Summer Idyll

I don't know if it's the 4th of July, or summer in Maine, or a week off with family, but this time of year gets almost ridiculously idyllic this time of year.

I bought Mr. Cleaver a pair of chaise lounges for the backyard as a Father's Day gift, and I'm starting to think that this made have been my best gift given to date. My brother and his family visited for 4th of July week, and we spent a good portion of that time, parents and kids all cuddled up on those chaises. I'm generally not great at relaxing, but give me a chaise, a cool drink, and a good magazine and I'm content for hours. 

My brother had never been to Maine in the summer before, and my adopted home did a great job of showing why Maine is so wonderful. We had sunshine for days and strawberries warm off the vine; we had seafood feasts and fresh strawberry ice cream; we played candlepin and wiffle-ball in the golden hour. We celebrated Steinbeck's gotcha day and Mr. Cleaver's birthday and Independence Day.

It was a warm, wonderful week and it makes me glad to live in Maine.  

The Big 4, Oh!

As the end of March nears, the weather is generally still cold and crummy, but we are in full celebration mode at the Cleaver household. 

When I was a kid, I was big into birthday parties. As early as nine, I would plan my own birthday party, devise games, and make decorations (usually modeled after a recent issue of American Girl Magazine) and thrill at the thought that I'd get to see all my friends in one place. So it's strange that when it comes to Little Miss Cleaver, I'm all about the simple. And fortunately for me, she seems to be pretty content with that as well.

I took the day off work for her actual birthday, which was a Wednesday. We opened presents and then headed into Portland to visit the dinosaur exhibit at the Portland Science Center. The animatronic dinosaurs were a bit loud, but she enjoyed the exhibit overall, then we had a lovely lunch with a great view at RiRa's. Then it was home for nap and then cake and more presents with Memere in the afternoon. 

On the weekend we headed to Gorham to celebrate our other March tradition, Maine Maple Sunday, with some ice cream, maple cotton candy, and a strangely large amount of cows. We did have a small friend party at the house this most recent Saturday, but even that was limited to our neighbors because of a major April 1st snowstorm. But kudos to LMC, who didn't skip a beat and played party games with her parents anyway. 

And honestly, for as much as I loved big birthday parties as a kid, as a parent, these are moments I love. So while I'm sure we'll follow the lead of the other parents we know with a shindig at some third-party location where the kids can run wild, I will treasure the turning of this year, the big 4, as something oh so special..

Those Last Days of Summer

Those last precious days of summer.

In reality, our schedule doesn't really change all that much between the seasons, but there's something about the marker of Labor Day weekend that kicks us into gear to finally get to our favorite beach soda fountain and make the trip to the Drive-In movies. Because even if our schedule doesn't change, those things pretty much shut down come September. So we got our ice cream cones and popcorn and wore our glow bracelets and sunscreen for one last summer fling. 

And it was fabulous.

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Summer

It takes a while for summer to arrive in Maine, but is it ever worth the wait.

Strawberries and splash pads and sunshine. Home runs and wading pools and little owl nests. Yes, please, and thank you.

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Pecan Oatmeal Apple Crisp (and Apple Abundance)

So we went a little overboard on the apple picking this year and picked a ton on our annual trip to Ricker Hill a few weeks back. (also we went on a weekday, so we had the full run of the bounce houses to ourselves and had to take advantage of that!) So even after two sizable pies, I still had about a bushel left and no gumption to make more pie, and so, enter crisp! This recipe is a mashup of three different ones, so it has a little bit of everything in it, which makes it totally delicious.And it's a big batch recipe (3 Qt baking pan), so it means that I'm down to only 2 dozen apples now!!

Filling

• ~10 apples, peeled and chopped
• 3 Tbl sugar
• 1.5 Tbl cornstarch
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3 Tbl orange juice

Topping

• 1 to 1 1/2 cups flour (Up to 1/2 cup can be whole wheat)
• 1/2 cup rolled oats
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 2 Tbl white sugar
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• zest of 1 lemon
• 1.5 sticks salted butter, softened
• 1 cup chopped pecans 

Preheat oven to 350 Degrees F

Place all filling ingredients into a 9x13 (3 QT) baking pan and mix together. Adding more apples as needed to fill pan.

In a separate bowl, mix all topping ingredients, except nuts, together until they make a consistency like wet sand. Mix in nuts as desired. Sprinkle topping loosely over apple mixture.

Bake for ~ 50 minutes until topping is browned and apples are soft.

Serve warm with ice cream 

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Pumpkins at Smiling Hill Farm

We got a late start on our fall activities thanks to some serious colds, but we're getting there! We made it to the pumpkin patch on Sunday, and the apple orchard on Wednesday, so we're all set on Autumnal produce. 

We Cleavers are creatures of habit and tend to go to the same places every year - so this is LMC's third year at the Smiling Hill Farm pumpkin patch. It's always interesting to see what's different with each round - what is she most interested in? (Answer: rainbow ice cream), what isn't she digging? (Answer: that incident with the turkey has made her nervous about all barnyard fowl).

It's also fun to get the random recaps that she'll spout out days or even weeks later, when she sees something that reminds her of her little adventure. 

I'm hesitant about pulling out the carving knives just yet, so we painted our pumpkins again this year. I didn't put on any sealant first, so they're already peeling, but I think they're beautiful anyway.

We've hung our bat lights and have been watching Curious George A Boo Fest on repeat, which means she goes around wishing everyone "Happy Halloween, hold on to your hat!" We're thinking about making a No-Noggin scarecrow this weekend. I have to admit of all the children's programming, I like Curious George the best (which is good, because LMC loves him).

 I've also been prepping LMC for costume wearing in the hopes that she'll actually wear her costume I'm making (since the wear rate of things I make for her is dismally low). What are you going to be for Halloween? Alice! What's mommy going to be? The queen. What's daddy going to be? The hatter dance! (Close enough).

I love prepping for Halloween.

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Fair Times, Fun Times

I think I say this every year, but I love fair season so much.

This is a big turn around from my feelings on the county fair when I was a kid, and never got to go on any rides and had to represent my dance studio on hot awful concrete stages, or at it's least appealing, that one time in high school I volunteered to do an anti-drug puppet show from beneath a folding table. Then, the fair was always an obligation, but as a grown-up - it's way more fun, and as a parent? A blast!

A grand time was had by Cleavers young and old, but Little Miss Cleaver, who is tall enough now to ride the rides, had the best time of all I think. She particularly wanted to ride the Ferris Wheel, and had a blast going up and down and up down. The Carousel took second place in her affections, I think. 

Speaking of placing things, I knocked another item off my bucket list by winning a blue ribbon at the county fair. I entered in two categories - pie (other) and coffee cake (quick). My Blackberry Pie with Lemon Streusel got me the coveted blue ribbon and my Prize Coffee Cake netted my a third prize (knocked down by "Way too much cinnamon" and my inclusion of some wheat flour which made it "heavy"). My efforts also netted me a check for a cool $8. Not too bad for my first try. It appears that if you want the really  big ribbons you have to go in for the sponsored contests, so I may try my hand at one of those next year. 

 We petted all sorts of animals and marveled at giant pumpkins, ate junk food, got poop on our shoes, and braved ourselves against the chill. Another fantastic day at the fair. 

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The Penultimate Weekend of Summer

How it is already September? The local schools start back up this week and when I dropped Little Miss Cleaver off at daycare they had changed all the decorations to leaves and pumpkins. Don't get me wrong, I adore Autumn, it's my favorite season, but summer seems to go so darn fast! It doesn't help that it doesn't start feeling like summer until July, but still. 

I have kept to my goal of taking more time off this summer and we seem to manage two weekends worth of activity in every one (having a kid that gets up at 5 AM helps there). I took a half-day Thursday and all day Friday off, so we could do this penultimate weekend of summer right. 

We took LMC to our favorite beach, which she adored. Splashing in the water, playing in the sand, screaming and running from imaginary lobsters. Mr. Cleaver and I aren't huge beach people, being easily burned, but her joy at it, makes the multiple sunscreen applications and big hats worth it. We lost a sand shovel in the tide and the tide gave it back. We took a beach break for shuffleboard and burgers and ice cream and then returned for more surf and sand angels. The weather was perfect and it was a glorious day.

Sunday, we grabbed a discount pass from our local library (Libraries are awesome!) , LMC picked out her fancy new kitty-cat party dress and we went to the Maine Wildlife Park. We saw all sorts of critters, but if you ask her about it, LMC will tell you all about the turkey that she tried to feed popcorn and that bit her finger and that she told it no more biting. (She's fine, didn't break skin, just scared her.) Both mornings ended with an insta-crash in the car seat and an epic nap at home.

Good summer living if you ask me.

A Walk in the Marsh

It's just one of those things. When something is so available you never think to take advantage of it, because it's always there. The opposite of the shamrock shake/limited time only effect. 

I drive by the Fore River Sanctuary twice daily, it was in the background of my wedding photos. but I never actually hit the trails until a few weeks ago.  Truly, I've been missing out.

Mr. Cleaver and I both agreed that we'd need to come back in the Fall, (there's not a lot of shade on the trail, so it gets hot) and maybe LMC will be interested in walking more than just the bridges (so much riding on shoulders!).

We only walked a small portion of the trail (see riding on shoulders comment above), but it was worth it even for that. 

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Raspberry Picking

At Snell Family Farm

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