PEI Quiz

Here's a short quiz to test your knowledge about Prince Edward Island.   You may or may not see some clues in the pictures below. (ANSWERS AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST)

1.  Which of the following statements are true about Prince Edward Island?

a.  the homes and farms are charming
b.  the red soil and green rolling hills are breathtakingly beautiful
c.  the fishing is amazing
d. the whole island is over inundated with references to Anne of Green Gables
e. all of the above

2.  Which of the following did we NOT see in Prince Edward Island?

a. a cute Anne re-enactment
b. a pig race
c. old friends
d. a wild fox
e. an old fashioned hoe-down

3.  Which of the following lessons did we NOT learn in PEI ?
a. Cami is a mean fake manure thrower.
b. PEI residents are called "Edwardites".
c. Raspberry cordial is overrated.
d. Boys can have fun visiting Anne of Green Gables sites too

4.  True or False.  Canadians always refer to the province by its full name, Prince Edward Island?

5.  Which of the following statements about PEI are NOT true?   

a. the main industries of PEI are tourism, fishing, and agriculture
b. PEI has the highest per capita cancer rate of all the Canadian provinces
c.  the bridge that connects New Brunswick to PEI is the longest bridge in the world
d.  Lucy Maud Montgomery (author of Anne of Green Gables) was a Prince Edward Island native.

6.  Which kind of fish did we catch dozens and dozens of? 

a. mackerel
b. tuna
c. sunfish
d. cod

7.  True or False.  We plan to visit Prince Edward Island again as soon as we can.

 

QUIZ ANSWERS:  

1--e 

(all of the above were undoubtedly true)

2--a 

the Anne actress at the Avonlea Village was  not in the least bit endearing 

3--b

PEI residents are actually called "Islanders"

4--false

people wouldn't even understand us if we said the full name "Prince Edward Island"

 Prince Edward Island is PEI and British Columbia is BC

5--c

at about 8 miles long the Confederation Bridge from NB to PEI is actually only the world's longest bridge over ice covered waters

6--a

we could catch a mackerel (and sometimes two with the double hooks) almost every cast

we then used pieces of the mackerels to try to catch cod

7--false

while we thoroughly enjoyed our stay there, we decided that we would not ever feel the need to return.  we have too many other places on our list

Welcome to Crazyland

/ˈkrāzē/land/

noun

definition:

the part of the earth's surface where insanity prevails synonym:  "Lara's house"

__________________________________________________________

Welcome to Crazyland....

where barely a week into trying to figure out this whole homeschooling thing...

the entire contents of our kitchen....

and dining room....

have been moved to boxes and bins in our basement....

until this....

turns into this.

In the meantime,  all of our food will be coming either from here...

or from here....

and I  am trying to look at the bright side of all the chaos by appreciating paper products and the good excuse it provides not to do any dishes for a few weeks!

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Sweet Labors

Part 1

After almost 20 years of marriage, Glen and I have established many traditions in our family.  Some, like our Christmas traditions, are pretty run-of-the-mill.  On Christmas Eve, for example, we have our Christmas devotional,  then we open our pajamas, put out cookies for Santa, and send the kids to bed.  

 Other traditions, like Glen making a special crepe breakfast for everyone's birthdays and the kids making a candy bar note for Glen on Father's Day,  are a little more uniquely ours.  

I don't even remember how they started, but I'm assuming it happened once and when the next birthday or Father's Day rolled around, someone said, "That was fun! Let's do it again!"

After reflecting back, I think that's exactly how our Labor Day tradition of going raspberry picking started.  We did it one year and in future years realized that Labor Day always seems to be right in the heart of raspberry season and that it was fun not to have to wonder what fun thing we should do with Daddy at home for the day!

This year, as always, we went with grand intentions of picking enough berries to make several batches of raspberry jam afterward.  We had invited friends to join us and were immediately disappointed (and a little embarrassed) when we arrived and realized that the picking was not going to be good. 

The raspberries were very picked over... 

and what few we got tended to be a little mushy and bug-filled.  After picking in the hot sun for about 45 minutes, we barely had half a bucketful. 

After resigning myself to the fact that I wouldn't be able to make jam this year,  someone had the idea of trying out the blackberry field to see if it was any better picking.  

On the way to the blackberries, we noticed the farm workers changing where the raspberry sign pointed to.  They were opening a new field! 

We rushed and were some of the first to arrive to fields bursting with perfectly ripe and beautiful raspberries! 

Within half an hour, we had about 10x more berries than we'd collected in the other field...

 and as was immediately noticed by the kids, they were also much sweeter and juicier berries!

We were happy that it ended well and were glad to have shared the day with friends

and critters alike.  :) 

Now we are enjoying the fruits of our labors with lots of jam on homemade bread!

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Part 2: 

This isn't a tradition for us (yet), but this year we also went peach picking on the Saturday of Labor Day weekend.  We went to Charlottesville early before the BYU game and the tailgating party just so we could go to the beautiful Carter Mountain Orchards.

When my sister, H, was a law student at UVA, she introduced to this gorgeous farm situated on top of a mountain overlooking Charlottesville.  We like going there as much for the views as for the plenteous fruits!  Our peaches did not look very pretty after sitting in the hot car for an entire day, but we still managed to eat a bunch and make a batch of half-peach/half-raspberry jam!


All in all, other than BYU's disappointing loss, it was a sweet Labor Day weekend spent making memories and enjoying time with family and friends!


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Size Doesn't Matter

Some people seem to think that bigger is always better....

and when it comes  to certain things--like closets and paychecks--I tend to agree!  

photo source: tumblr

But contrary to popular belief,  I am here to say that when it comes to fishing....

size simply just does not matter!

After all the hard work of choosing just the right bait...

getting the poles all rigged up, 

or in Ellie's case, actually making your own pole out of a stick...

that catching a fish is exciting... 

no matter the size!  

In fact, we noticed that the smaller the fish...

the wider their smiles

seemed to be!  

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First Day

For the last few weeks I've been admiring all my on-the-ball friends on facebook and instagram who've been faithfully posting their kids' back-to-school photos on their kids' actual first day of school.  Some of the posts are nostalgic, some are gleeful, and still others are just plain factual.   All of them, however, seem to use hashtags like #5thgrade, #bestdayoftheyear, and #wheredidthesummergo.

 I, personally, have never fully grasped the concept of correct hashtag usage, but when I do use them I like to make mine as long and weird as possible, just to see what kind of reaction I can get out of Spencer.  You should have heard him after I used "#dinnerat1030pmtastesbetter" on one of our vacation instagram pics.   I thought he was going to die of embarrassment on the spot.

Luckily he survived and is now doing his best to ignore us completely while he lives up the college life at JMU.   Hopefully the rest of his siblings will fare as well.  They all started school yesterday and while I did actually take pictures of them before school, it took until today to actually transfer the pics from the camera to the computer.

Cami is a junior in high school and is already running a million miles per hour.  She is taking a full academic load including 3 AP classes (AP calculus, AP human geo, and AP lang), going to early morning seminary, running cross country, and is the only National Honor Society officer left that didn't quit over the summer.   I have a hard time keeping up with her and I find myself in the weird position of often encouraging her to slow down, stop studying so hard,  and to breathe occasionally.

Ellie is in 3rd grade and is being homeschooled for the first time this year.  She is still having several absence seizures per hour, a fact which would make attending school a challenge, so I am excited to give her the one-on-one time she needs to thrive academically.  She is still a bundle of ever moving energy and I love to see how her creative mind processes the world around her.  If it were up to her she would cook breakfast, lunch and dinner for us every day and she has grand visions of publishing her own book one day (ideally before turning 9).

Adam is in 5th grade and is also being homeschooled for the first time this year.  Although he loves school and has always done very well in his studies, he was very excited to join Ellie at home this year.  He is naturally very curious and  I think my biggest challenge this year will be to keep him academically challenged and engaged.  He's spent the last two days perusing the Lego catalog in his free time and I sense that he is hoping that I might figure out how to make Lego building a part of his curriculum this year.  

Emma is in 7th grade and is just beginning middle school.  She has been counting down the days all summer long and she couldn't be more thrilled to be a "sevvie" this year.  She has been taking voice lessons this year and has decided that she really loves music.  In addition to having a beautiful singing voice, she also has become the first of our children to actually practice her instruments (piano and clarinet) without being asked.  Her music adds a joyful backdrop to our home and we are thrilled that someone appears to have inherited their music ability from Glen's side of the family.

I thought of finishing up this post with some really long, obnoxious hashtags just to see if I could embarrass Spencer enough to actually text or call.  Then I realized that in order for that plan to work he would actually have to lay eyes on the blog first.  He used to read it pretty regularly, so that he could correct/cajole me into fixing any perceived errors, but since he didn't even flinch when I posted this picture of him last week, I feel pretty confident in saying that I can hashtag anything I darn well please now without fear of sonly recrimination (or phone calls).  :(
 #imissspencer #noshame #teasingspencerisfun 

Game Day

Twenty some odd years ago, as a brand new freshman at BYU,  I camped outside of the Marriott Center to buy season tickets to the football games.  Although not near as big as a sport's fan as most of the male members in my family, my dad had raised me to believe that attending BYU games in person was an important part of the college experience and I was excited.    I was a faithful fan and often went home hoarse at the end of games.

In the ensuing couple of decades since my college days,  I've learned that, other than my own kids' sporting events,  BYU football is practically the only sport I care about in the slightest.   And even then, watching it on tv is not near as much fun as watching it live, but unfortunately their schedule doesn't bring them out east all that often.  So when Glen announced a couple of months ago that BYU was coming to play UVA, I eagerly gave my approval about having the whole family attend.

This past Saturday morning we awoke bright and early and bedecked ourselves (and our car) in Cougar attire and enjoyed the opportunity to drive around "enemy territory".  First we went apple and peach picking (post coming later) and then met friends for a tailgating party.

After a fun afternoon of  food, fun,  and friends, we drove to the game and ended up parking about 1-1/2 miles from stadium.  We sat with friends in the nosebleed section where Emma took the term a little too literally and randomly developed a nosebleed within seconds of arriving.

It was a very hot and humid day and a couple of the kids (Ellie in particular) spent the first quarter grumpy and complaining.  No one had scored yet, we were far away from the action, and we all had a layer of sweat dripping down our faces.

It was looking to be a long and miserably hot game until right right at the end of the first quarter, we were greeted with this message....

At the time we hadn't heard a single clap of thunder, but still we were not eager to walk the 1-1/2 miles back to our car with an impending storm approaching.  

So we holed up in the first air conditioned place we could find...a laundromat, which actually didn't turn out to be such a bad place weather the storm.  There were tables and chairs to sit at, vending machines, and not very many other people who had discovered it.  We spent about an hour there before venturing out to explore campus a bit.

While wandering we met up with my brother and his son, Lincoln....a development which made Ellie very happy!

About two hours after closing the stadium, the game restarted and we took over the seats my other brother (Peter) and his family had abandoned because they did not want to wait out the storm.  Instead of worrying about nosebleeds now, we were in the 7th row---a fa  it was a lot easier to get into the game from up close.

Then a little while later it started raining again....really, really hard.    There wasn't any thunder, so the game went on, but it dumped rain for 1/2 hour or so and it only took a couple of minutes before we were pretty much as wet as if we had jumped into a lake with our clothes on.   Funny thing though....the rain seemed to perk everyone up.  Instead of lying across our laps complaining about how boring it was, Ellie was energized by the rain and could be found the remainder of the game dancing on the benches with her cousin Lincoln and yelling, "This is Awesome!" 

After the rain stopped, I pulled my camera back out, we laughed at our wrinkly fingers...

wrung out our clothes, and spent the rest of the game on our feet cheering  for our Cougs.

Sadly, the game did not end the way we'd hoped, but alas it did not matter.  It was a day we won't soon forget and I am already looking forward to the next game that brings the Cougars out this way!