Craft Fairs, Picnics, Bike Rides, and even a Run

Exhibitors at the Old Deerfield Craft Fair.

As the title of this post might hint, the past few weeks have been full of fun.  This past Saturday we went to the Old Deerfield Craft Fair.  Historic Deerfield is a beautiful little village that was settled in 1669 as a frontier outpost in British North America.  While nearly destroyed in the early 18th century, today it is home to museums, working farms, and three private boarding schools.  The Craft Fair housed about 180 exhibitors varying from photographers to painters to salsa-makers.  The picture on the right shows just a small section of the exhibitors.

Wine and cheese samples

An interesting part of the fair was that we were definitely an under-represented age group.  As a result, when we first entered, a man dressed as the Town Crier was very eager to inform us that there would be a free wine tasting at noon.  So as not to be rude, after meandering our way around all of the tents, trying salsas and sauces from some of the exhibitors, we headed to the location of the wine tasting for a few free samples.  There were four types of sweet, fruit-flavored wines as well as cheese and crackers for tasting.  Next we went back through the fair to a few of our favorite shops and made some purchases before leaving in the early afternoon.

We've also been fortunate enough to go on a few picnics together.  Twice now we have gone to Puffers Pond (a great swimming spot in the summertime) and just the other day we went to a pretty little park called Mill River.  Below is a picture of us at Puffers Pond.  You can see that the trees are just barely starting to change...  You can expect a post in the near future full of pictures of the East Coast fall foliage.

Picnicking at Puffers Pond.

 Another event that is ever-present in our daily routine is bike rides.  Mike generally rides every day, and on some days Caroline will join him.  "Some days" meaning Mike's recovery days or on his cool down rides.  But Caroline has been pedaling along, and is really starting to get a hang of the cycling thing.  And while Mike loves to ride his bike, Caroline really enjoys running.  So, one afternoon that was supposed to be a rest day for Mike, Caroline jokingly asked if he wanted to go for a run with her.  And, to her surprise and delight, he said yes.  This was very exciting because on bikes, Mike rides circles around Caroline, but on our feet, Caroline runs circles around Mike.

This ends our second post.  We head into the weekend with plans of racing (Mike) and watching (Caroline) our first Cyclo-Cross Bike Race!