Family Mellmann

As the weather starts to get cold and rainy (part of autumn in Vermont) some of our activities move indoors. With the start of the school year, the Green Mountain Gymnastics Academy once again opened their doors to a community playgroup. So, as often as we can (every other week, at least) Katherine and I go to the playgroup and "shake our sillies out" and "wiggle the waggles away". It's a great time to run, jump, climb, crawl, roll, tumble, fly, and flop until the lights go out and it's time to go home.

I give a great deal of thought to each toy, activity, or play thing that comes into this house; is it educational? Is it a good value? Will kids play with it? Will it survive more than one child? Is it fun for me too? All of these things (and others) are considerations when I shop for kid stuff. Yet despite this thoughtful process they still gravitate to the everyday tools and materials; play with the box and disregard the gift that came in it or stomp on all the bubble wrap and forget about what that wrap was protecting. Today it is the fun of playing in featherbedding just brought out for the winter.

Nearly every year since we moved to Vermont we have traveled to Stowe (about an hour's drive from home) to visit the Oktoberfest there. For the past several year they have had a very authentic group, of German decent, perform. They are ' die Lustigen Almdudler ' and they play Patrick's favorite song ' Steirer men san very good '. We took our usual tour; drive to a parking area along the Stowe Recreational Path and then ride our bikes to the festival. It's a beautiful ride that includes ten bridges across little rivers and creeks, several little sitting areas and parks, and lots of nice scenery at this time of year as the Sugar Maples start changing colors. After we have danced, had our fill of German food and beer, and checked out the kid activities (there's always a jump thing, some craft, and a few other child destractions) Jörg rides back to the car while the kids play at the playground. We weren't sure about the weather - rain was in the for

I realize that this may only be pleasing to me, but this was my view out the front door this morning. With the low light it was easy to watch the fog rolling across the field. It lasted only a few minutes and then the sun burned it away.

Katherine is joining the band at the drums. Rock and Roll will never be the same.

Saturday was a beautiful day. Joerg and Patrick went to Tae Kwon Do for their mid-morning class and then went on to Little River State Park for a hike. The girls went shopping! On Sunday we had an overcast day, but it was fine for a fall festival. So, after church we changed into our warm apple-picking clothes and went to Adam's Farm and Orchard for their annual fall festival with a petting zoo, live music, apples for picking, and pumpkins for plucking. Everyone pitched in so it didn't take long before we had three large bags (equal to one and a half bushels) of apples plus a little one that Katherine filled. Now all I have to do is start making apple stuff (crisp, cobbler, sauce, pie...).

Our crab apple tree is finally producing fruit. When we moved to this property eight years ago the tree had been badly neglected and had gone un-pruned for an unknown length of time. A little pruning and clearing away surrounding brush seems to have helped and this year we had actual apples. Now they weren't that popular with the human members of our property, but the deer really seemed to enjoy them.

Katherine and I got to take Patrick to Tae Kwon Do practice tonight. It's a special class for the kids who will participate in the tournament in November. Patrick will likely be one of those kids. I put several pictures on the website, but here's a sneak peek.

On Sunday, after a weekend of overcast skies and rain, the sun peeked out and the skies cleared a little, so we threw the bikes on the rack and went for our 'standard' tour leading the Ethan Allen Tower. Part of this tour is a stop at the playground. It was a short ride, but it felt good to take a break from setting up the network server in our office at home and get everyone outside to move around. I'll try to get the rest of the pictures out to the website tomorrow (Thursday) so you can see the rest of them. It was a nice day.

The tower hike comes about midway along the bike ride. Patrick always likes to climb this tree.

Riding the bike trail.

Patrick is SO pleased to be getting a haircut.

Patrick really wanted to go fishing again today, but as we were loading the car to go back to Lake Iroquois he started to feel sick-to-the-stomach. By the time he started feeling better (we still don't know what brought this on) Katherine was quieting down in her room for a rest time and it was too late to go all the way to the lake. So, we settled for a little fishing in the river that runs through our back yard. We walked down to the area on the horse farm where there is a quiet area and bridge. Katherine and I swatted mosquitoes and Patrick caught a couple of fish.