Hi, everyone!
Whenever Grandma has a quart of heavy cream, we make cinnamon ice cream and sticky cookies and ganache for an AWACS cheesecake. Grandpa brought home a quart from Costco late in July, so Grandma and I were busy for a couple of days!
The ice cream and sticky cookies are all gone, but the cheesecake is in the freezer! There was a hazy sunset at the Point when we had more wildfire smoke.
Grandma took me on two kayak paddles the end of July. First, we went up to the wetland where the rose mallows grow, looking for blossoms. It was too early, but I could see lots of flower buds! We always pick up floating trash when we’re kayaking. This time I came back with a champagne cork!
The next day, we headed in the opposite direction. Grandma wanted to see whether we could get under the Old Ridge Road bridge to visit the South Bay Recreation area. We wanted to see the beaver house and paddle in the channels.
The entire bay south of the bridge was full of lily pads and water chestnuts! The weed harvesters had cleared an area just south of the bridge and one channel. Grandma couldn’t find the northern entrance to the recreation area channels in all the lily pads. We did find a way into a lagoon from the south and saw a great blue heron, but we never found the channels in the reeds that used to be there. When we started, there was a south wind. Coming back, the lake breeze from the north had picked up. Grandma said it was an upwind paddle both ways!
James and Thomas were both born in May, but they like to have their birthday parties at the bay, when the weather is better for going tubing with their friends. Thomas had his party first, yesterday. He had six friends and some of their parents at the bay for the afternoon and evening. There were a couple of rain showers, but they didn’t spoil the fun. At the end of the evening, all the soggy life jackets and lawn chairs that had been out in the rain came onto the porch to dry out. They were still damp this morning, so I helped Grandma hang them out on the railing to dry out.
Uncle Steven spent most of yesterday driving the powerboat to pull tubers. This morning, Grandma asked him to give us a powerboat ride up the rose mallow patch to look for blossoms. They were in bloom, all along the edge of the wetland! Aren’t they pretty?
Love,
Lion-san