The Androscoggin River Bicycle Path

Thank you Pati for the bike trail recommendation last month. We finally found some time when the weather was cooperating to make the trek over to Brunswick to try out the Androscoggin River Bicycle Path.

The trail was smooth without many hills and the bike lane was wide enough to accommodate the girls' occasional swerving because they are still novice bike riders (they learned to ride about a month or so ago) and are working on their steering correction technique.

Of course the reason for L's swerving is usually because she's looking everywhere but where she's going (yes mom, I know I did that too).

But her wandering eyes came in helpful for a stray caterpillar that had wandered onto the trail.

She had to 'save' the caterpillar from being run over and used a leaf to coax him back into the grass.

After the tree-eater rescue we continued on our way and before we knew it, we were at the end of the trail in Topsham.

We all thought those 2.5 miles flew by.

At the Topsham trail head there was a small pond brimming with frogs. I was surprised we heard the croaking over the highway traffic noise and airplanes flying overhead (it's not a quiet nature trail). But we did and were rewarded with many frog sightings and their croaking songs.

We found a quiet, grassy spot for a snack on our way back to Brunswick and after eating, L. demonstrated her bike hand signals for a poster she's making about bikes for her 4-H project.

Left turn signal

Right turn signal

The girls gave this trail an enthusiastic two-thumbs up! If you've never tried trail bike riding with your kids, it's worth the effort to dig out the car bike rack and load it up. And if your kids are like mine, they'll be beaming at the end of the day when they realize they rode 5 miles and passed through two towns in a single afternoon. 


Biking the Trail

Along for the ride

If you ever wondered what more was possible to do with a pet chicken, here's another gem from the Almeida girls.

Taking your pet chicken for a bike ride.



And Carl, I'm sorry about Burley the Dog's envy about riding on - rather than beside - your bike. But I think the chicken would have gladly traded places!

Oh, and my favorite bit in the video is when G. catches her dad doing a wheelie and L. lamenting that he's such "a showoff." Their commentary while recording their various videos was worth the price of their digital camera.

Half-way chickens

You know that joke, "Why did the chicken cross the road?"

It's meaningless at our house. The Almeida chickens don't cross the road -- they stop in the middle of it.

They do not seem to have the desire to actually get to the other side.

And even after beeping the horn repeatedly and driving really close to them, they don't budge.

One of several fearless hens in the Almeida driveway.

It usually takes one of the kids jumping out of the car to shoo her away.

We're not sure how Lucky Lucy broke her leg last summer but recently we've speculated that maybe she was one of our half-way chickens we just didn't notice.

A squeeze from Crackers

At the Old Port Festival parade L. saw Crackers from the Portland Pirates and of course had to share a big squeeze with him.

More photos from the parade

She's counting down the days until it's hockey season again (and that would be 124 days, 5 hours, 28 minutes until the opening night game).

Swimming hair fun

The Almeida females have hair style problems (i.e., none of us like to take the time to brush our hair), which I've mentioned before and been caught in lots of places putting up a quick ponytail.

At the Arboretum in Augusta

At the top of Cadillac Mountain in Acadia

But yesterday the girls decided they could let their hair down - and stay down - while swimming because they've got a new swimming game now - Hair Flipping.

Hey, I guess when you've got as much hair as they do (which they did NOT inherit from me) you might as well find a way to enjoy it.

Swimming and Hair Flipping
The early June air was muggy and warm but the water was chilly!

National Trails Day is today

It doesn't matter where you live (including you out-of-staters!), you can celebration National Trails Day too because it's a great day to get out and hike!

Find a NTD event near you

Find a trail to hike in Maine (look for the pink bunny for kid-friendly hikes)

I'm stuck at the office for the better portion of today but hope to go on a short hike with the kids when I get home. We've got a geocache on a trail near Watchic Lake that L. has been suggesting we visit and do some maintenance on (with the ulterior motive that she get a chance to swim as well). I think today is the day she'll get her wish.

Where is your favorite place to hike?

A working, painting weekend

It was a working holiday weekend for the Almeida family without a whole lot of fun and games (although we did have good time at the alpaca farm's open house yesterday).

We have a long list of home improvement projects needing to be done this summer and at the top of the list (well my list, Fino's list is longer and much more complicated) was a porch make-over. If you recall, I am often on the losing end of my battle to keep the chickens off the porch.

The porch has been looking particularly bad lately with peeling paint and chicken poop stains all over it. Since we have large sliding doors in our kitchen with a view of the porch, I decided a few weeks ago I was tired of looking at the sad sight.

I solicited the girls' help with the project in hopes that they would have more incentive once the porch was looking good again to keep those darn chickens off it.

The kids were all smiles the first day of the porch painting project when we primed the floor and steps. The second day was a bit longer painting all the railings and they were anxious for it to be done (translation:  they were whining about finishing so they could go and play).

The kids really like outdoor carpeting so we bought some at the hardware store. They assured me the chickens were not going to ruin their new rug! I really hope my plan works...

On Fino's list of projects was building a new book shelf. Our house isn't that big and we have A LOT of books, magazines and random items piled up all over the place (we're all pack rats) so we decided a new bookshelf was needed to get us better organized. He finished building it today and we put a coat of primer on it.

And if all that painting wasn't enough, L. and I also painted a sign for our dance studio this weekend. She really enjoys painting and art (we've done a few for Schoolhouse Arts too) so we volunteer to make them when needed.

Painting large signs isn't all that hard with an overhead projector, basic tracing skills and the ability to paint in the lines.

Needless to say, as I write this the girls are getting ready to take showers to wash away the latex paint that covers most of their bodies at the moment. And I'm covered in my fair share too.

What did you do this long weekend?