lot of prep. Mainly why they don’t work well in restaurants.

Cleaned and washed

Boiled, next to be sautéed in butter

We actually really liked them.

Onto the Saratoga City Ballet’s Spring production of Alice in Wonderland. That’s our friend Freya in the middle…

and this is our friend Mahogany

Here’s the only boy in the whole group. He is good. !

Love the en pointe thing. So much harder than it appears.

All three Waldorf kids afterwards. Mahogany and Freya are in seventh grade.

We went out for ice cream after the show (Atkins diet took a week off) and it was positively snowing white apple blossoms!

So pretty

A few hours later and it’s our annual birthday dinner at the Wishing Well!

In short order Elihu was playing along with the pianist in the bar

Elihu’s very favorite dish of all: Frogs’ Legs. ! (I think he’s playing drums on the table with their little leg bones. !)

Yeeps. I’m trying them too. And they’re actually very delicious. And no, not really like chicken.

The pic above our table (Saratoga is a racing town.) This is pretty incredible, huh?

Happy 60th birthday to us!

Thanks for singing!

Yay! A picture of the two of us taken by someone other than me. !

The Wishing Well is an old-world joint. Lots of wood, mounted moose heads and such.

Elihu gets a good-night smooch from owner Brenda Lee (with whom I’d sung ‘Exactly Like You’ earlier in the evening – when I requested  it and the pianist had – gasp – never heard of it.)

Good-bye  WW – see you next year! (We love the place, but must note that our fiddleheads were better than theirs and that the escargot was not good. Wine not cooked off, not enough salt or butter, and gritty. We’re very forgiving, but it was a lot of money for a not so spectacular dinner. But it was fun to actually hear a person playing the piano. Plus I have learned that I cannot casually drink a martini these days. I got fairly loaded on nearly nothing. Times are a changin’.)

This has been our wonderful month of May so far…