Time with the Nieces

My sister's girls (aged 6 and 8) are up visiting their Gram & Pa for a few weeks, so as I was planning to head to my grandmother's on Schoodic Peninsula for a too-short visit while my aunts are up from FL and NC, I swung by my parents' and picked the girls up to get a taste of what my childhood summers were like. We made the trip downeast on Thursday, which was also the peak activity night for the Perseids.

Since the skies were clear and perfect for some spectacular viewing, we fished out a couple of old Army surplus quilts to lay on the ground in the back yard and covered up with a quilt I had in the car. Alison (aka Ash), the younger, decided to stay up with me and we saw some amazing ones before Mary, who is not a night owl, was roused from her nap to come watch for a while.

The next day we headed across the road and down to the shore, where my uncle Brad lives. He was going to take the girls for a little ride in his inflatable raft but decided once they headed out that the water was too choppy for it to be enjoyable and took them for a somewhat longer ride in his big boat, which is moored out in the natural harbor.





The view of Mount Desert Island and the Porcupine Islands was particularly nice.



And the girls really enjoyed the boat ride.



Then we threw together a picnic lunch and headed to Schoodic Point.





And then on to visit cousin Miriam Colwell, who lives in the colonial farmhouse where she was raised by her grandparents and who, at 93, is remarkably spry. While I enjoyed visiting with Miriam and looking at the paintings and sculptures done by her late partner, the artist Chenoweth (Chennie) Hall, the girls were more interested in being kids.



Then we headed on to Corea village, so we could take some photos of the ever-picturesque harbor.





On the way back to the house, we stopped for one last photo op in Prospect Harbor village.



Mary declared it "the most awesomest day ever since we've been in Maine!"

Beach Boy

When I got off work this morning and headed home, the weather was about as perfect as could be - sunny, breezy, warm but not hot. And as it was the first day of summer, it seemed right to go to the beach. Seapoint Beach, our little local beach, is only about 2 miles from our house. The photo above is a blurry Photomerge that I'll have to replace someday with something nicer, but you can see how uncrowded it is. There are no concessions, no touristy shops; the beach is a municipal park and only locals are allowed to park in the small gravel lot right at the beach.

The natural breakwater right in the center has a lot of tidal pools just like this.



So after I set up my little beach chair, I headed over with camera to see what I could find in them. Unfortunately, I don't have a polarizing filter for this lens yet, so my apologies for the glare.

A fairly large green crab trying to hide

The blurry peach-colored blob is an anemone.

And here's a brown anemone.

This urchin had used some of its hundreds of sucker "feet" to camouflage itself with snails, some of which didn't seem to thrilled to be there.

This little guy was about the size of a penny, for you folks who need a reference.

When I arrived, I set my little chair up at a respectful distance from any of the other 4 or 5 groups who were already there, as beach etiquette dictates. When I came back from taking photos, the beach was barely any more crowded, but two women with small children had set up their blankets and collection of beach toys only about 8ft. away from my chair. With about a football field's worth of open space available to them.

Not particularly caring to listen in on their conversation about which disposable diapers are best to prevent chafing when taking the children to the beach (yes, this was the actual conversation-in-progress), I put away my camera in the car, then came back and picked up my things and moved them about 200ft. further down the beach, to an area that was not only very open but also closer to the water, so that the incoming tide would wake me up if I happened to fall asleep in the sun too long.

Guess where they decided to bring the kids to play in the surf? Some people are just oblivious. A minor annoyance, fortunately, and not enough to ruin a very pleasant afternoon. My knees got a bit sunburned, but it should fade to brown in a few days.

Knitting?

Despite all the nature photography lately, I have been doing some knitting. Got a bit more done on the sock last night work, and tonight I started doing a swatch of the latest iteration of the wedding vest motif. I'm doing a circular swatch with steek so I can a) get an accurate representation of my gauge, and b) play around a bit with steeking, since I've not done it before. Photos of those when I've got something worth showing.