Maggie, it sounds like a great way to spend time in the summer. I agree on the hummus and fresh veggies to dip. As for the Walking Tacos, that's a big seller at football games and track meets here, the concession stand does a booming business. Here they just open the bag of Fritos or Doritos, ladle in a spoonful of taco filling or chili, add some cheese, stir it all around. Depending on the thickness of your toppings, a fork or a spoon work equally well. I remember Grandma used to fill ice cream cones with kind of homemade trail mix so we just ate the cones when we were done with the stuff inside it. Back then it was called "gorp" and hikers and campers used to eat it. Ours was made with raisins, M&Ms, sunflower seeds, cereal like cheerios or chex, maybe pretzels, usually peanuts but the mixture is whatever works so something else could be substituted. If you can have that electric skillet, you can make nearly anything. The girls and I used to take one with us when we travelled, it fit in the van and we used it to make chili, baked potatoes, pancakes, rice and pasta, grilled cheese, oatmeal, bacon, eggs, hash browns, hamburgers, pork chops, we even "fried" dollops of cake mix like pancakes and rolled them up with ice cream instead of cones or sprinkled them with powdered sugar. Above all, though, keep it easy and fast, and have a great time! Annie

Well, we had a good week. Let's see, what about the eating part . . . we had ginger-garlic stirfry chicken w/ candied walnuts, classic hot and sour soup, abondigas (Mexican meatball) soup, pesto both normal/basil and tomato/trapanese, seared salmon with sweet sauce that I'd call ''semi-sashimi'', broiled beef short ribs w/ hoisin/BBQ sauce, miso soup, slow-cooked beef brisket, tomatoes baked and broiled w/ cheese and mayo, some excellent couscous in a great chicken broth, lots of tangy salads, orange cake, peach cobbler, spicy marinated and grilled steaks which put me in a food coma, two chicken and chorizo paellas which worked out even though we used long-grain rice, and some other stuff that I forget. Poor dishwasher worked overtime. Even though we dined like, well, oinkers, the total food and wine bill for the whole week was probably the equivalent of a couple of group dinners out. Doing your own cooking just beats restaurants all day long. Took a five hour kayak trip, mis-timed the wind (lake wind advisories the last couple of days) and paddled our arms off to get home before the whitecaps and waves got too bad. Some mild sunburns. A cigar and scotch night, which basically means me and W_____ being banished to chairs way far downwind, out where the coyotes prowl. Lots of ''stitch and b*tch'' circles, there was quite an obsessive knitting group - which is why we resorted to the cigars in the first place. Fixed some plumbing leaks - it is a very old cabin, and something always has to be mended. Some serious napping. Got caught up on our friend's lives, mid-life menopauses, growing kids, and how everyone is coping w/ the current economy - lots of ''re-inventing oneself'', ''consulting'' and ''living more simply'' going on, but things are okay. The BP oil spill cleanup looks to be a surprise positive for one guy's research funding, glad someone I know is benefiting from that. 13 y/o R_____ has become quite the jazz pianist. 11 y/o C____ does a mean Michael Jackson dance routine. Found a quirkly old-time gun and blade store that had a particular discontinued Forschner Chinese vegetable cleaver that I've been looking for. Then a 12 hour drive back to Portland, kayaks on the roof killing the fuel economy, and back to work today. The best thing is that we are all getting together in a month to rebuild a rotten deck at another cabin. And there's an excellent little oyster farm just five miles down the road . . .

Look for the features you want. I grill a lot of vegetables year round. I have a vegetable wok & a 12 x 16 vegetable cooker; they are black metal with small holes. I like the flat one better than the wok--it seems that only the veggies closest to the grill cook anyway. It fits 2-3 zucchini sliced or 2-3 chayotes (new grill favorite). Zucchini & summer squash do well cut in wedges also. Kabobs work great, but the tomatoes always fall off the ends. For chicken tenders (small pieces of skinless chicken breast) I like to line them up in a grilling basket and flip them all over at once after 8 minutes on a side; being next to each other keeps them from drying out on the sides. I like to nest shrimp together too--keeps them from dryng out. Pam makes a grilling spray that I use on the accessories. That being said, look for the amount of square inches of surface area you want. Stay away from the Sam's Club grill--it's big and has a big $$$; the problem is that you can't get replacement parts and you end up with a big, shiny shell in a few years. For Char-broil or Sunbeam or any others, look at the literature to see if you can get replacement parts easily. The burner (thing with holes) fills up with grease, burns out, and you end up with an uneven hot spot. Watch to see if grease can fall into those holes in the first place. That's when you need to get replacement parts. Our most recent grill is a Ducane, but I think Weber bought them out less than 2 years ago. I looked at my grill, but it doesn't list BTU's or anything. I prefer a shelf on the side & a side burner is something dh likes for tamales or fish soup. As far as timing goes, I have to get used to it for each grill--it must be a BTU thing--and how close the burner is to your food, and what high or low means...etc. With fish, other than shark, tuna or mackeral, I usually wrap it in aluminum foil. Reynolds sells a "Release" foil that foods don't stick to. Highly recommend it for fish on the grill. Oh, and fresh corn on the cob!! Can't wait: Take out the cornsilk; soak in water; then cook 10 minutes on each of 4 sides. By the last time, the shucks will catch on fire and some of the kernels will be slightly charred. Great in a black bean salsa! HTH

My big complaint is big breasted, big birds. The heritage hens (which are still white, so how heritage-y are they?) have normal pelvises, at least, rather than the tiny ones that even the normal free range birds we get do. I won't buy big chickens, however, and the heritage ones run huge, and I don't want a five pound chicken! When I was young, they were mostly in the 3.5 pound range, and were labelled 8 weeks. Now, finding a decent (i.e., local free range, organic feed (i.e., allowed to eat bugs but the food they're given is organic) chicken under 4.5 pounds is hard! When I find one that's under 4 lbs., I celebrate. There's one grower, whose birds I'd have to go well out of my way to get, who sells them without giblets or wingtips to get them under three pounds. If they came complete, they'd still be even smaller than my ideal, but I might go out of my way to get them. And even if I wanted to raise my own, I don't have enough land (city code). Agmss, Kudos to your sister for raising happier chickens.