Summer Bucket List: River Excursion

{doing}
 Well, we really waited until the last minute to check this one off the summer bucket list, but we finally made our trip down the river this week (on Tuesday)!  Actually, I think waiting this late actually was a good thing for several reasons. {1}we were able to get a lot of our gear on sale, {2}it wasn't crazy hot and humid, and {3}the water level on the river was a little higher then it might have been in the middle of the summer (although IDK about this year with all the rain we had over the summer) which made it easier to get through without having to get out and walk the boat as much.  And let me tell you it was awesome! Defintely something we will be doing again! (in fact I even went back to AndThat! yesterday and got a second of the inflatable boats that we had so that my husband and I each have our own and we can be a little more comfortable and not be so cramped - and it was on clearance for $19.99 by now.... can't beat that!)
    The Rappahannock River begins in the Blue Ridge Mountains and flows down through Fredericksburg on it's way to the Chesapeake Bay.  Fredericksburg, in fact, was built right at the fall line of the river.  In Colonial times when shipping between the Colonies and England was vitally important we were the furthest inland the ships containing goods sent from England could travel on the Rappahannock (which is one of Virginia's Major rivers).  The area was also rich in iron ore, which was mined here (George Washington's father was involved in it), and became a tobacco port as well.  Of course the history of Fredericksburg and the river could go on for pages and pages (book and books even) and if you're interested definitely look it up because it really is an interesting little city we live in (in fact even come and have a visit.... we have quite a few historic sites ranging from colonial times and the places George Washington grew up and his family lived for many years, to Civil War sites, to nostalgic businesses that have been in operation since the 1950's).  But I'm supposed to be talking about our trip down the river right now..............
    We started our journey just north of Fredericksburg at Mott's Run. (there is a public boat launch there) and planned to travel the somewhere between 5 and 6 mile stretch of river down to City Dock (I think the sign at Mott's Run said it was something like 5.5 miles). We passed under interstate 95, past the site where the Embrey Damn, once stood, and (had we actually made it the whole way would have passed) under US 1 and right past historic downtown Fredericksburg, to City Dock.  Now I will say we didn't actually make it all the way to City Dock, partly because we got a later start than we had intended (Someone *coughmyhusbandcough* left the valves for the boat at home and a friend had to come pick me up to take me back to the house to get them (although on the bright side he was able to come with us, which he thought he wasn't going to be able to do, since we were starting out later), but we did make it to the point the river runs right next to Fall Hill Ave. in Fredericksburg (check out the Friends of The Rappahannock website for more info about this leg of the river..... they also have maps of it... not sure if they are online or not though).  It was really a great trip.  There were calm stretches of river were we were able to just stretch out and relax, there was one area that was nice and deep so my husband and our friend got out and swam for a while (we were afraid the water was going to be cold but it was actually just right), there are areas where you have to paddle and steer your way around rocks (or sometimes get out and walk the boat over real shallow areas) and there are even a few little rapids.  Most of the pictures I got were of the calm areas, because that was the only place I really felt comfortable taking my phone out of it's two ziploc bags to take pictures (I've been wanting one for a while anyway but now I think I definitely need to look into getting a waterproof digital camera! (I used to have a waterproof film camera and loved it)).  So enjoy the pictures I do have of our excursion, and maybe even do a little research and think about planning a trip of your own :)

The view of the river from the top of the boat launch at Mott's Run

My husband inflating our boat...... we got a good deal on this, it came with two oars (not great ones, he managed to break them both by the time we were done, but still) and a pump to inflate it for $40.00 originally, and then our friend got one the day we went and I got another one the day after on clearance for $20.00 each!)

Finally on the water

you can get an idea of why I went and got us a second boat.... lol this is me trying to stretch out. Once I figured out to put my legs over the side though I was quite comfortable on the calm stretches of the river.  Also I actually got a sunburn on my legs which I don't ever remember having before except maybe once..... I'm assuming it was from spending so much time with my legs up like this.

I threw this one in there for comic relief..... I couldn't see my phone's screen very well as I was taking pictures because of the sunlight and didn't realize there was a little something extra in this one until looking at the pictures later...... that's the corner of the two bags I had my phone in to keep it dry.

One of the little rapids we went over after we passed it. Definitely a fun part of the trip (even if they were little) 

This cute little island would have been a nice place to stop for lunch, but we didn't see it until we were too far past

we saw a lot of wildlife, especially birds, along the way.  This is an enlargement of this picture so the quality is not great but it's one of the Herons we saw out that day

The I95 bridge in the distance as we're nearing it

going under I95

one of several man made stone walls we saw along the way.  Also the last picture I have from the trip we still had a little stretch of river we travelled after this before calling it a day, but my phone had been already telling me the battery was low for a while when I took this and I didn't want it to die in case we needed it for an emergency call (which we kind of did since we got off the river earlier then expected and needed to call my mom to come pick us up) (although we were at that point technically within walking distance from our house, but it's a pretty good walk from there - I've done it before - and we were tired and had a bunch of gear lol)

ARRRRR.... it be a pirate party!

{living}

So as I mentioned in my last post I've spent much of the past couple weeks doing a lot of prep work for stuff without a lot of finished projects or excursions to show for it yet....... One of the things I was working on you may remember was a pirate birthday party for my (65 year old) dad.  I've been wanting an excuse to do a pirate party for several years now and he wanted one for his birthday, so BOOM... there it was.  As I was beginning planning for it a couple months ago I had two things that I wanted for the party.  I didn't want it to look like a kids party, and I was looking for a little twist on just a plain old pirate party.  It didn't take long for the "twist" to present itself.......  My dad is a reenactor and since he got into the hobby has been known to style the mustache part of his facial hair in lots of... umm.... interesting ways.  (yes we of course give him a hard time about it, it would be okay if it were just for events, but he likes to wear it like that for real life too....) and he has gotten a bit of a reputation for his mustache, and curling and playing with it.  So the party's theme became "'Mustache' Bill, The Pirate's Birthday Party".  It also gave me the chance to get in on the mustache trend that still seems to be going strong right now.  I even designed a skull and cross-sabres with a curled mustache as the party's logo.  So here's some pictures of the decorations and such from the party........ {I do have to say though before getting to the pictures that I wasn't able to get very many good pictures of stuff because I wasn't able to get to the area to set up as early as I would have liked and then I had to go pick my husband up from work and we didn't get back until just after the party started so I had to leave a few last minute things for my mom to do and then missed my best opportunity for pictures..... in fact most of the ones I have of the decorations were actually taken the next day......)

The logo I designed for the party

The invitations

The desert table (without any deserts...) the party was held on my parents deck and it had the feel of the deck of a ship.

the desert table side of the deck again..... you can see one of the tables with it's centerpiece on it (I have a close up picture of the centerpieces further down)

Desert table sans deserts again.... closer view

this 'treasure chest" started life as a blue plastic toy/storage chest for kids from wal-mart that cost somewhere around $5.  I spray painted it (with spray paints I already had none the less) to make it look more realistic

gold nuggets and gold and silver bars pirate booty (aka candy)

picked up this lighted palm tree for 50% off in the summer clearance section of And That!  (which in other places is known as Christmas Tree Shoppes) there's a picture of it lit up further down

close up of the centerpieces..... unfortunately I didn't get a good shot of the tables set up because the final set up of them was one of the things I had to leave for my mom to do while I was gone and by the time I got back there were people sitting at all of them.... lol

This was where the buffet was (up against the wall of their house)

detail shot of the decorations

close up of the pirate flag I made with the party's custom logo (I made a stencil out of ink jet label paper by printing the logo out then cutting it out and stuck it to the back of the flag and the gave it a good spray with white spray paint and this is what bled through)

pirate booty and a pirate skull (which was actually meant to be a Halloween decoration (I got him at And That! too)

I added the mustache myself though ;)

hmmm.... kinda the same picture that you just saw, but here you go I think it's a slightly different angle lol

The Cake

the cake with the lighted palm treee

I had plain black square paper plates for the food but I found these awesome plates at Hobby Lobby and fell in love with them for a pirate party so I got them for the dessert plates

We also had two games, Pin the Mustache on the Pirate, basically pin the tail on the donkey, but with mustaches and a 36"x40" engineering print from staples ($7!) of my dad in his pirate get up; and a sword duel with foam swords from Dollar Tree...... and the prizes were an assortment of mini liquors (Captain Morgans and some others) and some candy..... I may have some pictures of at least the pin the mustache on the pirate game and the prizes, but i don't have them on the computer yet so if and when I do I'll add them to this post :)

Hurry up......... and wait......

{living}&{cooking}
 
Well, between some more sketchiness with the internet (we never did call the cable company to come out and take a look at it because it stopped giving us trouble, but then last week it was being a bit temperamental again), and several weeks of seemingly constant busy-ness, but not much show for it I have not been doing a very good job of keeping up with this blog.  There's been a lot going on here the past couple weeks and a lot of stuff I've been doing/working on, but it's been almost entirely prep work for upcoming exciting-ness..... soooo..... I both haven't really had much to post or the time to get on here.  But I did promise some summer pie recipes and I'll be sharing one of those today (and it's super easy). But before I get to that I want to share some of the other stuff that I've been working on lately.  For one I've got a party coming up that I'm working on, it's for my dad's birthday and he wanted to have a pirate party (which I've been dying to have an excuse to to a pirate party ), but being me I wanted to put a little bit of a different spin on it, and he is well known among his family and friends for the, umm...., interesting ways he likes to style his mustache (he does reenacting and often has the ends curled up dramatically, or pointy, or both) and so this party is a "Mustache Bill, The Pirate" themed party.  Which is also great because it takes advantage of the current mustache trend. So of course I've been working on and shopping for all sorts of mustache and pirate themed items.  For the party logo I designed a skull and cross-sabres with a mustache. These were the invitations we sent out and you probably can't tell but the "wax" seal closing them has the party logo on it.

of course after the party I'll post pictures of everything all set up too.

I've also been getting everything we need and getting it together for a rafting trip down the river that we have planned to do soon with a friend of ours.  I am actually really really excited about this and I'm sure I'll be posting pictures and commentary on the trip soon after.  I'm especially excited to be able to be getting out and doing something outdoorsy before summer is over since we haven't even been able to go to the mountains as much as we normally would this summer.  It seems like every time my husband had the day off and we would have been able to go either the weather was bad or something else came up that kept us from going.  I'm certainly enjoying the fact that we have had a lot more cooler weather this summer than normal, but all the rain that's come with it had kind of put a damper on being able to get out and enjoy it. (But then again I do love storms and rainy cozy days).  I think though that some of the summer bucket list items may get pushed onto the fall list, now that we are running out of summer (specifically my "around the world in VA"  day/road trips, we haven't managed to do one yet this summer lol).

And speaking of Fall. I am super excited that it's so close (even if there was more I wanted to try to fit in this summer). Fall is probably my favorite season.  The temperature is perfect, the food is delicious, it's got great holidays. I have to admit that I've already started working on not only stuff for Halloween (did I mention Halloween is one of my favorite holidays.... I mean you get to play dress up as an adult with no one thinking you're crazy for it, and you get to let your inner goth out... hahaha), but stuff for Thanksgiving too.  We have real Thanksgiving at my parents house, but my first Thanksgiving in my house I had a few friends over for a Thanksgiving dinner party a day or two before Thanksgiving and we some-what jokingly called it pre-Thanksgiving dinner (I think it was actually on the day before Thanksgiving that year, and I made a whole Thanksgiving meal).  Pre-Thanksgiving dinner is now an annual tradition that is coming up on it's 8th year, and this year my theme is "Glowing with Thankfulness" so I've been working on and planning lots of glittery and "glowing" decorations (glitter, metallic, shiny, candles, etc.).  Sometime in November I'll have to post some photos of years past, we've had "Thankful for the little things" (my favorite part of that one was serving cornish game hens as little turkeys), "Thankful for Each Other" (the first year after my husband and I got married), "Enormously Thankful" (I made a giant cornucopia out of a grapevine wreath and grapevine garland and filled it with a giant pumpkin and giant ear of corn and huge leaves and giant grapes....), and last year was "Naturally, Thankful" (by far one of my most awesome decorations to date was the turkey centerpiece I made for the buffet table, that was made all from fruits and vegetables.... it also made it to my parents for real Thanksgiving day to decorate the sideboard)

But anyway, it's not fall quite yet, so back to summer and getting the most out of the last few weeks (or perhaps days with the cool fall-like weather we've had this past week) of it.  And to my peanut butter banana cream pie recipe :)

Peanut Butter - Banana Cream Pie

 Ingrediants:
3/4 - 1c. creamy peanut butter (you can use more or less to taste)
1 package banana cream pudding/pie filling mix
milk (amount called for on the pudding package - use the amount for "pie filling", if they don't have instructions for that on the package just use a little less then for the pudding)
pre-made (store bought or homemade) Graham Cracker pie crusts (I've always made it with mini pie crusts so I end up with individual pies, I'm sure you could use one big pie crust too although you might have to thicken the filling just a bit for it to cut very well)

The steps for making this pie are very simple and it really only takes a few minutes of hands on time
{1} Melt your peanut butter in a saucepan over medium heat stirring often

{2} While your peanut butter is melting make the banana cream pudding according to the package directions

{3} Pour the melted peanut butter into the banana cream pudding and mix (using a whisk) until well mixed and smooth

{4} Pour/spoon into crusts and refrigerate for at least 30-60 minutes (or as long as the pudding package suggests) before eating.  I usually buy pre-made mini graham cracker crusts, they're made by Keebler and come 4 to a package.  I've never actually made more then the four because I've not needed more than that and didn't want to buy extra crusts, but I'm pretty sure you could get 6 out of this amount of filling.  I always have right much left over.  I just eat it as pudding while I'm waiting for the pies to set hehehe ;)

Also when transporting these I have found that the bases fit perfectly into my standard size cupcake carrier, you just have to stagger them since they are wider at the top.