More happiness

 My brother Jim, and his girlfriend Abigail, got married last week among family and friends.

I made it through the whole ceremony without crying but got teary seeing my brother smiling like this during pictures, I have never seen him look so truly happy and no doubt the beautiful lady beside him is the reason.

My family traveled up to the Adirondack Mountains for the wedding, where we enjoyed absolutely heavenly weather here:

on the shores of Lake Champlain, the lake that divides New York from its neighbor Vermont. Most days the water was around 70 degrees and the air was too! Bliss. The kids tried their hands at any and all watersports available:

Water skiing

 Kayaking

Sailing

Boating, swimming you name it!

We also visited Fort Ticonderoga, a place once called by the French, "The Key to a Continent" during the French and Indian War.

View from the fort

 

It was amazing to walk through the archway ( above ) and know we were walking where famous historical figures like George Washington and Ethan Allen once stood.

The ornamentation on the cannons was beautiful.
Unfortunately, our stay in the beautiful Adirondacks was overlapped by that of another visitor- this one less welcome- Hurricane Irene!

And like the Gulf Coast hurricanes we have experienced at home....

there was a lot of clean up afterwards.

So we were delayed in coming home a few days while the airports got straightened up but we had a great trip. I am home now and hard at work on the Quilt Across Texas Quilt for the shop. Hopefully it will be done tomorrow!  Stay tuned!