Montauk Lighthouse

Montauk Lighthouse with the caretaker's house in front

 A few weeks ago we took a drive out to Montauk.  It was a beautiful day, and when in Montauk, why not check out the lighthouse, right?


We walked all around, checking out the beach...

the beach in front of Montauk Lighthouse

Took pictures of the shoreline...

Montauk Beach

...the interesting items on the beach

Montauk Lighthouse, caretakers cottage and surrounding parkland

...and generally enjoyed the beautiful views. 

the view from in front of the Montauk Lighthouse

So by the time we actually got to the lighthouse and the caretaker's cottage, we had exactly...  12 minutes to look around.  

I thought the light thingy was cool.  I didn't have time to read the sign describing what it was actually called.  

I did have time, though, to take this slightly blurry picture of the door to the tower.  That's because I was not quite brave enough to go all the way to the top of the tower.  

Looking out the Montauk Lighthouse window

After walking on those spirally steps and seeing how the walls closed in more and more the further we went up (something I probably noticed MORE because of the YEARS I've spent listening to my darling husband tell me how claustrophobic he is)...I decided 12 minutes was not nearly enough time for me to appreciate climbing to the top.  

What a wimp I am. 

But it was a really beautiful day for early spring.

...and it was so much nicer outside.

School House Rock Jr. - Show Time!

Welcome to Ms. Mizer's room, the home of School House Rock!

We had the play almost two months ago, but shortly after the play weekend, my computer died an untimely death.  We didn't get a new one right away because we were contemplating our options.  When we finally did make a purchase, we chose an iMac, and if you've switched from a windows computer to a Mac,  you know there are some differences that make certain things awkward in the beginning.  It's taken me a few weeks to find the time to figure out how to manipulate pictures in iPhoto...  not that it's difficult, (I don't want to bore you with the details) it's just different.

So finally tonight, I had some time, edited my photos (taken by someone else with my camera - I was backstage for both shows, bossing around the kids) and here they are!

Getting ready for showtime with the traditional energy circle...

The Scary Bear from the Adjective Song

The girls who play different aspects of  Ms. Mizer's personality

The girls on the left are the five people inside Ms. Mizer's head...  Ms. Mizer is worrying about what to teach her students on the first day of school... Do you like my map of the United States?  Each state is outlined in glitter glue.  Wish the lighting guys would have lit them for maximum effect...  oh well!

Like my flag, and the circulatory man?  Both were internet pictures that I printed on overhead projector sheets and blew up thin plywood, making the painting much quicker.

Ms. Mizer (bathrobe, center) and cast singing Three is a Magic Number  

The Adjective Song

I'm Just a Bill

See the chalkboard?  If somehow the audience was board during the show, they could check out our diagram of the Pythagorean Theorem...

I'm Just a Bill

Ms. Elvis, from Circulation (about the Circulatory System) 

The Circulation Girls from the song, Circulation

Conjunction, Junction, What's Your Function?

Melting Pot

The desks above took FOREVER to paint.  The stage crew kept begging me to ask their teachers if they could use them in their real classes.

Can't remember the song this was from, but I made that costume on the right - it's the Beast's costume, from Beauty and the Beast.  In this play the boy wearing it was playing Thomas Jefferson.

The interjection board in the picture above was actually a blown-up internet picture as well. I think I googled images for "Interjections School House Rock" to get it.

LOVE my planets!  Even though these are blurry, I wanted you to get an idea of what they looked like on stage with the lights off...

Saturn and Jupiter in the center, with Mercury on the left, and Venus on the right

Sorry about the blur...  the Interplanet Janet cast held their planets on poles and circulated around each other with the planets lit up, and the stage lights off...  

Interplanet Janet with stage lights on and camera flash.  I designed the crystals on her costume, too.

Interjections!  (OWWWW, that HURTS!)

Interjections!

Interjections!  I love the look on the girl's face here - it's the same as the original cartoon, she's saying, "OH!  I"VE NEVER BEEN SO INSULTED IN ALL MY LIFE!"

Interjections!  Hallelujah!

bows

my AWESOME stage crew

some of the stage crew with two high school helpers

Darn, that's the end...

Hope you liked it!

A Visit to Catapano's Goat Dairy

 A few days ago, a bunch of us took a little trip to the Catapano Dairy Farm out in Peconic, Long Island.  My mom was proactive enough to call the farm and make a reservation for a group of us to have a tour.  My lazy self just had to show up and enjoy. Unfortunately, I drove around in circles for an extra half hour before arriving, due to the fact that I was just lazy enough to NOT google my own directions (that'll teach ME).

Fortunately, when I finally DID get there, those baby goats were CUTE as anything, and frolicking around like the picture of springtime itself.

Why don't I have pictures of any of those cute little baby goats?  Why, because I was too cranky from getting lost to take any at that point.  Sorry, folks.

So the woman who owns the farm gave us a little talk about the goats and the products they sell.  They actually won an award for one of their cheeses (would that make them big cheeses?) and after telling us a little bit about the farm and the goats, we got to try a few cheeses on crackers.  Yumm...  they were really good, although, not being cheese connoisseurs, I would not have known it was First Place in the Country Good.  But seriously, check out this cute goat beard...

Then some of got to try milking a goat.

There were mostly boys in our group, and they looked somewhere between horrified and really interested in the milking process.  The goat-who-was-ready-to-be-milked was very sweet and tolerant of our ignorance;  she just stuck her head in her feed-pail and turned around every so often to see how it was going.

The brave among us gave it a shot...  don't pull (like a cow?) just squeeze the top of the udder (so the milk doesn't go back up) and roll the fingers downward to get the milk out.  Some people are "naturals," she said.  

Not everyone wanted to try, and since we were a large group we couldn't go on forever - Gwen the Goat would have run out of food in her food bucket before we were done, and the girls could not be overfed.
My favorite part of the tour was seeing the boys all watching from the sidelines...

After the milking, we checked out the herd (Oh, by the way, there are something like 100 females and only 4 males, so if you're a male and you want a good ratio with the ladies, you should be a dairy farm goat).

We also checked out the cheese-making room...

...through the germ-proof window, of course.  I was disappointed we didn't get a close-up tour of this, but when you consider germs, I guess I understand.  I would have at least liked to see people in here, mixing things while swathed in white suits - kind of like an episode Dirty Jobs.  Oh well.

Each of us got a free bar of soap with our tour price, and it does smell rather nice.  They have a cute little store right in the front of the goat pen where they sell cheese, soap and other skin care products.  Check them out sometime.  Just remember - bring your own directions.