Birthday/Anniversary Weekend!

Unfortunately, Andy will be traveling for my birthday on Tuesday (boo hoo!) but he was home for our 6th wedding anniversary on Sunday... we celebrated by going out to eat Saturday night (WAY too expensive dinner at the Mohawk House!) and out to breakfast with the kids on Sunday at our favorite spot -

Il Porto on Lake Mohawk.  Never fails to please!   I got early birthday presents - yay!  Andy surprised me by stealthily buying me a purse I'd been eyeing recently, as well as a panini maker!!  Some of my closest friends here joined me for dinner on Tuesday at Blossom, which was by far the highlight of my (actual) birthday!!  We just laughed the night away, it was such good fun.  Here I am with Carol, Kathy and Holly, and a yummy dessert we all shared...

it was nice to have a candle to blow out!  I would say that at this time of year I feel like the luckiest woman around, but the truth is, I feel like that all the time.

Camping Extravaganza!

When five families - 10 adults and 10 kids - all go camping together, you just gotta call it an extravaganza! What other word

could capture the excitement? This trip was conjured up months ago, when June 2 sounded sooo far away, and ever since then we've been crossing our fingers for good weather (we had to book the sites in advance and hope for the best). We lucked out!!! After what felt like monsoon conditions Friday night, Saturday cleared right up and was gorgeous, all the way through to mid-day Sunday when we headed home, exactly as it started to drizzle. Amazing. A week or two before the trip, the flurry of emails began, when Ivy, Laura, Melissa, Carol and I started making lists and figuring out who would bring what.

Our dinner menu was hotdogs and cheeseburgers, along with Ivy's (amazing) marinated chicken kebabs and corn. Dessert - of course - roasted marshmallows and smores. Breakfast was a combination of leftovers (that chicken tastes great any hour of the day!), fresh fruit, sausages, marshmallows (you can't really have a campfire without them), loads of different granola bars, and anything else lying around that looked good - along with lovely cocoa and coffee.
We had chosen five campsites in a row at High Point's Sawmill Lake Campgrounds (sites 4-8), and they were all beautiful, right a the edge of the pond and connected with a

little path that skirts the entire pond.  The kids spent the whole time running happily from one site to another on the path, free as birds, and loads of time at water's edge, looking for frogs, finding various treasures, splashing about.  There was major excitement when someone spotted a huge millipede on a big log at Carol's site; after some intense observation, Andy released him to the woods, where he'd be free from the poking and prodding of 10 curious kids! 
Around 8pm we started getting

the kids ready for "bed," which meant rounding them all up into one big tent (and by "big" I mean a 3-room tent on loan from Kathy, which was fondly dubbed the "Taj-Mah-Tent") where we hoped they would at least begin to wind down and eventually fall

asleep... which they all finally did by around 10pm.  The rest of us BIG kids sat around the lovely, blazing fire until after midnight, chatting about lots of silly things and admiring the brilliant moon that shone as clear and bright as a moon can possibly shine.  We were spoiled by the heat of the fire, as it was a cold night when we all

got back to our tents (kids in tow) - about 50 degrees.  I don't think any of the adults slept particularly well,
but the kids did all right! 
In the morning, the sun was shining, the air was crisp, and there was a gorgeous mist covering the lake.  The kids played

happily for hours while we all had a long, lazy breakfast and lots of fun taking a big group photo using the timer function on several cameras. After that we finally had to (reluctantly) break down the tents and pack up.  Before heading home, we all drove up to the monument at High Point (the highest place in NJ) to take in the views (except for Andy, who biked to and from the

camgrounds, racking up a neat 104 miles total!).  In the 5 minutes it took to get there from the campground, Maddie and at least 3 other kids had fallen alseep.  I know our bed is going to feel wonderful tonight!  What an utterly fantastic weekend - just couldn't have been better.  Unless a few more of our friends could have come as well..... next time!!