My Family's Visit

It was great to have my family out for a little post-Christmas Christmas celebration. Nice to extend the holidays a little bit. Since it was Dave's first visit, we tried to fit a lot of stuff in. All the best restaurants (Gilbert's and Becky's), the Portland Head Light, steaming our own lobster, and a hike. Dave wasn't too sure about the lobster at first, and my mom wasn't all that excited about holding one. But they both were very brave. Claire was shocked.










































They picked a wonderful week to come. They were able to see the two feet of snow we had on the ground at their arrival, and then watch it steadily melt off as we had over a week of temperatures above freezing both night and day. One day had an official high temperature of 64 degrees. I get the feeling it would take many many winters to figure out what a 'typical' winter is like here in Maine.

Apart from that, Claire has started swimming lessons. She's taken lessons before, but always with Mike or I in the pool with her, and always with very mixed results. This is her first time in a pool with an instructor. I have to admit, given my past experience with Claire in a pool (earplugs are of more service than nose plugs), I was preparing myself to see her resist it completely. But I was wrong. She did fantastic. She had a little floatie and actually "swam" around completely on her own. She loved it. She was almost as proud of her self as I was of her.

Last week my parents (and Aunt and Uncle) were here. Since this was their second trip to Maine, everyone had a good idea of what they wanted to do. Most if it involved no schedules whatsoever, which is always nice on a vacation. As for Claire, Mike and I, we got all the benefits of being on vacation (trips to restaurants, getting to be a tourist, and a week of 'I don't have anything planned') and all the benefits of being at home. We did get to cross a few things off the 'List of Things to do in Maine' that were missed last year, such as the Bug Light. We had Claire's birthday party there last Saturday, and the park did not disappoint. It was a beautiful day. The skies were filled with kites, the harbor was busy with boats of all kinds coming in and out, and there was even a wedding. My family enjoyed watching all that was going on,














the kids ran around (mostly with Jaime),
















the Dads of the group played wiffle ball,



















and everyone else mostly watched.















There was even an obese wiener dog that kept trotting over from somewhere looking for pizza and cake.



















Definitely a successfully birthday party.

We of course had some repeats as well. A day at Old Orchard Beach, a day in Freeport, and lots of time on the Maine State Pier and in Old Port. These things were all much more enjoyable this year, since every day we enjoyed temperatures in the mid 70's and clear blue skies. Last year I think it rained all but one of the days they were here. Also on one of the beautiful fall evenings, Mike and I had a chance to go to a Boston Red Sox game (thanks again Jaime and John!). Unfortunately they lost, but I think on your first trip to Fenway Park, thats almost secondary.














It reminded me a lot of the evening games Mike and I would go to in Milwaukee. I didn't quite forget where I was, though, since I noticed that they did not sing "Roll Out the Barrel" and they did not have a Sausage Race. The entire stadium did sing "Sweet Caroline", however, and that was unlike anything I've ever heard before.

So. School starts for Claire on Monday. She'll be going three mornings a week this year, and has been looking forward to it since I broke the news that she wouldn't be going to school over the summer a week before her last day last spring. She's ready to go back. And I've been planning how I'll use the free time since I started taking pottery classes again. I'm about to see a lot more studio time every week!