Trails of Hats'n Hospitalitea

This is going to wrap up one of the shortest Sea Glass Odyssey’s we have ever been on.  Our ventures landed us in Eastport Maine, quaint village with a lot of history.  I recently found out that the Port in Eastport was the second busiest port in all of USA’s.  I often wonder why Eastport attracts me to her quaint hometown and I can think non other than it is an Island as PEI, it has a port, fishing and potatoes are plenty and tourism is growing.  A 4th of July celebration becomes a destination for thousands of people arriving in the ports and coming from all around.

The car is set up with a portable table and I’m wire wrapping sea glass off the beaches of Prince Edward Island as we drive to our destination.  The off season days will jet by fast and soon it will be high season again,  so I try and  make use of times like driving in the car.

I had the opportunity to make a few friends on the short stay I had in Eastport. Memories were made and mustard was bought from a shop that will stand out in my mind.  Beachcombing was on the thoughts of others while I was thinking of having a fresh pretzel with homemade mustard and my choice was “Spring Maple”  good! yes it was.  I visited Raye’s Mustard Shop for the first time and sampled about 7 of 25 handmade mustard’s with White Lightning being their 25th flavour and Sweet and Spicy being my favourite.

I found myself returning the second day for a piece of sea glass that absolutely caught my eye and turned a few heads, yellow in colour and handmade by a man in town who no longer is, I had to have it and will wrap it again not for any other reason than it needs to be wrapped in silver to show it off.

A true gem of a B&B was found after I battled not to pay the high price of a motel in town.  After all the motel, keeping in mind this is off-season $120 a night and not only was the town on a boil water but there wasn’t breakfast in the morning not even continental breakfast was served.  I protested and I’m sure my company wasn’t happy with me but we ended up finding a B&B full of beautiful furniture, little simple touches that just showed the extra the hostess was going to to make everyone comfortable.  Being off season I had the opportunity to pop in and out of each room and check them out, nice and I have picked out the room I’ll take when I return.  Each room had a dish of sea glass in it of different colours and shapes.

 This must be a beachcomber right? Yes! it was and down to the kitchen I went for some conversation and to find out where we might head for seaglass.  We always return to the ferry dock each year and seems that is the place to go.

Surprised by the amount of bottles stoppers and bottle tops I took plenty of pictures.  Then sitting on the mantle piece were doll parts, something I have only read about.  Shipwrecks filled with dolls had gone down and with a storm and the right North wind will stir a doll part up to shore for someone to find.  I never found a doll part but I did find a pipe tip.  In the 1920′s when fishermen went out most often one carried a 8 1/2 inch pipe and smoked from it. When he was done he would brake off the tip and throw it overboard and the next person would use the pipe.

This is Sea Glass I met her while she was showing off in the sun.  I couldn’t help but to sit down and stroke her a couple of times and then she followed me everywhere.  No! she was a he and tom cat of the town, seems everywhere we went over the next two days we met up with sea glass.

This is our sea glass find.  I know your thinking what am I going to do with all this sea glass? I have big plans for this coloured glass.  I want to make a stand up fountain, pressing the glass into mortar and then attach copper pipe over the top and then hook the water up to it and have it flow over the top.  Have you ever seen wet sea glass? It shimmers like nothing else, when it dries it is salty and has white pucks in it from the PH of the water.

Last but not least is another scenery shot.  In fact when you look at it, it almost looks like it might not be real, but it was and I was there, made the memory and collected what the glory hole left behind.

Have you ever beachcombed? Do you have a secret spot?  I do, yup I’ve been all down the East Coast and PEI has the nicest sea glass to be found.  Don’t get me wrong I enjoyed my holiday but prefer Prince Edward Island beaches and glass.  Thanks for stopping by my Sea Glass Odessey, let me know you were by….cindy

We are at it again! Beachcombing.  Leaving as soon as the French Gardener gets out of bed.  I’d hate to wake him so early as he worked hard yesterday getting things done so he could come along on this Sea Glass Odyssey Adventure with me.  We have located a number of beaches to explore using the satellite  images of Google Maps and we have found some pretty places that we might be finding beach glass.

We are off to the many inlets of Maine on our annual sea glass adventure. We packed lightly so we could fit in a couple of good friends with us on this beach combing adventure.  Our first stop is going to be Bar Harbor where we rented a cottage for 4 nights and we plan to venture to Bar Island and the many inlets around searching for sea glass.  We set on day aside for us girls to shop so the fella’s are taking us to Freeport Maine to the Factory Outlets where we can spend the day, the only condition; we go on a rainy day when they can’t beachcomb.  I’ll be picking up supplies at “The Beading Path” so I can build crafts and seaglass pendants for our “Island Made” gift shop.  Charlene and I are set up in the back of the car with lap tables and we are wrapping the whole way down and every chance we get.

Thanks for stopping by and I’ll return as soon as I have some more beachcombing news, cindy

It’s no secret that Grandpa and I are torn between the things we love to do.  If only we could set up the Tea Room on the Beach we would be all set.  That won’t ever happen so we take a day here and there to enjoy the beach like the many who come to Prince Edward Island love to do.

We are the finders of Sea Glass, shards of glass found in their natural state along the shore that has been smoothed by the elements of nature tossing it back and forth until it reaches the hands of beachcombers like us.

Grandpa and I have traveled the many beaches of PEI and find sea glass to bring home, wash, sort and grade.  He gives me the job of grading, sometimes I feel like a teacher and the sea glass are all students.  If you have a love for the sea and a passion for sea glass they come together very quickly and you look for a day when the tide is right, the waters after a storm, the business is slow and then you are on the go to another new beach looking for sea glass. Often we have gone to a beach and not found anything, returned to that same beach and found sea glass.  ”Where do you find sea glass?” Remember! wherever there is water, there is a beach and people you will find sea glass.

It is off season for our Tea Room now and we are open times are by chance or appointment.  Yesterday we had 6 people come in for lunch at 2:30 pm and my daughter and I had started making mustard pickles (another blog) and so we couldn’t stop for lunch.

Today we have promised friend of ours that we would take them to a near by beach and show them how to pick sea glass.

So this is what I do with the sea glass we find on the shores of PEI.  The stuff we don’t use we have started putting back so others can enjoy the sea glass hunt.  Sometimes it feels like littering, however I excuse the guilt and call it re-cycled sea glass.

The Island Made Gift Shop saw a lot of beachcombers this year as we offered a small PEI experience of teaching others how to wrap their beach finds. You can bring your sea glass, shells, drift wood or other finds into the studio and I’ll teach you to wrap it to go.

I had fun seeing collections of sea glass and it gave me a chance to meet other beachcombers a like.

These 5 pieces were gifted to friends who didn’t get to PEI this year for a vacation.

This is it all wrapped up.

We travel to many parts of the Island looking for sea glass and sometimes we have great finds and other times it is a hit and miss.  When you go to a beach and don’t find anything that doesn’t mean it isn’t a good beach it could mean someone has picked it clean and you need a new tide to bring it in. We often return to a beach where we didn’t find anything and then found sea glass on the next venture out.

We have been to a few spots like Cousin’s Shore, Fernwood around Chelton Beach area, Savage Harbour, and Souris Ferry doc.  Take Cousin’s Shore, we never have found any sea glass the one time we were out and gave up on it.  Around July a lady came into the shop with three beautiful pieces she found on Cousin’s Shore and now we return there to hunt sea glass.

Good luck on your hunt, and remember stop in with your treasures and we will teach you to wrap it to go.

Grandma ~00~  , on Sea Glass

Yes, the name Sea Glass why? Because it is offered back from the sea.  Years ago we didn’t have plastic and so everything came in glass bottles or jars.  Beach Glass as many know it today is created by many shards of glass washed by the gentle rolling waves and can be found while walking all beaches, lakes, rivers, and inlets where people might have been in contact with water.  Years ago before the days of plastic, recycling and garbage pickup people disposed of garbage by burying it or throwing it into the ocean to have it disappear.

Last Fall after the Bed and Breakfast closed we took a road trip. Call it on the beach and only along the East Coast and make this a Sea / Beach Glass vacation.  We blogged about it daily and you can read about it if you search Google for Ma & Pa on a Beach Glass Vacation.

Today we revisit our sea glass collection and memories each time we walk into the studio. Collecting Sea Glass can be addictive and beach-combing is now a tradition however, beach glass is slowly becoming a thing of the past as we use more plastic then glass.

Our beach-combing  hobby started out in PEI were we think of the Beach Glass as exceptional compared to many that is being found. I dont’ think we are experts as we don’t propel down cliffs or swim to non inhabited Islands to find Sea Glass but we have spent the better part of 43 days on the Coast from PEI to the Outer Banks of North Carolina on a Sea Glass Vacation. Living out of the back of a Honda Element and making lunch a la tailgate.  It was a frugal vacation that cost a few trips to the grocery store and gas.

Our Sea Glass treasures are displayed on the wall of our gift shop. Where we have bottle Beach Glass from many of the locations we visited along our way.  We bagged and carefully tagged each bag and journaled about our finds and rated the beach on a 1 to 10 for quantity, quality and if we would return.  When we arrived home we washed and bottled the Sea Glass naming the outsides of each bottle.

I never claimed to be an artist but I tried my hand at painting and what better way than to use  a canvas the size of a wall in a room that you are trying to hid gridewall.  My non painting side of me sure came out, however I do like the East Coast I painted down the left side and the Lighthouse I painted on the other side of the wall.

One of my favourite places was Tilghman Island.  It was here that we found the most unusual looking yellow brain matter that floated up onto the beach, read Wikipedia on Osage-orange, Horse-apple, Bois D’Arc, or Bodark (Maclura pomifera).  We also found plenty of Sea Glass in this area.  We blogged about this yellow brain that floated ashore and people were following our Ma & Pa Sea Glass Vacation and emailed to me what this yellow brain was.  I also fell asleep that night and had the most vividest dream about this brain matter that fell from a brain tree that when touched you became smarter, there is more, really go read.  It is a seed, imagine that it is the size of a two softballs in diameter and apparently these are full in this type of tree and when they are ripe they fall from the tree and if near water will float until they come ashore.  Hum, and we found one.

The finished wall

Getting back to sea glass, the wall, and the East Coast.  This is what the wall looked like when I started to paint it and you can see the painting of the East Coast from PEI to the outer Banks of North Carolina on the wall.  Now when you visit you will be able to see the bottled sea glass from some of the beaches we visited.

Cool, my work is done! I labeled the bottles, filled them with glass then told the French Gardener where to hang each shelf (he made) and then I placed a bottle on the area it belonged, and after a debate about the exact location of some we got the job done.

And one last picture before I go.  I want to show you what I have done with the beach glass collected from Prince Edward Island.  I’ll have it wrapped ready to go! is what people say when they purchase a gift for someone.  Here at the shop I tell people that if they find it on the beach and it is reasonable size, bring it back and I’ll wrap it to go for you.  Here is a sample of my pendants that I wrapped in silver wire.

Do you wrap, bunch or fold?  Perhaps you are a scrapper rather than a wrapper, or maybe you are a hooker, and spend more time quilting these day?  Let me know what your interests and hobbies are, I’m always interested in what others have to do with their time and seeing how talented hobbyist are in their space is always fun.

xo, cindy

Work before play is our rule and so we hurried up and tossed about the yard, scurrying here and there and getting things moved around, taken out, picking up.  The work wasn’t done but we were due for a little time for us, quiet time, a time to reflect, and remember.  THE BEACH! here we come, we have beachcombers fever? I know your saying what’s that?  Well it is the thoughts or run ons your mind spends in between doing odd jobs that you daydream about what else you could be doing instead, and then you just do it.

Here is the beach

Here are the treasures

Cobalt Blue and diamond shaped as well

This is what becomes of the little sea treasures found on the beach

A day at the beach means Beach Combing to me not sun bathing.  What do you do at the beach? Are you a comber or a sitter?

Rain for the next 3 days, sugar.

cindy

Day 13- Oct 31st, Sunday…. almost caught up.

A short day as I don’t remember much I’m sleeping most of the day and the French Gardener is on the hunt.

We start out to the South side of Cape Cod and onto Falmouth.  We have heard fine things here and it proves to be right.

This evening we are close to Newport RI and will stay close to the beach.

We plan to fill a bag in Tiberton downtown Rhode Island.

Tomorrow it is going to be bittersweet with Carol and Rich.

Until then take care, we care.

x0,

cindy

The metal garden sign said to come explore more.  The French Gardener wasn’t about to get out of the truck and leave Dashboard Sally by herself, giving me free time to venture into the Garden by myself.  After a few pictures I knew I was in someones wonderland. This person must like welding, art, bending metal and shaping the world changing it one heated metal at a time. The sound coming from behind me sounded like a horrendous banging in time to a clock ticking,  dull but loud. Curious, I turned and walked forward in wonder of the constant slamming of a dull sledge that moved the ground under my feet in this pleasant garden of steel.

I read the words BAM BAM on the top of the hammering machine, blinking with every slam.  Standing in front of the sledging was the largest man I have ever met.  My presence casts a shadow on his work table and he yells as load as he is able to come in, should I?  I walked forward, he took off his welding glove and put out his hand and shook mine telling me his name was Andy. With the mitt removed his hand still the size of a baseball glove.

me, “how-do-you-do-Andy?”

Andy, “I’m a Scottish Blacksmith”

me, “You make all this?”

Andy, “Do I, come see inside”

Andy takes me deeper into the metal twisted mess, structures here, metal balls fall from the table as he presses by like a bull in a china shop, ya no.  Stopping in front of his proudest project, a set fireplace poker, brush, ash pan he is making for someones fireplace.  He sets one piece down while another falls to the floor, he demonstrates how he will assemble it after pushing about 80 pounds of metal across the table top to give me an idea. He is right it will be a fine work of art.

I met an interesting proud man today, he reminded me of my dad, riping at work, racing like a bull in a china shop, getting work done on a deadline.

Speaking of dad, I tried to call him collect today, all he had to say was “yes” to I’ll except the charges. Instead he said “Cindy, ya operator I’ll except the charges, hello, hello Cindy as the automated operator says for the third time, “A collect call from Cindy, do you except the charges?”  I didn’t get talking to him because he doesn’t understand modern technology, I’ll have to try him tomorrow because he still thinks I’m on the phone and he hasn’t hung up and one hour has already passed. I’ll try him again tomorrow, I sure do miss the giant of a dad I once remembered looking up to.

I hope you enjoy the next burst of photo bliss, more beaches, harbors, ports and pumpkins, with some interesting shops and fine art.

Until Day -6

x0,

cindy

We’re home and we have taken down our “gone fishing” sign and put the open sign back up.  It was great to take a few days off.  Wonderful exploring yesterday and great finds on the beach.

A Pepsi Cola shard of glass dated back to 1940′s

White Shards

Brown Shards

Onto exploring, we came across an estate in Singing Sands and we ventured to the ocean.

The road went down a steep hill. At the bottom was a forest with a path leading to the edge of a cliff.  We went over the cliff and scaled the embankment looking for beach glass. The beach went on for miles and we marked our spot to climb back up to the car.

Off to the wind farm at East Point we go but first we come across some busy bees baking in the sun.

These bees are cooling off the box.

Don’t they look awesome?  It reminds me of when dad use to be a bee keeper. Here these bee boxes were and I moved in for a closer look.

While I’m getting closer…

The French Gardener, “Come on they are getting agitated.”

Me, “No, they are just coming back to the hive.”

The French Gardener, “You left the car door open and they think the car is a hive.”

Me, “Oh, how many are in the car? I just want to get a couple more pictures, you’ll be fine.”

They sure are busy, I’d love to open the lid and scoop out some honey and chew on the wax for awhile.

The  French Gardener, “Have you seen enough yet?”

Me, “I’m coming, grumble, grumble, spoil my.”

_____________________

When I turn back to the truck I see the sky in the window of the Honda, it looks fantastic.

ONto the Wind Mill Farm

These are V-90 Wind Turbines, I watched truck after truck the day they came across the bridge and up to East Point to deliver them they are ginormous.

And now home to wash our treasures and sort the sea glass into separate piles and sizes.

Sorry they are blurry.

White sea glass

And Brown sea glass.

Here is a new pendent I made with the sea glass today.

Thanks for stopping by,

xo,

cindy

We hurried up and got breakfast underway, clean two rooms and headed out to the beach.  We got glass, we got glass and here is a little bit to share with you.

Seeing it is Labour Day today we figured we had better labour to the beach again, perhaps I’ll post a find later.  Sorry to leave you like this but I got to go to the beach.  I hung a “gone fishing” sign on the door as PFA’s would understand you taking a day off to go fishing.

See you soon,

xo,

cindy

Friday’s FAVe Five

Walk with us for awhile and join in each week as Susanne has introduced us to focus on reflecting five favourite things, be them large or small, blessings obvious and gratefulness we dug into our hearts to share with others.

FFF#11- I think

1. Deadlines have a way of making things happen. Yes, I fell behind all kinds of deadlines this week, and put everything on hold while my brother and his family visited ( it was worth it).  Then this week I had 7 deadlines to meet and as I said deadlines have a way of making things happen, I met them all Wwwwohhhooooooo.

2. Sea Glass found on the Beaches of PEI. You know what that means, yup yesterday was Thursday and it was my turn to pick the place, the thing, the do, and lunch.  We went to the Beach, set up and had a picnic lunch, picked sea glass, visited Terri at Fire and Water, then ate fish and chips at Rick’s in St. Peter’s. Yum

(photo at bottom)

3. I miss my brother. I was thinking of him today, while I was at the same beach that we went picking sea glass together at.  I’m glad we had a visit.

(Photo at bottom)

4. Frugal never felt so good. I have been named the Queen of Frugality! Ya that is a big one.  Imagine what the name tag would look like.  This week I was frugal in every way, come have a look at my frugal flip flops.

5. Side by side with My French Gardener. We played side by side yesterday and today we will work side by side.  We have a hurricane on the way, notification has put us on alert with emergency services.  We will pick up the yard, tie up lawn chairs, take our business sign down, fill water canisters, put candles in each of the B&B rooms, make sure the lanterns are full, and pray the power is only out a short time.  We have 8 guests in the B&B tonight and for the next couple of days. I wish everyone well and I hope I’m back in service on Monday to tell about the storm. Happy weekend everyone.

Sea Glass

Walking Beach

Missing my Brother

This has been my FFF. For more Friday’s Favourite Five, visit Suzanne at Living To Tell The Story.

xo,

cindy