Side Trip to West Island, Fairhaven

When scouring aerial/satelite maps of the area to look for possible good beach glass beaches, I saw a potential beachcombing area on West Island, which is the crescent shaped beach at the bottom right of this pic.

First I stopped at Hoppy's Landing to take some pics before I continued onto West Island.

Huge pile of shells.  Having a crushed clam shell driveway is very popular in these parts.

Looking over at Sconticut Neck.

This was an old WWII lookout tower and is in the parking lot at West Island.  You can read about the history of it HERE if you are so inclined.

The beachcoming wasn't very good at all.  I found one green piece and one brown but that was it.

Just some little waves.  It was a calm day.

Painted on a utility box.

Gettin' My Kicks on Route 6

Did you know that Route 6 stretches from Bishop, California all the way across the USA (3,205 miles) to it's terminus at Provincetown?  Around here, it was the main route to New York before the interstates were built in the 1950s.  What I refer to as 'The Mid Cape Highway' is 6. It's also known as 'The Grand Army of the Republic Highway".  You can read about the history of the highway HERE.

Last year when we were helping my youngest stepson look for a car, we took 6 from Wareham out past New Bedford and I really enjoyed the ride.  I made a mental note to make sure that I planned a photography road trip.  We also drove right past that cool part of Fairhaven I was in last summer with my cousins when we went to Fort Phoenix.  The original plan was to go as far as Fairhaven but Russell suggested I continue into New Bedford to check out the historic waterfront.  I've always thought of the cities of SE Massachusetts as horrible, run down, crime ridden blips along I-195, and parts of them are.  But the bits off 6 are still pretty nice.  Not as kitschy as Rte. 66, but still has some cute places.  

I ended up shooting 210 pictures, mostly of the amazing architecture and old homes, plus tons in the New Bedford Whaling Museum.  I missed a few kitschy buildings on the way down there so I shot in places like Marion & Mattapoisett both going and coming.  In an attempt to break these down into viewable posts, I have condensed the pics from Marion & Mattapoisett as one entity.  The future posts will be of Fairhaven and New Bedford, respectfully.  Those of you who are my FB friends can view the album in its entirety over there.

Headed out from Wareham

Sadly there wasn't much to take pics of in Marion and I missed the road to the lighthouse, which is actually in Mattapoisett anyway!

I had to cut out the Chinese restaurant next door!  This is so delightfully retro.

Mattapoisett seems to have a seahorse theme.

It's a little crooked because I was driving and shooting!!

Technically this McDonalds is in Fairhaven.  Not sure if it's a new restaurant built to look old, or really one of the first ones.  I could only find some info on that old 'Speedee' logo which was used from the late 40s till 1967 when Ronald McDonald became the mascot of the franchise.

You don't see many of these oldies so I had to stop and get a snappy.  I did not, however, get anything to eat there because, well, Ew.

I am already planning a Mattapoisett 'do over' because of missing the lighthouse.

Beach Glass Heart & More Eggcitement

This is one of the first pictures I ever pinned on Pinterest.  I loved the idea of use beach glass chips to make a design, and lord knows I have a lot of chips.  It was just a matter of whether or not I could make myself glue them to canvas in a rather permanent way.  I also didn't want the picture to be vertical, but horizontal and not encased behind glass.

On the other hand, I keep said chips inside 2 cool salt & pepper shakers, and there was no room to put anymore glass in them so I decided to make the project.  I got a square of artist's canvas at the store and first did the outer heart, but felt it was missing something.  I asked my pals on Facebook if I should add the second row and everyone said definitely.  After I finished it, I felt it still needed one more row and again, my friends concurred.  I swear I reach all my decisions via Facebook committee!!!  But that's sometimes the only way I can see the forest for the trees.

Here is the final version.  I really love how it came out.  There's a kind of fluid flow about it.  I didn't use any of my super special red chips because against the canvas they looked brown.

Now I have room for more chips in my shakers.

Two weeks after Easter and I'm still decorating these dadgum eggs.  Are you so eggcited to see them?

I've had that angel in my Christmas decorations since I was a little kid.  

Next year if I vocalize the desire to decorate eggs again, SOMEBODY STOP ME!

New Gratitude Journal

A couple years ago, my dear friend and college roomie Angie made me a Gratitude Journal, which is a composition book on which she did some awesome collage work.  I was supposed to write in it every day but I just couldn't keep up, esp. when some days I was thankful for the same things. So I started doing the gratitude lists once or twice a month which worked out better.  Plus I put thank you notes received from my friends, and some of my giveaway wins.  Finally, I started transcribing all the amazingly sweet and loving texts I get from my honey.  My phone only holds about 100 texts so I had to figure out a way to save them and I don't mind transcribing them at all.  

I finally ran out of room towards the end of March, so I made my own new Gratitude Journal which starts as of April 1.  This is the front cover.  I used bits from my paper craft supplies and I also cut stuff out of catalogs and magazines.  And that's a real metal key on the front too.

And the back.  I used double stick tape to place the items and then covered the whole thing with clear contact paper so it got a little bubbly and wrinkly in places.

This is the inside front cover.

Kind of a bad pic, but Harry Potter fans will instantly recognize and understand what 'Always' means.  The emotion behind it makes me tear up every time I think about it, and it reminds me of us, except unlike Snape, Russell got his 'Lily'.  "After all this time?"  "Always."

Yikes! Dirty camera sensor alert!  I shoot my crafts with the Pentax so please ignore the dark spots.  I also like to decorate the pages with pictures from catalogs and Chinese fortune cookie fortunes.

As a side note, I'm still keeping up with the Blessings Jar in the kitchen, but I'm noticing that much of what goes in there is also in my Gratitude Journal so it's kind of repetitive.  Do any of you note your blessings?

Canal Walk

It's so nice not to have to wear layers, boots and bundle up every time you leave the house to get the mail.  And even nicer to get out and walk again.  This time I met up w/ my dear childhood pal, Sheila.  We've been best friends since kindergarten and even though she moved to Orleans when we were in the beginning of  3rd grade, we always wrote & kept in touch.  So we went for a walk on the Canal along with her son Joey.

Traps washed up on the banks.

Joe had climbed up on the retaining wall to walk along the top and his eyes got huge and he yelled, 'OHMYGOD IT'S A SNAKE!'  Sheila and I looked behind the wall in time to see this large black racer headed up in the woods.  She's convinced his 'big mouth' (her words) spooked him.  It had to be 4' long.

See the Ninja Turtles?  SQUEEE!

Joey walking on the wall.

Train

I loved this ribbon effect

This stump looked like a clover leaf to us!

We walked pretty far....started out in Bournedale near the Sagamore Bridge and I was surprised to see how close we got to the Bourne Bridge.

More cormorants.

We got to this point and then headed back the way we came.  We probably did 3 or 4 miles.