A Walk in the Woods

Hey Friends.

Sometimes you just need to take a break.  I don't know about you, but sometimes I just need to get away from it all and take moment for myself.  To remind myself that the world is full of beauty even when it seems so ugly.

For my part, the best way I have found to do that is to go out and enjoy nature. Pick a place -- a local park, the beach, the mountains -- whatever you have that is convenient.  I'd love to go to the ocean and just relax, listen to the waves washing against the shore, but that's not really an option due to the distance.  I choose to go explore the mountains and the woods.  It's quiet, peaceful, and I love the feeling of the wind blowing through my hair.  Added bonus:  you normally can't get any service to get on social media even if you wanted to, so avoiding it is that much easier.

I think I mentioned it before, but I have set the modest goal of trying to visit all of Scenic Hudson's parks.  Since I was on vacation this week, I decided to visit more of them.

As you may or may not recall, Friends, not all of my adventures go smoothly.  I'm glad to report that this one was easy and went off without a hitch.

My first stop?  Lighthouse Park in Esopus. I had already been to Esopus Meadows Preserve, although I didn't realize that these two parks were practically on top of one another.  Turns out that Lighthouse Park is literally just a park with views of the lighthouse, and some picnic tables.  All of the hiking/nature trails were the ones I had already explored in the preserve.  Kind of a bummer, but there were some gorgeous views of the Hudson River.

View looking South

Looking North

The lighthouse, of course

While I was there, I noticed this strange piece of machinery at work out on the river.  I think it's like a lawn mower for the river, which I admit sounds strange.  That's the best description I can come up with for it.  I watched it for a while, and from what I could tell it was going back and forth over certain areas of the river, chopping up the heavier vegetation growing on the surface of the water.  You know, like a lawn mower but on the river.  I'm assuming this is to help keep the channels clear for boats.  Maybe I'm wrong.  This is the best picture I could get of the machine in action, since it was a fair distance away.

River mower?

As there was no more to that park and I still wanted to get a hike in somewhere, I decided to check out Black Creek Preserve.  I've driven past it so many times on the way to other places, and since it was nearby it was the perfect choice. 

The park has a couple miles of trails all together.  I imagine it would be breathtaking in the fall, when all of the leaves are changing colors.  I should note: if you don't like walking up hills, this is not the park for you.  You are going to have to go up a pretty steep incline to get to 90% of the trails.  There will be more uphill climbs in your future if you take the trail that leads down to the river's edge.  You go out the same main trail you came in, so if you go down to the river you will have to come back up again at some point.  

The entrance is pretty cool -- Black Creek is spelled out on the top.

Wooden bridge -- which you can get to without having to do the uphill climb, for those that want to check it out.

Lots of stone walls

I just liked the way the light was falling on the tree stump

River view

It literally stops right there.

Pretty now, probably gorgeous in autumn

This is the best I could do to give a vantage point of the hill near the beginning.  You go out the same way you came in.  This is from about the halfway point on the hill, looking down toward the bridge pictured above.  

Great way to unwind and unplug for an afternoon. Also,  it is two more parks off the list.  I'll get to them all eventually.  

Summer Is Music Season

Hey, Friends.

What do you think of when you think of Summer?  Nice weather, spending time at the beach, barbeques...all good things, for sure.  I also think of Summer as being music season.

Every season is music season, really.  Summer always seems to have more opportunities to enjoy it: it seems like more bands are on tour (maybe because there is less chance of bad weather screwing things up?), and there are tons of free concerts in the local parks.  I love going to concerts.  I'll go see pretty much anything.

Okay, that's kind of a lie.  I would never choose to go to a country music concert. Sorry. It's not my thing. I've been to some with people who wanted to go, and they were okay, but it would never be my first choice.  Not that they aren't talented musicians in their own right, I just don't like it.  Personal preference, people.

Why am I rambling on about this?  Well, the free concerts in the park have started here, and that got me thinking about all of the awesome concerts I got to see last year, and the ones I am looking forward to going to this year.

Shall we recap, Friends?  Yes, we shall.  Feel free to quit reading right now if you don't give a shit.  I'll never know the difference.

2015 In Review

First of all, there were the free concerts in the local parks.  They are always enjoyable -- different types of music that you might not normally get to see, and local bands you may not have heard of before.  Everyone should go and check them out!  It's an enjoyable evening, and you can bring a picnic.  What more do you need?

The Greyhounds are always great

Last June the BFF and I embraced our inner teeny-bopper and went to KFest at Dutchess Stadium. There were a lot of great performers there: Charlie XCX, Robin Thicke, and Flo Rida just to name a few.  The band I was most excited to see? Walk the Moon.  And they were fantastic.

Not the best picture, I admit

And then in July, the madness really began.

First off was Heffron Drive at Webster Hall with my niece.  New Friends: this was a fucking event because we actually got to meet them.  I even wrote a blog post about it.

My niece with Kendall and Dustin.  So damn adorable! (And see the James Maslow Save the Music t-shirt she is wearing?  Totally refused to wash it after this so as not to wash off the "Kendall loving".)

I've said it before, and I'll keep saying it: if you haven't checked out Heffron Drive's music, you really need to do so. Seriously.  I'll make it easy for you -- their latest release is below.  Just watch it.

Next up was Taylor Swift at MetLife Stadium.  It was a surprise for my niece, and my BFF went -- on crutches -- and was a total trooper.  So many damn stairs.  (Yeah.  There's a blog post about that one, too.)

Shawn Mendes was first

Vance Joy

Haim

And Taylor Swift, of course.

And I'm throwing this view of the crowd in just because I love it.

Next up was Of Monsters and Men at the Beacon Theater.  Got the tickets from a coworker who couldn't go.  Sucked for him, but worked out great for me!

And rounding out the year and the summer of music was Speed of Sound Fest. There was a full day of great music.  The final act was The Avett Brothers, and they were wonderful.  I was super-excited to see them.

I tried, people.  Yes, it's my own crappy video work.

And that rounds out the 2015 review, Friends.  Wow!  That was a lot of great music.

2016 Is Going To Be Epic!

Not gonna lie, Friends, it is already off to a pretty fantastic start.  A friend and I went to Foxwoods to see PVRIS, AWOLNATION, and Fall Out Boy on Wintour.  

I think you can figure it out on your own

AWOLNATION

Fall Out Boy

More Fall Out Boy

And that pretty much brings us up to date.  There have been a few free concerts in the park so far. This is a short clip from the Bearcats performing at Vanderbilt Mansion.  This is one of my favorite songs ever, St. James Infirmary.

Again, video is my own

And then things get really exciting.  This summer is going to include....

-- Going to Speed of Sound Fest with my niece, nephew, and the BFF.  The Lumineers, people!  

-- Taking my niece to see Twenty One Pilots at MSG.  Not sure which one of us is more excited about that!

-- Heffron Drive at Webster Hall!  Sadly, sans niece this time.  Stupid Texas starting school so early.

-- And rounding it out (at least at this point): All Time Low and Blink-182 at SPAC.  Hell yeah!  

I'm a little excited, Friends.  This summer is going to rock!  I had to get it all out of my system before I exploded.  

It's Quite a Yarn

Hey there, Friends.

Yesterday I got recruited to go on an adventure with my Mom. I was responsible for navigating our course and any parallel parking that might be necessary.  What was our adventure about?  I'm so glad you asked!

Yarn Shop Cruise Passport.  Yeah, you read it correctly.

My mother loves to knit and crochet, Friends.  She is involved in several different groups.  A friend in one of her groups told her about this...game? contest?  I'm not sure what to call it.  You visit all of the yarn shops in this passport, and at each location you get a stamp and a little prize.  Once you fill your entire passport by the deadline you are qualified to go on a cruise on the Hudson River, and win some other prizes.

I myself don't knit.  Oh, my Mom has tried to teach me, but it just isn't my thing.  I succeeded in making one scarf, and it was it was a hot mess: full of holes and saggy, all off kilter.  The recipient wore it at least once, so I count that as a win.

My role in this adventure was purely navigating and having a sense of direction. This is something I obviously did not inherit from my Mom.  In her mind if you turn right you will be going North -- doesn't matter what direction you were facing previously, right will always be North in her world.  I can't even tell you how many times we have had a version of the following conversation:

Mom: And I couldn't go back the normal way because of construction, so it took me forever to get home.

Me: Why didn't you use the Garmin?

Mom: Didn't have it with me.

Me: So just head towards the river.  Doesn't matter which side you are on, just head towards the river and you'll find a road you recognize, and then you'll know where to go from there.

Mom: But if I don't know where I am, then how do I know where the river is?

Me: Because it's the river!  It's a huge landmark!

Mom: But if you can't see it then you don't know where it is.

Me: OMG you were my Girl Scout Leader!  If you can't see the river, use the sun.  That will give you East and West.  

And it repeats.  It's an endless cycle of her not having a sense of direction, and me being flummoxed by the fact that she can't vaguely figure out which direction to go.  

Back to the point, Friends.

So, the yarn shops participating in this passport deal are all over the Hudson Valley. She and some of her knitting friends are going to visit 3 of them together on Tuesday.  She has already recruited my Dad to take her to the ones south of here because she doesn't like driving in all of that traffic. Yesterday we were visiting two shops on the other side of the river, and she needed my navigation skills.  I am also more familiar with the area as a lot of the parks I like to hike in are over there.  She has this all plotted out based on when the various stores are open.  This is serious business, Friends.

The first stop on our adventure?

Saugerties

Lucky enough we were able to find a parking spot quite easily, and my parallel parking skills were not needed.  

I noticed as were were driving that there were all of these horse statues in front of different businesses.  They are apparently part of the Gallopin' Around Saugerties Street Art Project run by the Chamber of Commerce.  They are pretty cool.

The unicorn was my Mom's favorite.

We also found this one nearby.

This one looks like it is made of chocolate

He was nicely color-coordinated with the building across the street

This liked this one a lot

This one is my favorite, of all the horses we saw.

After we were done horsing around (ha!), we made our way to the The Perfect Blend Yarn and Tea Shop.  

The Perfect Blend street front

Display in the shop

It was a very cool, pretty place.  My Mom got her passport stamped, and then she had a list of different yarns she wanted for various projects.  Mainly the list was to try and keep focused so she wouldn't just buy a shit ton of yarn.  

Not being a knitter myself, I was checking out all of the cool colors and designs.  They had yarn there from all over the world!  I had no idea there were so many different types of yarn -- and I don't just mean the thickness or colors.  There was yarn made from wool, cotton, silk, bamboo, mohair, alpaca, and even yak.  Yak yarn!  

Cozy scene, interesting looking wooden thing

So that's what it does!  Still not sure what it is doing, but at least I sort of get it now.

After my Mom had made her purchases, it was time to head back to the car and continue on our journey to shop #2.  Saugerties seems like a pretty cool place.  I'll have to go back and check it out when I have more time to just wander around.

Love Knot

We didn't get to far in our journey before we were stopped by a train.

There was some impressive graffiti on a few of the train cars, but didn't get a picture

Thankfully, it was not one of the super-long, 100+ car trains.  We were headed to a shop with a New Paltz address.  We drove through New Paltz, and the directions kept going.  We got there eventually, but it seemed to me like we were closer to being in Gardiner than New Paltz.  The boundaries around that area confuse me.  It has also caused chaos in Library Land, being between two different systems, but that is a long story and I don't want to bore you to death.  

We finally reached our objective: White Barn Farm Fiber Shop.

Like the name says: white barn

This place was interesting for different reasons.  Yes, there was lots of pretty yarn and colors.

Very cute display

It also had an area of local yarn.  Like really local.  The woman who owns the store also owns a flock of sheep, and it is the wool from those sheep that is in the local yarn.  There are also yarns from other people nearby, or yarns painted by people nearby.

Can't get much more local than that

I was also digging some of the funky decor.

Sheep in a hat...maybe of his own making

My Mom got her passport stamped, and while she was paying for her purchases I was checking out the bulletin board by the door.  My attention was drawn to a big handwritten notice, and I felt the information was important enough to take a picture to share here:

I hope it came out clear enough for you to read it, or at least to be blown up and read.  

And then we made our way back home, actually passing through Gardiner.  My Mom has been there before for the Cupcake Festival, but she still didn't really know where she was until she saw a pretty obvious landmark.

It's pretty memorable

It was a successful adventure.  I'm pretty sure my part in the great Yarn Passport event is now over, barring assistance being required to make it to other shops before the deadline.

I'm not a knitter, but I would recommend checking out both of these stores.  While it is all yarn, the selections available in each place were very different from one another.  Plus you get to do a little exploring and have a quiet, calm sort of adventure.

My Flowers Have a Story

Hi there, Friends.

So, I was out in the garden yesterday morning, watering the flowers, when I came to a surprising discovery:  some of my flowers are taller than I am.

Yeah, I literally did wake up like this, and you can tell by my hair.

I'm not that short.  Some of these flowers have to be getting close to 6 feet tall! Made me feel a little like Alice in Wonderland.  

Maybe a different perspective will help.

My flowers are special.  No, not just because they are so tall -- most lilies get pretty tall.  And no, not just because I grew them in my garden.  These flowers are special because they were a gift, and they have history...

...and there may or may not have been a crime involved.....

but that would have happened over 30 years ago, and all of the participants involved are no longer with us, which makes me think it is safe to tell the tale. 

Hopefully not incriminating evidence

My street literally has the word "cliff" in its name.  Not surprisingly, it can be very hard to garden. Some spots in the yard are okay.  Other times Most of the time I can dig down about an inch before hitting solid rock.  Between the rock and the neighborhood critters -- woodchucks, deer, and rabbits to name a few -- it becomes quite the challenge to get anything to grow.

My neighbor, on the other hand, seems to have no issues.  He has gorgeous flowers, and his vegetables never seem to get munched with the same frequency as mine.  Granted, he has been here many, many more years than I have so he probably has this down to a science.  I've tried to copy his methods, but they don't seem to work as well for me.

A couple years ago he happened to be out working in his yard at the same time I was working on my garden.  He had one particular type of flower that was growing like crazy -- trying to take over his whole garden.  He had removed several of the plants, and he asked if I would like to have them.

Hell yes!  I will be more than happy to take them!  If they can grow that well next door then I should have a fighting chance of getting them to grow in my yard.  This was awesome.

I have managed not to kill them so far

And then he told me the story of the flowers, Friends.

When I bought my house, my neighbor and his mother both lived next door.  It is his family home.  I never got to meet his mother and only ever saw her briefly.  She was ill, and passed away not too long after I moved in.  

Apparently she and my neighbor's aunt were both avid gardeners.  They loved growing new and different types of flowers.  If they saw a plant somewhere that they really loved they would often ask for a clipping to take home and try to grow.

These flowers, according to my neighbor, are a bit different.  

Apparently his mother and his aunt had been touring over at Franklin D. Roosevelt's estate in Hyde Park, and they fell in love with these flowers.  This was over 30 years ago, according to my neighbor. He didn't know if they had asked for clippings and been denied or what the entire story was, but apparently they went back at some point and took some flowers.  Like under cover of darkness, just went back and pilfered some presidential flowers.  They had been growing in his yard ever since.  

Stolen goods....kinda, sorta

Now, I've been to FDR's estate several times since my neighbor gave me these flowers.  I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that before today it never even crossed my mind to see if my flowers were on the grounds.  Maybe it was because I was there to tour the library and home, or it was the wrong season for flowers. The idea piqued my curiosity and wouldn't leave my brain.

Since I was writing this up, I decided I should take a ride over to Franklin and Eleanor's place and see if I could find the flowers.  It would be a long shot.  A lot of things have probably changed in the last 30+ years.  I was hopeful, but realistically there were a lot of reasons they might not be there:

1. The weather could have destroyed them over the years.
2. Building projects may have caused them to be removed.
3. Curator preference.
4. Maybe they weren't historically accurate.

At any rate, it was worth the effort to go and find out.  The things I do for you, Friends.

I decided to start in the garden, as that seemed like the best bet.

Close, but not the same

More lilies, but still not right

The garden was lovely

And so, after walking the property and around all of the buildings, my search turned up empty.  There were a lot of beautiful flowers, but none of them were the same as the ones in my yard.

Do my flowers have presidential roots?  You can decide for yourselves, Friends.  I choose to believe that they do.  I can't imagine my neighbor would make up such a tale about his mother and his aunt potentially having committed a crime.  

Even if they aren't, I still think they are special.  They were a gift, and they have the magical ability to make me feel like Alice in Wonderland.