Best Life

 A perfect day.   A blessed life.  Seriously.  It could not possibly have been anymore gorgeous today.  Sunny, mild breeze, crisp and clean air.  A great decision to go kayaking.  We headed to Flagstaff Lake in Eustis.  An easy launch with a few other boats.  Usually I head to the north and the islands for a quick trip.  Scott suggested heading south instead.  This was actually preferable since it was upwind and we have learned do the harder paddle first and "float" back to the starting point.  In all the years we have kayaked here, I never thought to head in that direction. I always thought it was a dead end.  Hah!  It leads to the South Branch of the Dead River.  Amazing scenery.  Quiet.  Postcard photo worthy.  The Bigelow Preserve including Sugarloaf Mountain can be seen in the background. With the water roughly 3 feet below "normal" we could not go far down river.  Still incredible....

 With the forecast of intermittent rain, the plan was to hike to the caves just north of Piazza Rock on the Appalachian Trail.  From the parking lot on Route 4 to the Rock = 1.8 miles.  The caves approximately another 0.8 miles.  It has been years since I ventured on that trail and I knew the hardest part was at the very beginning (and then the very end).  A steep climb over wet and muddy rocks and roots.  It's good for warming up fast and then knowing how close to the parking lot - all good. Crossing the Sandy River. Many of the "balance beams" that rock, twist and are slick have been replaced with great flat stones! And we made it to the caves!  It took me a minute to convince myself to crawl through the flat crevice.  But after removing my backpack - good to go.  It helped that I could see sunlight on the other side.  Also that Scott and Rebecca scared away any creepy crawlies! We came out on the other side and then had to climb to th...

 Having my fingers crossed may be working.  May.  Paul was getting antsy this morning wanting to email LURC and try to obtain an ETA for our permit.  Nope.  I vetoed against it.  When I was a supervisor and receiving calls asking, "When?", I always responded, "Longer now because I had to answer the phone!".  Just a few hours later - we had our permit!!! We have made continued contact with Mike, site prep guy.  Just awaiting his invoice to make our down payment.  A bit pricier than anticipated but with lots of fill coming in our hands are tied. We made an early start on our site work this morning.  Rain was predicted for 1pm so we hoped to clear yesterday's "mess".     By 1230pm we had cleared all brush by chipping and Paul had restarted taking down trees.  The storm arrived by 1pm.  Thunder in the mountains - so cool.  I love the reverberations between the mountains!  It just seems to go on forever. Sit...

 We have committed.  Paul has signed a contract (and sent a deposit) with a building company.  The specific plans will be "ironed" out next week with the project manager.  This will be another first for us.  We have never built a steel building.  Exciting but a bit trepidatious.  (There will be ladders involved!) We have also spoken to the construction guy about the site preparation.  Contract headed our way.  The last piece is the cement guy.  He should be calling us shortly.  (In Maine shortly has a different meaning!) Now we wrestle with the time frame.  Site work is about 4 weeks out.  Hopefully everything will fall into place this year.  Fingers crossed. Today we continued clearing what we could from the site.  Three hours and almost 6 miles later - can one even tell?                                    ...

Somehow I thought today was Niece's Day.  It is not.  But it is Just Because Day.  So I am paying tribute to my beautiful nieces just because!                                                                           Maddy - 17 and gorgeous!                                                      Layla - what made you want to sit in the lobster pot?                                                                ...

 More pictures from the wedding - thank you Peter for sharing with me!                                                                                     Mom and Kevin                                                                                     Peter and Isis                                                         ...