Saturdays . . .

Since Josh has started working we're feeling like real grown-ups. What do real grown-ups do on Saturdays? Chores, projects, stuff like that. So Janae has been working on things to keep us busy. Her first thought was finding a solution for this:

She did some looking on KSL.com and found this:

Then we borrowed a saw from Sue, and Janae talked Josh into cutting the thing in half:
Now it looks like this:

We like having things tucked away a little more. It's nice. With that out of the way, Janae's moved on to the furniture . . .

But our Saturdays haven't been all work. We still managed to squeeze in some celebrating last week for Josh's birthday. We had fun with family coming over to our house, and as usual in this family, the party continues with more family this weekend.
We were also celebrating because we found out that Josh passed the bar exam. For a combined birthday/bar present, Janae got Josh some chocolates from Chocolatier Blue. Fantastic.

Prince Edward Island

Part of the reason that we wanted to go to Maine was the relatively short distance that it is from Prince Edward Island. Janae is a long-time fan of Anne of Green Gables stories, so she has always wanted to visit the places that served as the inspiration to Lucy Maud Montgomery's stories about Anne. Plus we'd never been to Canada before . . .


We crossed the border much later in the day than we thought we would, so it was getting pretty dark. And it was very foggy as we were driving in. We didn't think about potential currency issues until we hit our first toll booth. We fumbled around looking for something to throw in the bucket, and finally Janae ran over to one of the booths with an attendant to get change. The whole ordeal ended up taking a few minutes. Fortunately there was no traffic that late at night, but we did thoroughly frustrate a Canadian man behind us who yelled at Josh as he switched lanes to go around us, "You could have killed me, eh!"


The fog stuck around for one more day, and we were sad that we didn't really get to see much of St. John, New Brunswick.

St. John sits on the Bay of Fundy, which is home to some of the biggest tide changes in the world. The water fluctuates 28 feet between high and low tide. This change causes a unique phenomenon called the reversing falls on the river as it flows into the bay. We weren't able to see the falls at their peak, but we hear it's pretty impressive. We decided we'd had enough of the fog and headed on towards PEI.
Fortunately things did start to clear up when we got closer to the island. We got some great views as we were going across the Confederation Bridge. We were amazed at the bridge. It's very long (about 8 miles) and very tall (almost 200 ft). Pictures can't do it justice. It's also very expensive - $42.50 - but only on the way back to mainland. You can visit from Prince Edward Island for free, you just can't leave. We were also surprised at how big the island is, and how many beautiful things there were to see as we drove to the place where we were staying. We managed to get lost a few times trying to find our B&B, but were very pleased when we finally made it to the Misty Meadows. Janae picked the place partially because of it's convenient location, and the next morning we headed out to Avonlea village to get a taste of what life was like in the world of Anne of Green Gables. We started out at school . . .

Then we played dress up . . .

Yup, ALL of us played dress up . . .
We made crafts with Josie and co. (characters from the stories) . . .
Drank raspberry cordial (but not until Josh made Janae confirm that it was non-alcoholic) and ate chocolate covered potato chips . . .
And met Ms. Of-Green-Gables herself . . .

That afternoon Hurricane Bill threatened to hit the island. The storm ended up as a near-miss, but we got hit with a lot of wind and a lot of rain. So we ended up spending time in the car looking for lighthouses. We found some pretty good ones . . .
While we were at the Avonlea village we met someone who was born in this lighthouse . . . But Josh's favorite was this one. The storm was really blowing when we found it, but he decided to jump out for a picture anyways.

The weather cleared up the next day, so we headed back to Avonlea to go for a spin on the carriage ride and give the pony ride a try. Ainslie loved them both.

After that we headed over to the real Green Gables house that was the inspiration for the stories. We took a little tour of the house . . .

And we even put Ainslie in the "special backpack" for a stroll through the haunted forest and down lover's lane.

Sadly, we had to leave Prince Edward Island and head back home, but we loved the time that we spent there.

Maine

A little while back we decided that we wanted to try to squeeze one more trip in before Josh had to start work. Several attorneys at Josh's firm had suggested that it's good to take advantage of the time while you can . . .

So, we headed out to Maine to check out the coast and drive to Prince Edward Island. We saw lots of lighthouses, ate some great food, and had a good time. Maine is lots of fun. We flew in and out of Portland, Maine. Ainslie was pretty good on the planes. She loved The Incredibles and Hannah Montana on the planes that had TV's in the seats. We had a few layovers each way, so we ran around the airports trying to get her good and worn out in hopes that this would happen . . .
Ainslie was good in the car too. We spent a LOT of time driving, but with the help of a few DVD's, a laptop, and Phineas and Ferb on the iPod, Ainslie did just fine.
She did get burned out on the videos every once in a while and took it upon herself to come up with other entertainment. Like experimenting with her wardrobe while giving some goldfish crackers a chance to take a swim . . .
And we'd stop to run around or play at McDonald's when we needed a break.
The drive was worth it. We saw lots of beautiful lighthouses.
And there were lots of other beautiful things to see too.
We stopped in Freeport to see the LL Bean headquarters and check out some of the other stores there. Janae wanted to see the giant LL Bean boot, but Ainslie was kind of scared of the boot and opted to relax on some of the chairs they had out front.









We loved the view from the top of the Penobscot Narrows Bridge.
The weather didn't really cooperate when we visited Acadia National Park, but we loved Bar Harbor and want to go back to see more of what the fog was hiding in the park.
Ainslie was especially fond of the fountain in the city park in Bar Harbor. That night there was a jazz concert in the park, so we bought a pizza and had a picnic on the grass while Ainslie danced away to the music. When the pizza was gone we moved on to blueberry pie and blueberry ice cream. Delicious.Maine is pretty proud of their blueberries, and we ate lots of them. We also ate whoopie pies. But our favorite was the lobster rolls. We loved the lobster, Ainslie loved the lobster buzzer they gave us to let us know when our food was ready. She also loved posing as a lobster ("crabby") when we ate at Shaw's Wharf.
We ate some great food, but Ainslie's favorites were the "worm babies" and other treats that she ate in the car. Lots of candy. We stayed in some pretty good hotels as we went. We found some online beforehand, but other nights we took our chances and stayed wherever we could find a room. One night turned out extra adventurous when we got into Camden a little later than we thought. Most of the places to stay were starting to close, and we ended up staying in a little cottage that was threatening to fall off the hillside. The shifting had left a sizeable opening under the front door. This left plenty of room for a mouse who decided to join us for the night . . .
One of our favorite parts of the whole trip was the sunset boat ride that we took around Casco Bay. We had been hoping that we would find a windjammer that would be Ainslie-friendly, and Frances was perfect. The sights around the bay were amazing.Ainslie loved to ring the bell on the boat more than anything else about the ride.

At the very end of our trip, we drove down to Boston to walk the Freedom Trail. Our hotel in Boston was very fancy, and being in the big city really made us feel like we were in a different country. But we loved Boston. Once again, Ainslie was more interested in the playground at the park, but we managed to drag her along as we walked the Freedom Trail. We loved seeing Paul Revere's home,

seeing where many of the important events leading up to the Revolutionary War happened in downtown Boston,

and although we decided not to go onboard the USS Constitution (they say ringing bells on the ship is a big no-no, and Ainslie REALLY liked ringing the bell on our boat ride) we thought the ship was amazing.

We also got to see the church where the lanterns were hung before Paul Revere's famous ride.Lots to see in Boston. Lots to see in Maine. And we haven't said anything about Canada. It was a pretty big trip, and we all came home exhausted. But it was great.