A Weekend in Vermont

I'm really not going to explain why I haven't been blogging.  I had some excuses before that included things like vacation, sickness, stress, exhaustion, etc.  However, all those things past and I still didn't feel like blogging.  I still had stuff to say and as I walked from work to the bus I thought of all the different posts I wanted to write - but then I got home and I just couldn't muster up the energy.  So, I didn't force myself to write anything.  My writing is nothing too spectacular on a regular day, so I can imagine how bad forced-writing would be.  I sure didn't want to subject you to that!

However, tonight I got home from dinner with my sweet husband (today is our 1st anniversary!!!) and felt like writing a little.  Since it's been so long since I've felt the urge to blog, I wanted to take advantage of it.

I've definitely had a lot of spots of happiness in the past few weeks but rather than doing a massive round-up I thought I'd post about my recent trip to Vermont.  Hubsters and I headed up for an almost spur-of-the-moment trip to Vermont last weekend to "help" with maple sugaring.  I put help in parenthesis not because we didn't really help, but because it's not like our help was imperative or anything.  We, especially hubsters, had a blast though!

Amazingly enough I took some photos of our time there.  My favorite part of the trip was hanging out with my mom in the hot tub and sitting by the fire while it snowed outside.  Yes, I said SNOW!!  It was pretty crazy to me - to have a big snowfall the end of March, but it's Vermont I guess.  Nothing much stuck to the ground but it looked beautiful.  The photos resemble the pics I took during our trip in December actually.

So, first here's some photos of sugaring.  My parents and their neighbors tap about 400 trees and during the month of March spend many hours either emptying the sap buckets or boiling the sap down into maple syrup.  They love every second of it - I usually get my fill in one weekend.  Hubsters had a ball though and would have stayed in the sugar house drinking beer long after I had returned to Maryland, if possible.

Sap buckets that collect the sap from the tapped trees.
If the weather is right, these are emptied about once a day.

The crew heading down the path with pails to empty the sap from the buckets.
There is a tractor that goes with the crew and it pulls along a large canister that holds all the sap.

My mom and me working really hard...taking photos!
Ignore how un-cute I look in this photo.

Hubsters working a little harder than my mom and me...
doesn't he look like he was born to do this?

What maple syrup looks like when it comes out of the tree,
just like cloudy water.  It's amazing what the end product looks like.

The sugar house where the sap is boiled down -
and where the guys hang out and drink beer and wine.

The boiler - it takes a lot of boiling before you get syrup.

Rick is the Master-boiler -
it's actually very difficult to boil the sap down because it can easily burn.

And the finished product - lots and lots of maple syrup.
Of course there is no going back to Aunt Jemima after this!
So far they have about 50 gallons to split between the neighbors - since they don't actually sell the syrup they make.

Ok, I think that that is good enough for now.  I'll post the storm photos later and make sure you keep an eye out for a re-cap of our One Year Anniversary post on Maple and Mud.  I haven't uploaded all the photos yet, but as soon as I do, I'll put them up.