horseback riding

Liesl and I had another new adventure today: horseback riding lessons at Anamchara Stables, a 20-minute drive west of home. Our teacher was Zyla, who guided us through grooming a horse (Katie), saddling it up, and leading it into the big covered barn, then getting on (and off), making the horse go and turn and stop, and balancing your weight and positioning your legs. It was so fun. The horse looked so small when we were next to her, but once you were sitting on its back, it felt very high off the ground! 

anadama bread

I baked two loaves of anadama bread today, following our tried and true Fleischmann's baking book. Dad made anadama bread frequently and it was always my favorite as a kid -- and now I always look forward to having a slice or ten when I visit. It was fun to knead the dough and bake it today, and it tasted amazing with butter. I say this every time I make homemade bread, but why don't I do it more frequently? The results are so worth it, and the amount of active time spent is really not that much. More bread!

Valentine's Day

We ate a lot of butter today in celebration of St. Valentine's Day... buttery waffles, buttery mashed potatoes, buttery chocolate lava cake... along with ample pork (bacon and shoulder roast) to balance things out. (!!!) Anyway, it was a day of good food, small gifts and cards, and more snow play.

 

Liesl trekked down to our local market in the blizzard conditions to pick up small treats for us all - Oreos for Steve, peanut M&Ms for me, and Airheads for Seb.

Steve and I walked down to the pond in the morning (and got in some snow bocce with giant snow/ice balls), and then up into Forest Park this afternoon. Jasper accompanied us, delighted to be out, though less delighted by the ice layer covering the snow, making all of his steps either slippery or post-holing down.

more snow adventures

It stopped snowing/pelting ice mid-morning Saturday and turned into the perfect day for sledding and snowshoeing. Not too cold, no more wind - and about a foot of snow everywhere. We spent all morning at the school field with friends, I went for a nice long snowshoe tromp in the afternoon, and then Liesl and I joined friends again for more sledding.

 

 

Although it cannot be discerned from these photos, which show his great happiness at romping and chasing and running around outside, Jasper hurt his paws on Friday - either some ice cut him, or he chewed part of his own paw getting snow out, or something - because he was bleeding a bit and limping. Poor guy.  It didn't dampen his enthusiasm, obviously.

Seb and Wyatt went out in the morning and again the afternoon, hiking up to the top of Miller and sledding down the hill, trekking along the trails over to Birkendene and sledding there, and in general having a good time off on their own.

I headed out after lunch and walked down to the pond and then up the trails to Birkendene, and then further up to Thompson, and then further up to Skyline, and then I dropped down Firelane 3 into Forest Park to the Wildwood Trail. It got prettier and quieter the further up and in I ventured, and I was so happy with the serenity and beauty of our local forest trails. Although I took my camera and risked frozen fingers snapping a couple dozen photos, none of them turned out very well. I'll post my feeble efforts anyway --

Neighborhood friends built a jump/ramp on one of the side streets, and Liesl took some turns going down and off it with Elia.