Circle Game

 I have been trying to figure out what happened to this past week.  I can tell you for sure that we've been distracted!  It was Jon's birthday, and rather than doing yurty projects I put all of my energy into making him a present.

It took me three and a half full days, but here it is, all done!

Jon spent his 'spare' time delicately handcrafting the wooden frame for our hearth pad.  I wish I had pictures to show you, but I was... distractedly trying to work on his present between his frequent visits to the kitchen where I was camped out.  It took a few tries and some troubleshooting with the various table saws in the basement, but he finally made a beautiful beveled frame out of a raw piece of ash that has been hanging out above the shingle mill for quite some time.  With the frame in place, I wasted no time in grouting, and only half a day's work produced this:

Grouting itself doesn't take that long, but the repeated wiping with the sponge was what took the majority of my time.  The goal: getting a smooth grouted space between each tile, and a relatively clean surface before I let it dry for a day or three.

Our little Argentine potatoes got hit by the last frost (even though we had them covered), but they're still hanging on!  I was contemplating digging them today before we get a few days of rain, but Kathy said we might as well let them grow more and dig them once they die back.  So here they are, still boogying:

 It's really starting to feel like fall here now that the weather is cooling down and the leaves are changing.  Jake doesn't seem to mind.  I found him here under the apple trees, ready for a cuddle...

This weekend we went on a birthday trip to Attean Pond in Jackman (about 3 1/2 hours North of here).  Oh. My. Goodness.  It was so beautiful!  And peaceful.  And we had the place to ourselves to boot, which really made the trip seem special.

 We canoed across the lake from where we put in, and found a lovely camp site on a natural sand beach at the foot of Sally Mountain.  We hadn't planned on it, but we ended up staying there both nights because it was so lovely.

 We hiked Sally Mt., relaxed on the beach, made some wonderful campfires, and some stellar food too!

The colors of the changing leaves were phenomenal!

And there were so many interesting natural world tidbits to appreciate and wonder at...

 On the mountain top Jon saw what he believed to be a fisher, eating berries off the Mountain Ash tree.

This fellow with a rather long bottom came by to say hello...

 And we sat for 15 or 20 minutes watching a red squirrel try to untangle a small rope he had found from a tree.  He worked hard shoving the rope into his cheeks and then pulling with all his might in every direction.

He seemed to be getting himself quite worked up, so eventually Jon snuck over there and cut the rope off the tree for him.  The squirrel came right back and shoved his cheeks full of rope and ran off to some undisclosed location.  Hopefully that rope will keep him snuggly and warm this winter!