Life After Windbird, Day 101: To Boston with Kevin and Claire
Date: Monday, November 21, 2016
Weather: Mostly Cloudy and Still WINDY; High Temp 39, Low 32 degrees F
Location: At Home at the Studio, Falmouth, MA

Early this morning I headed to Heather’s to get the Goldpebbles off to school while Heather left for Woods Hole to host her Monday morning show. I slipped out of the apartment leaving Kevin and Claire still in bed at 7:15 am and returned three hours later. Claire had a late breakfast ready for us and then we took time to have her trim my hair and show me how to embed videos in PowerPoint. Then we were off for Boston. Kevin and Claire’s flight home was not until after 8 pm tonight, so we had time to check out our old stomping grounds. We met when we lived at Shipyard Quarters, a marina in Charlestown, just across the bridge from Boston. Kevin and Claire have not been back to visit this area since they left in 2006, but we have all kept track of who we knew that are still there. The only ones left are John and Karen of Duchess, and now of the very successful Green Turtle Inn, a floating bed and breakfast. It was so much fun to return to Shipyard with Kevin and Claire and actually find John and Karen at home. John met us on the dock and took us down to show us the three boats that comprise the Green Turtle Inn—two trawlers and one houseboat. Karen met us aboard the house boat to show us the rooms and then we went over to Duchess to spend some time catching up on what has been happening in our lives the last eleven years. It was just so wonderful to see John and Karen again and to have some of our “old gang” together. I lingered longer than I should have as I needed to get back to Falmouth to babysit Ollie while Heather went to scouts with Jonah. I left Kevin and Claire at Shipyard with John and Karen and the plan was for them to go out for an early dinner and then for Kevin and Claire to take the water taxi across the Boston Harbor to the airport. I heard from Kevin once they arrived at the airport, so it looks like plans worked. It was a wonderful ending to a wonderful weekend with friends. And even though I had to fight rush hour traffic, I made it home in time. And Kevin and Claire just sent an email stating that they are home as well. Tomorrow is a day of rest before we start the three days of Thanksgiving feasts.

Life After Windbird, Day 100: A Pickle Jar, Salt, and Downtown Turkeys
Date: Sunday, November 20, 2016
Weather: Overcast and WINDY; 51, Low 34 degrees F
Location: At Home at the Studio, Falmouth, MA

What does a pickle jar and salt have in common with downtown turkeys? The answer—Kevin and Claire and Judy. Today I had lunch at The Pickle Jar with Kevin and Claire, after which we watched the Falmouth turkeys roam about downtown, and then we had dinner at the C Salt Wine Bar & Grille. K & C were definitely trying to spoil me and I enjoyed every minute. Thank you, Kevin and Claire, for a wonderful day full of food and fun.

Heather and Jon left right after breakfast and Kevin, Claire, and I spent the remainder of the morning doing laundry and working on my computer issues. Unfortunately, my laundry results were not as positive as one would hope. In my rush to get things done, I sprayed my very favorite cold weather shirt with Clorox Clean-up instead of Shout. I must have left the Clorox Clean-up on the washing on Thursday when I was doing house cleaning and didn’t look before spraying some grease stains on my shirt this morning. I have always had a love-hate relationship with Clorox but never have I intentionally sprayed a good piece of clothing. I now have a beautifully blotched purple thermal Columbia shirt. It was lunch time before we knew it and we decided to go out. Claire asked where we might find a good sandwich shop and I thought of a place on Main Street that I have heard people raving about. But I couldn’t remember the name. Claire and I did searches and found that the name of the place is the Pickle Jar Kitchen. So we drove downtown had lunch there. The food was good and it was a delightful little place to have lunch. After lunch we did a walk about Main Street, visiting the kitchen store, the children’s book store, the French bakery, and spending some time communing the Falmouth downtown wild turkeys. Yes, Falmouth has a small flock of wild turkeys that just roam about town and today they made it feel much like Thanksgiving!

When we returned home we watched the Patriots play the 49ers and after the game we went out to dinner. We let Claire choose the restaurant based on ratings she found on the internet and it was definitely a great choice. C Salt is tiny but very nice and the food was fabulous. We had tuna tartar for an appetizer and for main entrees we all chose something different. Claire chose the bouillabaisse, Kevin had steak frites, and I had grilled sushi grade tuna. All were delicious, but Claire kept feeling guilty because she was certain hers was the best by far. We had flourless chocolate cake for dessert and then came home to watch more football. It was a ‘full’ day in more ways than one. I don’t think I’ll need to eat for the rest of the week.

Life After Windbird, Day 99: Exploring the Outer Cape
Date: Saturday, November 19, 2016
Weather: Overcast and Misty; High 47, Low 34 degrees F
Location: At Home at the Studio, Falmouth, MA

Great day but too late to write much. We joined forces with Heather and the Goldpebbles to explore the Outer Cape today. We went to Marconi Beach in South Wellfleet to see the site where Italian inventor, Marconi, completed the first transatlantic wireless communication between the United States and England in 1903. We then walked the mile and a half Atlantic White Cedar Swamp Trail where we encountered monkeys climbing in the trees. The weather was not perfect—overcast and misty—but we persevered and had a great explore. We then drove back toward home to the Salt Pond National Seashore Visitor Center where we found a nice little museum of local history and watched a couple of videos—one about Marconi and one about the geologic formation of the Cape. We continued our trek back toward home and stopped in Orleans for lunch and a walk at the Kent’s Point Conservation Area.

Heather and Jon leave in the morning and then Kevin and Claire will fly home on Monday evening. We don’t yet have plans for tomorrow, but I’m sure we’ll find something interesting to do together.

Life After Windbird, Day 98: Having Fun with Kevin & Claire, Heather & Jon
Date: Friday, November 18, 2016
Weather: Sunny and Clear; High 55, Low 46 degrees F
Location: At Home at the Studio, Falmouth, MA

It was a fun day with Kevin and Claire and Heather and Jon. And Heather and Ollie joined us for lunch, so that added even more fun. After a big breakfast, we headed to Woods Hole to go to the aquarium and the WHOI Exhibit Center. We started at the aquarium for the seal presentation and then toured the aquarium. All of us were fascinated by the tiny sea horses. After that, Claire gained entry for us all to tour the Marine Biological Lab building that houses holding tanks of critters that are sold to other research institutions. There was a big tank of skates and another one of skate egg cases. You could actually see the developing skate inside the case. Squid, horseshoe crabs, sand dollars, and small sharks were among the list of critters in the other tanks. And after this, we headed to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Exhibit Center. Heather and Ollie met us there and we all went to Quicks Hole Tavern for lunch. On the way home we made a stop at the Nobska Lighthouse and when we got home, a down time was in order for all. Once we regained our energy, Kevin did the prep work for dinner and then Jon helped him grill the steaks.

Tomorrow we have decided to not go to Nantucket, but to stay on the Cape and do a little exploring. We are hoping to encourage Heather and boys to join us. Ollie told Heather he wanted to go with Oma’s friends to “explore the world”—so we’ll try not to disappoint.

Life After Windbird, Day 97: They’re Here
Date: Thursday, November 17, 2016
Weather: Partly Cloudy; High 53, Low 43 degrees F
Location: At Home at the Studio, Falmouth, MA

Hurray, hurray! Heather and Jon drove to Boston from Vermont, picked up Kevin and Claire at the airport, and they all arrived here by 9:15 this evening. I had a late dinner ready and we ate and talked and talked and talked. The five of us haven’t been together at the same time for eleven years, so this was a very special reunion. We made plans to go to Woods Hole tomorrow and maybe to Nantucket on Saturday. That is still to be determined. But whatever we do, we’ll have a great time.

I spent most of my day going to the grocery store and then cooking for the weekend. I took time out in the late afternoon to drive to Woods Hole to pick Ollie up from school and take him home. He was very jealous that I picked Sam and Jonah up three days this week, so today was his turn. As we were driving home he noted that Granddad always sat in the front passenger seat and now I have no passenger. Oh, how right he is. But I reminded him that he is now my passenger. He just went on to say that he really loved Granddad and that he misses him so much. Love that little munchkin.

Life After Windbird, Day 96: If You Give a Mouse a Cookie
Date: Wednesday, November 16, 2016
Weather: Mostly Sunny; High 57, Low 43 degrees F
Location: At Home at the Studio, Falmouth, MA
There is a children’s book called, “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie . . .” And, of course, if you give a mouse a cookie, he is going to need glass of milk. And if you give him a glass of milk, he is going to need a napkin, and you can see how the story goes from there. Well, today, I rewrote that story. It went something like this. If you decide to clean the kitchen, then you are going to wipe down the glass mason jars full of nuts and seeds. And if you do this, you are most certainly going to drop one of those glass jars on the kitchen floor. And then you are going to have to clean up the mess . . .” And this goes on and on. Well, I did drop a quart jar of quinoa and the glass and tiny little quinoa seeds went everywhere. My kitchen floor is tile and when the glass jar hit the floor, glass flew all the way to the front door. And if you are not familiar with quinoa, the seeds are teeny, tiny and they also flew everywhere. I vacuumed and vacuumed, and still there were little seeds all over the floor. Needless to say, the clean-up was pain-staking. It made me think that cleaning is way over-rated because cleaning up the mess with my small shop-vac led to cleaning the shop vac and this led to cleaning something else, and on and on. That’s how my day went, until, thankfully, I had to go pick-up Sam and Jonah from school mid-afternoon. That ended the cleaning spree.
Tomorrow I will do a little cooking to get ready for visitors. Sure hope that goes more smoothly than cleaning.

Life After Windbird, Day 95: Homemade Apple Cranberry Juice
Date: Tuesday, November 15, 2016
Weather: Overcast and Rainy; High 58, Low 50 degrees F
Location: At Home at the Studio, Falmouth, MA

Heather was in Boston today, so I picked up Sam and Jonah after school and we headed home to make apple cranberry juice. As part of my ‘get healthy’ focus of the past few months, I bought a juicer. When Heather, Jed, and boys went to Maine over Columbus Day Weekend, they brought back apples from the very old apple trees on the family farm. The very next weekend was cranberry harvest time in the bogs here in Falmouth and we picked off the berries left behind by the professional ‘pickers.’ On Sunday when I was at Heather’s I saw that the last of the apples from Maine needed to be used, so I arranged with the boys to make juice from their Maine apples and our local cranberry harvest. When we first got home, we had to do homework. And by the time we got everything set up to make juice, Jed got home with Ollie. So all three boys were able to join in the fun. And it was the perfect rainy afternoon for this indoor activity and it was raining outside. The boys really enjoyed de-stemming and cutting the apples in half and then putting them through the juicer. I had no idea if they would like the fresh apple juice. You know how kids are. They want everything store bought, not home-made. And Sam doesn’t eat fruit. But the apple juice was a definite winner. Hurray! We then tried juicing the cranberries and this was trickier than expected. You put the fruit in the top of the juicer and try to get the tamper in to prevent the fruit from being shot back out of the top. That was hard to do and we sometimes ended up with cranberries shooting back out at us. Of course, the boys loved that, but it made quite a mess. But what beautiful, bright red juice we got. If you drink cranberry juice, you must have noticed that there is always added sugar or a mix of other juices, as on its own it is quite tart. But it was so beautiful that all three boys wanted to try it. It was tart, almost bitter, so they wanted to mix it with the apple juice. It was enjoyed by all. I felt bad that Jed was trying to cook dinner while we were finishing up our juicing experiment, but he tolerated our craziness and enjoyed the results as well. Everyone agreed that the cranberry apple was the favorite, even though it was on the tart side. I think it was because of the beautiful red color, but whatever, I’m just glad that all three boys liked homemade apple cranberry juice.

I went to the gym today to ride the recumbent bicycle and use some of the weight training machines. And I was quite surprised when I got there. When I was there a week ago I was told that construction of the new studio would begin in a day or two and that there would be no more classes until after the construction project was completed. But it hasn’t even started. I could have been going to classes all along. Supposedly it will start on Thursday of this week, but now I know to check the gym’s Facebook page for updates.

Tomorrow I will start getting ready for the arrival of friends on Thursday night. Kevin and Claire from Virginia, and Heather and Jon who are home visiting while their boat Evergreen waits for them in Spain, are coming to visit for the weekend. We all became friends when Mark and I lived aboard Windbird in Boston from 2003 to 2005 and we have remained close over the years. I’m old enough to be their mother, but regardless, we have always enjoyed a friendship as equals—blind to the age difference. It will be the first time we have all been together at the same time since 2005, so it will be a very special weekend.

Life After Windbird, Day 94: Delightful ‘Do What I Want to Do’ Day
Date: Monday, November 14, 2016
Weather: Sunny; High 59, Low 50 degrees F
Location: At Home at the Studio, Falmouth, MA

Today was a delightful day of doing just want I wanted to do—which was not much. I caught up on watching a number of health-related web programs and then this evening I went to Heather and Jed’s to spend time with Ollie while Jed took Sam and Jonah to their scout meetings. Heather is in Boston at a conference and will return tomorrow evening. So tomorrow afternoon I’ll go pick Sam and Jonah up after school and we are going to experiment with making apple cranberry juice from apples from Maine and cranberries from the neighborhood bog.

Got some great news from Puerto Rico late this afternoon. Justin and Jo have been trying to buy a house, the same house, for over a year and a half. The bank bureaucracy to get the loan has been crazy. But finally today they got the ‘approved’ email. I am so happy for them. That’s it from here for today.

Life After Windbird, Day 93: Supermoon 2016
Date: Sunday, November 13, 2016
Weather: Sunny and Warming Slightly; High 58, Low 40 degrees F
Location: At Home at the Studio, Falmouth, MA

Oh, the things that happen by accident. There’s a bit of a story before I get to the ‘thing’ that happened by accident, so bear with me. First, I had a great morning with the Goldpebbles. Sam and Jonah started their morning playing games on Granddad’s tablets that haven’t even been turned on since September 11 while Ollie and I had a morning read-in. Then we had a huge breakfast. The boys played Legos and Star Wars while I cleaned up after breakfast and then we all played a marble game. This apartment has tile floors. Last week, Sam and Jonah discovered a container of marbles that used to be Justin’s and they have invented two marble games on the tile flooring. Their games are a lot of fun and we must have played for over an hour. After a great morning with the Goldpebbles, I took them home just after noon. Heather and Jed had lunch ready for them and then they were going for a fall walk in the woods. A very stubborn four year-old named Oliver caused a bit of delay in this because he wasn’t happy with this shoes. After a long struggle, with everyone’s nerves on edge, they were on their way. I had wanted desperately to get a good fall family photo of them today, but after Oliver’s struggle, what I got was a resistant group of little boys who weren’t happy with the brightly shining sun. But during the Oliver stand-off, I did manage to get some great individual photos of Sam and Jonah. And when Ollie finally did join us, Jonah got a good photo of him. What handsome young men!

I got home and did this and that around here. And just when I thought I was settled in the for evening, I realized that I had forgotten to stop at the store to buy milk. I don’t drink milk or eat dairy products these days EXCEPT for the milk I put in my coffee every morning. So I decided I needed to go get milk. It was about 6:30 pm when I headed out to the store. As I walked out to the car, I looked up and saw a completely unexpected beautiful full moon. This was the ‘thing’ that happened by accident. It was beautiful and when I got home from the store, I looked up the November full moon and found that this moon is closer to Earth than any other since 1948. And because it is so close, it appears 14 percent bigger and 30 percent brighter than the average full moon. How lucky I was to have forgotten to get the milk earlier.

Right now I am multi-tasking. I am writing this log while listening to a web presentation about the necessity of changing our food policies in this country and while watching a silenced Patriot’s game against the Sea Hawks. At this point the Patriots are winning, barely, but hopefully they will be able to pull this one out. That will definitely be easier than changing our food policies!

Life After Windbird, Day 92: Last Soccer Game of the Season
Date: Saturday, November 12, 2016
Weather: Sunny and Chilly; High 47, Low 36 degrees F
Location: At Home at the Studio, Falmouth, MA

Today was the last soccer game of the season for the Goldstones and it was Jonah’s day to shine. Sam’s season ended two weeks ago and Ollie decided at the beginning of the season that he did not want to be out on the field. So the last game today belonged to Jonah. His team won and he scored two of the five points. For the recreational soccer games, I often leave not knowing who won the game. That is really not the point, unless you are Jonah. But in today’s game, it was hard to overlook that Jonah’s team won. Jonah is the team’s best cheerleader as well as a good little soccer player. When they score a point, Jonah always pumps those arms in a victory V and runs to hug the friend that scored. And today he got his fair share of hugging when he made his two goals. For one of the points, he kicked the ball from a long distance and it went right into the goal. He was one happy little boy.

The Goldpebbles were up and going by 7 am, so I was up earlier than usual. But despite the early hour, we had a good morning before heading out to Ollie’s game at 10:30. He said he wanted to go and just cheer his team on and he stuck by that. There was no way he was going out on the field. Heather and Jed joined us at the field. It was sunny, but there was a definite chill in the air. Between Ollie’s game and Jonah’s, I went home to get my winter jacket because I was freezing. After the game, Heather ran the more than four miles home and Jed took the boys. They said they would return to my place for dinner and to spend another night, and they did. Life with three little boys around is always interesting and joyful. I got a particular chuckle tonight when I looked at the dinner table and realized that we had an arrangement of Lego creations as a centerpiece. And with that, once again I had better get myself to bed so I’ll be ready for the 7 am wake-up call.