Wee Scottie's fun rest stop in Germany

I mentioned back in September that our geocaching travel bug Wee Scottie was in Germany.

He's still in sprechen sie Deutsch-land and yesterday we received a new photo update of his adventures. Apparently he visited the Illertal-Ost rest stop in the southern part of the country.

His traveling partner posted this message for us:

The motorway service area of Illertal Ost in Bavaria/Germany has been designed by Herbert Maierhofer in the End 1990s an is highly imaginative from the outside as well as from the inside. Wee Scotty will enjoy himself.

The ice cream-like buildings sort of reminded us of Storyland ... without the entrance fee.

(Travel bugs are geocaching game pieces with a dog tag that travels from geocache to geocache. We have several and track them through geocaching.com).

A brainstorm while canoeing

It's cliche, but it's true. You simply never know what your kids are going to say.

While canoeing on Friday, we were discussing which dance costume the girls were going to wear in the parade the next day. L. couldn't decide and started to drift from the original topic at hand to a costume idea she had for her dad.

It involved wearing a brown hat, brown pants, brown shoes and having a wooden cut out.

Do you have a guess where she's going with that?

It's an L. idea all the way, which is why I'll leave it to her to explain.



And after seeing this grin once she shared her dad's costume idea in the video, I realized she helped me to live up to the LOL costume suggestion this morning.

But when it came time for her sister to suggest a costume idea for HER, it was a whole new story. She decided it was time to stop the brainstorming session.

Steamy hot parade fun

We just got home from the Gorham Days parade. The girls' dance studio asked them to be part of the parade dancers and they had a lot of fun.

They were a colorful group of dancers wearing a variety of former recital costumes.

G. was hesitant at first to agree to join the group but she was all smiles once the parade got going.

But man, was it hot! So afterwards I took my girls to get a slush to cool them off.

Now they're laying on the couch thinking they're too hot and tired to do anything but sit in front of the air conditioner ...

Can't say I blame them a bit.

Gorham Days parade gallery

Noodle chairs easy to trek to beach

Our beach toy policy - you want it, you carry it - is easier this year with a recent purchase.

Noodle chairs.

The mesh material has straps that slip on to form a chair so the kids can float around.

Of course, they're kids so they're not typically 'floating' for long.

The thing I like about them is that they're easy to carry and break down to drag to and from the beach (the noodle itself is a bit of a hassle because of its length but it is light-weight and easy for the kids to carry).

And the mesh chairs still keep the regular noodle options open.

What do your kids drag to the beach?

Roundup of fun with cousins

So I've mentioned we have had family visiting for 2 weeks. And man did we cover a lot of ground while they were here (they headed home to California yesterday amidst a very tearful goodbye for all the younger girls).

As you can see, we were REALLY on the move these past couple of weeks and took so many photos -- and had so much fun -- that there was no way to get it organized every night to blog about it all.

So here's a few of the other highlights of our adventures (in addition to the ones I already mentioned -  Boston,  Sticky River, Enchanted Forest and Ossipee Fair) with our family.

We made indoor s'mores because it rained the first couple of nights they were here.

Another cousin from Oregon taking a furniture making class in Rockport for a couple of weeks took a break from his project for an afternoon BBQ.

Of course, everyone was entertained by the chickens - and learned first-hand their love of ice cream cake.

No one was a lobster fan but they all loved New England clam chowder at the chowder house in Old Port.

We took the crew hiking and geocaching near Diana's Baths in the White Mountain's National Forest in NH.

And no one remembered to wear their bathing suit. Of course it didn't stop L. from enjoying the chilly mountain water.

We took several trips to swim in the Saco River (and remembered the bathing suits!) which was a lot warmer.

We managed to get some crafting time in between adventures and the girls made little backpacks for their Webkinz. They wore those packs - along with their specially designed (by them) silk-screened t-shirts all around Boston. At least we could spot them from a distance...

We did a lot of archery in the backyard.

And played some volleyball.

But my brother-in-law and oldest niece spent all their extra time fishing. C. caught the most - >and biggest - fish during their trip.

And Fino used those fish as an opportunity to have multiple campfires in the backyard.

Well, at least this time they didn't chop off this fish's head.

C. had a chance to milk a cow at Smiling Hill Farm during Open Farm Day.

And the group couldn't resist a chance to pick blueberries in Maine since they all love the fruit. I easily made cobbler 4-5 times while they were visiting along with some berry cheesecake.

I wonder how much we'll fit into next year's visit ...

This kids put together this slide show (with some help from me because it was an overwhelming number of photos for them) for our YouTube channel.

Our Summer Vacation


Share your own Maine vacation photos!

A soggy trip to OOB

Our visitors didn't want to leave Maine without at least a quick stop to Old Orchard Beach to see the sights (including the Canadian license plates they wouldn't normally see in southern California), play the arcades and taste the pier fries. And a soggy afternoon wasn't going to stop them.

But as usual L. was true to her messy nature when eating fries. 

Want some fries with that ketchup?

Cousins have special outdoor spot to play

The girls and their Los Angeles area cousins have been spending a lot of time in the wooded area behind our house. There is a trail from our backyard that leads to a small stream and the girls dubbed the area the "Enchanted Forest."

They visit at least a couple of times a day to make up stories, cool off in the stream and climb around the logs.

But Fino does require the kids to carry a walkie-talkie whenever they go to "The E.L." (their new nickname for the forest), and it makes everyone happy. The kids have the E.L. to themselves and the parents can keep in regular contact to know they're safe (and it isn't far from the house anyway).

With the exception of the bugs (the kids have used nearly a full bottle of spray in two weeks), all the kids have loved the E.F. and will likely always remember playing with their cousins there.

Summer is a great time to be a kid in Maine.

The Enchanted Forest

Everyone had fun on Sticky River

After several years of borrowing canoes from friends, we FINALLY have our own now!

We thank all of our friends for their loaners throughout the years! But now it's great to have our own at-the-ready for whenever we want to go out for a paddle.

The first outing with our new toy was to the Sticky River in Standish.

With my sister-in-law and her family still visiting, we had a large group (10 of us altogether) so everyone had to take turns on our new ride.

The younger girls really enjoyed paddling by the lily pads out on the river to pick  flowers. The activity did require a few reminders about not tipping the boat to lean over the edge to pick one.

While the other kids were waiting on the shore for their turn in the canoe, they each managed to find something else fun to do...

 ... like catching frogs

 ... sitting on the 'mermaid rock'

 ... and catching fish

C. was more than pleased to have caught the largest fish of the day from our group!  And actually, C. has caught more fish than any of her siblings or parents on this trip to Maine. Way to go C.!

And boy was it nice simply to kick back and enjoy the day by the water.

You can see more photos from our canoe/fishing adventure.

And you can post your own photos on MaineToday.com too!

Hanging out on the Sticky River

Peep Fest is always silly fun

Every year after dance recital the studio has some fun with marshmallow Easter peeps and my kids look can't wait for it.

They love making art projects around the Peep theme but unlike the Edible Book Festival at the library, they can use whatever materials they want (not just edible) as long as the project includes Peeps in some way.

"Peep Winter Dance" by G. Since we've done Peep Fest for a few years she decided to expand into Peeps from other holidays for her project.  L. thought the gingerbread peeps were weird looking so she explained it by telling everyone they had "big brains". I thought they sort of looked like aliens.

L.'s "Peep Love." She enjoys making shadow boxes and last year's "Peep Show" that included purple peeps with canes and hats dancing behind a curtain was really cute. She still hasn't figured out why the adults thought that one was so funny though...

There were some really great entries in the art display this year like the "Just Born" (there's great detail in that one like the dad's cigars) and "Leaning Tower of Peep-za" made by a couple of the older teen dancers.

The Peep Fest also includes a day of carnival games and relay races and you can see all the art and fun in our My.MaineToday.com photo gallery.
Peep Fest

If you go to a festival or event this summer, be sure to take some photos and share them in My.MaineToday.com too. You never know, maybe you could win a Vespa with photos of you and your family having fun!

Webkinz travel to Boston, sees the sights

Yesterday we took my sister-in-law and her family to Boston to see some of the historical sites. The four younger girls in our group decided to wear their newly made backpacks (they each made their own the day before) because it seems that L. and G. have spread their enthusiasm for Webkinz to their California cousins (it was our New York cousins who got my kids hooked). So each of the girls (except for G., she was more reasonable about the whole thing and had a smaller pack anyway) had to carry their Webkinz stuffed animals on their backs ALL over the city.

That would end up being a 7-hour walking tour.

Of course carrying junk around is nothing new for L. She HAS to have her 'special' something(s) with her wherever we go (from biking trips to hiking).

But L. wasn't content to simply carry her beloved stuffed animals in her pack like the other kids. Nope, she had to have one in her hands at all times.


On the T with CheChe the monkey (just like in Dr. Doolittle)  and her cousin's Peanut Butter the pug.


The monkey climbed all 294 steps to the top of the Bunker Hill Monument in L.'s hands. And might I just add that we were all dripping sweat and panting by the time we got there....


... because that is one tall monument! 

I think bumper stickers about climbing this monumement would be more worthy a feat to advertise than the Mt. Washington car climbs. (And sadly we looked but found no stickers for climbing Bunker Hill so we've decided to make our own.)

After a snack  - we needed the energy boost! - we walked several blocks to our next chosen stop, the USS Constitution.

But the really over-the-top thing was that L. decided to rotate the animals she carried in her hands with what she had in her backpack so each of her special friends had a turn to see everything.


Note the swap to the duck posing with the cousins.


Exploring the USS Cassin Young WW2 battleship after the Constitution with Patty the duck.


The duck apparently liked the navy yard.


And the jellyfish we saw in the harbor.


Then it was back on the Freedom Trail to Faneuil Hall. And even though you can't see L.'s hand (she's in front of G. in the blue shorts), believe me that she had a stuffed animal in her hands then too.


And when we got to Haymarket Square, she had swapped the duck out for the monkey again.


But the duck was back by the time we made it into the hall to learn about its history.

I grew up just outside of Boston and am familiar with the sites along the Freedom Trail (I even spent some time following it to my workplace just after college) but I still found the www.thefreedomtrail.org a helpful resource in planning our day trip to the city. I knew we couldn't walk the entire trail with our big group yesterday so the detailed map helped to estimate how much our group of 10  could realistically see in one day.