Fun-gi

Yesterday we went for a hike. I'm not a hiking kind of a gal, I don't mind a walk in the woods, along nice flat trails, but I'm really not into storming up a mountain along rocky, rooty paths. Half our family, however, is.
We drove about an hour away to a state park. We wanted to take Honey somewhere as it had rained the previous day, and we're going to be out all afternoon today. It was great in that respect-dogs everywhere.

I was quite happy just walking along and capturing all the wonderful array of 'shrooms, toadstools and other fungi.
Have you ever seen such wonderful, colourful mushrooms?
We certainly don't have ones like this in Australia.

But the path kicked up...if you look WAY ahead you may be able to see Kit and Remi who think that hiking is a competitive sport. I think at his point I had stopped to wipe the sweat that was streaming into my eyes, only to see how much more steep stuff we had to go. Finally it was Ella who saved me, saying she was tired and ready to head back. Fortunately is was mostly down hill on the way back. Remi twisted his ankle right towards the end, so we limped in hot, sweaty and very thirsty.

After that we decided we deserved some pizza, so we drove into New Haven which is supposed to have an awesome pizza shop called Pepes. (Oscar and I have even seen it on a food show). When we got there, though there was a line down the street to get in, so we went across the road and had some different pizza (still pretty good) and some Italian Lemon Ices (as they call it here-gelati at home). A good day had by all.

After a nap when we got home, I was back up to my attic room to work on my painting. I've finished the big one, but waiting for it to dry. It only just fits through the attic door. Here are the canvases as I was gessoing them. I was very proud of myself that I stretched these myself (I've never been shown how and have had to kind of make it up), and got them so taught they sounded like drums. (and I forgot to turn this photo)Tonight we are off to our annual fun night at Rye playland. The kids have been looking forward to this all summer. For a while we weren't sure if RBS would be hosting it this year, with the way the markets are here, but they are (yay!). I'm going to try to remember to get some batteries and take my little camera along tonight to get some photos of the fun. We will be home late (I think the last two years we've stayed until it closes at 11pm), but the kids have had a lot of late nights lately so hopefully they're up for it.