grandma visits

Today is Halloween, so I hope that tomorrow we'll have some great trick-or-treat pictures. For now, a quick update on October...

The highlight for us was the visit of my (alex) mom earlier this month. She was here for just over a week and we all had a great time.

She came armed with early birthday presents... note, anyone looking for presents for these kids might consider Playmobils. They are wildly popular among the younger set in this house.



















We had some great dinners together. Ellie and Nico always wanted to sit next to Grandma, as close as humanly possible.



















My mom showed us some high-end bottling techniques. The peach jam is sooooo good.



















We visited our local botanical garden, the Bayard Cutting Arboretum. It's small but has some great features.



















Including this turtle!



















They had some beautiful old Japanese Maples.



















There was a dahlia exhibit going on while we were there. I had no idea there were so many kinds of dahlias.



















We also visited a pumpkin farm on the North Shore of the island. There are lot of these farms around, and most of them offer other entertainments for kids. We have learned by hard experience that the quality of the establishments vary, however. Fortunately this one was of the higher caliber.

They had a bounce-room...



















...a haybale maze...





































... and of course, loads of pumpkins.



















A lot of the "farms" are just empty fields with a lot of pre-picked pumpkins strewn about on the ground. I fear this gives kids the impression that pumpkins magically materialize in such places... kind of defeats the purpose of exposing city kids to agriculture.

This place was a real farm, you had to saw or tear off the pumpkin from the stem. They also had lots of other types and colors.





































The results were great!



















Thanks for coming out, Mom! We hope to see you again soon!

quarry trip

Recently I had to travel to a stone quarry in the Adirondacks. The purpose was to select the boulders for my DeLury Square project in Lower Manhattan.

The quarry is really cool. This was my second trip, so I didn't go for the whole tour this time. This time I had to select around 40 boulders, of varying sizes. Most are smaller seating stones, but a few are larger, and will be used to make a fountain. These had to be selected carefully to fit the space and aesthetics of the design. The largest is 13' high (although 3' of that will be buried), and weighs around 40 tons.

Here's the second-biggest stone... you can see the ledge behind where they are sliding off more stone. They actually do this whole operation with surprisingly little impact to the environment. Obviously there's the excavation, but they don't do any more than absolutely necessary, and they "use the whole deer" so to speak -- there is very little waste. Stormwater is closely managed, too... am I losing my audience? Anyway I think they do a pretty good job. And the stone is of the highest quality. If you're in the market for granite, be sure to check them out at www.champlainstone.com.





































The landscape up there is beyond amazing, of course. I really miss living in Ithaca.





































I wrote into the contract that the contractor had to pay for all travel and lodging expenses for this trip. The contractor didn't care what kind of car I rented, so naturally I chose the new Chevy Camaro. (For all you whistleblowers out there, it was actually about the same price to rent as a regular boring car).



















I was very impressed -- although that could be related to my typical driving experiences, which is either in the office's Civic or my own 8-year-old Accord. With the Camaro I was expecting a fast but jumpy sports car, not that comfortable or smooth on the highway. It was indeed fast (not going to offer details on how I know that), but also very comfortable. This would be an outstanding road trip car, as long as you don't have more than 2 people. There is a back seat, but it was apparently designed for people without legs.

As Ferris says, if you have the means, I highly recommend you pick one up.

View from the driver's seat... note the tasteful retro gauges.



















Ellie and Nico got a look the next morning, before I returned it. They were very interested in a "real" sports car, although Nico was a little skeptical because it didn't have a rear spoiler.



















Cruisin', yeah...

tom comes to visit

My brother Tom came for a long weekend this month. Our main goal was to pack in as much baseball as possible, although I quickly learned that he was also very interested in finding some good fresh seafood.

We got some good tickets to Mets vs. Marlins and Yankees vs. Orioles -- that last one was especially significant since those are our favorite teams.

Unfortunately I didn't have the camera for the Mets game, so you'll have to take my word that the new stadium is outstanding in every way. Waaaay better than Shea, which is not saying much.

Heading to the Yankees game...
























Pretty good seats -- lowest section, shallow left field.







































Jorge Posada, at the bat and about to strike out. Jeter's on deck. Unfortunately he had just got his hits record on the previous game.



















In the end, the Orioles (dead last in the division) soundly beat the Yankees (best record in baseball). Also Tom's favorite player, Brian Robinson, hit a grand slam. Tom was standing up cheering loudly while B.Rob rounded the bases... pretty brave, I thought. There was much grumbling, but no beers were thrown (it ain't Boston, after all).

A few other highlights -- we had a late-night cruise through the foggy city... here's Empire State.



















One day we traveled along the North Fork of Long Island, all the way to the very tip. It's pretty cool, the land actually comes to a point and then slowly sinks into the water. Not sure if you can tell from the picture, but the waves are coming from both sides, colliding in the middle (that's an island in the distance).



















Tom really wanted to see the Whaling Museum in nearby Sag Harbor, but unfortunately it was closed. Sounds intriguing, especially because it's in an old Masonic temple.



















I didn't get any pictures of the fresh seafood place, which was pretty amazing. Huge platefuls of different kinds of seafood, most of it caught fresh + local. Anyway, as you can see, there's something for everyone here. So when are you coming to visit?

Beethoven and Bernstein

We have a LOUSY cd player in our kitchen; it only plays some of our cds. I'm not sure of its criteria, but the player seems to weed out about 80% of our music. I went through 6 cds, all summarily rejected by the stereo, before I resorted to my favorite, which always seems inexplicably acceptable. I was secretly happy. It was what I really wanted to listen to, but I'm a little embarrassed to listen to it as much as I do. I listen to it so much that my 3 year old knows what it's called. "It ends with 7th," he states.

Beethoven's Symphony No. 7 is perfection itself. The man was brilliant!

I actually have two recordings of it, but honestly, who can compete with Leonard Bernstein??

I would upload the music here, but have spent the last hour failing to figure out how. Alas. Instead, you can go here and listen to tiny snippets, or simply buy your own copy.

harriet

When it became clear we were heading for a place with more outdoor space, the kids and Ami lost no time in lobbying for a pet.

Now I have nothing against animals in general. We're all just trying to get by on this crazy planet. But I do have objections to sharing my house with animals. Also, I have plenty on my plate already, thank you, without having to take care of an animal as well.

So the negotiations began. Ellie's starting position was a full-on farm, with cows, horses, llamas, who knows. More like a zoo, actually. The pro-animal coalition finally agreed to unify and push for a dog. No way was I going for that. Again, I have nothing against dogs, I actually like them if they're not yappy all the time. I just don't want to clean up after them and take them to the vet and etc. I suggested pet rocks as an alternative.

After some weeks of discussion, I had agreed to a single goldfish, and the Coalition was now arguing for a low-maintenance outdoor cat (Ellie, the extremist in the coalition, pushed for a large family of cats). I was considering this, but not quite ready to make a commitment.

Then Harriet showed up, and made the decision for us.

We have no idea where she came from. Our neighbor says she'd been roaming the neighborhood for a few weeks, looking for a place to call home. I suppose she was abandoned by her previous people. Anyway, we fed her a couple times and she stuck around, even defending her new territory against interlopers. Ellie named her after a character in the Catwings series, one of her favorites.

I'm glad she came. The kids adore her, of course. Ellie constantly asks us where Harriet is, as if we had her hooked up to a GPS. Ami and I both had cats growing up, and she reminds us of those Past Cats.

Harriet is a bit of a lounger.



















But she rouses herself to follow us around on our Saturday work. Does she think she's helping, or supervising?



















A few days ago she leapt into one of our pear trees.



















I was a little concerned -- could she get down ok? Turns out she was just curious, or perhaps trying to prove her agility. After exploring a few branches, she executed a few deft moves and landed gracefully on the ground.



















When I was growing up, our cats would line up outside the door and watch us for hours. We called it Cat TV. This must be a common trait in cats; Harriet subscribed to Cat TV right away.



















Welcome to the family, Harriet.

Queens: We miss your flowers.

The flowers outside SS Natural are missed. Even though we walked by them hundreds of times, the kids never failed to stop and smell them.

Ellie age 2:





Ellie age 6:

Nico and Ellie at the beach.

Since moving to Long Island, we've been to at least 6 different beaches; some of them several times. Initially Nico was VERY reticent to get in the water at all. He'd only go in if we were holding him and even then, just barely.

(This, my very favorite beach photo of Nico, aka Nico the Mad, was blatently stolen from the blog of Anne Hart. Check out those furrows!)

Luckily, Nico has warmed up to the water.

(Photo courtesy of Monica Rich, from whose blog I stole this one... although I did actually ask persmission, sort of. I do occasionally take my own pictures. But only occasionally.)

While I'm stealing pictures from Monica, I thought I'd throw this one in of our day at the Sunken Forest beach out on Fire Island. The waves were crazy that day, but it didn't stop the Ellie from having a blast! You can see Ellie on the right and me running in behind her to make sure all the little kids weren't washed away.




Last, here are Ellie and two of her great friends having a wonderful time on a sand bar on the North Shore. The tide came in shortly thereafter and washed the sandbar away, but not the girls.