Tag: nature

My first year of blogging and my first Top 10 List | Maine Memories from 2016

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Looking back on 2016, my first year of blogging, I am excited with the direction of my blog, and motivated to expand and grow  my content to focus on even more of the amazing adventures available in Maine. But, before I jump into 2017, here are ten of my favorite activities from this past year, and links to the blog posts I wrote about them.

(1) Artascope Studios | Saltwater Etching for Copper Class. I love learning new crafts, and while I don’t always have as much time as I would like in this area, I did spend a productive Sunday, this past spring, learning about copper etching. Artascope has studio space in Yarmouth where they run a variety of classes including day long workshops, and more extended six-week sessions. I’ve taken many classes at Artascope and they have all been amazing.

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Hiking Maine | Looking for something to do besides shop at Clarks Pond?

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Black Friday is coming. The official and frenzied kick-off to the holiday shopping season. While I enjoy shopping, sometimes you just need a break from it all. Nestled amidst the retail stores, and shopping plazas, of the Clark’s Pond area in South Portland, is the Clark’s Pond Trail. An unexpected oasis and peaceful green space where you can unwind.

Until goggling trails in the area one recent Sunday morning,  I never realized it was there even though I had been to this shopping destination many times. The start of the trail is easily accessed by parking in the back of the Home Depot lot, and walking a short distance to the well-marked trail entrance. The trail immediately immerses you in forest quickly leaving the stores behind although the steady buzz of cars never quite goes away and remains as a ready reminder that you’re still in an urban space.

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Apple Picking at Apple Acres Farm in Hiram, Maine

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Fall brings with it many rituals. Apple picking is one of those activities so when the weather starts to get crisp, and the leaves begin to change, you’ll find me headed to an apple orchard. Things have been a little hectic this year, so I was a little later than usual in venturing to an orchard, but fortunately it’s a fairly long season in Maine and there were still many varieties of applies ripe for picking.

After a hearty breakfast at Krista’s Restaurant in Cornish where I enjoyed a meat lover’s omelet overflowing with filling, my friend and I headed to nearby Apple Acres Farm. As we approached the farm, the neat even rows of apple trees could be seen on each side of the road. The weather was perfect for apple picking and the countryside was starting to show a colorful fall palette making everything especially picturesque.

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Kite Festival at Bug Light Park, South Portland

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We own a kite that sadly has gotten little use over the years. We purchased it when our girls were young because kite flying seemed to be just something you do with toddlers. We did attempt to fly it a few times but never to much success other than a few perfectly windy days at the beach, so eventually it went into storage in our garage. Somewhere along the line we picked up a friend for our little kite. I don’t remember where, but most likely it was from a yard sale find that was just too good to pass up. Even though the one kite we owned wasn’t getting much use, a second one somehow seemed like a good idea.

I never thought much more about it, until I found out that South Portland has a spring Kite Festival at Bug Light Park. It felt like the perfect time to pull our kites out of storage and let them fly free again. There was a reason we had kept them all these years.

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#atozchallenge | H is for Hiking Mackworth Island, Falmouth

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According to Newton’s first law of motion, a body at rest stays at rest, and a body in motion stays in motion. This law tells me I need to get moving. Actually, I’m not sure what it really tells me as physics was my worst subject in High School. But, the way I choose to interpret it is that if I want to keep on doing the things I love as I age, I have to keep moving my body. I’m good with that.

I love to walk and living in Maine gives me lots of beautiful opportunities. For awhile, I was walking almost every day, but unfortunately an injury slowed me down, and then inevitably winter makes it more difficult with the snow and ice although the cold is not a problem. It’s actually pretty exhilarating to walk in the winter as long as the roads aren’t icy.

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