We arrived home Tuesday night around 6:30 p.m. after a brief stop at the local grocery store. Our trip home was uneventful. On the last day we faced rain most of the day while driving through Ohio and Pennsylvania but it wasn’t too bad. We had a good book on tape and that kept us occupied for most of the day. When we turned off of I-80 onto Green Pond Road we were caught by surprise by the twisty, turning road. Whoa, I said to Rick as we careened around the corner a little too fast, you’d better slow down. We aren’t driving in a straight line anymore! We had gotten so used to the wide, straight roads of the west that our dear familiar little roads were strangers to us.

Where did the three weeks go? Good question. I have no idea. Life at the cabin is so different that it seems surreal to me now. Like being transported to a different country to live. The culture is different, the landscape is certainly different. Since we’ve had the cabin for so many years it’s like another house of ours. It’s completely outfitted, especially in the kitchen. It always amazes us that we have all the right tools for cooking as we tend to forget those kinds of things in the year long gap between visits. So for us it’s not really like a vacation destination; it’s home. We completely immerse ourselves when we are there.

I feel odd and slightly out of sorts. Don’t get me wrong, it’s good to be home. It’s just that it takes a little time to get readjusted. I know that sounds crazy, but it’s true. My own house and surroundings are kind of like strangers to me for the first few days. The dogs, however, have no such qualms. They’ve taken up all their old habits and sleeping places without missing a beat.

It was still summer when we left; now it’s obvious it’s autumn here. Yesterday I donned jeans for the first time in I can’t remember when. While at the cabin I wore shorts (and I have scratched up legs to show for it) since it was in the 70’s during the day and even hit 80. Unheard of for this time of year up there. After looking at deep blue skies with no clouds and a searing sun, we now have clouds, some drizzly rain and a high temperature yesterday of 62. Yeah, definitely more my speed. I get tired of the sun, I really do. We had all these cozy comfort food lines up to make at the cabin that we ended up not cooking since it was so unseasonably warm. We grilled a lot more instead. Hopefully our weather will stay conducive to cozy stew-soup-braises kind of food. Bring it on!

So now it’s back to real life again. There are so many things waiting to be done here that it’s hard to know where to start. We need to move wood underneath the deck for our winter supply and then stack the new cord of wood that is still waiting in a big heap. We need to contact John Deere and order a leaf attachment for our mower since we don’t think it’s a good idea to mulch all our leaves for a third year in a row. We need to take up all the hoses that are imbedded in our new-ish landscaping. I need to transplant some of my bee balm—Maggie are you ready to swap varieties? And the list goes on and on.

This weekend we have plans with friends to luncheon at the CIA (Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY) and to do the Walkway over the Hudson. Should be fun! Rick and I have done the walk before when my sister was here back in May and it was lovely. Hopefully now the trees will have some color.

Then the following weekend we’ll be back up in the same area (only a bit further North) for the Sheep & Wool Festival in Rhinebeck. We had so much fun last year! I thought Rick would be bored but he wasn’t. Not at all. This time I will go with at least one project in mind to buy yarn for. I haven’t been knitting much, which is sad. I hope this winter to get together with neighbor Aileen to have some knit fests. Maybe neighbor Kim might want to learn too.

Did I tell you that I’ve signed up for pottery classes? They start on November 1st. I took one a long time ago when we were first married through our local Parks & Recreation program and it was fun. We’ll see where that leads!

I have some more cabin posts to do, so stay tuned.

Mushrooms growing on our stack of firewood from all the rain we had while we were gone!