I know I promised you all some Puerto Rico stories and pictures, but it will have to wait for a few more days.  No joke, I have absolutely no room left on my Mac to upload the 1,000+ photos that we took.  So I spent a little time this weekend organizing my computer files and moving old pics to discs (see #28 on the list…organizing the house) and I finished two more photos books (#18 on the list).  See…I told you I did some list conquering.  But the big list task I conquered this weekend was registering for the annual Beach to Beacon 10K Road Race in Southern Maine (task #10 on the list).

Technically I haven’t completed the task so technically I can’t check it off yet and technically the race doesn’t take place until after my 30th birthday, but I’m checking it off.  Technicality, schmecknicality!  I just have the compulsive need to check things off lists.

But let’s talk about the race and how I’m so excited for it.  The Beach 2 Beacon race is actually a bucket list item of mine.  It’s a 10K race in Cape Elizabeth Maine that attracts thousands of world class athletes and running enthusiasts like myself.  The 6.2 mile run is an annual event started by 1984 Olympic gold medalist Joan Benoit Samuelson.  From what I’ve heard the race is pretty scenic, starting at Crescent Beach and ending at the Portland Headlight.  While I will be running the following race map:

Colby is planning a whole other route.  He will be competing in the lesser known, Beach 2 Beacon 12 bar race, where he will be bar hopping along the route “cheering” me on.  I love my husband!  And his enthusiasm for all things beer related.

I consider myself uber lucky to be even running in the race.  Let’s just say…race registration opened at 7:00 am and by 7:05 am registration was full. Whoa!  But now that the registration rush is over, it’s serious lace up those sneakers time.

I was on a good 3 to 5 mile run, every other day routine before we headed out to Puerto Rico, but haven’t run since.  It’s time to get back into the swing of things…wish me luck.  Actually, I don’t need luck I just need a new running mix?  Any suggestions?

As for the rest of the 30 Before 30 list, here’s where things are standing with only 4.5 months to go to D-Day…or should I say B-Day…har har har…I’m so sorry!

1. Get Married (August 10, 2012)
2. Go see the Timber Tina Lumberjack show in Bar Harbor
3. Consider having children
4. Join Colby for a romantic date night out
5. Learn how to use the video function on my Nikon DSLR  (March 5, 2013)
6. Purchase a big girl couch (September 3, 2012)
7. Try surfing (March 8, 2013)
8. Track dow the world’s most amazing Sangria recipe
9. Travel somewhere outside the continental US (March 6, 2013)
10. Run the Beach to Beacon road race (registered March 15, 2013)
11. Hike Cadillac Mountain
12. Finish a quarter of the books on “The List”
13. Go on a picnic
14. Learn to sew
15. Bake Colby a birthday cake (August 19, 2012)
16. Learn to knit
17. Dig for mussels on the Maine coast
18. Finish the yearly photo books
19. Make my own Christmas cards (December 7, 2012)
20. Spend a weekend in Southern Maine  (July 20 – 22, 2012)
21. Go to an auction
22. Send my mom flowers
23. Watch all 10 seasons of Friends start to finish
24. Explore Portsmouth, New Hampshire
25. Cook through my recipe idea files
26. Attend the infamous Brimfield antique show
27. Become a mug club member at a local bar (November 14, 2012)
28. Organize the house
29. Conquer Julia Child’s Le Boeuf Bourguignon
30. Host a yard sale (September 1, 2012)

Over a third of the way done!  Woot woot!  And let the training begin!

Pssst…Anyone else out there running in the Beach 2 Beacon Road Race?  Or another road race this summer?  Or anyone have any training suggestions they would like to share?

One of the tasks on that list was to learn how to shoot videos on my new-ish DSLR camera.  I’ve had the camera for over a year and have just recently figured out how to shoot a video on it.  Not a great video by any means, but a video.  Since I went public on the 30 Before 30 project, and vowed to complete it before our dear readers, I should probably share the results of this task.  So I present to you my sub-par efforts in video production (Steven Spielberg and George Lucas I am not), starting with the first video I ever shot.  It’s of Goose “opening” his presents at Christmas.  And yes, our dog child gets wrapped Christmas presents.  I’m pretty sure he likes the wrapping paper just as much if not more than what’s underneath the paper:

The second video is a little more recent, from a few weeks ago after a snow storm.  I know I tell you guys about a million times how crazy Goose acts, so here’s to mentioning it number one million and one, Goose is crazy.  Here’s the evidence.

That dog cannot get enough snow shoveled into his face.  Crazy fool.  And this was a mild snow Goose outing for him too. You should see him run!  And at full force!  If only we could harness that energy for the greater good?!  Goose will spend HOURS running down that path…back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, typically chasing squirrel.

And then there was yesterday’s video of Colby hammering in cut nails in our guest bedroom.

I think my video shooting skills are getting ever so slightly better.  I don’t look down and find out I’m accidentally shooting my feet instead of the dog and I’ve learned to keep the expletives at a minimum, you know, to keep these flicks PG.  Okay…more like PG-13.  But I still have some work to do in the video recording front.  And maybe even the video editing front.

And it wouldn’t be a complete 30 Before 30 list post if I didn’t share the full list and what I’ve checked off the to-do list so far:

1. Get Married (August 10, 2012)
2. Go see the Timber Tina Lumberjack show in Bar Harbor
3. Consider having children
4. Join Colby for a romantic date night out
5. Learn how to use the video function on my Nikon DSLR  (March 5, 2013)
6. Purchase a big girl couch (September 3, 2012)
7. Try surfing
8. Track dow the world’s most amazing Sangria recipe
9. Travel somewhere outside the continental US
10. Run the Beach to Beacon road race
11. Hike Cadillac Mountain
12. Finish a quarter of the books on “The List”
13. Go on a picnic
14. Learn to sew
15. Bake Colby a birthday cake (August 19, 2012)
16. Learn to knit
17. Dig for mussels on the Maine coast
18. Finish the yearly photo books
19. Make my own Christmas cards (December 7, 2012)
20. Spend a weekend in Southern Maine  (July 20 – 22, 2012)
21. Go to an auction
22. Send my mom flowers
23. Watch all 10 seasons of Friends start to finish
24. Explore Portsmouth, New Hampshire
25. Cook through my recipe idea files
26. Attend the infamous Brimfield antique show
27. Become a mug club member at a local bar (November 14, 2012)
28. Organize the house
29. Conquer Julia Child’s Le Boeuf Bourguignon
30. Host a yard sale (September 1, 2012)

Okay, so I lied.  Eight down and twenty-two more to go.  Wish me luck!  I’m gonna need it!

Pssst…Do you guys have any video recording tips or tricks up your sleeves?  Do share!  I could certainly use them!  Or any resources you find helpful for learning how to shoot videos or general DSLR help?  I feel like such a camera spaz most days, but at least I’m tryin’!

So let’s talk about the beer a little bit.  Way back in in the fall of 2012, Colby and I signed up for the mug club at one of our favorite local bars, Paddy Murphy’s in Bangor, Maine.  In fact, being a mug club member was one of the items on my 30 Before 30 list.  Consider that task officially checked off…cuz our mugs FINALLY came in!

The poorly lit, Instagram photo of our mugs just so happens to be Colby’s favorite pic of the month.  Our mugs took forever and a day to come in because they’re made by hand and personalized.  Unlike many mug clubs, we get to keep our mugs once we no longer want to be members anymore.  Fat chance of that ever happening!  Ever since our mugs came in earlier this month, we’ve been spending way too much time down at “our” bar.  If this bar was called Cheers, just call us Norm.

My favorite picture this month was, as per usual, a pic of Colby and Goose.

This is how Goose likes to ride in the truck.  He curls up on the back of the seat, kind of wedged between the seat and the rear window, and rests his head on Colby’s shoulder.  He’ll ride for HOURS like this.  As long as you don’t put on a blinker or a deer doesn’t walk by (both things that freak Goose out…I’m officially adding those to the “things Goose is afraid of” list).

This truck ride was extra exciting because it was to go see a guy about a buffet.  Yup…we made our first Craigslist purchase and lived to tell the tale.  But I’ll have more info about that for you later.  We’re planning on converting the piece into a bathroom vanity.  It should be an interesting project!  Stay tuned!

Pssst…What have you guys been Instagramming up lately?  Any favorites?  Or anyone else out there compulsively take pictures of their beer mugs?

Psssssst…You can check out all our Instagram roundups right here.

Drum roll please…”Joy To The World” (note the Chevy Chase Christmas Vacation reference)…our Christmas card.

You should recognize the photo from our little photo shoot back here, and subsequent outtakes.

And a zoomed in shot of the message on the back.  Do you like how I incorporated a little bit of Christmas light action on the back to tie into the Christmas light action of the front?  I amaze myself sometimes at my sheer brilliance (note the sarcasm).

We ordered the cards from my new favorite picture ordering site extraordinaire, mpix.com.  The site is great.  They have quality photo gifts and prints including cards, notepads, planners and more…and they’re relatively inexpensive.  It cost us just under $50 for 50 cards/envelopes and to ship them.  They even allow you to design your own cards from scratch, which was my original plan but I just plum ran out of time.  Maybe next year.  To design your own cards all you have to do is download their Photoshop template, design your cards anyway you want, and then upload the file to be printed.  AND the best part about mpix.com is that they have your order printed and ready to ship in 24 hours.  No joke.  I ordered our cards on a Tuesday and had them in hand on a Friday.  Now that’s what I call service!

But this post isn’t so much about the cards (although I can gush about them all day) but more about how we jazzed up the cards…including spicing up the boring white envelopes that came with the cards with washi tape.

That’s a set of Martha Stewart washi tape that I picked up at the craft store for $3.  After a little bit of playing around with the tape, and trying to keep it simple since…ahem…50 cards to adorn here, I decided on washi tape trees.  Trees are simple, no?!

And it was super simple.  Just peel, cut, stick, repeat.  And it only took me one episode of Gold Rush and three episodes of Storage Wars to finish them all AND address all 50 cards.

But my favorite part of jazzing up our printed cards was how we signed the cards.  I’m a stickler for making Colby sign his own name on things.  I think it’s nice when the guy man’s up and signs his own name (Colby even signed his name all legible like…so unlike him…where’s the squiggle I know and love!).  But since the card was from all of us, dog child included, we even had Goose sign the cards.

Confession…it would have been hazardous for everyone’s health to have Goose REALLY sign his name via paw print (serious flailing would be involved…we don’t need someone to lose an eye).  So Goose’s “signature” is just a dog paw stamp.  Close enough.

The final piece of our dressed up, snazzy, take me out on the town now cuz I’m lookin’ so damn cute cards, was sealing the envelope with some more washi tape.  No licky licky needed!  Woo to the hoo!

So that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it our Christmas card 2012 story.  This was my first attempt at making our own cards, which also happened to be on my 30 Before 30 list.  Consider this task officially checked off the list.  And while we’re talking about lists, let’s just take a little looks-ie and see where we stand:

1. Get Married (August 10, 2012)
2. Go see the Timber Tina Lumberjack show in Bar Harbor
3. Consider having children
4. Join Colby for a romantic date night out
5. Learn how to use the video function on my Nikon DSLR
6. Purchase a big girl couch (September 3, 2012)
7. Try surfing
8. Track down the world’s most amazing Sangria recipe
9. Travel somewhere outside the continental US
10. Run the Beach to Beacon road race
11. Hike Cadillac Mountain
12. Finish a quarter of the books on “The List”
13. Go on a picnic
14. Learn to sew
15. Bake Colby a birthday cake (August 19, 2012)
16. Learn to knit
17. Dig for mussels on the Maine coast
18. Finish the yearly photo books
19. Make my own Christmas cards (December 7, 2012)
20. Spend a weekend in Southern Maine  (July 20 – 22, 2012)
21. Go to an auction
22. Send my mom flowers
23. Watch all 10 seasons of Friends start to finish
24. Explore Portsmouth, New Hampshire
25. Cook through my recipe idea files
26. Attend the infamous Brimfield antique show
27. Become a mug club member at a local bar (November 14, 2012)
28. Organize the house
29. Conquer Julia Child’s Le Boeuf Bourguignon
30. Host a yard sale (September 1, 2012)

I am DYING to organize the house.  DYING!  My inner organizational diva needs to unleash her fury on our mess of a home.  That and I really want to try my hand at sewing.  Maybe this weekend.  Perhaps…but I’m not holding my breath.  Still so many things to check off the list!

Pssst…Have you sent out your Christmas cards this season?  I’m curious…did you buy or DIY?

Without further ado, I introduce you to our new, grey sectional with a chaise.

But before you can REALLY appreciate the new couch, step into our old world for a moment.  A world where one could not read in peace lounged on the couch while husband watches tv and dog watches squirrels.  Maybe all those Goose butts in the face are what finally pushed us over the edge to get a new couch?  Naw…it was my feet in Colby’s face I’m sure!

When we bought our couch a few weeks ago from the American Mattress and Furniture Gallery in Bangor, we sprung for the delivery service instead of trying to move it ourselves.  Best $30 we ever spent!  So on delivery day, we were anxious.  So anxious that we properly cleaned out the living room and mopped the floor…twice.  That’s the cleanest the floor has ever been.

And then the couch came, in all its gloriousness, and thankfully in two pieces for movability’s sake.

How’s that for a sneaky, “I’m not taking pics of you from the second floor window” snapshot?!  Anyway, the delivery guys were pros.  They moved that couch into our living room with ease and were out of our house in no time flat.  They even assembled the couch AND fluffed the throw pillows that came with the couch.  I wonder if Pillow Fluffing 101 is a course in furniture delivery school?!

Speaking of the throw pillows, as I was taking these pics, Colby and I looked at each other and were like, “WTF?!  I didn’t know the couch came with four pillows?!  There were only two on it in the showroom!”

Then I took this pic and Colby said, “We must be the last stop and got all the pillows that they forgot to deliver during the day.”

Then the delivery guys came knocking on our day, actually they never got to knock since our Goose alarm was too busy howling at them, and asked for the florally pillows back.  They belonged to the house they had just come from.  Whoops!  So we gave them back.  Thankfully I wasn’t terribly attached to them (not really my style).  Then we lounged…much improved.

I love that we can both sprawl out on the couch with ease.  Which is generally not an easy task since I’m all of 5’9″ and Colby a whopping 6’5….yeah our kids are gonna be tall!  But with this couch, we have no problems with synchronized sprawling.  Our only problem is fighting over who gets the chaise section.  So far I’m winning at a score of seven to five but Colby is closing in on me thanks to an early evening nap.  We both love the chaise!  After a brief nap and a few chapters read in my latest book, it was time to move back in the other furniture including a storage ottoman and Goose’s chair.

I even added a pair of orange/white throw pillows that I picked up at Target for $14 each.  I love that the orange in the pillows plays off the orange lamps in the room.  I also flipped the freebie pillows to show their backside (scandalous) since I wasn’t really digging the pattern on them.  The backside is the same material as the couch so it’s a little too matchy matchy right now.  But I have big plans of covering them in the near future.

As for the other furniture including the second Goose chair, side table and lamp, they got moved into the parlor for now.  I’m not convinced they’ll stay there but it’s working out for now.

We’re loving our new couch and have already logged some serious hours on it.  There may have been a few naps, a round of Space Balls movie watching, and a book and a half read this weekend thanks to couch time.  Can we say lazy, rainy weekend?!  AND I’m loving the couch’s color!  I was a little skeptical that the tone on tone grey would look a little hokie but I’m loving it!  I can’t wait to play out the neutral greys with more pops of color in the room.

So it’s back to lounging on the couch with a sad, sulky Goose looking on from “his” chair.  Goose isn’t allowed on the new couch.  We’re not quite ready for him to destroy this guy yet.  He ate our old full size couch and ripped the cushions apart on the love seat, thus his new couch privileges have been revoked.  And it hasn’t been going so well.  He’s been more than a little bit sulky.  But he’ll get over it.

So now let’s look at that updated 30 Before 30 list and officially cross off “purchase a big girl couch” off of it:

1. Get Married (August 10, 2012)
2. Go see the Timber Tina Lumberjack show in Bar Harbor
3. Consider having children
4. Join Colby for a romantic date night out
5. Learn how to use the video function on my Nikon DSLR
6. Purchase a big girl couch (September 3, 2012)
7. Try surfing
8. Track down the world’s most amazing Sangria recipe
9. Travel somewhere outside the continental US
10. Run the Beach to Beacon road race
11. Hike Cadillac Mountain
12. Finish a quarter of the books on “The List”
13. Go on a picnic
14. Learn to sew
15. Bake Colby a birthday cake (August 19, 2012)
16. Learn to knit
17. Dig for mussels on the Maine coast
18. Finish the yearly photo books
19. Make my own Christmas cards
20. Spend a weekend in Southern Maine  (July 20 – 22, 2012)
21. Go to an auction
22. Send my mom flowers
23. Watch all 10 seasons of Friends start to finish
24. Explore Portsmouth, New Hampshire
25. Cook through my recipe idea files
26. Attend the infamous Brimfield antique show
27. Become a mug club member at a local bar
28. Organize the house
29. Conquer Julia Child’s Le Boeuf Bourguignon
30. Host a yard sale (September 1, 2012)

Only 25 more to go!

Pssst…Anyone else purchase a new couch lately?  Did it change your life?!  I’m pretty sure ours did.

We’ve been planning on having a yard sale pretty much since the day we moved into the house and we FINALLY pulled the trigger on it this weekend.  After months of pulling “merchandise” we were ready and had a little free time (now that we’re post wedding) to hold a successful sale.  So I bring you our “how to hold a yard sale” post and share with you what we did and some tips and tricks worth noting.

First up, the merchandise.  We waited to have a yard sale until we had a decent amount of things for the sale.  I know I tend to drive right by yard sales that look sparse so I wanted to make sure that we had plenty to sell.  We’ve been storing yard sale items on our porch.  For more than a year now, every time we found an item in our house that was yard sale worthy, something we longer needed or used, we grabbed it and stored it on the porch.  That is until we pretty much filled the entire porch with yard sale merchandise.  Here’s a pic of the porch before it got too overrun.

Once we decided to pull the trigger and actually do a yard sale we did two things: promote the yard sale and price the merchandise.  For the yard sale promotion, we opted just to make a few signs: a pair of signs on each end of our street.  We live in a pretty busy neighborhood and right down the street from a school.  So we waited until the day school resumed to post our signs, just a few days before our sale, and called it good.  We opted not to pay the thirty dollars it cost to advertise in our local paper.  We just wanted a nice, simple, impromptu yard sale.

Then came the infamous night before the yard sale pricing extravaganza.  An extravaganza indeed!  It took over our living room.  It was like a sea of stuff eating our couch alive.

This isn’t even the half of it!  There was still stuff out on the porch, items lining the hallway, and while I priced away Colby was still combing the house grabbing anything and everything that we wanted to part with for a few bucks.

The pricing strategy was easy, but it took me a little while to get there.  I used those little round stickers that you can get at Target for a couple of bucks.  You know, those neon ones that you see at all the yard sales.  I simply wrote a price on the sticker and placed it on the product.  I had a hard time at first pricing things, some items were definitely overpriced, mostly because I kept thinking of what I paid for that item.  But I quickly let that go since the mission of our yard sale was to get rid of the clutter in our house!  Not necessarily to make serious money.  Then I started think like a yard sale shopper, and what I would pay for something at a yard sale.  I ended up using prices like $1 for a vase, $0.25 for a three ring binder, $0.50 for a pair of earrings, $5 for a small suitcase, etc.

We had a few big ticket items like a dryer for $50, table and chairs set for $60, and skis for $75.  But the rest of our merchandise was pretty much $5 or less.

We priced everything out on Friday night to get ready for our Saturday, 8 am to 2 pm yard sale.  A couple things to note…definitely price your product before the sale.  The morning of the sale, even if you get up extra early and think you can price things as you put them out, think again.  You’re gonna get early birds.  No joke, a pair of ladies came by our sale at 6:45 am!  Crazy fools!  AND we had only set out two boxes!  They were pawing through our boxes as we were setting them out.  I wanted to kick them out of our yard, mostly out of spitefulness, since we were promoting an 8 am sale, but I couldn’t kick out a customer.  They ended up buying about $15 worth of stuff AND came back later so I guess I can’t complain.

Some other important yard sale tips that we learned:

• Categorize your merchandise:  Keep like with like.  We had a kitchen wares section, purse section, jewelry section and more.  The jewelry section was a real hit!  But the categorization made it easier for customers to peruse what interested them and to find things they were looking for.
• Have change:  Lots and lots of change.  It was amazing the number of twenties that we got even for one or two dollar purchases.  Have lots of singles, fives and tens and a handful of quarters.
• Negotiate and be willing to come down in price:  One of the most successful selling methods was when Colby would walk through the crowd of perusers and try to package deals.  For instance, we had priced my old purses at about $3 each but offered up a any two for $5 promotion as women looked interested in some of the bags.  And it worked.  There were a couple of upsells using this method AND we got rid of more things…the ultimate goal of the sale.
• Be friendly:  The more we chatted with our customers and the more random stories we exchanged, the more they perused and the more they bought.  I also learned more about our town and neighbors that I could have ever imagined learning at a yard sale.  Sometimes a bit too much!
• Keep it short:  We advertised an 8 am – 2 pm yard sale, but we should have just ended it at noon.  We were super busy all morning but as soon as noontime hit, crickets.  No one came by.  Next time, we’ll do a Saturday only sale from 8 am to 12 pm.  Nice and short and simple.

All in all, I would have to say we had a successful yard sale.  We got rid of so many things, including every big and bulky item we put out there, and made about $350…sa-weet!  And in the end, we decided to pack up what little merchandise we had left and do it all over again next fall.  But this is all we had left:

We went from about twenty boxes of stuff down to only three.  AND our porch is looking almost usable these days:

Hmmmmm…could it be time to start refinishing the front porch?!  Perhaps!

Now that “yard sale” is checked off the list, let’s take a look at what my 30 Before 30 list is looking like these days:

1. Get Married (August 10, 2012)
2. Go see the Timber Tina Lumberjack show in Bar Harbor
3. Consider having children
4. Join Colby for a romantic date night out
5. Learn how to use the video function on my Nikon DSLR
6. Purchase a big girl couch
7. Try surfing
8. Track down the world’s most amazing Sangria recipe
9. Travel somewhere outside the continental US
10. Run the Beach to Beacon road race
11. Hike Cadillac Mountain
12. Finish a quarter of the books on “The List”
13. Go on a picnic
14. Learn to sew
15. Bake Colby a birthday cake (August 19, 2012)
16. Learn to knit
17. Dig for mussels on the Maine coast
18. Finish the yearly photo books
19. Make my own Christmas cards
20. Spend a weekend in Southern Maine  (July 20 – 22, 2012)
21. Go to an auction
22. Send my mom flowers
23. Watch all 10 seasons of Friends start to finish
24. Explore Portsmouth, New Hampshire
25. Cook through my recipe idea files
26. Attend the infamous Brimfield antique show
27. Become a mug club member at a local bar
28. Organize the house
29. Conquer Julia Child’s Le Boeuf Bourguignon
30. Host a yard sale (September 1, 2012)

Pssst…Read about my initial 30 Before 30 project post back here and catch up on all the progress here.

Psssssst…And now it’s audience participation time again.  All you overachievers can put those hands down because I’m calling on all of you.  What are your yard sale tips?  Or stories?  Anyone else have crazy early birds come by?!

So I took over the kitchen, brought up an easy white cake recipe on the iPad, and fired up the Kitchen Aid.

Can I just take a moment to digress about how much technology has taken over?!  An iPad has replaced my cookbooks in the cookbook stand these days!  Sheesh!  But getting peanut butter stains on the iPad just ins’t as cute/character-ific as getting peanut butter stains on an old cookbook.

After frosting the cake with a homemade peanut butter frosting and decorating it with some chopped up chocolate, Colby’s birthday cake was good to go.  I should have put candles on it and made him blow them out while I sang him happy birthday.  Scratch that.  No one wants to hear me sing on their birthday. That’s just plain mean!  Apparently I spent the money my parents gave me for singing lessons on new shoes.  Sparkly ones.  In pink.

After I finished fluffing and prepping the cake, the birthday boy came out to admire it.  He turned the big thirty-faux yesterday (not thirty-four…thirty-faux…as in he’s in his thirties but doesn’t want people to know just how far into this thirties…he’s such a girl).  Colby even brought out his bedroom eyes for the cake occasion.

And then this happened.

No…I did not prompt him or suggest this.  He did this all on his own!  Our little photo shoot conversation went something like this:  ”Colby…will you take a picture with your cake?” to which he responds “wouldn’t it be cool if I wore that glass thing like a hat?”  He’s a thirty-faux year old going on nine!  That’s why I married him!  Wait…not that I’m into boys…that’s not what I meant…I’m just gonna stop talking now.

So what’s my little 30 Before 30 checklist looking like now?

1. Get Married
2. Go see the Timber Tina Lumberjack show in Bar Harbor
3. Consider having children
4. Join Colby for a romantic date night out
5. Learn how to use the video function on my Nikon DSLR
6. Purchase a big girl couch
7. Try surfing
8. Track down the world’s most amazing Sangria recipe
9. Travel somewhere outside the continental US
10. Run the Beach to Beacon road race
11. Hike Cadillac Mountain
12. Finish a quarter of the books on “The List”
13. Go on a picnic
14. Learn to sew
15. Bake Colby a birthday cake (August 19, 2012)
16. Learn to knit
17. Dig for mussels on the Maine coast
18. Finish the yearly photo books
19. Make my own Christmas cards
20. Spend a weekend in Southern Maine  (July 20 – 22, 2012)
21. Go to an auction
22. Send my mom flowers
23. Watch all 10 seasons of Friends start to finish
24. Explore Portsmouth, New Hampshire
25. Cook through my recipe idea files
26. Attend the infamous Brimfield antique show
27. Become a mug club member at a local bar
28. Organize the house
29. Conquer Julia Child’s Le Boeuf Bourguignon
30. Host a yard sale

Consider #20 Spend the weekend in Southern Maine, checked off.  Although I’m not 100% convinced that I tackled it, I had intended to spend said weekend in Portland with Colby, but alas that did not work out.  But still, I was in Portland…booyah.  Originally, we had planned to spend last weekend in Portland together, celebrating my birthday, living it up in the Old Port, and cruising around the local shops and pubs.  But when Colby’s best man approached me asking if that weekend would by okay for Colby’s bachelor party, and if I could somehow get him down to Portland on Saturday, I caved.  And the weekend quickly became a surprise bachelor party weekend for the Colb-ster.  Meaning, while the boys played, I cruised around town…primarily at the beaches.  And drooled over all the lovely beach houses around Scarborough beach.

That one is my favorite!  AND it’s for sale.  I don’t even want to know how much it costs!  But isn’t the gray siding/white trim/aqua door to die for?!  Loved it!

I pretty much spent my entire weekend at the beaches in Southern Maine, soaking up the sun and taking way too many pictures.

I got to Scarborough Beach, just South of Portland, early in the morning before too many people showed up, and just walked the beach for a few hours in the early morning sun.

It was amazing…peaceful and amazing.  I came back later in the day to an overly crowded, loud beach but it was still alot of fun.

After my early morning stroll along the beach, I checked out a local flea market, Cascade Park Flea Market on Rt. 1 between Saco and Scarborough.  I was thoroughly disappointed.  But maybe that’s because I’m so spoiled with the coastal flea markets in our neck of the woods where I’ve scored sweet kitchen chairs and lounge chairs for the yard.

I did come across some interesting pottery imported from Mexico but the prices weren’t your typical flea market prices.  After my brief spin around the flea market, I kept heading South to Biddeford, home of my alma mater, the University of New England.

And my how the campus has changed in just over five years!  I strolled around campus, snapping pictures, checking out all the new buildings and of course my old dorms.  I was also reminded about why I loved my school so much…it’s right on the Saco River where it dumps into the ocean.

It’s a beautiful, beautiful campus this time of year.  I couldn’t help myself taking a short stroll down Hills Beach, where I used to spend many hours “studying”.

After my short visit to UNE, I ran a few wedding related errands.  You know…touring the local Walmarts looking for ferns, purchasing more kraft paper tags for favors, finding presents for our parents, you know…the usual stuff.  And then…finally…I spent a little time exploring the Old Port in Portland and it’s many wharves and shops.

I managed to find a store I have been drooling over for ages, Sea Bags.  All I have to say is go check out their website.  Their products are amazing!  I’ve been obsessing over their totes for awhile now but at about $140 apiece, it’s not in my budget.  Le sigh.  Maybe someday the birthday fairy will get one for me!  It was so difficult to find their shop since it’s very unassuming and out of the way.  But anyway, the company makes bags (tote bags, travel bags, etc.) out of old sail boat sales.  So cool!  You walk right into the shop and they have a few bags for sale but you mostly sea the staff hard at work making bags.  It was such an interesting place to experience.

Then I came across this shop called Anniebell’s.  I dream of owning my own home decor shop someday and in those dreams, it looks just like this place.  Seriously…I wanted EVERYTHING in this store.  The store was so packed I had a hard time snapping a good picture of the decor, bedding, and other amazing items inside. But I did capture this weird image of their shop window.  I could just snuggle right up in that bed!

Next up, East End cupcakes.  It was my birthday weekend so I had to indulge myself in cupcakes, right?!  I loved this shop.  Loved, loved, loved this shop.  And not just because they serve bacon cupcakes with maple frosting.  It was adorable!  Check out the lounge area.

I ended up getting six cupcakes: Oreo, red velvet, funfetti, vanilla, coconut lime, and peach.  And I am ashamed to admit that I ate four of them for dinner.

And they were delicious.  I saved two for Colby but alas, they melted before he could taste their decadent goodness.  All in all, the Portland Old Port is a fabulous place and I enjoyed exploring.  I just wish I had spent less time lounging on the beach and more time here.

All in all, pretty good trip.  I could have done without the two parking tickets and getting pulled over, or spending the weekend by my lonesome (I didn’t realize I was losing Colby to bachelor-dom for the entire weekend, I thought it was just Saturday, and had planned on doing some Sunday exploring together, oh well).  But it was good.  I want to go back soooooo bad.  Actually, scratch that, I just want to move there!  It’s so fun in Southern Maine with so much to do and eat.  Oh the eating!  There are hundreds of amazing little gems of eateries down there waiting to be discovered.  Oh the possibilities!

So what’s my little checklist looking like now?

1. Get Married
2. Go see the Timber Tina Lumberjack show in Bar Harbor
3. Consider having children
4. Join Colby for a romantic date night out
5. Learn how to use the video function on my Nikon DSLR
6. Purchase a big girl couch
7. Try surfing
8. Track down the world’s most amazing Sangria recipe
9. Travel somewhere outside the continental US
10. Run the Beach to Beacon road race
11. Hike Cadillac Mountain
12. Finish a quarter of the books on “The List”
13. Go on a picnic
14. Learn to sew
15. Bake Colby a birthday cake
16. Learn to knit
17. Dig for mussels on the Maine coast
18. Finish the yearly photo books
19. Make my own Christmas cards
20. Spend a weekend in Southern Maine  (July 20 – 22, 2012)
21. Go to an auction
22. Send my mom flowers
23. Watch all 10 seasons of Friends start to finish
24. Explore Portsmouth, New Hampshire
25. Cook through my recipe idea files
26. Attend the infamous Brimfield antique show
27. Become a mug club member at a local bar
28. Organize the house
29. Conquer Julia Child’s Le Boeuf Bourguignon
30. Host a yard sale

Pssst…Where have you been exploring lately?  Any nearby towns or cities beckoning you these days?

1. Get Married
2. Go see the Timber Tina Lumberjack show in Bar Harbor
3. Consider having children
4. Join Colby for a romantic date night out
5. Learn how to use the video function on my Nikon DSLR
6. Purchase a big girl couch
7. Try surfing
8. Track down the world’s most amazing Sangria recipe
9. Travel somewhere outside the continental US
10. Run the Beach to Beacon road race
11. Hike Cadillac Mountain
12. Finish a quarter of the books on “The List”
13. Go on a picnic
14. Learn to sew
15. Bake Colby a birthday cake
16. Learn to knit
17. Dig for mussels on the Maine coast
18. Finish the yearly photo books
19. Make my own Christmas cards
20. Spend a weekend in Southern Maine
21. Go to an auction
22. Send my mom flowers
23. Watch all 10 seasons of Friends start to finish
24. Explore Portsmouth, New Hampshire
25. Cook through my recipe idea files
26. Attend the infamous Brimfield antique show
27. Become a mug club member at a local bar
28. Organize the house
29. Conquer Julia Child’s Le Boeuf Bourguignon
30. Host a yard sale

And a few notes: