I finally saw...

a MOOSE! It walked right across the road in front of us. I had taken my mom to the studio of a woman who makes beautiful woven rugs. On the drive back a bull with a smallish set of antlers stepped onto the road. He quickly crossed and disappeared into the woods on the other side before either of us could snap a picture. We could hear him crashing through the brush for a minute or so. It was about 3:30 pm and it was less than 10 miles from the house near the town of Cushing. Too cool! I've also heard there might be moose living in the bog on the other side of the hill from us. There is quite a bit of protected land around the bog, and it's apparently big enough to support a few moose. Need to check it out.

Summertime, and the Living is Easy

Wow - I must have been busy to not post an update in so long. August went by in a whirlwind. The kids and grandkids were here, we saw Arlo Guthrie again, and we hosted a big farewell party for Gretchen before she left for Namibia for the next 18-24 months. She's still offline, so we are missing out on hearing about her adventure. We plan to visit her sometime next year. We also made a trip to Brookhaven, Long Island, over Labor Day weekend for a visit with Rob's brothers and to enjoy a great summer beach weekend.

We got away for a visit in CA in early September. We had a beautiful week spent visiting family in Arroyo Grande, old friends in San Luis Obispo, driving up Hwy. 1, lunch at Nepenthe, and camping with our best camping buddies, the Happy Campers, in Capitola. It was a wonderful relaxing trip.

My mom is visiting now, and I'm enjoying taking her around to see the sights of mid-coast Maine. It's definitely headed into fall. Some of the trees have started to turn beautiful yellow, orange, and red already. We've canned some of the pears off our tree, and are hoping the tomatoes on the vine will still ripen (not likely). We've eaten green beans, tons more swiss chard, and our first potatoes. A vine that volunteered out of the compost pile has produced four large pumpkin type squashes, but they have yet to turn orange so who knows what strange mutant squash they are. Next to be harvested will be sun chokes - a first for me.

The flower garden has done pretty well of late. Check out these morning glories! Now that I know how the plants look as they mature, I got into a frenzy of moving things around. Too much fun! I made a couple last runs to the nursery because of great sale prices and picked up some new fun babies. Next year's garden will be soooo nice!

Miss you all! Start planning your 2009 visits! xoxo Gail