sunday and monday

yesterday we swam at south lake and diligently read robin hood . . we're determined to finish it and then begin a lois lenski book we found at the amagansett library. yesterday evening, before dinner, a rain storm passed by that my brother-in-law said had just passed through storrs, connecticut. it went south over the sound and passed through montauk. today we went to sag harbor and visited the library and health food store, and in the evening the girls watched a movie (five children and it) with nana and nonno.

 

 

celebrating my birthday

 at south lake.

 working on a sturbridge project.

 nana usually bakes me a strawberry pie with fresh local berries.

monday at the beach

chanda picked the beach for today: south lake.

 the water was actually quite warm, and we did run across a few jelly fish.

 

chanda did get stung by one. it hurt, but she's not allergic so all was well. we washed it with white vinegar and then hot water when we got home.

 we brought the raft down, but didn't get it blown up.

the bicycle pump didn't work for it, and i was open to blowing it up by mouth, but chanda wasn't enthusiastic. last year nonno blew it up with his air pressure gadget, and then we brought it down in his car.

 morgana read morning girl . . 

. . and chanda read the sable quean . .

greg is reading two books at the moment . . and i haven't paid attention to the titles! lately, he likes to read books he finds in the laundry room and on the shelves of our neighborhood coffee shop, grounded.

it was so windy that we needed to hang on to the umbrella at all times . .

saturday: sixth day

yesterday at sag harbor we had also picked up little women paper dolls from the variety store. chanda spent the morning cutting them out while morgana read david copperfield.

the color outside was clear and saturated.

we decided to drive to south lake, since we hadn't been for a visit yet this trip.

it was quiet and peaceful.

a morning swim and geese over south lake

before getting on the road for home, we went for an early morning swim at south lake. all i can say is, i wish i could start many mornings out this way. there's nothing more rejuvenating and uplifting than a cool morning swim in salt water.

my morning was further brightened by the sight of the canada geese beginning their migration. i love seeing them at south lake. we missed them last year. (they flew directly over our heads in 2009.)

i hope they're not heading to manhattan. our welcoming committee is not the best.

not a day's rest

we didn't have much time to recuperate from the party. we were up early this morning to drive to montauk to see nana and nonno.

nonno was marching in the montauk memorial day parade . .

and we arrived just in time!



hmm . . i saw more through the camera. they marched by so quickly.

afterwards, we went with aunt kathy to ditch plains where the girls went for a walk and collected seashells.

and managed to swim in the cold water!

nana and nonno had baked morgana an apple pie . . so we sang happy birthday again and she opened her gift from them and aunt kathy (a beautiful grey cotton sweater that she had asked for from the olive juice catalog).
we left later than we should have on monday morning. m and c and their friend deychen were very absorbed in a game of montauk "townopoly." we said good-bye at noon, and it took us three hours to get past southampton! i worried that we wouldn't make their 6:00 pm quintet rehearsal on time, but we were lucky and did not hit traffic on either the belt parkway or the gowanus expressway. we arrived at DTW at 5:40. i was so relieved!

ice on south lake

aunt kathy and uncle warren left for home this morning. after saying good-bye we drove to south lake to see what there was to see!

it was beautiful, with a layer of ice on the water that rippled with the gentle lake waves.

i suppose she's trying to skate here, but she could be dancing . .

i love the winter colors.

they were excited to be able to walk on the ice around the reeds. usually they have to take the boat to this part of the lake (last picture on this link) . .

eighth day . . always a beach day

today we went for a walk along hotel beach.

and ran away from the waves.

i love the grey-blue winter colors of sea and sky.

and we stopped at south lake to see how it was doing. it was hazy and the ice had melted.

our final stop, before going home to dinner and nana, was the library. chanda took out one of her favorite books about being a ballet dancer. the other book we really like is called i skate, by margaret faulkner. unfortunately, we found out that it had been pulled for the summer book sale. we'll have to look for it there, or look online (alibris, maybe).