Spring Break!

We're taking a little road trip.

And someone wants to make sure he gets to come too!

Our $900 a Pound Lobsters

You just can't put a price on the thrill of being able to go out and catch your own lobsters. But we jokingly tell each other, for every lobster we catch, our investment to do so, costs us about $900/lb.

Each Spring we begin the first of many trips to Downeast Fishing Gear to replenish our supplies and pick up what we need for maintenance. Thankfully, we have plenty of traps thanks to our good friend and former commercial lobsterman, Dan G, and husband of my lovely friend Diane. Below is a shot of some new ones being offered at the store. Aren't they pretty?








I really do enjoy our trips to this place, it's only painful if you have to spend money on boring stuff though. Thankfully, I think there are a lot of pretty selections though. Here's a sample of available gloves. I use the green ones and they are still in good shape so no need to buy a new pair.

Here are some available buoy paint colors. We still had leftover hot pink, but we ended up having to buy more green this year.

A selection of colorful rope. Rope is expensive. But we're all set with that too.

These are bundles of bait bags. We needed some of these too.

This is what we came home with. Anti-fouling bottom paint, touch up paint, green buoy paint, bait bags, and bands for the lobsters. The damage was just over $200. (And we bought the cheap paint.) Keep in mind this was our initial trip though, and there will be many more trips made. It's less painful that way, sort of.

So it was time to unveil Fearless to get her ready for a new season.

That reminds me, I need to get her a 2010 registration sticker too. And renew our recreational licenses as well.

Time to get the ladder back out to climb aboard.

Henri has his work cut out for him, but he loves it.

And you just can't put a price on that.

Old Sheets

Today, we were up visiting my Mom [still a bit blog shy] and she said it would be fine to show you what I made up for her bedroom a few years ago.

She had told me she was going to shop around for a new bed ensemble for her room and asked if I wanted to go with her. That's about the time I spotted a couple sheet sets in her linen closet and asked her if she wanted me to sew up a duvet cover and some accessories with them. She kind of looked at me funny and said "You mean with those old sheets?" "Yes, Mom. They're beautiful. Don't you like them?" Long story short, she had no problem with me ripping them apart and so I did and she still is using them in her bedroom during the spring/summer season.

So here goes. I didn't have to do anything with the pillow cases, but I took two of the flat sheets and sewed up a duvet cover for her down comforter. I used ribbon in a matching shade of blue to tie the top together. I also made a pillow and monogrammed it with her first initial (same as mine).



I just free formed the "L" on a block of white fabric I made and hand stitched it with embroidery floss. Then I hand sewed the white block onto the sheet fabric. {This is the part I will ask you to pretend to not see the black ink peeking out from under the embroidery floss.}

I had found some pretty sheer white ribbon that had a strand of faux pearls running down the center and criss crossed it with some ribbon I found with a special message written in gold.

Here you can see a closeup of the "old sheeets" which have a linen-like print, as a background to the flowers.

I even had enough fabric to make up a French message board. It looks great with some of our old sepia family photos tucked into the ribbon. (She had just changed back to this set today and had not yet put the photos back up though).

I found some very inexpensive flowers and made up this arrangement to go with her new "old" set. {Yes, I know there's no such thing as blue roses, so don't look too close at that either.} The wicker vase is one that I had from back in the 80s that I was happy to find a good use for.

And I had just enough fabric to make a quick set of toppers for both of her plain white curtained windows. I lined the toppers with the white fabric I already had.

And then today, she reminded me that I had also made her a button box back then too.

It was just a little round cardboard covered box that I painted in a Tiffany blue shade, and then had glued overlapping white buttons all over the lid.

But this is the part I had all but forgotten. She told me to look inside at what I had put into the box for her. There were a couple pieces of heart shaped sea glass in there.

I had added a heart shaped rock in there too.

So there you have it, pictures of my Mom's room done up with a few old sheets.

Double Takes

You know how that plastic from a CD gets all clingy when you peel it off just to get the case open? Henri bought this CD 2 weeks ago.

I guess that's how I managed to find the label again today, because of the clingy factor. Anyway, here it is displayed with my sea glass button. Kind of fits, don't you think?

While out thrifting today, I found this pin that looks like a wreath of roses. Then upon closer inspection, I discovered it's actually made up of little tiny sea shells. Someone had a lot of patience to arrange them like that. I've never seen shells that color here in Maine, but what a great idea for someone who has, provided you have a pair of tweezers handy.

We were so hungry today by the time we got back home that this is what we ate for dinner. Egg salad sandwiches (with a few spinach leaves).

It's kind of sad, but this was our dessert. A few dark chocolate melts and a handful of white chocolate morsels. I didn't even take the time to melt them down into candy molds.

"What are these?" asked Henri. I didn't really have a good answer, but he ate them anyway.

That's love.

Long Neck Treasures

What to do with all the beer bottle sea glass that is so commonly found along the shore.

Today I paired a few pieces with a small wired wreath form and some 24 gauge gold wire.

The wreath form was just 39 cents. A roll of gold wire is about $6.

When displayed near light, the beer bottle glass glows a beautiful amber color.



This could also be used as a wreath to hang in a sunny window.

Or a wild and crazy necklace for a dress form.

Just so the other ones have something fancy too, this one gets some faux peonies added to the neck.

And a disco pendant for this one.

Just so you know, I would not really wear a sea glass wreath around my neck, but it's the evening and my sea glass needed to be photographed in some light.

Bright Spots Of Our Walk

Blue sky backdrop to this eagle weather vane atop a cupola.

This is Rosco, a blue tick hound dog. We just met him yesterday and we were so happy to see him again today.

What a welcome sight to see the winter shrinkwrap coming off of the sailboats as we passed by Sorrento's West Cove Boatyard.

Another blue sky backdrop, even though there are still no buds yet.

But then I spotted this newly budded tree right around the corner! The first that I have noticed here this year.

And then there are always the ocean views that we get to take in all along the way.

And, of course, it's so nice to walk without being bundled up in our winter coats!

Color My World

Neon buoy paint. It's that time of year again to freshen up the lobster buoys in my favorite color combination. Hot pink and lime green are the colors I chose to register for my recreational lobster license. And just last year, they became Henri's colors too.

Henri's buoy colors used to be blaze orange and marine blue. But now his license is registered to use these colors as well. [It takes a real secure man to fish with pink buoys don't you think?]

Back inside, I spot my pink wool yarn that I just picked up a couple days ago.

And my best bud, Simon who's been with me now for 34 years.

I think I must have trained my eye to naturally look for these colors, now that I think about it. [Truth be told though, my real inspiration for picking out my buoy colors was from a popular brand of mascara.]