Monday, July 21, 2014: Back from Up North

First the good news: My Moose finished his antibiotics up north!  He is doing really well and seems to have made a full recovery!  I've seen few symptoms of Lyme Disease from the beginning and see none now!  I'm (of course) ecstatic!

We had a few lovely relaxing days up north.  This was my front yard for the last few days; isn't it gorgeous?  I wish I lived here all the time.

The cabin is a yearly loan from some friends of Hubby's family that we look forward to each year.  It is on a small lake.  The lake only has about ten cabins, only one of which is a full time residence and the lake is no wake restricted (you are not allowed to get a boat to a speed that would cause a wake--the waves that come off the back when they are moving quickly) so things are very peaceful.  We usually head up early in the season (we were a little more than a month later than normal this year) when things are particularly quiet, but there were not many people up this week, so we still got our peace.

After several years of the lake being "down" the dock was moved further out last year.  Of course that means the lake came back up this year!  Never mind...  We were warned and we all brought our "puddle boots" (as Babygirl calls them.)  Babygirl found the top of her boots one day out on the dock; instead of using the blocks as steps she decided to just walk through the lake...  She was very amused when Hubby showed her how to "empty" her boots by raising her legs in the air!

Hubby and Babygirl had lots of fun fishing.  I personally would rather watch paint dry than fish, so I usually read a book, walk the Moose, knit or go to town and do some antiquing instead.  I'm glad Hubby has someone to share his love of fishing with now.  Babygirl and Hubby both caught several fish (all released back into the lake) and Hubby was very proud of Babygirl for reeling them in and sometimes even releasing them all by herself.

Babygirl was thoroughly entranced with the loons.  Usually we see the baby loons newly hatched (last year they hatched while we were there!) but coming up later meant more mature babies!  They were being taught to dive for fish earlier today when we were packing up.  I love watching them and listening to their calls.  Babygirl was imitating the calls with some success!

I found some lovely flowers on my walks with the Moose.  The flowers were different from the ones I usually see earlier in the year.  I picked a bouquet of daises, yarrow and orange hawkweed for our table while out walking the Moose.  Since Babygirl loves flowers she thought it was fabulous and even picked a few more daises from the backyard to add to the bouquet!  Most of the actual flowers I photographed I am not familiar with.  I just thought they were pretty, so I snapped them with my phone and left them alone to continue their life cycle.  I also really liked the way the ferns I took a picture of were fanned out.  Almost as if someone had arranged them.  I think my favorites were they tiny white flowers I found along the driveway.  They were so tiny and delicate, barely the size of a pencil eraser, I didn't want to even touch them for fear of disrupting their fragile beauty.

One day I came back from a walk with a special treat for Babygirl--I had found a patch of just starting to ripen blueberries!  Since blueberries are her favorite fruit she was thrilled and we all went out and collected the handful of berries that were ripe to go with her yogurt the next morning!

We all had a great time and were all very sad to leave today.  Hubby has been visiting the cabin since he was a very small child, and has been "dragging" me along for 13 years now.  Moose has been coming up since we adopted him as a puppy nine years ago.  He still enjoys swimming out the middle of the lake, and if you don't take him out on a leash he will very shorty be in the lake!  This was Babygirl's third year up there; her first trip was at four months old, and she enjoys it more each year.  

Unfortunately, Hubby has to be elsewhere for business tomorrow, so we had to leave.  As usual, we wished for *just* one more day...  Babygirl, Moose and I dropped him at an airport on the way down and made the rest of the trip home on our own just in time for dinner.  We will pick Hubby up at a different airport closer to home at the end of the week.  Even if we were sad to leave it is good to be home, and there is always the next trip to look forward to!

Wild life spotted:

• Several roadside rafters of turkeys ( I was a turkey spotting expert apparently)
• Deer
• The loons 
• An eagle
• Snakes sunning near the lake
• A raccoon attracted by our garbage
• Black squirrels 
• A fox (which yipped causing the "What Does a Fox Say" song to be stuck in my head.  I've known that they yipped since I was a small child--apparently the song's author(s) didn't do much research...)

Things I forgot (because I always have to forget something!):

• Babygirl's toothbrush (luckily Hubby had a spare!)
• A belt
• Face soap
• My hairbrush
• Extra hair clips for Babygirl
• Nail polish remover
• A dirty dish towel I left in the cabin kitchen instead of putting with the rest of the laundry to be brought back :(  My apologies in advance to the next person to go up.