Return to Reed Valley

Summer brought another love back into our lives...blueberries, baby, blueberries. Reed Valley Orchard in Paris, Kentucky, just gets better and better every year. And all of the rain we endured over the past couple of months has yielded a fantastic crop of blueberries, red raspberries, and black raspberries. Let the picking begin!


We know that all parents think their children are very bright bright or excel at one particular activity. Well we are pretty darned impressed with Callie's fine motor skills, and on this day she did not disappoint. She picked gently and precisely, showing an instinctive knack for only the bluest of blueberries. Not all of those precisely picked berries made it to the bucket, however, for Callie was always ready to taste the fruits of her labor.


Despite her ravenous blueberry consumption, we still managed to bring in a full gallon over a short period of time. It was hot, though, so we needed to sit down and perhaps eat a few before we moved on to the next crop.





The red raspberries were a bit more challenging, we're not going to lie. The bushes have thorns, the berries are a bit more delicate, and you have to adapt to a new color for ripeness. And this means that the final picking of the day, the black raspberries, were really tough. Now if the berries were red you didn't want to pick them. Not the easiest thing to explain to someone 20 months old, no matter how fine their motor skills.


Nevertheless, Callie would not be stopped. She loved to walk through the rows of bushes, pointing and sniffing. We can't wait for our next visit to Reed Valley. They are good people, and we learned on this past trip that they converted their livelihood from tobacco to orchard fruits nearly two decades ago because of the onset of throat cancer within the family. They felt they couldn't be involved in the tobacco industry anymore. Somehow stories like this just makes the fruit taste even better.


Visits to Reed Valley have a way of producing sweetness throughout the week that follows. It always includes one if not two days of fresh blueberry pancakes, which we all seem to love. In this particular picture, Callie and Sarah decided to make blueberry pancakes for Father's Day. It doesn't get much better than that.

Okay, so we are caught up for now. Unfortunately, through the camera debacle, we were unable to capture a true milestone moment for Callie. But it may be for the best since there is some difference of opinion in the Bowes household over what might be fit for blog publication. The fact is, Callie pooped in the pottie!!! That's right, our little girl tugged at her diaper and pulled us to the bathroom. Although we were slow to understand all of the signs, we finally figured it out, placed her on the pottie, gave her a book and a few minutes, and the rest is history. Even though we are not completely prepared to embrace this new activity, Callie continues to have the desire to use the potty about once a day. So we are certainly not out of diapers yet, but we can see that day approaching...we hope. Either way it is pretty exciting to us.

Hope you all are doing well. Tomorrow we are off to Connecticut for Alison Skonieczny's wedding and a few days on Block Island. Who knows what fun and adventure lies ahead.

Lucas Family Reunion

Let's start by setting the scene. It is the last weekend in May. We have driven a total of four hours and been on two airplanes for a total of five hours. Our destination rests in the heart of California's interior - a small town named Coalinga and a small resort called Harris Ranch. For people from California, it's the place on I-5 about halfway between LA and San Francisco literally right next to the largest, smelliest cow farm you have ever seen. We kid you not. The steaks were good but the smell could have been better.

That being said, what mattered most was the reason we were there. It was the 2009 reunion of the Lucas family - all of the descendants of seven Lucas siblings who represent the great-grandparents of Callie's generation. It was quite a crew to say the least. But we got into town early which meant we had the pool to ourselves.






Sarah made a great call and bought an inflatable floaty and lots of sunscreen. Callie was a very happy child. She spent a lot of time in the floaty, splashing around and just hanging out. It was fun to see.



When she wasn't floating around, she enjoyed climbing up and down the stairs on the side of the pool. She particularly liked splashing around with Grammy Gayle and they spent a ton of time together. Here is a picture of the two partners in crime sharing some fun in the sun.




Next up we have a picture of a couple of bathing beauties who are clearly having a blast. Callie is definitely mimicking her parents in actions and words. So if her Mom was going to lie on her towel and get some sun, that was what Callie wanted to do. They truly are a cute pair, aren't they.




Speaking of cute pairs, here's a picture of Zac and Keith at the reunion dinner on Saturday night. Two things are now official - Keith is taller than Zac and at the time we write this Keith is also a high school graduate. These two brave souls also jumped out of a perfectly good airplane this past week to celebrate Keith's graduation. Nothing like a little skydiving to bring father and son together.




The cute pairs just keep on coming. Callie loved hanging out with Keith and we have quite a few pictures of the two of them cutting a rug on the dance floor. It's amazing to see how great Keith is with Callie. She just can't get enough of him and can't wait to see him at Thanksgiving.




The dance floor seemed to be populated primarily with people under 3 feet. For those of you who attended our wedding, you know that the Lucas clan loves to dance. And the youngest generation is carrying on that tradition proudly. Here's little Brady Lucas and his parents, Tyler and Sara, getting the party started.


Callie really enjoyed hanging out with Brady who just celebrated his 1st birthday. The two of them started their night off by rolling around in their great grandmother's walker, moved on to enjoy the fine buffet, and then hit the dance floor like nobody's business.





There may have been some moments where Brady wanted to dance solo and Callie would not let go of his hand, but I guess she's a girl who knows what she wants and doesn't give in easily. It was fun to watch.



Grandpa Dan took advantage of hanging out with Callie and truly lived up to the "anything goes when Grandpa's around" motto. As you can see here, Callie is eating "fruit" which just happens to have a wee bit of chocolate on it. Honestly, if there was some chocolate with a wee bit of fruit on it Grandpa would have let her have it as well.


The night ended with Great Grandma Hazel hanging out with her girls. It's always cool to see several generations together like that. And though you can't tell from this picture, there is another girl in the mix. Haley is pregnant and expecting a little girl in November. Needless to say, Thanksgiving is going to be a lot of fun with the ever growing family.





It was a quick trip to California, and we were on a plane leaving San Jose by noon on Sunday. But the traveling was well worth it. We saw so many people, John learned to play the Portuguese card game called pedro, and Callie got to meet more cousins than she knew what to do with. Hopefully there will be another reunion soon.

A Little Colorado Love

We were lucky to have an important and fun visitor in May. Suzy was able to fit a stop in Lexington into a business trip to the East Coast. And we must say that the East Coast has clearly stuck with her. As you can see in the picture below, Suzy was happy to show Callie how New Englanders wear their sweaters.




To be honest, Suzy probably could have shown Callie how to do anything and Callie would have done it. She loves spending time with her Auntie Suzy. And they even got to spend a full day together while we were at work. Good times were had by all.



It just so happened that Suzy was in town when Lexington hosted the annual Stock Dog Trials. We drove off to Masterson Station Park with very different visions in our heads. Suzy thought we were going to a "Best in Show" type of dog event. Sarah thought we were going to watch dogs catching frisbees and running through obstacle courses. John was the only one who realized that stock dog referred to a dog who herds livestock - like, for instance, sheep. Here we see Callie watching one of the fine dogs herding three sheep through a series of obstacles. No frisbees or ribbons, but still pretty cool.



Suzy's visit also coincided with the second leg of horse racing's Triple Crown. It is pretty obvious that Callie was born in Kentucky because she gets so excited about horses, especially when they are racing. This picture doesn't do the moment justice - Callie was shaking her fists at the TV and shouting. It was so funny to watch how expressive she was throughout the entire race.


We also fit a visit to the Newport Aquarium into our schedule. We only took a few pictures before the second camera went down, which meant that we don't have pictures of the Duck Tour we took in Cincinnati. So as you look at the endearing picture of a brother and sister below, try to imagine a picture of Callie driving a duck boat on the Ohio River. Seriously. Callie got to sit in the driver's seat and drive the duck boat on the Ohio River along Cincinnati's riverfront. But our camera was broken. But don't John and Suzy look cute?




Alright, we are slowly but surely catching up. Next stop is our trip out to California in late May for the Lucas family reunion. Stay tuned.

Grandparents and State Parks

Well, well, well. Spring sprung and now summer is in charge. However we thought we should do a quick update on our spring activities. Sorry for the delay, but after we broke two cameras we needed some time to get our act together. Everything is back on track now, at least that is what we hope. As the title of this post notes, we'll be covering two big events here - a visit from Nana Taffy and Grandpa Jay and a trip to Lake Cumberland State Park.


As usual, spring was beautiful here in Kentucky. We had a ton of rain and it really helped all the local flowers. As you can see in the picture here, our garden produced some wonderful tulips. We are still amazed that our "maintaining" approach to gardening still produces living things. In any case, here Callie holds the flowers she wanted to give to Nana Taffy.



One of the best things about the nicer weather is that Callie has had the opportunity to develop her love of playground equipment, especially the slides. Callie loved showing off the local playground to her grandparents. She led Grandpa Jay all over the place from stairs to slides. And as with most things these days, she didn't want any help. Here you can see how Grandpa maintains a respectful distance so that she can embrace her independence.




Callie has no fear when it comes to even the biggest slides on the playground. Without any hesitation she sits at the top, gives a big smile, and pushes off. She is definitely a hands in the air and enjoy the ride kind of gal. This is something that makes her mother very proud and her father a little nervous. Surprise, surprise.





We were fortunate that this visit coincided with Callie's baptism at First Presbyterian Church here in Lexington. It was great because not only did Jay and Taffy get to be a part of the day, but also our neighbor Chris Chrisman presented Callie on behalf of the session. Callie behaved very well during the service and was extremely pleased to be the center of attention for a few minutes.




The following weekend was the first weekend of May, and here we made both a good decision and something of a rookie mistake. The good part was we took action on a resolution to get to know Kentucky better by visiting some state parks. In this particular case, Lake Cumberland was a great choice. The rookie mistake was we planned a trip on the Derby weekend. We still got to watch a great race in our room, but you don't want to make plans like that on Kentucky's biggest day of the year.


Among its offerings, Lake Cumberland has some great hiking trails. And even though it rained most of the weekend, we managed to get out and enjoy all that nature had to offer. Callie wanted to make sure that we enjoyed that nature in silence, which is why she clamped her hand over her dad's mouth in this picture. Or she was trying to feed him a Cheerio. Sometimes it's tough to tell.



There were a lot of things Callie enjoyed about this trip. One was the indoor pool, but we don't have any good pictures of that. Another was picking up rocks and exploring around the area. She was a pretty happy camper, and probably the only unfortunate part for her was the playground was too muddy to take advantage of.


One of the coolest things about Lake Cumberland was the lodge/restaurant that looked over the entire lake. The food left a little to be desired, but the view was absolutely gorgeous. We also enjoyed the fact that Callie ate for free. And she enjoyed the big fireplace with all of the fishes mounted over it.




We can't wait to put another couple of state parks under our belts by the end of the year. It is pretty impressive how beautiful Kentucky really is. There are so many great places to visit. (Hint, hint, for anyone reading this who has not come to visit us yet.)

Okay, there's the first installment of several posts to get us back on track.