Day 13.172: Some visitors

...not the human kind obviously!

This impressive bug visited our beans while Exile #2 was looking for some of its much smaller and presumably much more destructive cousins:

A turkey that wandered through:

and this Carolina wren that attracted our attention with some very loud singing:

and as June comes to an end (and Pride "Week"* with it), a rainbow that visited the other day:

Day 13.171: Drive-in; keel over

I attempted to make an animation from a series of still photos I took at the drive-in graduation last week. Normally, Google Photos does a good job of this - but the dark surround and the bright screen seem to have confused it.

I'm feeling a bit seasick.

Day 13.170: Misty at the beach

It was back on Wednesday, when Exile #2 and I went for a morning walk on the beach in the mist. Goosefare brook had taken a southerly path as the tide went out and seemed to be emerging from the fog and the wide sand flats towards Ferry Beach looked endless.

Here are some of the things we saw (the flowers were at the parking lot):

I'm not sure we've ever seen an oyster shell at the beach.

And - as I usually do when we see them - I attempted to catch the terns doing their thing:

Day 13.169: Dance recital - take 1 part 2

Around 2 pm, we finished filming the last dance for the recital and just like that, the team started dismantling the stage. I stayed for a while to help carry the unbelievably heavy marley (dance flooring) back to the studio, but then left the rest of the team to the remainder of the destruction.

Overall, I think it went really well and I'm glad in retrospect we didn't try to do the whole show in one day - that would have been extremely grueling (or maybe I should say - even more!)

Day 13.168: Dance recital - take 1 part 1

Months ago, I agreed to do the video recording for Exile #3's dance studio recital. At the time, we expected it to be much like last year's - two performances in a school auditorium for all the gathered families and friends.

This being 2020, it didn't work out quite like that.

Today, we gathered in small, mostly masked socially distanced groups to record the recital on an outdoor stage for later showing at the drive-in. Originally all the filming was due to happen tomorrow, but the second half of the day was pulled in because of expected bad weather starting tomorrow afternoon.

Exile #3 in her Modern dance 

All in all, it went very well and I am quite pleased that the day was split as five hours today and five hours tomorrow seems a lot more manageable than one ten hour day.

Day 13.167: Crystal Gems Cornhole

Our wood-working project is complete.

The decorating phase started with Exile #4 drawing these renditions of Peridot and Pearl from Steven Universe and then Exile #4, E5N1 and I transferred them onto the 4 ft x 2 ft boards and color-blocked them:

and here is a shot of our first game in progress:

Day 13.166: The Drive-In Commencement

This evening, we went to the local Drive-in movie theater, but this was no normal movie night. It was Exile #3's class graduation or commencement ceremony (with social distancing restrictions). It was a lovely evening for it and it was fun to see Exile #3 and her friends on the big screen!

Day 13.165: Celebrating beers

One of the things that has changed due to our disrupted shopping habits, is that Exile #2 has been buying beer for me. She knows in general what I look for - but the specifics have been down to whatever s available and catches her eye.

Recently this has been two celebratory beers. The first is from Shipyard - celebrating Maine's 200th birthday (another celebration that has been rather seriously curtailed by the current situation). It comes with lots of different can designs celebrating Maine things:

The second is a special for June in its status as what we've been jokingly referring as "Pride Week" (I think it started with me misspeaking attempting to refer to Pride Month, but it has stuck!)

Hoppy Pride indeed!

Day 13.164: One peeper peeping

I'm not sure, but I suspect this little frog - spotted on our deck door tonight - is a spring peeper. I suspect it was not much interested in what was happening inside the house, but you can never be sure.

Day 13.163: Exile #2's Sunday Column #302

Exile #2 writes...

It was a little bit of a scramble, but we did just about manage to recover enough from Exile #3’s birthday to celebrate Father’s Day.. The young Exiles put their artistic talents to good use, as usual, and Exile #1 got to pick out the afternoon games. He chose Exploding Kittens and Coup, which was one of Exile #4’s recent birthday gifts. To succeed at Coup you need to be good at bluffing and Exile #1 is, of course, a past master at this. Exile #4 is coming up fast, however, so he’d better watch out!

Day 13.162: #3 is 18

We celebrated another birthday today - Exile #3 is 18:

Want to see inside the cake? Let me answer that for you - you do!

Day 13.161: Eastern Trail (at Thornton Academy)

We couldn't remember having walked this bit of trail since October - but it was where our feet took us on Wednesday evening.

Day 13.160: Small enemies in the vegetable garden

Constant vigilance is required in the new vegetable garden. Tiny creatures are threatening to do unmentionable evil there.

This is not one of them:

She may not be everyone's favorite, but I think she is quite pretty and she may well be helping in the battle against aphids and cucumber beetles and the like. She can stay.

Day 13.159: Birds at Scarborough Marsh

Our walk was mostly on the trail in the woods - and the only wildlife we saw was lots of chipmunks and a couple of gray squirrels.

When we arrived at the marsh, we saw a few birds. Here are a passing cormorant. a great egret, a glossy ibis and a song sparrow that cooperated enough to be photographed:

Day 13.158: Eastern Trail to Scarborough Marsh

Exile #2 and I had a little outing yesterday morning (I had a day off work). We decided to go to Scarborough Marsh, but anticipating that the parking and the trail at the marsh might be difficult for social distancing, we parked a couple of miles away and walked along the trail to the marsh.

The parking lot was full, so it was a wise choice. We were surprised to see only one out-of-state plate there and commented that in a normal year even well out of season that would be unusual.

The marsh is looking very green now and there were blossom-laden trees and roses and wildflowers along the trail.

Day 13.157: Two sisters doing their thing

There are many things that Exile #3 and Exile #4 both enjoy - they are both enthusiastic about including drawing and singing and watching Dimension 20 D&D videos.

Then there are their own things.

In the absence of karate class (for the time being at least), Exile #4 has been learning to use power tools and helping out with (actually doing most of) our little project - now unmistakably a cornhole set. Only sanding, painting and decorating to go now.

Meanwhile, it is costume-week for Exile #3's dance classes - next week they practice their dances for the last time and then next Saturday I will be videoing their dances in a day-long social-distanced outdoor recital. This was costume number one:

Day 13.156: The growing season

The growing season is short around here, but with a little care it's possible for quite a lot of growing to happen in a short time.

These photos were taken about a month apart:

And not just the raised bed - look at the change in the trees too.

Day 13.155: Games beginning C. O. ...

We did a bit of everything today - I mowed the lawn while Exile #2 did some other yard-work, I did a bit more of the current woodworking project. We ate the last of Exile #4's birthday cake and watched some of our current family viewing - Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Early in the afternoon, four of us had a little game-playing session, featuring these games:

Coup was one of Exile #4's birthday gifts and is easy to play but hard to master. After E5N1 suggested Codenames, we wondered if we had any other C.O. games to add into the mix. We couldn't think of any at the time. I later realized we probably had a Connect 4 set somewhere. We didn't dig it out however.

Day 13.154: Remember when...

...we built a raised bed from some timber and some stay-at-home time?

Well look at it now - thanks to Exile #2's hard work - it looks like the beginnings of a rather good vegetable garden:

Day 13.153: Now #4 is 16

Happy Birthday to Exile #4 - sixteen, but don't call her "sweet"!

Day 13.152: Rhubarb surprise

Exile #2 discovered this large spider the other day.

The is a picture of the under-side of a rhubarb leaf by our deck. The spider is on the under-side of the leaf but inside a dome shaped web/nest: