Fall,,,,, ahhh.....my favorite season

Somes Sound from Sargent Drive

Motoring and Sailing past Bear Island Lighthouse (wonder who won?)

Atop Cadillac Mountain. That's Cranberry in the upper right (Little Cranberry is the long shape to the left and Sutton Island is the long shape in front). There are many beautiful views from here, but I can never stop taking a pic in this direction. Every single time!

Cruise Ship in the harbor at Bar Harbor

Northeast Harbor

Foggy Acadia

Tyler's new gig

Looks like Tyler won't be leaving anytime soon. He's got a cool new job. At the Fisherman's Co-op on Little Cranberry. Check him out....

The co-op is the blue building. It's where all the fishermen take their catch. Not just lobster. Anything they catch that can be sold.

School Fieldtrip

No trip to the zoo, Biltmore House or animal farm down the road. These island kids do some serious traveling on school trips. Our school, along with 5 other small island schools, traveled to Cliff Island, near Portland, to visit the school there and do some important "inter-island peer networking". It was fun for me too. Except for the camping. I'm not much of a tent camper. Apparently I'm a whimp. Doesn't help that I caught a cold there and had body aches. Never had I needed a warm and soft bed more and not been able to have it. I enjoyed meeting other island families and learning about the similiarites and differences on our islands. Samson met new friends and even shocked me by signing up for the talent show! His talent? Telling jokes and doing accents. That kid cracks me up!

The ferry boat to Cliff Island is actually much bigger than my hand!

"Bug Light" off the coast near Portland

playing parachute games in "tent city"

Our tent. And I put it up all by myself!

The church on Cliff Island (Samson is toasting it??)

Making sandcastles

This was our alarm clock. The sound of this lobsterboat getting started at the crack of dawn.

First Day of School!

sportin his star wars

his first walk down the dock to get on the boat to the first day of school. insert long, sad, sigh.

oh, you know mama is riding the boat with him!

SummerTime = CrazyTime

Well, it's been weeks, months even, since I last posted. We were so busy over the summer, it was nuts. So much about island living is seasonal and the job market is no exception. At the beginning of the season, we agreed to take on many jobs, some regular, some one-time hits, in addition to our regular jobs. So by August, it was out of control. Especially as Ric spent more time lobster fishing. That meant I had to work some of his jobs too! By August, I was tired and grumpy. Lesson learned. Next year I will just have to say NO, which is hard for me to do. (By the way, I have said this 4 out of 4 summers living here.) Working so much can take the fun out of summer, especially when we had company. Grandmother spent a nice long time with us. My cousin Darlene and her family visited. Tyler came here twice and is still here. And Amber and Carrie and the kids visited. I'm gonna scrounge around for some pics to post. The laptop that I use for storing pics is broken. It has "the black screen of death" and I could cry when I think about the 7 years worth of photos I have stored there.

Me and Samson on the sailboat Margaret Todd in Bar Harbor

Terry and Samson on "The Todd"

Darlene and the kids Samson was upset for DAYS when they left

Ric brought home lobster, of course

You go, Dar

Samson's new best friend forever, I aint ever gonna love anybody more, I wish he could live with us, why did he have to leave, can he come back every summer, Cooper.

What's a vacation to Maine without the fog, right??

Amber, Carrie, and the kids arrived in the fog. Welcome to Maine!

Carrie and Amber brought Cheerwine and country ham. Yay!

Arr, me hearty

A scurvy pirate come to th' island to visit th' lads. She landed by boat then told them stories 'n sang songs. Samson had a great th' hour fightin' wit' th' other wee band o' pirates.

Fightin' wit' th' frogs

Our bucko ruby on th' trail to the beach

Th' scurvy pirate has landed

Th' canon guns were loud

Touristing with Tyler

We really don't leave the island much, especially this time of year, when we are so busy with work. But Tyler is leaving soon (sniff, sniff, pout, pout) so we took him off island one day to do the things tourists to Maine are supposed to do. We went to Acadia National Park. Drove to the top of Cadillac Mountain. Played putt putt. Had ice cream.

He dressed himself this day. The upturned collar was his idea. I have no idea where it came from.

looking down on the town of Bar Harbor

Whale Watching

It costs around $60 per person to take the whale watching tour boat in Bar Harbor. And they go really fast to get you out there. A lot of people get sea sick. And when a whale is spotted, there is almost a stampede to that side of the boat so everyone can get a look and take a photo. Sooo, instead, we went with friends on their boat on our own whale watch. And we did see them! We also saw porpoises (how to you make porpoise plural??) and seals. We had a picnic on the boat and there was no stampede or tourists to get in our way. But I did get a little sick, I admit. We went about 13 miles out. So that was a long ride. And it was choppy out there. And that's my defense. I don't know how Ric does it every day. I was just pleasure crusing and got sick. Anywho. These are not the kind of whales that jump completely out of the water or do tricks and jumps. But it was still really neat to see and amazing how close we got to them.

That's the mountains of Acadia in the background. Way in the background. I've never been out this far!

If you feed the seagulls, kids, they wont go away!

Tyler and Samson

another use for lobster bands. jewelry.