August part 1

August was a fun, crazy, and busy month! We started out the month by leaving Landon with friends for a couple of nights and taking an "us" trip to Rockport, MA and York and Ogunquit, ME. It was quick, busy and fun! We started our trip in Rockport, a small coastal town in Northern Massachusetts, where the film Proposal was filmed. We started the day in Gloucester, MA, town where the TRUE Perfect Storm happened. We visited the monument to all the fisherman who have been lost at sea since 1623, 387 years ago. The main plaque included some facts that were really interesting and sobering: Men known to be lost at sea and honored on the plaque-5,368; Of the nearly 1,000 ships lost, the number lost with all hands-265(or 365--can't tell); Between 1860 and 1906, a staggering 660 ships sank, and although many of the men were saved, 3800 men were lost; a single storm in 1862 claimed 15 schooners and 120 men, while another devastating storm in 1879 took another 159 men; Thousands of widows struggled to survive and raise their children, many of those fatherless children entered the trader of their lost fathers. It shocked me to see that in 1883, over 250 men had been lost. I can't imagine how devastating that would be to such a small fishing town. EVERYONE would have lost fathers, brothers, sons, grandpas, and uncles. I'm amazed at the resiliency of the town!

After that we got to go on a whale watching cruise! I had wanted to do one for a few years and we were finally doing it! While we were waiting for the ship to depart, I watched some fisherman receiving the fish from the boat and it was really fascinating!

We saw a couple of local castles, including the Hammond castle, as we were leaving the port.

The scientist on board came around with some pictures, some facts, and some REAL baleen, you know the long hairy/bony stuff in the whale's mouth--like on Pinocchio? Anyway we got to feel it.

Our cruise was really long, much longer than they said it would be, because the whales were much farther away (as opposed to other days or other parts of the season I guess) and it took a couple of hours before we saw the first one. I was getting really discourage because they said we had been "close" for like 45 minutes and hadn't seen anything. We were almost all the way to Providence, the very tip of the Cape! We could see the lighthouse at the tip of the land. It was so exciting when we saw the humpback whale.

Then I got these cool successions of pictures of the whale jumping and crashing into the water.

The whales spent a lot of time slapping the water with their fins as well.

Then the CRAZIEST thing happened! The whale SLAPPED the boat!!!!

Our finned friends also like to wave their tails and blow water.

When one of the whales was alongside the boat, Chris could see it's eye! Crazy! Near the end of the whale sightings, we saw 3-4 whales jumping at the same time! Unfortunately the didn't coordinate their jumps so I didn't get a picture of all of them in the air at the same time.

After a much longer cruise than we expected, we headed to the bed and breakfast to check in and get some dinner.

I had to catch pictures before it was TOO dark. If you've seen the movie the Proposal, then you should recognize the red building as the bar.

We had some yummy lobster for dinner and then walked around the cute shopping area and got ice cream from the teeniest little ice cream store I've ever been in!

The next day we walked around the main strip, Bear Skin Neck, and around the harbor area.

We stopped to watch salt water taffy being made by a machine that has been in use for over a century! You can see the arms twisting the wrapper!

In the afternoon we decided to head to York, Maine. Unfortunately, everyone else had the same idea and with some accidents, our afternoon was mostly spent in the car. By the time we got to York, we decided it would be too late to swim, but we took a stroll along the beach. It was the very tip of high tide when we got there, so there was no beach and everyone was smashed up against the sea wall.

Here you can see the Nubble Lighthouse in the distance at the end of the strip of land.

A couple of families made the coolest sand "hot tub". They dug this whirlpool and if you look on the right, you can see the stairs that go down into it. Rocks spelled "welcome" in the sand. There was a shelf for drinks and food. They also used plastic sheeting to line the sand in another "pool" and then they filled it with water. It was their baby pool! That must have been a lot of work!

After our stroll along the beach we headed over to the lighthouse.

Then we decided to check into our inn in Oqunquit, ME and find some dinner.

We had gorgeous views from our restaurant! Unfortunately, no good places for me to take pictures of it! Oh well. After dinner we headed to a theater to see the play Forever Plaid. Oh heavens we were in for a surprise and sad that we spent money on it. We were in a motel basement watching a lackluster performance by college kids home for the summer. The play is a musical and their singing was less than desirable and was more grating on the ears than anything. We sat in plastic lawn chairs underneath the exposed piping and heating systems. Maybe 20 or 30 people were in the performance and many left during intermission, which we would have to if we didn't feel so guilty. I guess we got what we paid for...the cheapest performance tickets and they were still $20 a piece!!! Oh well. The next day we took a walk to the harbor area and then went on walk down Marginal Way, a walk along the coast, which was very beautiful! We loved this drawbridge! The boats would signal with a horn that it needed to go up and then the pedestrians on the bridge would push a button to make the drawbridge go up, and if no pedestrians were there, then the harbor master would do it.

At the end of Marginal Way was an awesome beach! Oh man I REALLY wanted to swim. The water was shockingly WARM! We must have just gotten lucky, because it honestly felt like bath water. It was low tide and the water went out SO far, leaving tidal pools and long stretches of shallow water that would have been perfect for Landon to splash in. I was missing the little guy and thought how this water would have been just right for him. So we walked and waded around and then packed up and headed home to see our little guy.

The night we got home, we attended a good-bye party for our friends the Mortensens.

A few days later, Landon and I flew with my family to Texas to visit my dad's family. We did fun things like swimming, jet skiing, boating, movie watching, ping-pong playing, mafia playing, and visiting the US mint in Fort Worth (it was really cool!). Best of all we got to spend time with family. The last time we had almost everyone together was 6 years before. Landon and his Aunt Erica.

My brother-in-law Chris, my Uncle Steve, and my dad.

My cousin Cassidy and Landon.

Uncle Steve and Dad

Cousin Jeff and his wife Samantha

Landon and his Aunt Diana

Aunt Colleen and cousin Grayson

Erica and cousin Cassidy

When we got to Texas, it hadn't rained since APRIL, and the whole state was in a major drought. We were the lucky charms to bring the first storm in months! Everyone waiting and watching! And doing a rain dance...I purposely left off the picture of me doing it, haha. Even Grandma joined in, it was so cute!

Aunt Colleen was great and got some group shots, including some with the whole family and this one with Grandma and her 3 kids.

After a few days in Granbury with my dad's family, we headed down to Austin see my mom's youngest brother and his family, before heading back to Granbury for a couple of more days. The older kids toured around Austin while the littles hung out at the hotel pool. We walked around the Capital and around 6th Street.

Then we met up with my uncle and his kids for dinner at Salt Lick. It was fun to meet my 2 youngest cousins for the first time and see my other cousins for the first time in 7 years!

We also went to check out some of President Lyndon B. Johnson's historical sites and visitors center. We didn't have time to do everything, but we hit a few key points!

This picture cracks me up because Emma was having a fit. We driving around the sites and listening to a CD and we had been in our gigantic van for awhile. We stopped to go into one of the visitor's centers and Emma took off in opposite direction. As soon as I called for her, she started running and she plopped herself under the tree and folded her arms. She was SO mad that she couldn't do what she wanted to and she was sick of being in the car!

The drought was so bad that the river in front of the Texas White House was completely dry!

After some more time with our family in Austin, we headed back up to Granbury for a couple of days. We spent time with family and spent a lot of time in and on the water! I drove a boat for the first time and got BEAT up going tubing!

Landon and Gigi.

We are so grateful that we had the opportunity to visit family in Texas since we hadn't been together in years. As this is written, I am even more grateful since my Uncle Mike unexpectedly passed away this past December.