Green Glasses in the District: more views from canterbury.

A group of us gathered in Canterbury at the home of my grandparents. It was sunny and breezy with slightly crisp mountain air, as we sat around chatting over a couple of cold ones.

We completed our womanly duty as gatherers - picking vegetables and herbs from the garden for dinner.

And our other womanly duty of standing around and chit-chatting.

Check out the giant zucchini they've grown. It's like a mini pumpkin but oh-so delicious sliced and baked with fresh herbs and olive oil.

My grandparents have an amazing garden. Delicious fruits and vegetables, and beautiful flowers.

We had dinner and a show, as a little-known secret came out...my grandmother used to play the trumpet! The boys ran out to the garage to find the evidence, but they came back with what appeared to be the instrument that my DAD used to play....aha! secret number two. Naturally we had to pass it around the table and see who could make a noise out of it.

Eventually we tuckered out, the more outdoorsy of the crowd retired to their tents out back.

And then we spent the next 4 days in a hayfield in Walpole. Just in case you thought I might not be the outdoorsy type, let me defend by saying that I hiked (swam) through hay as tall as my shoulder and even used the facilities camping-style on multiple occasions... Not to say that I particularly enjoyed this part, instead I was yearning to get back to the homeless scented sidewalks of familiar DC. But the family time was fun; we kicked it off with a toast and a picnic.

I shuddered as my grandmother boasted about how lucky we were to have such great weather (it's raining and it's 50 degrees out. THIS is your good weather??). Even the Florida folks seemed to love it...I guess I'm getting soft from a DC summer.

The guys sliced some kind of unidentifiable "man meat". Upon tasting it they all tossed it into the bushes. I discovered this little gem of a meat caught dangling from the hay.