Muskoka {1}

If you've read my blog for a couple of years, you'll know that our usual summer vacation is to head up to Ontario, Canada, to the lake country which is called Muskoka. 

This year was no different. Here are some snapshots of our first couple of days. 

This is a rock in front of our cottage--we've named it Australia. It's within perfect swimming distance of our dock. 

My love bird parents reading at sunset

I think we've had corn every night this week. Dad LOVES it--we go through a dozen ears each night. 

Because we can't bring our pantry with us and we don't want to buy everything in our pantry all over again for a couple weeks and bring it home to our already full pantry, we stick with simple meals with few farm-stand-fresh ingredients.  Ontario is blessed with amazing produce which we consume in vast quantities during our visits.

Lots of time to journal

and enjoy evening boat rides to watch the sun set

I wish you could bottle up evening sunshine. It's so golden, and seems like I could reach out and touch it. 

Australia as viewed from our cottage porch.  That's my Dad, Emily, Lottie, and yours truly.

We have lots of lovely lily pads near our dock, thankfully not close enough that we have to swim through them. 

Did you know water lilies close up for the night?

We've read oodles of books so far. On vacation I bring my favorite books along and re-read them again and again. 

Some of my favorites are: the Anne of Green Gables series and To Have and to Hold. 

I finished Rilla by L.M. Montgomery yesterday and cried throughout the whole thing. Despite having read it at least 5  times I still cry, both happy and sad tears. 

Our lovely cottage and boathouse

Daddy enjoying the hammock on a lovely, cool summer evening. 

Couldn't decide which hammock picture I liked best. 

Poor Emily itched her nose on an evening boat ride. 

That would not have been a problem if she hadn't had been wearing glasses...that promptly flew into the water. Thus, she is using binoculars to see the sunset. 

Hopefully the ducks are making good use of her glasses. 

The evenings are so cool here we have to bundle up, it's just lovely for us!

Me, reading, which is pretty much all I do up here. 

We rented a boat for a week used it for wake-boarding. 

Wakeboarding isn't the most interesting sport to take pictures of, unless you can do tricks, which only Carter can. Consequently, I took pictures of the wipe outs. : )

Em

Lottie upright...

...and coming down

and down....

and under

More coming up later. 

Niagara Falls

On our way north we stopped at Niagara falls for a night. Dad wanted to stay in a hotel with a view of the falls just once. We weren't about to complain.

Mission Accomplished.  

And we loved it.

This is our incredible view from our room, you can even hear the falls with the window closed

American Falls which are no where near as interesting as the Canadian Horseshoe Falls

American falls again, the rocks ruins any chance of going over the falls in a barrel safely. Not that I wanted to though. 

The maid of the mist enshrouded in mist

The water is such a lovely green color at the top of the falls

Playing with long shutter speeds

As you might imagine Carter was just thrilled with this picture. : )

These girls on the other hand are also hard to take good pictures of, but obviously for different reasons. They pose too much

I'm the only child in our family who actually poses nicely for pictures. Consequently, our computer is not filled with goofy pictures of me, nor unsmiling ones. 

Just spectacular!

Despite being allowed to walk right up the edge of the falls, you'll notice I don't have any pictures closer than this. The reason for this is the mist. The mist is so heavy at the falls that it seems like it is pouring rain and I didn't want to get the camera wet. 

I went up, admired for .975 seconds, and after being throughly soaked I moved on. 

The falls are lighted up at night but the mist doesn't allow for great viewing. 

Niagara Falls,

Check!

FYI

There's a beautiful new blog design coming in the next couple of days. :  )

I am sooooo excited to show ya'll. 

I hired this beautiful young lady to design it for me. 

Graphics by Bree

And I can't believe what a perfectly wonderful job she did! She made exactly what I had imagined, and made it even better. 

If you're looking to redesign your blog, hire her, her prices are incredibly reasonable, she does a beautiful job, and she is super sweet. From now on whenever I want a new look I'm hiring her. : )

Reforming Food and Family

Last weekend my dear friend Kate and I headed to San Antonio for Vision Forum's Reforming Food and Family conference. It was three days packed full of talks on the biblical principles of food, french cooking, toxins in our food and body, nutrition, farming, and the importance of family meal times. Since for the last year I have been studying nutrition this conference was fantastic. 

We had time to kill when we arrived on Wednesday so we walked around the Alamo in the rain. 

Some advice for you, do NOT walk around in the rain and jump over puddles in a long skirt and flip flops. Doesn't work too well...

The Alamo up close. 

I didn't know this but Davy Crockett fought in the battle at the Alamo.

After walking for 1/2 hour in the rain (thank goodness Kate remembered her umbrella!) we arrived at  Market Square when can be summarized as touristy, touristy, touristy. Let's just say I'm not into tourist spots. 

The river walk on the other hand was quite lovely. 

On Thursday morning there was ladies tea at the historic Menger hotel. I had a lovely time dressing up, admiring beautiful dresses of other girls, and meeting some sweet new friends. One family we met lives only an hour from our house and we didn't even know each other. 

These girls provided some lovely music for us. 

Lovely tea food, the white chocolate cranberry scones were particularly delicious. 

We should really wear hats more often...

Kate and I

So many beautiful dresses!

New friends. 

This dress is an antique from the 1800s and looks beautiful. 

My tea dress which I made. 

Mrs. Campbell gave a wondering and challenging talk on the importance of family meal times and hospitality. 

I have pictures of other talks but its not very interesting to see pictures of people talking...

But I am writing up a post on some of the things I learned. 

Taking a break along the river walk

These boys would play some music before the main sessions and did a wonderful job. I like the song about dinner, theres a five pound possum in my headlights tonight...

Walking to the conference center

Loved seeing you again Verret ladies!

We stayed in a hotel directly across from the Alamo. 

The lovely view outside my plane window on the way back.