I can’t believe it’s fall already! This summer was so busy, and it just flew by.
New House
The first bit of news is that we bought a house. It’s a 1907 Folk Victorian with lots of gorgeous original woodwork, plus many layers of “updates” from the 50s, 70s and late 80s. We are slowly restoring it to a more modern condition while leaning into the original charm and character. You’ll hear more about some of these projects in the coming months.
Even though we are spending a whole lot of time at the house, we have still managed to have some fun this summer.
Santa Fe
In May, Robert and I snuck off to Santa Fe for a week. It was really nice just disconnecting from the world for a whole week and exploring an area he had never visited, and I had only seen briefly in the past.
We visited Los Alamos and toured the museum there, but mostly just enjoyed the beautiful scenery.
One night we went to Meow Wolf – which is a weird, interactive walk-thru art installation in Santa Fe. I must say, this place, which is one of several locations across the country, is the work of some really incredible imaginations.
We visited Taos and the Pueblo there, where indigenous Americans have been living for more than 1000 years. It was really interesting and a beautiful setting. On the way back to Santa Fe, we detoured to see the Rio Grande gorge, then ended up on a “shortcut” which had us off-roading through a BLM area. The coolest part of that was getting to see some of the local wildlife.
After a few flight delays, including an unplanned overnight stay in Maryland, we finally made it home a day late and immediately started planning for putting the condo on the market and priority projects for the new place as soon as we got the keys.
Fun with Friends
Friends from Massachusetts came to visit Memorial Day weekend. We hadn’t seen them in eight years, so it was great to have a chance to catch up. We spent a couple days visiting local wineries, checking out waterfalls, and visiting artisan markets.
The house closed the first part of June, and the first order of business for me was to tear out the carpet in the kitchen and bathrooms. Yes. You read that right. It was pretty disgusting, but the removal immediately solved the slightly greasy, musty odor in the kitchen.
With that done, we hired an architect to help design a master suite addition we plan to add.
Most of June revolved around planning for and executing small projects, ordering new cabinets for the kitchen, and getting the condo ready to list.
Weekend on the Water and Keifer
We spent father’s day weeken d on Lake Ontario learning to sail. It was fun, but confirmed for me that I don’t want a sailboat. It is WAY too much work. You are in constant motion, messing with the sails trying to find the wind, or jibing and tacking when you are running. There were times it was downright boring, waiting for a breeze, but I will admit it was really exciting when the wind caught the sails. It felt a little like flying.
After our sailing weekend, we had a chance to to see Keifer Sutherland (I LOVE Keifer!) in concert at the Homer Center for the Arts. It was a great, intimate concert , and we were literally 20 feet away from him!
It amazes me how many cool things there are to do in this part of New York.
Off to Texas
In July, we met our son and his family in Texas for a few days. We rented a great house on Lake Ray Hubbard near Dallas, which was the perfect location for water sports, relaxing, and visiting with family. Our son had a chance to reconnect with aunts, uncles and cousins he hadn’t seen in a while, our daughter-in-law spent time getting to know some of the cousins she had only met briefly in the past, and our grandson met lots of new relatives. It was a really great way to get family together and still have our own space.
A Respite in The Catskills
In August, we were hard at work on the house again but managed to sneak off to the Catskills for our anniversary.
We visited the town of Woodstock, and the site of the original Woodstock festival in Bethel, which is about an hour drive from Woodstock. Fun Fact: The Woodstock promoters planned to hold the festival in Woodstock, but the town would not give them a permit. Other nearby towns also refused permits as no one was keen on having 15,000 (the original estimate) hippies converge on them.
The festival planners finally found a farmer, Max Yasgur, who was willing to rent them his dairy farm near Bethel for the event. Th festival drew a crowd of more than 460,000 people. We happened to visit the site on the 55th anniversary of the festival, and it was pretty crowded!
The festival was also being commemorated in several of the towns that weekend, including Saugerties, which had miniature Volkswagen buses decorated by local artists on display throughout the downtown area. It was fun walking around and finding such creative works of art around every corner.
September was quiet, but we are making progress on the house. The kitchen cabinets, countertops and backsplash are complete. All that’s left is a few pieces of trim and the drawer and cabinet pulls.
In other news, we have found a contractor for the addition, so hopefully he can get started soon!
Thanks for reading!
Until next time,
Kelly