It's been a LONG while....

In some ways it amazes me that it's been two and half months since I've made the time to post but when I sat down and tried to make a list of all that's gone on in the time, I'm not so amazed! It's just been crazy but good. Anyway, what better thing to do on a crummy raining Sunday than sit down and get this blog up to date! I don't know if I'll make it through the whole list because the post might get really long especially since I've taken hundreds of photos too. But here it goes anyway and I'll see how far I get!

April

• Sugaring wrapped up with a good year for us. We made about 365 gallons which is very close to the 4:1 average for a good year.
• I took another online digital scrapbooking class with Jessica Sprague. It was her advanced class called Digi In Deep. I didn't get all 8 layouts done but I did complete 4. Here they are

• I have the 1st and 2nd framed together for my dad for Father's day. If you are interested in checking out Jessica's website and her classes go here's the link.
• We celebrated Sarah Kaufmann's 18th birthday with her on the 12th of April.

• Some where in there we spent a weekend washing tubing. On Saturday, John and Tim washed tubing and on Sunday it was Evan, Shane, Larry, Doug, John and myself (with Ben in the backpack) It was good to get it all done and clean up on time this year. Here is a picture of all of our syrup samples for the year (4/13)
• Another cute picture from 4/13
• These are from 4/14, spaghetti face singing itsy bitsy spider
• Self portrait taken with the timer on the deck (I haven't edited any of these photos. These are all as taken Agh!) 1st one taken 4/16 2nd one taken 4/18
• Full Moon Photo taken on 4/18
• On 4/24 we traveled to NJ for a mini family reunion with John's immediate family. It was a great weekend and deserves a whole posts all by it's self. But here are a couple group photos.
• I picked up ten new baby chickens the day before we left for NJ and took them out to Patty house so she could take care of them while we were gone. 4 for me and 6 for patty. Here a picture of them on the 3oth when I got them home.

The apple blossoms started budding the end of April (4/30) and some cute photos of Ben and John.
Well that pretty much sums up April. I'm going to publish this post and then do another about our weekend in NJ.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Today is my 35th birthday! Hard to believe! Anyway, to celebrate I am blowing off doing all the things that I'm so far behind on right now (sweeping up the mud in the mud room, laundry and dishes) and I getting my blog up to date. I was hoping to have time this past week but it obviously didn't happen. We have run out of wood for sugaring so we have been buying it from a customer who has some all cut and split. So we have to go to Brandon, load it onto Doug's dump trailer a cord at a time, come back to the sugarhouse and unload it on pallets. And gather and boil on top all that! But it's been a good year so far, we've made about 340 gallons which is more than we've made in a long time. So that's good. Anyway, lots of pictures to share with you.

This is just a super cute one of Ben playing in one of his bins after he took all the balls out.



Last Friday was my Dad's birthday and we celebrated it on Sunday at our house. Dad came over early and spent some time with Ben and I while we were eating lunch. Afterward, Ben went and got a book and brought it to Granddaddy and climbed right up in his lap. This is the first time he's done that and of course my dad was thrilled! And of course, I had to take some pictures. This once came out the best and is my favorite!


After that, we went over to the sugar house and did some walking in the woods checking the tubing and such. Ben loves to walk in the woods. And of course I had to take some more pictures.


Walking in the sugar woods with Granddaddy




And Ben's second favorite love is water so to find a puddle in the woods is great excitement!


These next pictures are for my sister Holly who is in the Navy and on a ship at sea right now. Here is Dad opening up his presents!









After a great dinner of steak, potato salad (made by Krysta) and asparagus. We had birthday apple pie that I made for my Dad at his request.

Auntie Krysta and Ben holding Granddaddy's birthday pie

Granddaddy and Ben blowing out the birthday pie candles


Here is Gramme and Ben playing and providing some entertainment after dinner.


It was so much fun having everybody here for dinner. I love having the space to have everybody over to our house.

Finally finished!

I finally finished my week 4 digital scrapbook page for the J. Spraque Now we're rockin' with Photoshop class. Just in time for the Digi in Deep class to start on Monday. Here's a look at my page.



By the way, we've made about 205 gallons of syrup so far! Pretty good and the weather is looking good so far for next week!

Happy Easter!

Some pictures of Ben and I coloring eggs on Saturday nights








Easter Morning at our House



Hunting Eggs and Hanging out at Gramme and Grandpa's









It was a fun day and Ben really seemed to get into "hunting eggs" for a little while, until we got to the barn and he got distracted by the horses, playhouse and the swing. And I think it was the coldest, snowiest easter I can remember. Gramme and Grandpa have way more snow than we do in Middlebury. But believe it or not, the tulips and crocuses have pushed up through the ground! Spring is on the way!!

Sugaring Pictures

Just thought I'd share some cute pictures from sugaring the other day.













Krysta's boyfriend Eric firing




Yummy Syrup!


My Dad firing




Ben has been such a great little helper. On Tuesday, we were tapping at Horn's and Ben was helping tap by using the hammer to set the inserts with a little help from Daddy. Of course, I forgot my camera so I don't have any pictures. But he was excited because it involved using a hammer and banging! He loves puddles and playing in the water. He brings his bucket into the tub every night to play. I hope to have more pictures as the season goes on.

Happy spring to all! Mother nature didn't get the memo here in VT though. The highs this weekend are 30 and 31 and teens at night. Brrrr! I'm definitely looking forward to some warmer weather!

Sugaring Time!

And that's a sign that spring is on the way...FINALLY! John boiled last night for the first time for 2008. He thought he made about 8 gallons but only boiled about half of the sap we had. He's over at the sugarhouse right now boiling again to clean up what's left from yesterday and what little has run today. We tapped all last weekend and had quite a crew on Sunday to help. Big thanks to my Dad, Larry, Peter and his son Gus.

So I looked before I started this post to see when the last time I posted was and it was the 17th of Feb.! Where has the last month gone! WOW! I know we've been busy but didn't realize that much time had gone by! I suppose the next month will be just as bad now that sugaring has started. Plus we have a super busy month coming up anyway. Can you believe Easter is a week away? Then Yonik, Margaret, Kayla and Jason are coming to VT for a visit the 28-30th. My dad's b-day on the 28th hen my 35th b-day and at the end of April we'll be hopefully heading to NJ for sort of a reunion with John's family. All of this on top of sugaring and getting geared up for excavating. I'd better hold on to my pants because we'll be flying!!

But I have thought about blogging a lot. I even started a list of things to write about. It has 10 things on it so far. I even started a post one day but haven't yet had a chance to finish it. Once sugaring is over maybe I can get back to my goal of a weekly post, even if it's a short one!

Anyway, I have got to go work on the painting upstairs in the master bedroom while Ben's sleeping plus the house is a mess and laundry needs to be done. So stop by and see us boiling if you're local!

Here are a couple of cute photos from this morning and yesterday to leave you with.





Oh and if you want to see some cute photos of Ben with his friend Gavin, check this blog out. (You may have to scroll down some)

McNulty Family

Later!