Maui!

I've been back from Maui for almost a week, but haven't posted anything as I picked up a sinus infection and double ear infection on the plane ride home. Ug. I'm feeling a little better and thought I'd share some pictures from my wonderful vacation to paradise!

Here is Tutu's house that we stayed at -


My sister, Becky, and Tutu enjoying dinnner -


Becky and I took a hike to a place called "Twin Waterfalls" -






We took the road to Lahaina and then kept going on a tiny one-lane road that hugged a cliff the entire way around. It was super scary, but the views were awesome -








Here are a few of our favorite beaches -






Finally, Iao Valley-

Vacation Time

Here are a few pics from the past weekend ---

Hank & I relaxing after a long day at work:



Some beautiful pictures from my visit to Horseneck Beach:







I probably won't be posting for the next two weeks. My sister, Becky, and I are leaving the boys behind and heading to Maui! I'll take lots of pictures and update sometime in the first few days of September. Aloha!

Happy Anniversary, Rebecca & Danny

A year ago (okay a year and three days ago) my sister and her husband were married. Congratulations on your first year as newly-weds. Here are some pictures of their special day.

Well, we can't start this off without a picture of Becky's crazy bachelorette party - on a boat in Plymouth!



And here are the bride and groom jamming with the band!



Becky and Grandpa George share a dance.



The four Nelson Girls. One married, two engaged, and one with a long time to go before she has to think about these things!



The Girls!



This was the funnest wedding I've ever been to. I'm next - if only Jay and I could pick a date and location. In due time, my friends.

Books & Back Pain

I've been dealing with back pain and stomach yuckies for the past week, but I think I'm *almost* better.

I spent some time reading at the cottage this weekend while trying to recover. I finished "Ordinary Wolves" by Seth Kantner. It was excellent.

I found this list on another blog. Evidently these are the top 100 books as voted by the public. Books I've read are in bold. Books I've never heard of are in itals. My comments in brackets.

1. The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
3. To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien) [I can't believe that I've never read this series.]
6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)
8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery) [One day I will visit PEI.]
9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)
10. A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
11. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)
12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)
14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving) [This is on my list - I almost picked it up at the library last week. Now I have to.]
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (Rowling)
17. Fall on Your Knees(Ann-Marie MacDonald)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Rowling)
20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)
22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
25. Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)
27. Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)
28. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie (Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)
33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. 1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. I Know This Much is True (Wally Lamb)
39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)
40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel) [I loved this series - although there was a lot of werid caveman sex]
42. Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)
44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. The Bible
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas)
48. Angela's Ashes (Frank McCourt)
49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck) [I started it, but never finished for some reason]
50. She's Come Undone (Wally Lamb)
51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver) [Ha! This one's on my nightstand!]
52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. Ender's Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. Great Expectations (Dickens)
55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)
57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. The Handmaid's Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. The Time Traveller's Wife (Audrew Niffenegger)[One of my alltime favorite stories.]
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolsoy)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davies)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants (Ann Brashares)
68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)
70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
71. Bridget Jones' Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
76. Tigana (Guy Gavriel Kay)
77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
78. The World According To Garp (John Irving)
79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)
80. Charlotte's Web (E.B. White)
81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)
82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Wizard's First Rule (Terry Goodkind)
85. Emma (Jane Austen)
86. Watership Down (Richard Adams)
87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)
90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)
96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)[Loved, loved, loved S.E. Hinton books when I was in Jr. High!)
97. White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield) [Well, I started it. Never finished.]
100. Ulysses (James Joyce)

The Birthday Weekend

Had a great time at Dad's 60th Birthday Party at the cottage. It was a beautiful day with a short sun shower in the afternoon. I don't think I've ever seen this many people at the cottage before - there had to be over 60 people!

Here's Tim! Isn't he so handsome. He's basically like my brother since I've grown up right alongside him my whole life. Love ya, Tim!



One of our favorite things to do at camp is catch turtles. I'm 31 and still get excited to go 'turtle hunting.' Becky caught this little guy and Thea wasn't too sure about it.



After the rain - swimming, boating, and playing with babies and dogs. Perfect!



Jay and Hank enjoying the party.



Here's the Birthday Boy!



Auntie Amy and Thea!



The Nelson Girls.



The Fearing Pond Brat Pack!

Beware: You Might Cry

I did...

60th B-Day Celebration

Heading down to the cottage to help Mom and Becky get ready for Dad's 60th Birthday party on Saturday. Happy Birthday, Dad!

A Busy Weekend

I think this is the first weekend all summer that I haven't gone to the cottage. Jay and I had a busy agenda this weekend.

First, there was a trip to New Bedford and then a little bit of Rock 'n Roll!

Then Jami and Andy had us over to their new house for dinner. Drew put on quite a show!

And then on Sunday, my dad and I acted in a play called "Softly Speak the Stones." The play told the story of 8 people buried in the old town cemetary and was part of my neighbor's Girl Scout Gold Award. I was Hannah Farrington, who was 37 in about 1800, and I spoke for my triplets, Emaline, Oliver, and Fisher, who passed away soon after birth. My dad played Deacon Francis Nicholson who was one of America's first documented makers of planes, a device with a blade used to smooth out rough surfaces of wood. He was also know as the master of the slave Cesar Chelor. Nicholson taught Cesar his trade and upon Nicholson's death, he willed Cesar his freedom, as well as enough land, tools, and stock to start his own business. Cesar Chelor became the first African-Americn plan-maker and some of his planes are included in the Smithsonian Museum's Anacostia Collection.

Our Favorite Things!

Here's my favorite thing in my home (right now anyway). It's the cutest little tray decorated with a fawn. I have it on my rescued apothocary chest in the living room and put spare change in it.

I have to post this one too. For as long as I can remember this beautiful blue goblet sat on the mantle of my Grammie & Grampie's house in Cape Cod. They moved into an assisted living facility about two years ago and I got to bring it to my home. I love, love, love it! I put a votive in it and it looks so nice.

Stained Glass

I found the best website EVER! I absolutely love homemade crafts. I sometimes fancy myself to be a crafter, but I have neither the time, skill, or patience to be a real crafter. Anywho, this website is ETSY and it's kinda like EBay, where a gazillion different sellers can post their goods -but it's not an auction and they only sell homemade items. Here's what I splurged on yesterday:

It's a stained glass froggie. I bought another, but I can't find the picture of it. I'll add a pic when I get it. I LOVE stained glass window catchers. Here's a few from my collection:

That one's a 3-D window catcher. It's in an old window from and has tree branches in it. The tree branches have stained glass leaves and a stained glass moon attached to them. It's called "Blue Moon" and I got it at North Quabbin Woods a few years back. The artist is amazing and has items for sale there.

These two were give to me by my Grammie:

My sister gave me this stained glass wind chime a few years ago and then last year she gave me the canoer.

Lastly, this is a yard sale find from this summer. I haven't hung it up yet, but it looks pretty cool just sitting on a table.