Summer 2010 Bucket List

"Ah, summer, what power you have to make us suffer and like it." -Russell Baker

People just love summer.

I hate heat, which is why I live in Maine and why summer is my least favorite of all the seasons after winter and fall, in that order (there is really no spring in Maine, so it doesn't count). It's not to say I don't like this half-time of the year, but I love skiing and sweaters and soup and empty beaches and the smell of our woodstove more, and so my affection for summer is secondary to that of what I feel for the others.

But after a tough winter and with some fun plans already penned in for summer of 2010, I am resolving to make the most of this summer ahead. I got the idea of making a summer bucket list after being inspired by one on one of my favorite blogs, b*spoke. Say what I will about summer, but it's a season of possibilities thanks to its long days and lack of constricting coats. I like lists, and keep lots of them, mostly on Post-it notes. I often write down things I've already done that day, or simple tasks like "take a shower" just for the thrill of completion and crossing it off. When I make lists, things get done.

Here's what I hope will this summer (in addition to the to-do's that go without saying including making all of my wedding couples and their families insanely satisfied with their imagery, being good to family and friends, eating lots of fresh veggies from our new garden, tearing up Pine Point Beach with Alder and Nikon as often as possible, and leading my husband to side-splitting, snort-starting laughter at least four times a day):

-Have a date night with Kyle and the dogs at the drive-in movie theater at Pride's Corner
-Canoe the Scarborough Marsh (Completed on the summer solstice- here's proof)
-Travel out of Maine to second shoot a wedding (Completed July 8-11 when I traveled to Santa Barbara, California to second shoot with talented Texan Kate Mefford at the Montecito Country Club
-Have one (or more) of my Alpha Kappa Camera girls come to Maine to second shoot a wedding with me (Completed August 18-23 when the adorably awesome Cristi Owen came to Maine for five days to serve as my second shooter when I photographed Deidre and Ryan's wedding at The Barn at Walnut Hill in North Yarmouth. Click here to see some of my favorite images from that wedding.)
-Retreat to Montana for a week with my Alpha Kappa Camera sisters (Completed July 19-23- see the fun pictures here on our group Facebook fanpage:
-Learn how to use our grill
-Write a procedures guide for my business (I told you, I really love lists)
-Have a fellow Maine wedding photographer come second shoot a wedding with me (Crossed this off the list technically in the spring, but it was Memorial Day weekend and a balmy one at that, so I'd say it still counts. Thanks to one of my betest and oh-so-talented friends, Amy Salerno, for coming with me to shoot Amy and John's Peaks Island wedding.)
-Help craft the class and then launch the new ICL Young Emerging Leaders Pilot Program that will prepare and place Maine's 20 and 30 somethings onto nonprofit boards in Maine (Done and Done! Read all about this innovative program and meet the class - hint, hint, I'm on the list- here.)
-Get over it, and start wearing shorts more often
-Start a club (maybe book or movie- who is in?)
-Host a backyard bbq- cause for celebration TBD
-Learn how to wear seersucker (and yes, Kyle, I know it's a fabric not a pattern)
-Book our fall or winter (we haven't decided which) trip to France for our fifth anniversary celebration
-Finish my Invisalign treatment (eight months down, three to go!)
-Play tennis
-Attend one bluegrass festival (and sadly, not this one at Saddleback, as I have two weddings in two states that weekend)
-Make homemade ice cream (Completed on the eve of summer, when I made strawberry ice cream with berries we just picked at Maxwells in Cape Elizabeth)
-Make homemade ice cream sandwiches
-Take Kyle on a whale watch on the Maine coast (and we'd actually like to see a whale, thank you very much)
-Spend the night with Meg Simone in Blanca (that's her Sporty) (Completed on September 2-3 when Meg and I visited bride and groom Alison and Steven to catch up with them before their wedding weekend at Greystone Manor in Cape Neddick)
-Go for a 50-mile bike ride (Scheduled for October 3 - yes, I know not technically summer- when past brides Amy (5/2010) and Susan (12/2009) join me and another friend to make up the Whirling WINErs as we ride the 50 mile course of The Dempsey Challenge)
-Go to a Red Sox game
-Not get sunburned
-Take someone who hasn't been to Monhegan Island
-Learn how to kite board (I realize this will never happen but I wish it would)
-Get all my 2009 weddings up on the blog, finally (I know, pathetic, right!)
-Spend at least two nights every week dining at Chez Warren (that's our home and with our busy social schedules of late, two nights a week is a challenge for sure)
-Finally finish setting up my home office, and actually work in it rather than my current perch on the couch or kitchen table (hey, I like to stay close to the food)
-Find the perfect art for our living room walls on Etsy
-Consult a financial planner (any good recommendations?)
-Spend at least three nights camping at our favorite summer spot on Aziscohos Lake in the Rangeley Lakes Region (private beach, no cell service, firepit, an outhouse with tp and the most postcard perfect sunsets you've ever seen- what's not to love!)
-Get some really great images of Alder and Nikon and have them made into canvasses, like my friend Graham Yelton did here
-Spend at least one night camping somewhere we haven't stayed before (Kind of completed when I spent the night on Rippleffect's Cow Island in Casco Bay as part of the ICL Young Emerging Leaders Pilot Program launch. We slept in a yurt though, so not sure that's technically considered camping.)
-Catch one fish that impresses even Kyle

What are your summer plans and what Maine must-do's am I missing?


SWW WEBSITE | SWW ON FACEBOOK | SWW ON TWITTER | CONNECT WITH SWW

Published in Bangor Metro mag: Documenting Gulf Hagas

Last Labor Day, Kyle and I did just that. While much of the rest of the country BBQed and toasted the final day of wearing white and seersucker, we filled our water bottles, laced up our hiking boots and headed into the North Maine Woods so I could labor away on a photography and writing assignment for the summer guide of Bangor Metro magazine (which also publishes the highly helpful eye candy that is Real Maine Weddings magazine).

Hiking is hard enough (especially after photographing two Maine weddings the weekend before), but adding lugging gear and notepad and the responsibility to document all you see during the day resulted in more of a challenge than I expected. Of course, what really made it most difficult was that the place was so damn beautiful that I was easily distracted from the documentation I was there to do.

Gulf Hagas, located an hour or so northwest of Bangor, is often called the Grand Canyon of the East, and it is the totality of the forest it's located in – the Gulf Hagas Trail is in a tract encompassing 175,00 acres – and the falls – Screw Auger joins five others including The Jaws, Hammond Street Pitch, Buttermilk Falls, Billings Falls and Stair Falls – that draws visitors from great distances and ensures they'll be planning their return trip even before they leave, despite the remoteness and the moderate challenge of the hike. We were at the first falls for nearly an hour before we realized it, as the crashing water and the realization that it had burrowed through the bedrock persistently enough over the past ten thousands year to create this canyon (that at times is nearly 150 feet deep) was simply spellbinding.

As a photographer, what was most striking to me about Gulf Hagas was the quick contrasts between foot-pathway and waterway that make a visit such a worthy adventure for the senses, and a challenge to capture in camera. While sun streams through the proud pines trees that line the dry trail we walked in on, by the water's edge down at the fall's base, it was dark, dank and deafening. This dance between darkness and light pushed me throughout the day, and I'm honestly hopeful to one day return and put what I learned with this assignment --and the time I've had to reflect on it since-- to work. Another plus-side of this project- getting to better know the maven that is Melanie- the editor of the magazine, as well as Real Maine Weddings and Maine Ahead and just a fabulous firecracker of a friend.

Gulf Hagas is a classic case of what makes the state such a Cracker Jack box with fun surprise gifts around every corner, even for those who have lived here our whole lives (or in my case, for most of it). I invite you to read and see more of this special place in my story below, or by linking to the Bangor Metro Website here. You can also flip through and download the entire June issue of the magazine including the summer guide as a PDF here.

I was picked as one of the featured contributors to the issue, and they included the headshot of me taken by good friend and fellow AKC girl, Kara Purtell.


And, here's the story (bonus points if you can spot my hot husband)...





SWW WEBSITE | SWW ON FACEBOOK | SWW ON TWITTER | CONNECT WITH SWW