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We spent most of the weekend in Maine, where Sarah will be at camp.  We stayed in Belfast, on the Penobscot River, with very nice views.

We dropped Sarah off at camp on Saturday.  Each child was promptly issued a kitten.

Sarah is participating in the Brumby program, a camp-within-a-camp that allows her to muck out stalls and ride two hours a day while still participating in the other activities of the camp.  Each camper is matched with her own horse to look after.

More kittens!  In the foreground is Sarah’s friend Marin, who is in the bunk bed catty-corner to Sarah’s in their cabin, Halley’s Comet.

We spent Sunday night at the farm and gathered about two quarts of black raspberries.  The jam must go on!

As the sun set on the longest day of the year, we decided that it was so nice that we would stay Sunday night and head back to New York Monday morning.

On Sunday, the Ostroys had a pool party so all Sophie could see all her friends before heading off to camp for a month.  Sarah too will spend a month at camp — we’ll be driving her up to Maine on Thursday.  We will miss her!

In unrelated news, here’s an Eastern Comma.

Jen and Sarah had simultaneous riding lessons on Saturday.  I watched with Sarah’s friend Marin, who visited for the weekend – they’ll be bunkmates at Hidden Valley Camp in just a couple of weeks.

In the afternoon, they planned a kayak trip, only to find a garter snake coiled in the cup holder, as well as a very large spider roaming around the cockpit.  Lots of shrieking.  Jen rowed across the pond to help them, followed by Daisy, who swam clear across the pond(!).  The girls got in the rowboat and rowed to safety – but then another garter snake slithered out from under the seats.  Now everyone is afraid of snakes, even the previously aphobic.

It is high season for peonies, and Jen gathered a big bunch to bring home today.

Here are some of the varieties, in situ.

Many flowers are blooming.  This Silver-spotted Skipper visited a blackberry blossom, a harbinger of jam.

The Red-Winged Blackbirds are numerous, and talkative.

Here’s a Blue Jay in flight.

And here’s an Oriole.  We seem to have a lot of them this year, and often hear their five-note call.

Daisy had a big day in the pond today.  She went swimming after lunch with Jen and Sarah, and again in the afternoon when she had a visit from Saffron, the Golden Retriever.  We expect Daisy to sleep well tonight.

It is springtime, and everything is coming into bloom.

Sarah has just two more weeks of school.

On Sunday, Jen and Sarah continued their mother-daughter riding lessons.  Sarah had Cookie.

Jen had Hero (the Magic Horse™).

The barn swallows kept busy.

This heron, rather impressively, caught a large-mouth bass in the pond.

He tucked it away and took off, gracefully.

Daisy, with her native good sense, again spent most of the weekend outside.

We capped off a long weekend by attending the Memorial Day Parade, something Rhinebeck does especially well.  Here are some images from the parade.

Sarah watched from under her fine new hat.

Jen’s parents visited for the weekend, as did Erica and Geoff.  We celebrated the publication of Erica’s first book, Intimacy and Family in Early American Writing.  Daisy spent the entire weekend outside.

Jen’s peonies are starting to bloom.

Jen and Sarah took riding lessons together Saturday morning at Southlands.   Susie taught Jen to ride Hero, whom I heard described as the Magic Horse.

Susie was amazed that Jen had only one riding lesson since she was Sarah’s age.

Sarah had a lesson with Allison on Rocky, the sweet yet balky pony.

Here they are together.

Jen started the day with her customary Mother’s Day breakfast in bed.  We decided to take a year off from giving her presents that she was required to plant, and instead gave her books to read and write in.  Sarah also made her a polka-dot headband.  Jen spent most of the day planting things anyhow.

On Saturday, we had a visit from Ginger, Bill and Dan Wadsworth.  Ginger is the granddaughter of Clinton G. Abbott, who bought our farm from Isabella Burger in 1915, and who built, among other improvements, our barn.

In this picture you can see Clinton Abbott packing apples (while wearing a necktie).  Ginger’s mother is at far right.

We had threatening weather but took a nice walk with the Wadsworths after lunch.  Ginger is a children’s book author, and she presented Sarah with an inscribed copy of The Sage of Slabsides, her biography of the naturalist John Burrows.

Perhaps in honor of Clinton Abbott, an ornithologist, we saw some excellent birds in the afternoon.  Here’s a Scarlet Tanager.

And here’s an Osprey who came fishing in our pond.  Clinton Abbott was the author of The Home-Life of the Ospreys (London, Witherby & Co., 1911).

We saw a number of Black Swallowtails.

Sarah spotted this Gray Tree Frog, which looks just like a rock.

In the city people wonder why they never see baby pigeons; in the country it’s the same with squirrels.  In both places the reason is the same: it’s because they grow quickly.  Here, though, is an unmistakably young squirrel.

On Saturday we had a sun shower.  Everything is greening up nicely.

Here is one of our tiny handful of surviving tulips.  The deer treat our garden like a buffet at a Las Vegas casino.

Sarah had a busy weekend.  On Saturday she had a riding lesson in the morning and in the afternoon participated in a fish print-making class at Starr Library (they used actual fish!).  On Sunday she used the sewing machine to make a pillow, and also washed her late grandmother’s car for ten bucks.  She did a creditable job, but she couldn’t reach the roof.

Sarah had a happy Easter.

She received her customary Easter basket.

And she enjoyed an egg hunt with her friend Michaela.

Other signs of spring abound.  The Ring-necked Ducks are in residence on the pond, together with a pair of Mallards.

The daffodils are doing their thing, as are the bees.

And, while our Daisy is growing up, sometimes she still looks just like a puppy.