visiting with aunt kathy

the trees are always so beautiful in new england.

on thursday morning, the day after halloween, the girls were up and running around outside in the yard. it's nice to be able to run around out in the fresh air . . 

after my sister made us a delicious breakfast of blueberry and apple pancakes, we showed deychen lake terramugus.

and saw a blue heron (sitting on the middle of the raft above).

and went swinging on the swings for a little while . . 

my sister wanted to show us the falls in cobalt, and a special doll museum.

the beautiful falls which i had never seen before!

playing pooh sticks . .

i've passed this doll museum for years, as had my sister. she finally visited just a few months ago with a friend of her's and couldn't wait to show us.

so many dolls!

owner renee silvester, who knows everything there is to know about dolls!

she has a vast american girl section, and my girls enjoyed exclaiming over the old clothes and dolls, and lamented at how mattel has not kept up the quality that the pleasant company created.

the german made dolls were rather astounding in the beauty of their expression and their clothes.

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after visiting the doll museum, we went to rossini's italian restaurant in marlborough and had a pizza before saying good-bye and heading home. it was late when we arrived back in the city, and it felt strange to still be without power. 

what we did on halloween

on wednesday morning, halloween morning, we woke and headed over to abingdon square to stand on line at la bonbonniere for a cup of hot tea from their lovely gas stove.

then we sat around the table at home eating leftover muffins and drinking our hot tea and coffee. korrina is here! i forgot that on tuesday night while on our way home from deychen's, we ran into her at hudson and bank street. her friend had to go into work, so she walked across the williamsburg bridge and then took the crosstown bus on 14th street to home. it was wonderful to see her. it felt like she had been gone forever! the past three days felt like forever.

we finally made the decision to drive up to my sister's as planned for trick or treating in connecticut, even though she didn't have power either.

we were glad we did. the foliage was beautiful!

a viking in the woods!!!!

all ready for halloween . . hogwarts students and viking.

my sister went out to the supermarket in the next town for two chickens and broccoli salad. it was a delicious dinner by candlelight.

a standoff!

definitely.

it was quite cold! i was glad i was wearing my new down coat.

one of the neighbors had a fire burning and it felt wonderful to warm up beside it.

we stopped at home for a break . .

before heading over to the next block to meet my sister's friend, author gail gautier. she's written several books my girls love, one of them being the hero of fort ticonderoga (which i think may be their favorite).

it was late, but the girls were determined to hit one more street . . the street with the big houses with owners who supposedly give out the big candy bars . . it was a lot of running around, but fun.

sorting the loot . . not all of which will be eaten . . well, not by the girls. probably by their dad!

finally, setting up the sleeping bags. oh! notice how the lights are back on! the power came up around 8 pm or so. it was nice to have a warm house to come home to.

the day after hurricane sandy

we woke tuesday morning after the hurricane to a devastated downtown. all tunnels were flooded and transportation to brooklyn and new jersey nonexistent. korrina was safe in bushwick. she said they still had power and it all felt the same. but in the village, everything was quiet and everyone was walking around in shock. there was one car on our street that never got moved when the water came up, and was totally flooded.

the water mark at west 11th and west street.

the river seems very quiet now!

it all feels very surreal.

the pier was very battered, but held up. 

every few moments extreme gusts of wind would whip by to remind us that sandy hadn't left completely, yet.

the sky was a beautiful grey, and it was reassuring to see the empire in the distance, kind of like "and our flag was still there . . "

mr. skeleton was still hanging on, though backwards.

trees are precious in the city, and losing them is sad for us.

this was very odd! a building's facade was washed away at eighth avenue and 15th street.

the blackout affected downtown from 34th street onwards. greg decided to go into work and took several items from the refrigerator to place in the work frig. morgana, chanda and i were joined by their friend deychen, and we walked uptown (with everyone else from downtown!!) to find a hot cup of tea.

passing the new york times building . . as we moved uptown, street signals would be working, and then as suddenly not working at the next street. by 34th/36th street, all was fine.

posing with jackie gleason at port authority.

we ended up going to the little pie company at 43rd street. what's funny, is that the couple sitting next to us had walked uptown from jane street (jane is just a few blocks from bank). they said jane street was terribly flooded. even though it's further uptown from us, the street dips down more and floods more easily. we had the nicest visit here. the young lady behind the counter was so sweet and heated all our pie requests!!! it felt so wonderful to eat warm pie and drink hot tea!!! she doesn't realize how happy she made me. it was cold outside, and it was a long walk for a cup of tea!

walking back home we passed this lightpost that looked a little lopsided.

so . . most of the buildings along west street had their basements flooded (as were all the ground floor apartments in our building). the window gates on the left hid a scene like this picture below:

someone's bedroom filled with the hudson river. it's quite an awakening to realize you live in a flood zone. should we continue living here? how do you close up a neighborhood and turn it back into marshland? or, rather in our, case, the river!!! from greenwich street westward, it's all landfill. i'm living on landfill. did i think about that when we bought the apartment? no!!

another linden tree downed in bleecker park (sigh).

i don't have a gas stove in my apartment. sad to say, i know. so we took our mashed turnips and chicken soup to deychen's home to heat it up on her gas stove.

deychen's computer had two hours of power left, so they watched an old movie while eating the soup, which tasted amazingly delicious!!!!!

plugged in . .

our power was restored at 4:25 this morning. thank you everyone for your thoughts and prayers! they meant so very much.

our street got flooded monday night. i went to bed thinking about the hudson river floating past my doorstep. i was surprised to wake and find it gone in the morning. did a giant come by and blow it back behind its banks? did someone tilt the city west so it would flow back in? i guess it was just the tide pulling it back out. it felt miraculous.  

korrina came in this morning and sat on the edge of my bed, beaming because she could get up and make a pot of coffee. i had earl grey tea, and chanda and morgana had chai tea. we curled up in bed and read several chapters from the second harry potter book. then we jumped up and started cleaning so we could get the place straightened up before chanda had to go to rehearsal. we had a refrigerator to clean out and laundry to start washing. and did the rug ever need a vacuuming! while she was at rehearsal, morgana and i shopped at fairway so we would have fresh food for dinner. it felt nice to sit down to a warm meal all together. i'll post about this past week in the next few days.