I had a birthday recently… though I swore I was done with all that aging nonsense, the years still keep coming …. and woke up to find these in the kitchen.
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Bless his heart, my husband does try.
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Two boxes of fat bomb truffles even though he knows I’ve been trying to cut back on sugar.
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And no, he didn’t buy me the usual unwanted expensive small appliance this year, but I did get a marble and river rock spoon rest… complete with spoon.
🥴
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And though I really wish he wouldn’t, he bought me jewelry. A rather odd silver bracelet with attached rock.
Now, I do love me some rocks…. but I have a feeling this particular one will be quietly exchanged.
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But there was a pretty flower arrangement delivered later in the day…
I love a good museum, and the fact that this one was a complete surprise made it all the more special.
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The Hudson at the University of Maine, Orono is billed as a Native American/Anthropology museum and features an impressive collection from indigenous people all around the world.
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I fell in love with Kachinas when we visited Arizona in 2019.
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They’re marvelous!
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Seriously, what’s not to love?
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For a small museum, the Hudson has some wonderful pieces.
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Both ancient and modern.
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Have you ever heard of a potlatch?
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I hadn’t either, but I really liked the whale in the back.
I saw an advertisement for a Native American gathering and craft show last week, so we headed north to Orono.
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Passing through Bangor we saw Paul Bunyan.
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And some lovely churches.
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On the way to our University of Maine destination.
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Which, with its giant blue M, was hard to miss .
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The Collins Center for the Arts was the venue and never having attended this yearly event, I wasn’t sure what to expect.
The Wabanaki Confederacy (Waponahki) — translated as “People of the First Light” or “Dawnland” — currently comprises five principal nations: the Mi’kmaq, Maliseet, Passamaquoddy, Penobscot, and Abenaki.
There were some fabulous crafts on sale made by various artists but instead of the arena like setting I was expecting, they were set up in a curved hallway which made navigation a problem.
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Jewelry, textiles, root clubs, beading, woodworking, and birch bark items were all on display … but honestly? It was all about the baskets.
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Fabulously intricate pieces of art which went for extremely high prices. I would have photographed more, but almost every table prohibited it.
I really wanted to come home with one, but after picking up a tiny little jewel that fit in the palm of my hand and seeing the $600 price tag… I didn’t.
I also fell in love with an amazing root club carved with a bear head that would have been perfect for the Man Cave/Barn Mahal… but again, with an almost $600 price tag, I came home without that as well.
After oohing and ahhing over the crafts, we looked up.
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And realized there was something interesting on the second floor.
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Aside from the giant bronze and copper fire.
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As we climbed past the totem pole…
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We discovered there was an entire museum upstairs.
Well, I’m not yet. But it looks like I’m going to be because every single furniture store I’ve shopped is dedicated to that color.
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I’m looking for two couches, a chair and an ottoman in this hardback, rolled arm style. The couches will be solid, the chair and pillows a coordinating pattern.
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All the floor samples are beige, which is fine… it’s not like I want neon orange. But the decided lack of color in the fabric choices is driving me batty.
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The fabrics are pretty…
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But I swear they’re all blue and grey.
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Everywhere.
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At every store.
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My kitchen and breakfast nook are blue and grey.
My den is blue and beige.
My spare bathroom is blue and grey.
Which is why my living room has always been green.
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But it looks like that’s not happening this time around.
The year was 2015 and it was my first Christmas without my mother. I’m an only child, my father died when I was 15. Losing my mother hit me hard and I was feeling unhinged. Alone. And not at all in the holiday spirit. Decorating the house and hosting my husband’s ungrateful family was more than I could bear…. so I went to a travel agency, told them how much I wanted to spend and asked them to find me something interesting within driving distance.
Which is how we ended up spending Christmas week in the Pocono mountains of Pennsylvania.
We generally like our accommodations out of the way and quiet… and brother, that’s just what we got.
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Welcome to the Pocono Manor Resort. A massive, secluded, surrounded by mountains and rolling hills, giant stone edifice I won’t ever forget.
It was dark and overcast when we arrived. Mountain fog surrounded the grounds and the silence was eerie. No cars in the parking lot, one dim light by the front entrance.
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And while the interior was fully lit and beautifully decorated…
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It was as silent as a tomb.
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A very large tomb.
Built on 3,000 acres in 1902 as a summer vacation residence for wealthy New Yorkers, families lived here for months with no reason to leave. Boasting an 18 hole golf course, tennis courts, a full spa, riding stables, fly fishing pond, indoor and outdoor pools, multiple restaurants, game rooms, library, theater, and it’s very own post office with private zip code… it was a world unto itself.
And when we visited December of 2015?
We literally had the entire building to ourselves.
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No, I’m not kidding. For the first 5 days of our week long stay it was just us … and every time I walked down this hall to our room? I expected to see the twins on tricycles because we were staying at the Poconos version of the Overlook Hotel.
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Yes, there was staff.
Ghostly staff, because you hardly ever saw them.
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We wandered room after room and never encountered a soul.
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Every morning we had breakfast alone, in a room that probably seated 600.
Creepy?
You could say that.
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We sat alone in the theater…
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And watched It’s A Wonderful Life.
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Hoping the lights would come back on when we were through.
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Long, endless, empty hallways with only the sounds of our footsteps for company.
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Ho! Ho! Holy Hell it was bizarre.
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It was a place frozen in time, although it had just undergone a 5 million dollar renovation.
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I never did manage to get a photo of the entire place…
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You couldn’t really, it was too big.
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But it was definitely a magical and quirky way to spend the holiday.
Sadly this amazing place caught fire and sustained substantial damage in 2019.
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(not my pictures)
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It’s been closed since then with various plans to rebuild.
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Horror of all horrors? The latest developer to be interested is the Margaritaville Corporation who want to build a village of tacky housing.
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They say they will “honor the memory” of the Manor but I don’t think plastic palm trees are going to cut it.
😰
Now it’s your turn.
Share a happy, funny or strange Christmas memory with me.
Have you ever seen something that was simply too perfect?
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Okay, so it’s not a pear tree. But a partridge on your Christmas wreath is pretty damn close.
We had one of those beauties on our front lawn a few years ago.
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I had no idea what it was and had to look him up in my bird watchers bible.
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Native to the Middle East and southern Asia, the Chukar was brought as a game bird to North America, where it has thrived in some arid regions of the west. From late summer to early spring, Chukars travel in coveys, but they may be hard to see as they range through the brush of steep desert canyons. They become more conspicuous in spring, when the harsh cackling chuk chuk chukar of the territorial males echoes from the rocky cliffs.
They’re noisy little devils and if you’ve ever heard one… you’re not apt to forget it.
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Where there's only one step from the sublime to the ridiculous.
River's world..... 