Ramos Tribe Adventures: July 2017

Monday, July 31, 2017

Canada Day

I have posted many times that our family is very Multi-cultural! Living this close to Canada only seems right to adopt some of their culture! Growing up at RVA helps since a lot of my friends were Canadian and we sang their national anthem a lot.

For Canada Day we went across and spent the day in St. Stephen and St. Andrew. It was super fun with classic cars, parades, Mounties and patriotism. This year Canada celebrates 150 years of Canada being joined together. They got their independence later but Canada Day is the day that all the provinces were joined together as one. What a fun time to celebrate. The fireworks were postponed due to rain so we got to celebrate them on my birthday. But here are some pictures of our day celebrating our neighbors.

I got to see my first Red coat Mounties(they actually don't wear these uniforms except for special occasions ) ... And of course being a crazy tourist I asked to get a picture with them. They thought it odd but then after I was done, a whole line had formed to get a photo with them. Sorry guys if you had to stay a little longer. But I had to get my picture! Don't they look dashing?

My little guys got their face painted

Cool cars!

It was a wonderful day! Happy 150th Canada Day!

The Parker visit

Sometimes you have close family, sometimes you have close friends, and sometimes you have close friends that are practically family. The Parkers have been in my life since I was in 4th grade, well technically before I was born, though I would not know that till my college days. Here's our story:

Once upon a time there was a missionary family, who while on furlough, visited a little church in Cuero Texas. This church was actually a church that the missionary wife, Lindy, grew up in, as her father was the pastor of the church many years before. On their visit to this church, the missionaries daughter, Tabitha, went to the 4th grade Sunday school class. She doesn't remember much, except her teacher was a man named Dwayne Parker and he had a box of donuts. The missionary family gave little carved elephants to all the families in the churches because elephants never forget, and that was a way for people to remember to never forget to pray for the missionaries around the world.........Now, fast forward 10 years, to Lake Jackson Texas, the missionary daughter is now in college and is sitting in Sunday school, next to her boyfriend Keith. A new girl is sitting across the room and keeps looking over at Tabitha. Tabitha asks Keith if he knew who she was, but neither one knew. She keeps looking so Tabitha asks Keith if she had something on her face or in her teeth.... hahaha. Nope. OK after Sunday school was over this strange girl, walks over to Tabitha and asks, "Do I know you?" As a missionary kid, you get that A LOT! Usually it's from a church visit or someone has your picture/prayer card on their fridge. Usually that is the embarrassing picture of you with freckles, clashing clothes and your tongue sticking out because you're tired of pictures being taken, you know that prayer card?. Well I went through my questions of How would I know Tina? Me: "Where are you from?" Tina: "Cuero" Me: My Papa was a pastor in Cuero and I think we spoke there one time. Did we speak in your church? Tina: are you a missionary kid? Me: yes Tina: Did your parents give out wood elephants to remember to pray for them? Me: YES! ......Tina: I still have that elephant!

OK so then we continued talking and catching up and I won't continue in story form. But the story continues of Tina becoming one of our best friends. We join their family on many trips, she is one of our bridesmaids, and she travels to each place we moved to except North Carolina because we actually met up in Puerto Rico. Her dad, Uncle Dwayne, shows us the pictures he has of our family, and his connections to my family. Tina is the reason we laugh at all the Tabby Moments(moments in life where I run into someone I know or knows someone I know, the 6 connections to Kevin Bacon has nothing on me) Anyways. This family is very dear to our hearts. Uncle Dwayne, Aunt Sandra, Tina and Laura. Mark and Billy joined the family and though technically, Tina and Laura took their hubby's names, they will always be Parkers to us. Sorry guys! But it is a great family to marry into. These people are about as close to family as we can get. Glad we are adopted into it.

So the Parker family trip to Maine was a great one! We went to Campobello, St. Andrews, Acadia NP, and the guys went fly fishing almost every evening. We really enjoyed your visit Parkers!

Luke Waiting for Aunt Tina

Visiting St. Andrew

Acadia National Park. We went to the top of Cadillac Mountain! SO PRETTY!

Kaden

Isaiah

I love this guy!

Luke

Picnicking on top of Cadillac Mountain

Sam and Luke had fun together!

My three hiking buddies

Father's Day

For Father's Day, I bought Keith an Oven! Aren't I the sweetest? Our stove has been giving us trouble for a while, but trying to not spend a lot of money, I was making due with just a few stove tops working. Well of course when you have a big group of people coming, you know something will break. This time it was our stove... well technically it was our oven, which caught on fire. There were Sparks and Glowing light! And of course you know things have to break when your husband is going out of town the very next day for a week and you have visitors coming. So while the Jeffers' were here and all week while Keith was in West Virginia, I was getting creative with my cooking. For two weeks all our meals were done via Slow cooker, grill, electric skillet, and rice cooker. It was actually encouraging to know new recipes that could be made in all those things. Cakes, cinnamon rolls, and curries all made in a slow cooker. But I knew with our next group of people coming, feeding 11 people with no oven or stove was going to be a little more difficult. So on Father's Day, after church, we took our trailer to Bangor to look for a new stove. Not exactly what I wanted to do to celebrate Keith, but something we had to do. But we found a great stove loaded it up and then we decided to do something fun because the boys did great while we had to shop. We took the boys to a go-cart place and had a blast. Kaden was old enough to drive by himself and Isaiah got the thrill of riding with Dad. I let them enjoy while I videoed and held Luke. Oh the Joy they had! Glad we could have a fun family day even if it wasn't ALL fun! Happy Father's Day Keith! We love you more than Chocolate covered strawberries!

My boys!

Ramos Family

Kaden got the hang of it pretty fast

On your mark...

I can't tell if Isaiah is screaming in fear or squealing with joy!

When History comes ALIVE!

It's Summer, and we had a homeschool day! Not the sit down and do Math kind of a day, but the kind where History came ALIVE! Literally! Ganong Nature Park held a Historical Re-enactment that had Dank's Rangers, who were colonist from Massachusetts, who fought for the British, during the French and Indian wars 1755-1761. There was also men representing the 20th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment also showed their involvement in history. They revealed how life during the Civil War era was. Both groups showed camp life during these time periods and did an awesome presentation. We got to see them shoot guns, cook, and saw their life in camps. We also got to see them building a barn with only tools from those time periods. No nails, no power tools, just muscle and sweat. We had a blast no matter if it was rainy and cool. This was perfect for school since we have and will be studying Colonization and the Civil War in school.

The Camp. Not as many tents out due to rain

some of the actors

Isaiah trying on some of the uniform

Different time periods

Isaiah helping to build a barn

Kaden drilling holes for the wood pegs

A Blast from My Past

One of our summer visitors were the Jeffers family. These are the type of friends that follow you around and visit, to each place you move (except Florida and Alaska but mostly because they were busy getting married and having kids in that time frame.) But Josh has been following me around since 6th grade when I met him on the play ground at RVA, when he was late for Lunch, apparently. I should say we followed each other around, maybe because of our awesomeness, or just because we are about as close as you could probably get to twins with out being blood related. Even his wife Robin comments on our "likeness". It's kind of scary if you think about having two Tabithas or two Jeffers! We got into a lot of trouble together in school and if I was even being disciplined, it was usually Josh that was standing beside me. But I will not tell of our "fun escapades" in protection of self and the fact that both of our kids don't need any help or ideas of ways to get into any trouble! Hahahaha. But one thing I am thankful for are friends old and new that decide to keep up with us and visit us in our crazy adventure.

The Jeffers family usually arrive at our house with their RV trailer in tow, they usually knock on our door, or just jump in with their Nerf guns blazing, which totally thrills our kids. My boys have learned to be locked and loaded when the Jeffers family arrive. Josh definitely keeps me young.... or shows me how out of shape I am in, as an epic battle with the Nerf guns ensues. I must say this new house is the EPIC battlefield! Two stories, multiple hallways and rooms to hide in. Oh the fun we have!

Their trip was a short and sweet one. We packed a lot into 3 days. We went Canada twice and saw what we could around Maine. Keith was in training in West Virginia but I sure had a blast from my past! Thanks Jeffers family for visiting us! Glad we were the reason you got to add some more states to your map! We love you guys!

I didn't actually take many pictures while they were here and I only got these pictures the last night at 10 o'clock.

Thursday, July 13, 2017

Projects

With a "New to Us" house there are always projects to do. When the day after you purchase the house you get snow, the outside projects tend to wait till spring. Our first major project was to build a walkway to our side entrance. After a winter here we realized the rocks that were there were horrid with Ice. Slipping coming in our house and slippery going out.... Not something we liked at all so that was our first project. The second was leveling our deck in the back. Both projects turned out a little more complicated than we anticipated, but looked great after done. we completed both of these on the same day. A few days later we finally tilled and planted our garden.

Before we had giant slate rocks that you can see to the left.

Keith leveling the sand before we laid out the pavers

Finished! I LOVE IT!!!! There are still slate rocks on the steps but that would be a major over haul to remove them since all the wood was originally built on top of them.

Leveling the deck required power tools

Before. We ended up taking the right stair to the house completely off and lifting it up that distance. Now it only has one step down to the deck and it is now level where your grapes won't roll off your plate!

We hire 3 guys to paint the Green trim of the house. A lot was peeling. It looks great now!

Keith had some good helpers in the garden work

Planted, and Randall Tobin helped Keith build the fence while he was here!

RRRRR YE READY TO PARRRRRTY?

A group of friends got together and we had a splendid Pirate Party! Sherri did amazing at decorating! The pirate food and drinks were delicious(yo ho there wasn't a bottle of rum) and the rowdy crew were even more fun!! There were a few sword fights and a few people had to walk the plank for reasons only beknownst to them. And I finally got Keith to dress up for a party!! RRRRRRRRR!!!

The RRRRRRRamos crew

Evidence of Keith participating in dressing like a pirate. And Gloria photo-bombing =)

Pirate Ladies

I made a pirate ship fruit salad

Oh my it was fun to be a pirate for one night, though me pearls be fake and my sword be dull.

Tobin Visit

We were so excited our friends the Tobins came to visit from Florida. It was their first trip to Maine and the boys first airplane ride. We sure enjoyed them being here a week. They were our first visitors of the summer and we took them to all the pretty spots. We discovered a lot of new places with them and had a great time. It was crazy and loud but totally worth the chaos! We love this family so much!