I decided to do this series because of Valentine’s Day so I thought it would be nice to do a romance this month.

Vampire Knight is a popular shojo manga ( a style of romance manga typically aimed towards females ) published by Shojo Beat in 2004.

From road rage to political discourse, in today’s society the rise of incivility, both online and in person, has become the new norm, leaving many wondering, is basic courtesy, respect and kindness a thing of the past? In a poll released in 2016, nearly 70 percent of Americans felt political incivility has reached crisis levels.

Maybe we’re a little more insulated from it in Maine, where largely, the unspoken appeal of living here is the civility of most people.

It surprises folks visiting from away how welcoming people here are, whether it’s getting a “hello” from strangers on the street or engaging in pleasant transactions with those behind the counter.

Last year The National Institute of Civil Discourse even chose Maine among four states to work on a project that helps citizens revive civility with in-person “Civility Kick-Off” events.

That said, we’re human and we can all let a bad moment or a bad day get to us. Summer or leaf-peeping traffic and road rage is always a problem. Tensions and spats break out on social media quite frequently and even in our small towns, rude encounters can plague one’s day.

In recent weeks, Midcoast Message Board, the virtual water cooler for some 22,000 members locally, has cropped up with posts of random acts of kindness.

“Went to get a movie from Redbox for tonight, and $4 and this note was inside my case!” wrote Brittany Louise, of Morrill. The note tucked inside the DVD cover read: “Snacks on me—enjoy!”

“Swear To God, only in Maine,” wrote one commenter to the post, which received 42 shares.

“Will definitely be paying it forward,” wrote Louise.

“Paying it forward”—responding to someone's kindness by doing a good deed for someone else—is an old concept; but, with the Redbox example, it took on a new technological twist. (For those who have never rented a movie through Redbox; it is a big red kiosk outside most grocery stores. With payment from a credit or debit card, you receive a DVD of your choice of a movie within a plastic case. Here is an easy tutorial).

Those movies, when returned in the slot, will sit in the kiosk until the next person rents them. It’s easy to stick a couple of bucks inside the plastic sleeve and a note, knowing that a local person will benefit from that kind gesture. 97ZOK Radio even did a short video showing how to do it.

Without anyone making a big deal of it, the ”pay it forward” concept in the Midcoast continues to get traction in a variety of ways. Other random acts of kindness reported on Midcoast Message Board included people returning wallets to stores that they’d found in shopping carts in the parking lot; strangers paying for coffee or donuts ahead in the drive-through lane, so that the next person to drive up gets a free treat, and paying for someone’s lunch and then leaving the restaurant without letting him or her know.

Here are five “pay it forward” ways to keep your Karma golden and revive the civility (not just in yourself) but in the fabric of this entire community.

1. If after leaning on the horn, frustrated with a slow driver in front of you and flipping him or her the bird—

The next time you’re at a toll booth, pay the toll of the person behind you.

2. If leaving a particularly nasty review on Yelp about a local restaurant you were disappointed with—

Delete the review and the next time you have exemplary customer service somewhere, make sure you make a point of telling that person’s manager.

3. If catching yourself making a derogatory comment about someone’s looks—

Write a positive note and stick it in the pocket of a pair of jeans in a department or thrift store.

4. If you’ve ever grumbled about being in a long line when you were in a hurry—

Let someone go in front of you in the grocery line who may have as many items as you, but looks in a hurry.

5. If you ever denigrated someone’s opinion online in a heated or politically charged conversation—

Delete your post. And if you see someone who waits on you frequently (i.e. at the post office, convenience store, or grocery store) make a point of learning that person’s name and using it the next time.

If reviving civility means paying attention to our own negative daily behaviors and correcting them or paying them forward, it goes a long way toward keeping our Maine communities evolved while the world changes around us.

Ideas courtesy RandomActsofKindness.org

 Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

CAMDEN—With Christmas and the holiday season come and go, there is still one other special day in every child’s life—a birthday.

Richard and Kit Aroneau, owners of the toy store Planet Toys in Camden, have long been supporters of the Knox County Homeless Coalition’s "Adopt-a-Family for the Holidays" program, which, thanks to the generosity of the community, gave nearly 90 families received presents, clothes and necessary items this year.

“We have worked with the Aroneaus for years and they’ve always donated gift baskets and toys for our programs, but we got talking about the idea of birthdays and how it’s such an important occasion for kids,” said Volunteer Coordinator Ev Donnelly. “Though everyone has a birthday, not everyone gets a birthday present. And it would really be nice to have something for them year round.”

With the Aroneaus’ donation, 20 families will receive a gift certificate of $25 to spend on a child’s birthday at Planet Toys. Already, one young woman visited planet Toys to buy a gift for her one-year-old baby.

“They don’t just have toys at Planet; they’ve got clothes, books, electronics and games,” said Donnelly. “So, some of our families with a child’s birthdays coming up can take their child into the Planet and select  something really nice that they might not have been able to afford.”

Donnelly said the gift certificates are for their clients and will be issued on a first-come, first-served basis, but that they may stagger the gift certificates out throughout the year. “We also have some funding left over from Adopt-a-Family for the Holidays program that we put towards birthdays, so if one of our clients is really in a pinch and wants something special for a child’s birthday, we’re open to helping out,” she said.

Richard Aroneau said: "The great Jewish philosopher Martin Buber wrote ‘Every time a child is born it’s as if the first child was born’. In other words, every life is unique and miraculous.  That’s why birthdays are so special and why it’s so vitally important that every child’s birthday be recognized and celebrated with joy.  At Planet, we’re excited to be able to play a role in helping to create that magic.”

 Planet Toys will be closed for winter break the whole month of March.

To find out more about how you can make a difference with those who are homeless in our area, contact the Knox County Homeless Coalition at 207-593-8151 or info@homehelphope.org.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKPORT—Swinging back up to Maine once again, the Banff Film Festival’s World Tour is coming to Camden Hills High School Strom Auditorium in Rockport February 9 and 10.

For the last 18 years, Maine Sport has hosted this annual event, which showcases short films on mountain sports, adventure and the environment. Moore than 22 films will be shown over the course of the two nights.

The lineup this year is exciting, as always. Jeff Boggs, manager and buyer for Maine Sport Outfitters, said, “We're traveling to Mont Blanc, Nepal, West Virginia, Iceland, Greenland, Faroe Islands and Norway this year in some films. We’re also going on an epic trip to Greenland, traveling over glaciers using kite skis to haul the gear and kayaks.”

As someone who is heavily involved in bringing the festival back to Camden every year, Boggs noted that there were several films in the line up that were getting some buzz.

On Friday, breakout films are sure to include:

Loved By All – The Story of Apa Sherpa (14 minutes)

Apa Sherpa has climbed Mount Everest 21 times, more than any other human. But he wouldn’t wish this upon anybody. Having grown up in the remote Khumbu region of Nepal, Apa was forced to leave school and work as a porter at the age of 12. His dreams of being a doctor forever lost. It is a story all too common for the Sherpa people of Nepal, a story Apa aims to change with his work at the Apa Sherpa Foundation.

And another one that will thrill the ladies in the audience:

Where The Wild Things Play (4-minute short)

Friday night at the local watering hole and … where the ladies at? Answer: BASE jumping from high desert cliffs, performing tricks on slacklines, climbing granite routes, shredding singletrack, skiing backcountry lines and generally leaving you fellas behind. This rowdy ode to female athletes by Krystle Wright leaves no doubt about the state of women in today’s outdoor world: badass.

And to circle back to what Boggs was referring to about kite skiing:

Into Twin Galaxies: A Greenland Epic (52 minutes)

Three National Geographic Adventurers of the Year embark on an unreal ski and kayak mission across Greenland. Using kite skis, they tow their whitewater kayaks over 1,000km of the Greenland ice sheet to reach the most northern river ever paddled.

And on Saturday night, a film that will warm your heart is:

Edges (9 minutes)

Tragically, she passed away two days after the release of this film, but 90-year-old skater, Yvonne Dowlen was still ice skating at least five days a week. She rose to fame as an Ice Capades star and never officially retired from competitive figure skating. This short film about Yvonne, Edges, is a celebration of the longevity of life and resilience of the human spirit.

To see each night’s lineup visit: Maine Sport movie presentations

Each night’s show begins at 7 p.m. and features a different slate of films. Online ticket sales have closed. Tickets are still available at our Rockport and Camden locations, over the phone and depending on availability, at the door. Adults: $10 when purchased in-store, $12 at the door, Students: $5 per show. Call (207) 236-7120 for more info.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

HOPE—Meghan Vigeant, an oral historian and writer, has made the art of telling a story her life’s work. After 12 years of producing audio narratives and books for private clients, organizations, and public radio, she has just formed a new workshop to be held at Sweet Tree Arts called “Storytelling 101.”

“I’ve always been fascinated by storytelling in general, but the type of stories told before an audience, true personal stories, sort of like The Moth story slams, is a form that really appeals to me,” she said. “Also, I used to work as a professional actor and there is a certain magic that happens between the people on stage and the people in the audience. I want to share that magic, get people to go beyond their fears, get them excited to stand up and share a little gem from their world.”

The Moth, whose tagline is "True Stories Told Live," holds live storytelling events all over the country and plays many of them on their podcast and on NPR.

The format of oral storytelling is one of the oldest forms of entertainment and education, but what makes story slams like The Moth so compelling is that they are contemporary stories covering a great range of human experience.

However, the art of storytelling may not come easily to everyone.  It’s one thing when Uncle Joe has a rapt audience among his family members around kitchen table, but it can be quite another situation when Joe has to stand on stage in front of a large audience, many of whom he doesn’t know. Even a fantastic storyteller can get tripped up by the unfamiliar element of public speaking and a great story can go flat.

“There are a lot of aspects to shaping up and polishing a really good story before going in front of an audience,” said Vigeant. “Memory of the details, of course, is just one element. Some people are unsure of how to begin and how to wrap it up. Then, there’s choosing what to put in, what to take out, how to hone it for say, a five-minute slot — all of these are skills that can be learned and practiced. It’s very similar to what a writer experiences: setting the story up, building trust with the audience, and telling a story in a way that feels natural.” 

The Moth offers its own Storytelling Tips. On its page, The Moth offer an interesting list of Story Slam “Don’ts” — those pitfalls storytellers have gotten themselves into on stage. For example, consulting one’s notes up on stage is not allowed in a story slam environment. That said, the storyteller shouldn’t feel he is at a deposition and has to memorize every line. There is a natural rhythm to each story. And there needs to be “stakes” in live storytelling; that is, the storyteller has to have something to gain or lose within the story. 

“The topics people pick are often very personal,” explained Vigeant. “The stories have to be true, but, the kind of story that’s universal–the ‘we’ve all been there’ kind of story’, whether it’s embarrassing, funny, heartbreaking, or vulnerable — that’s the kind of story that really resonates with an audience."

Vigeant’s four-week workshop, “Storytelling 101” goes from Feb. 21 to March 14 at Sweet Tree Arts in Hope.

“The class will perform their stories during the last class for an audience of family and friends, and, if they chose as a group to open it up, we may invite the public as well."

For more information visit: Stories To Tell

Kay Stephens can be reached atnews@penbaypilot.com

Actress/comedian Amy Poehler first coined the term “Galentine’s Day” in a 2010 Parks and Recreation episode as a way to celebrate one’s girlfriends on the most manufactured holiday of the year that sweet occasion known as Valentine’s Day — so move over Hallmark, Tiffany’s and 1-800-Flowers, we’ve got some locally made gifts (all handmade by women) to show your girlfriends you love them!

Messy Bun Hat

by Whitney Brown Designs

The back story: Whitney Brown, once a skating queen in the Midcoast Rock Coast Rollers, moved to Vinalhaven with her husband, a lobsterman, and has adjusted from mainland to island living. A mother of two boys, she knits in her spare time and just set up an Etsy shop.

“I love spending cold afternoons cuddled up with my kids and making things with yarn,” she said. “I've made so many things that I've run out of people in my family to gift to and have started placing my creations on Etsy and sharing them with anyone interested. The messy bun hat is super fun right now because it's chunky and warm, and it lets you keep your hair up while your outside freezing your butt off. This Messy Bun hat is perfect for the bestie who doesn’t feel like showering or arranging her locks just to go out for a cup of coffee.”

Where to find it/price range:

$30 online 

Last thing: If you love the concept of this and knit yourself, there are multiple free patterns that can be found here–including a Princess Leia bun hat. 

Allen’s Coffee Brandy Pin

by Maggie Blue Creative

The back story: Artist Maggi Blue started her career with hand-dyed fiber and fabrics and morphed into fused glass and metalwork and has been expanding her skills and products ever since.

“This sweet coffee liqueur is known by many names (my favorite being ‘the Champagne of Maine’) and is the state’s most popular brand of liquor,” she said. “In fact, it dominates the liquor market. Love it or hate it, it is iconic Maine through and through.”

Where to find it/price range:

$10 online

Last thing: “Wear this pin to show your love of this popular spirit—the amount of irony you choose to ascribe to it is totally up to you.”

Shower Shots

by Dulse & Rugosa

The back story: This mother-and-daughter team of Claire and Carly Weinberg started in 2012. They wild-harvest or grow their botanicals and seaweeds on Gotts Island, a tiny island off the coast of Acadia National Park in Maine and set up their production facility on Rockland. Shower Shots turn an everyday shower into a wonderful aromatherapy journey.  Made in jello shots molds, scented with healing essential oils and beautiful herbs and flowers hand picked on their Maine island farm, shower shots make for one sweet shower. 

Where to find it/price range:

$3 per shot or $18 for a six-pack online

Last thing: f you had a rough night after celebrating with your Allen’s Coffee Brandy pin, we recommend the Hangover Cure:   An essential oil blend to help with head and tummy aches including Lemon, Grapefruit, Cedarwood, Juniper and Lavender.

Nasty Woman or Snowflake Lip Balm

by Long Winter Soap Company

The back story: Whatever your politics, this Waldoboro studio and shop has a handmade lip balm for you. Started by Amanda Nolan (with one of the cheekiest websites in Maine) this Etsy store became a brick and mortar store in 2017. What’s in Nasty Woman lip balm?

“For all those times some ******* keeps interrupting you and you nearly bite through your lip,” said Nolan. “We flavored it with coffee and walnut, because we suddenly and inexplicably were in the mood for pairing nuts and scalding hot coffee.”

For Snowflake lip balm: “Here in Maine, we're familiar with the power of snowflakes. When assembled towards a common goal they'll change the course of your whole day, and sometimes even history. We flavored this snowflake with hot chocolate and brandy so you can be extra prepared for the next avalanche”

Where to find it/price range:

$5 per lip balm online or visit the store at 11 Friendship Street in Waldoboro.

Last thing: Not only is this a cool shop, but they also serve as a satellite adoption location for the kitties of Pope Memorial Humane Society. You can read about their adoption process here.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKLAND — Tucked away within Rockland's Industrial Park sits an unassuming white building with an attached 3,000-square-foot warehouse packed with natural and wooden toys. It's like Santa's workshop in there with rows of industrial shelves holding toys, books, music, board games, and boxes of wooden play kits.

Bella Luna Toys is owner Sarah Baldwin's dream job. At age 50, Baldwin, a Waldorf educator, decided after 15 years of teaching that she wanted to put her energies into a new direction and in 2009, began selling toys and games online, designed to encourage imaginative play and enhance children's learning.

Like many a Maine entrepreneur, Baldwin started off small, with a website and a stock of 100 natural toys, operating out of her small garage at home. Today, she runs a company with an inventory of approximately 2,000 toys and games, books and music, arts and crafts, and dolls, and ships to customers around the globe with the help of 10 employees.

Baldwin explained how it all started.

"Bella Luna Toys began in 2001 as a small, home-based business in California,” she said. “The young mother who founded the website had her hands full with young children at home and wanted to sell the business after the economic downturn in 2008. With my kids in high school, it was a perfect time in my life to devote my energy to it, so I bought the name, the website, and the small amount of remaining inventory and had it shipped to Maine."

In the last eight years, Baldwin's little toy company has become a huge success. Bella Luna Toys ships to customers across the U.S. as well as internationally. This past holiday season, Baldwin and her staff were working seven days a week to keep up with all of the orders.

The entrance of the building houses a small showroom, so that local people can enter, take their kids, and touch and play with the toys.

"We also invite them to shop our warehouse shelves in order to see our entire collection,” she said. “We love to help them find just what they're looking for. Some people have described us as 'Rockland's best kept secret.'"

Baldwin, who never had any formal business training, credits her passion for her products—as well as help from a business coach—for her success.

"I was never interested in a career in sales, but I am so passionate about these toys, having used many of them in my classroom and at home with my own two children for years that it didn't feel like selling,” she said. “It felt like doing what I loved."

Bella Luna Toys is now the number one search result on Google for "Wooden Toys"—ranking above much bigger and well-known companies such as Toys 'R' Us and Melissa and Doug.

Her business acumen and risk-taking style propelled her to acquire another online toy business, Oompa Toys in 2015. Much like Bella Luna Toys, Oompa ranks on Google’s first page on popular searches for wooden and natural toys and offers many products sourced from Europe that are hard to find in the U.S.

Baldwin sources from more than 100 different vendors and artisans, importing toys from all over the world to her Rockland warehouse. She is always on the lookout for toys made in Maine and New England and offers playthings made by a number of local craftspeople. Many of the toys complement one another. For example: Bella Luna Toys offers books on fairy tales, such as Grimm's Fairy Tales, classic stories and mythology that go hand in hand with their Camelot knight, wizard and dragon puppets.

There's also a Velveteen Rabbit Plush Toy handmade in Europe, with soft cotton velveteen, filled with wool stuffing to resemble the rabbit in the original edition of The Velveteen Rabbit, the classic children's book by Margery Williams, which Bella Luna Toys also carries.

This past week, Baldwin launched a third website to complement her two toy businesses called The Waldorf Shop (waldorfshop.net), a directory of resources related to Waldorf education.

"The Waldorf Shop lists toy sellers, schools, books, teacher training programs, home schooling resources and more," she said. "I knew when I started this business, I wanted to do more than just sell things—I wanted to promote my love of Waldorf education,” she said. “I love introducing parents of babies and young children to toys that are healthy and engage a child's imagination. Waldorf educators like myself believe that imaginative play in early childhood is essential to creative thinking later in life. Studies have shown that children who spend the most time engaged in free and creative play in early childhood grow up to be the innovators and problem-solvers later in life. Our mission is to help raise future generations of creative thinkers through the power of imaginative play."

To learn more about Bella Luna Toys and their Rockland shop, visit: www.bellalunatoys.com

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKLAND — In February, the winter seems to stretch on. But photographer and film artist Jason Elon Goodman is not one to hibernate. “I know for a lot of people this time of the year is kind of isolating, but I can’t sit still,” he said.

Currently traveling on assignment in Mexico, he said by telephone, “I travel a lot for work and when you look at all of these ancient ruins and the hieroglyphics, it’s all pictures of people eating, drinking, dancing and playing music and that’s how I like to set up my events.”

Goodman hosts periodic artistic/musical events called Salt Stage Live, which are akin to vérité or modern Vaudeville. On Feb. 2, Goodman is bringing a good friend and Grammy winner Stephane Wremble and his band up from their tour to play one night at FOG Bar and Café with contortionist/acrobat Jessica Jones as a side act.

Wremble plays in the style of Django Reinhardt, who was one of the best Gypsy jazz musicians in the 20th century. Wrembel, who learned his craft among the Gypsies at campsites in the French countryside, plays what Goodman calls, “That 1930s Paris hot club sound.” 

“Stephane and I are old friends,” said Goodman.” I was in his band doing video and photography as we toured different parts of the world. I asked him to come play in Rockland. Normally, he probably wouldn’t come up any farther than Portland as we’re really not a thoroughfare up here, so this is going to be a special night. I consider him among a handful of the greatest Django Reinhardt-infused musicians in the world.” 

Wremble will be performing new original songs from his just-released album The Django Experiment III, which marks the 108th anniversary of the birth of Reinhardt. Rolling Stone Magazine has called him “a revelation.”

Salt Stage Live is known for incorporating circus arts in between acts. “Jessica Jones is from Circus Maine out of Portland and is new to the roster,” he said. “I really like her portfolio as she has trained with some serious European circus masters. There are so many people doing great music events here, but I try to do something a little different with each show. I want to create two nights this February to remember with the entertainment, the food and the drink.”

FOG Bar and Café will be crafting a special menus and specialty cocktails around the evening’s theme.

The following Friday, Feb. 9, Salt Stage Live and FOG will team up once again to host Roots musician and songwriter Joe K. Walsh and Grammy-nominated performer and songwriter Celia Woodsmith, along with Jessica Jones, once again.

For more information or to purchase tickets visit: Salt Stage Live

CAMDEN—Quilting as an art form needs an image overhaul. Most people associate quilting with dusty, old bed covers made by somebody’s grandmother. But, Carrie Connors of Camden joins a national society of quilt artists who use contemporary quilting techniques to create art.

Her artwork, which is rich in imagery, and features many of her original poems, hangs at Zoot Coffee Shop in Camden until the end of this month. She works from a largely neutral palette in many of her pieces, some tonal in black and white. Other pieces are washed in soft blues and reds and symbolic of both nature and women. Each piece is made of up three layers. There is a back layer, the cotton batting middle layer sandwiched in between and the top layer, which is a mixed media collage of shapes sewn together.

Quilt art is sewn intuitively, so there is not much room to make any mistakes.

“Some people have sewing machines that are computer programmed to make specific lines, but I do all the detail by free hand,” said Connors. “If I do make a mistake, I end up ripping stitches out, but I try not to do that if I can help it. Often, I’ll just go a different direction with it using another layer.”

Given that her mother and grandmother both sew, Connors was destined to discover this art form.

“When I was about to have my third child in 2004, my mom got me a sewing machine and helped me make a little baby quilt for my son,” she said. “By then I was hooked.”

A year after that, Connors attended a quilting retreat in Waterville Valley in New Hampshire with her mother. There, she discovered that quilting wasn’t just for bedspreads; there was a whole community making quilt art as wall hangings. 

“I was so inspired by the work that was there,” she said. “I’d also done a little writing and drawing before, but once I saw this medium, I said, ‘Oh, this is it.’”

Working with fabric, and incorporating her poetry into it, became her new passion.

At first, Connors emulated the style of her mentors and worked out how to freehand “draw” with the sewing machine stitches, making fabric reproductions of paintings by Vincent Van Gogh and painter Gustav Klimt’s The Kiss, until she found her own style.

“After that first initial retreat, I went back several years in a row and since 2010, I’ve taken over the yearly workshop from the women who started it and now run it myself.”

Her inspiration often comes in waves—and at odd hours.

“Sometimes, after putting my kids to bed, I’ll go to my studio and sew into the middle of the night,” she said. “I work in creative waves and when I am in one, I will find any way to make my art.”

Connors has shown her artwork in libraries, local businesses and juried shows around New England and won several awards for her pieces. A mother of five, Connors, works several part time jobs in addition to her quilt art to make a living, but hopes to do this full time. When the artwork comes down at Zoot on January 31, those that haven’t been sold will go right back on her walls until the next show.

On Feb. 26, Connors will be teaching a class on Quilt Art through Five Town Adult & Community Education. For more information on Quilters Getaway Weekends visit: Getaway Weekend.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

BELFAST — On February 1, The owners of the “witchy” oddities shop Alder & Vine will team up with the restaurant Ondine Oyster & Wine Bar for a special “Sonic Supper” to celebrate the night that lies between winter and spring solstices known as Imbolc Sabbat —a wiccan/pagan holiday.

Imbolc, in Irish Gaelic, is called “Oimelc,” which means “ewe’s milk.” It’s a time when agricultural societies anticipated spring lambing and were looking forward to the planting season.

Heather Q. co-owner of Alder & Vine said: “We’ve been celebrating these solstice events at our farm for the last few years, but this is the first event we’re doing by pairing up with a restaurant, where my husband Jason is one of the chefs. It’s a way to celebrate ‘coming into the light’ with candles and fire.”

There are multiple interpretations of Imbolc.

“This particular holiday was actually the foundation for Groundhog’s Day, but in Celtic tradition, a crone makes an appearance instead of a groundhog,” she said. “The crone would come out of her cave on the first of February and if it was a nice day, she’d be able to gather dry wood to keep her heath going until spring. If it was raining or snowing and the wood was wet, and she would not have enough firewood to get through the winter, so she would allow spring to come early.”

According to legend, the crone would be reborn in the spring as the Irish Goddess Brigihid whose name means “the bright one.”

Brigihid is considered in Irish lore to be the “keeper of the sacred flame” and the guardian of hearth and home.

Chefs Evan Mallett of Ondine and Jason Hay of Alder & Vine will create a special menu for the event.

“We’re offering it either as a full course menu or you can just order special plates,” said Heather Q.  “Keeping with the traditions of Imbolc, we’ll be celebrating local, seasonal food,” she said. “The menu is going to feature  of root vegetables, seeds along with dishes made from sheep’s milk and lamb.

Alder & Vine, the subject of our story, Spells, skulls, seances rule this tiny Belfast shop, will also bring their particular otherworldly brand into the mix with music from 6:30 p.m.  to 8 p.m. by osmia and The Orchardist. Patrons are encouraged to bring their crystals and arrange them around the musicians to be cleansed and charged by the sonic waves. There will also be tarot readings by crssy puccire available throughout the evening: $20 for a 15-minute-reading.

The dinner event can seat 40 people but tables are filling fast. Reserve a table for a seated dinner or walk-in for drinks and small plates at the bar.

For more information visit: alderandvine.farm/

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

These days, so many people whip out their phones whenever they see something interesting. But what happens when they are in a gallery or a museum? Should one ask permission from the gallery owner or artist first?

Red Dot Blog, an art marketing news site, explored this topic with a post by gallery owner Jason Horejs titled: “Debate: Should Visitors be Allowed to Photograph Artwork in Galleries, Museums and Art Shows?  The blog explores the concerns of a studio owner who is irritated by people who photograph artists’ work in her shop without asking permission.

“We do have a sign posted that photographs of the art are not allowed because of copyright issues,” said the studio owner Karen in an email to Horejs. “Yet I am often confronted with visitors sneaking photos of everything they like, or just expecting that they can, and feeling indignant when they can’t.”

He tells her in his response that she might want to think about turning the negative feeling about it into a positive sales opportunity as their sharing the photo on social media helps market the artists’ work.

So how do those in the Midcoast’s artistic community feel about this?

Jay Sawyer, a local artist in Warren, who operates an outdoor studio on his property is on both sides of the debate. Admittedly, he has grappled with his discomfort over it for a long time.

“I’ve been mulling over this topic for a decade and am just as confused as when I started,” he said. “Everyone is a photographer these days and the concepts of ethics in regards to taking pictures of an artist’s work seems to have eroded a bit. My studio, Jbone, is an open area that has taken on a very big presence over the years and some people come just to experience the space itself. I would much rather have them experience the space rather than take it all in behind the lens of their camera, because it’s not the same.”

Jana Halwell, owner of Caldwell Gallery in Rockland, also had mixed feelings about amateur photography.

“Much of the time, folks who wander into our gallery take photos liberally without asking,” she said. “Some, however, do ask. My issue with it is more about the image and how it represents the work. If they take a poor photograph, which many do, putting it up on the website will not do the artist or the gallery any favors. This is why most professional artists hire professional photographers to shoot their work. Also, if a person really wants to take a photograph of a work of art they can easily be covert about it and do it without being caught, regardless of gallery rules. A savvy person can also rip them off of websites and blogs fairly easily, even with right click disabling.”

Halwell recognizes this issue isn’t always black and white. “There are pros and cons to the world wide web,” she said. “If you are going to take advantage of the pros, you have to know you are exposing yourself to its vulnerabilities and cons, as well. The same is true with allowing someone to photograph art in your gallery. If it's a good image, they could potentially post it somewhere that might help the and artist enormously, or they can mash it into another work of art or even try to print it. In my humble opinion the benefits outweigh the risks.”

On Jan. 17, 2018, museums all over the world encouraged its patrons to take a #MuseumSelfie with artwork, as did the Farnsworth Art Museum. David Troup, Communications Officer at the Farnsworth said, “We allow visitors to photograph certain works except for those pieces that are on loan to us and then it sometimes depends. There are certain private collectors who do not allow visitors to photograph works, and of course, we have to respect that. As an educational museum we are protected under the copyright laws and can share certain images because they serve in an educational capacity, but at the same time, we are careful not to offend certain donors and we have to take their preferences into consideration too.”

Bottom line, it appears from both side of the lens: before you whip out that phone and click on the camera function—ask first.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

AUGUSTA— Police estimate that between 3,000 to 4,500 men, women and children went to the Maine State House on Saturday, Jan. 20, as part of a nationwide ‘Women’s March’ rally held in 35 states in support of women's rights, civil liberties and to encourage more women to vote, and to run for political office.

The rally was organized by March Forth Maine, and co-sponsored by Maine Democratic Party, Suit Up Maine, and Capital Area Indivisible, titled “Maine Women’s March 2.0: Power To The Polls.”

Similar sister marches were held Saturday in Bangor, Bar Harbor and Gouldsboro, while Portland participants  of Women’s March-Maine were encouraged to come to the Augusta rally.

Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets nationally over the weekend amid a government shutdown and on the one-year anniversary of President Donald Trump’s inauguration. Authorities estimated 100,000 people attended the rally in New York and 500,000 people attended in Los Angeles.

The event in Augusta began at 11 a.m. with speeches from lawmakers, activists and artists. A number of community organizations set up tables and campaigners worked through the crowds collecting signatures for the Ranked Choice Voting Maine petition.

The march began around 12:30 p.m. with thousands streaming around Capital Park as far as the eye could see before passing the Blaine House and resuming back at the State House for follow-up speeches.  The walk was peaceful with only a handful of counter-demonstrators.

The overall theme of the event was about how much women have galvanized their collective energy and power all over the United States in one year.

One speaker, Emily Cain, a former Maine House minority leader and state senator, stood before the crowd and said, “What I saw a a year ago and what I see today are women standing together making a deliberate choice to stand up and to fight back.”

Cain, who was chosen as executive director of Emily's List, a political action committee that started 33 years ago to encourage pro-choice Democratic women to run for office, told the crowd that in 2016, 920 reached out to Emily’s List to run for office.

“As of this morning, I got an email that totaled that number to more than 26,000 women intend to run,” she said to a loudly cheering crowd.

“In the last year, we have marched; we have made calls and and signed our names on petition after petition,” said Cain. “We have stood up and we have shown up and we are not stopping. Did you know 2018 is already being called ‘The Year of the Woman’?.... Women voters and those who support them are poised to transform our politics at every level.” 

Lucie Bauer, a member of the First Universalist Church in Rockland, who also attended last year’s inaugural rally in Augusta, held up a sign with her group titled “Standing On The Side of Love.”

“This is all about keeping the momentum going,” she said. “Keep calling and writing to your legislators, and don’t get complacent,” she said. “Keep voting.”

All photos by Kay Stephens. 

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKLAND —  On a Friday afternoon, a lab full of students are quietly working away on animated and design projects at Mid-Coast School of Technology in Rockland.

They are all working on projects for MCST’s Design Tech program, which taps into teens’ natural media consumption and turns them into creators of it. The courses offered include Graphic Design, TV/Film Production, Interactive Media Design, and Animation.

“This is one of the most popular programs the MCST has,” said Design Tech instructor Brandon Soards. “We have to actually go through a process to determine which students get in.”

Currently, the program holds 30 students from all over the Midcoast with juniors and seniors getting priority.

“This program can funnel these kids into some good careers,” he elaborated. “For example, a lot of kids come in with the idea that they may want to design video games, but after two years of the program, they figure out that they might be better suited for the programming side or that they like the art side better. This gives them the advantage of fine tuning their interests and skills before they go to college or go into a job into this field. “

Sylvan Gamage, 18, goes to Camden Hills Regional High School, but spends part of his day in the computer lab working on a number of storytelling projects that he initially began at home when he was a sophomore. He has been working on a comic book for the three years called Journey of the Unfortunates and is in his second year in the program.

“There’s a lot narrative and literary work that goes into a project like this,” he said. “I had to redraw a lot of it after going down the character list and revise a lot of what they initially looked like.”

Before he can draw the characters, he has to think about how well they work as protagonists.

“I’m still figuring out how these characters work their personalities and their motivations,” he said. “The first incarnation of it is a fantasy story, but I wanted the main character not to be a typical hero. In most books, movies and comic books, the hero is on the good side. What if the hero was the lowest of the low creatures in this fantasy universe? What if they are on the side of evil, but they don’t want to be?”

While Sylvan works on his anti-heroes to tell the tale, he knows how he wants the pages of the comic to look—the trick of course— is learning the computer programs well enough to translate what’s in his vision to what comes out on the screen.

He drew the cover in pencil first and scanned it in, then used Corel Painter, digital art software to pump up the vividness of color and brushstrokes.

“I’d eventually like to submit this to a publisher but there’s a lot of work first that needs to be done to really get all of the final elements down on paper,” he said.

Sylvan not only works in still images, but has made 2-D and 3-D animations, using the MCST lab’s equipment and software.  He uses Adobe Animate and Corel Painter as well for this project. When he goes home, he has Corel Painter on a computer at home and an Adobe license, so ends up working on it in his spare time as well.

“Animation is something I never really got into until I came here,” he said. “I do have an affinity for it, I’ve been trying to learn a bunch of different techniques.” Sylvan said he was fortunate enough this past summer to attend a Massachusetts School of Art 12-day workshop.  

“I would like to get my associate’s degree in community college, then see where I stand on the job side of things after,” he said. “Maybe work in advertising.”

For now the characters in Journey of the Unfortunates need his attention. It will be interesting to see when the comic done, where they end up. And where Sylvan will end up, as well.

Hail To The Rad Kids is a feature that highlights teens with artistic or musical talent and to recognize the contributions that middle and high school teens are making in our community.

 Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

UNITY — There are some well known challenges to living in a small home, but solo builder Jim Bahoosh, who lives in a small home in Unity he built himself, finds that there are many more advantages, particularly in Maine.

After getting into the building industry in 1984 and renovating old houses, his interests gravitated toward building houses that are smaller than average new house. According to a 2017 report on national trends, the square footage of a single family newly built home is around 2,661.

“In the 1950s, a new house was about 800 square feet with more people in the house,” he said. “Over the years, things have dramatically shifted.”

By 2001, Bahoosh was designing and building houses between 500-1,000 feet. With $160.00 per square foot that translates to roughly $80,000 to $160,000, not including land, water, septic and site work.

“Some of the major costs of building are the same, no matter what size house you build,” he said. “Where a small house really shines is in the long term. They’re easy to heat and maintain.”

Bahoosh, who is committed to building projects for the next several years, said he is not interested in going much beyond that 500-1,000 square-foot range as a builder. He has to turn people away from retaining his services, now that the small house design has caught on so well in Maine. His upcoming talk at Hutchinson Center  is not to generate business, but, instead, to generate more awareness of the advantages of a small house.

“For me, personally, it’s important to help people be aware that there is an option to build smaller and it’s not that big of a deal.”

On one hand, a smartly built small home with the proper insulation, is already ahead will be more energy efficient. Given that this winter is already seeing oil vendors facing challenges to keep up the supply for the demand, Bahoosh said: “A small home with comparable insulation to a big house is straight up physics, it’s going to take less fuel to bring the entire place up to temperature. Overall, small means reducing the amount of time to build it, to take care of it to heat it.”

Bahoosh, who has worked with many new homeowners, said that Maine is a state with a glut of old houses on the market with notoriously long and cold winters.

“It can be a double edged sword for someone trying to afford a house in their price range,” he said. “The mortgage might be manageable, but with this stock of older houses, the cost of maintaining the house, particularly those without good insulation, becomes unmanageable over time.”

Given that Bahoosh is at a place in his career where he can be discerning about what he chooses to build, he has a certain aesthetic, with an emphasis on natural building materials.

“If someone wants vinyl siding on their house, that’s fine but, I’m probably not going to be the person who is going to do that,” he said. “What you really need when you’re choosing a builder is to make sure your aesthetic sensibilities line up. Like every other relationship, you need to mesh.”

Some people just cannot imagine how they could live in such a small footprint. Bahoosh will discuss in his slideshow creative solutions to rearrange space to fit the homeowner’s main needs.

“A small house is more about what you truly need rather than what you want,” he said.

His talk at Hutchinson Center will feature several of the small homes he has built over the years, including his own. With a photo slide show, he wants to give the pros and cons of making the choice to live on a smaller footprint and will mention information on current Maine programs that increase energy efficiency on new or existing homes.

The free talk will be on Jan. 19 at The Hutchinson Center from 5:30 to 7p.m. Website: Hutchinson Center.

FMI: https://jimbahooshbuilder.com

BELFAST— Where can you go to get French crêpes for breakfast, a locally grown microgreen Mediterranean salad with a small hummus pie for lunch, and the slow-cooked goodness of takeout Jamaican oxtail with extra gravy on the rice and peas for dinner?

The United Farmer’s Market in Belfast, an indoor year-round venue for 65 vendors (and growing), has builta reputation on offering international cuisine with its varied vendors. With a sunny, window-lined communal dining area, often accompanied by live piano music, this place is the ideal way to try flavors from around the world.

“We try to get as much diversity in the market as we can,” said Paul Naron. “We’re working on an application to get Indian takeout food in several weeks.”

Many of the vendors are Maine farmers and bakers who sell through farmer’s markets in the summertime and find a vibrant winter market here. A walk through the 30,000 square foot space finds more than just food vendors–but food is the reason we’re here.

Stone Fox Cold Creamery, run by Bruce and Kathy Chamberlin of Monroe, is known for their ice cream. But, what really draws customers in the wintertime, is their crêpes.

With a portable crêpe machine—a circular griddle— positioned on a side counter, Kathy whips up egg, bacon and cheese folding into the fresh, thin pancake off the griddle.

“I’m actually Italian,” she said. “My husband taught me how to make crêpes. We’ve been to Paris and saw how it was done.”

They offer sweet and savory crêpes every week with the above combination being the most popular.

“We have a mobile set-up and we go to farmer’s markets a lot, but this is primarily where we are for the winter,” she said.

Laan Xang Café is an authentic Laotian and Thai restaurant in historic downtown Belfast, owned by Salika and Dan Johnson.

Every Saturday, Salika sets up her booth and recreates multiple dishes  from the restaurant for takeout. She makes her mother’s homemade sausage, a popular dish with customers of the United Farmer’s Market, served with steamed vegetables and a homemade chutney.

“After that, Drunken Noodles are probably my most popular takeout dish,” she said.

The menu is pretty consistent in the winter and Salika varies it up more toward summer.

Down several booths from Laan Xang Café, Steve Sleeper arranges his multi-shelved cold case of homemade Spinach Fatayer, Hummus, Baba Ghanoush, and for desserts, Baklava Lemon Ricotta Fritters.

He and his wife, Terri, own Mediterranean Cuisine, and each Saturday, they sell out of most of everything they make.

“My grandfather came from Lebanon 100 years ago and since I’ve been eating this kind of food my whole life, we decided to make a little business out of it,” he said.

The United Farmer’s Market in Belfast is their only winter venue; in the summer, they take their food to other various outdoor farmer’s markets.

“Our regular customers come back every week, so we provide something new for them every Saturday,” he said. “The newest thing we’re now offering are these microgreen salads, which we grow ourselves. The flavors are so intense and everything is vegetarian with a lot of vegan dishes. By summertime, we’ll also have gluten-free dishes, as well.”

How about a slice of Greek pizza for lunch?

Abraham’s Goat Farm and Pizzaria, run by Kaili Wardwell and Leslie and Lou Harris, from Newport, offers the deep dish flavors for only $2.50 a slice.

The Greek pizza is made with the farm’s own goat cheese feta, fresh tomatoes, red onions, and spinach.The farm and the pizzaria go together and are side by side at the Farmer’s Market.

“We come to the market every Saturday to add value to our farm,” said Kaili.

The Farmer’s Market is only open Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., so while breakfast and lunch may be taken care of, there is still dinner to consider.

Jamaican Vybz, a Caribbean takeout restaurant in Bangor, owned by Pagiel Rose, has a booth next to Abraham’s and offers the kind of slow-cooked, fresh flavors one can only get in Jamaica.

That day, they were offering Brown-Stewed Chicken, Jerk Chicken, Curry Goat, redolent of hand-rubbed spices. Jamaican Beef handpies or patties sell for $2.50 each and are one of their more popular offerings.

Or circle around the world to back to Maine and stand before the fish case of Pemaquid Lobster and Seafood, owned by Tom and Traci Penniman of New Harbor.

Specializing in wild caught North Atlantic seafood and lobster, there was fresh haddock that day in the case, along with smelts.

“We would have had more this week, but the storms last week limited the catch,” said Del Paquin, who was running their booth. “Normally, we have Maine farmed Atalntic salmon, which happens to be on the ‘good’ list of Seafoodwatch.org.”

Smelts can be a delicacy if cooked right.

“You can split them, bread them and fry them up in a pan,” said Del.

Or take home their frozen haddock chowder and lobster mac and cheese, and grab a baguette from a local baker on your way out.

Take advantage of these slower Saturdays in the winter to sample food you’ve never tasted before and take a trip around the world in one afternoon with your fork.

The United Farmers Market of Maine is located at 18 Spring St, Belfast, ME. For more information, please call (207) 218-7005. Visit: https://www.belfastmarket.com/

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

LINCOLNVILLE BEACH — On January 4, right around noon, an astronomical high tide coupled with a super moon and high winds resulting from a blizzard surged up Lincolnville Beach, flooding the Lobster Pound parking lot and a stretch of Route 1 up to the doorsteps of a number of small businesses. At its highest point, the water was well above six inches. Some businesses were able to avoid disaster; others didn’t get so lucky.

The Beach Store sustained the most damage as seawater poured in under the glass door. Without a buffer of concrete steps, like some of the neighboring businesses, the entire floor was covered in nearly six inches of water, almost up to the second step of the short stairway in the back of the store.

“The water actually moved the pizza oven a half inch,” said said Sarah Lord, who with her husband, Rod Lord, were running the store on owner Diane Lord’s day off.  “We had to have the gas inspector in to make sure the everything was still okay to use.”

Several of the Beach Store’s commercial coolers were hit with electrical failure when the seawater damaged the compressors.

“We had to completely replace the ice cream cooler, but not we’re sure about whether insurance is going to cover any of this,” said Sarah Lord. “The coolers are actually owned by companies [to the products} and they actually replace the units.” 

The good news is the Beach Store is still operating and several of the coolers are back to working. A yellow mop bucket in the back of the store is the only indication that it had been flooded.

Luckier still were the two businesses on either side of the Beach Store. Kathleen Farnsworth, Secretary for Maine Artisans, inspected the building that houses a co-op for artists this week and said by phone, “We’ve looked everywhere and there is no sign of any storm surge damage.”

Dwight Wass, owner of Lincolnville Fine Art Gallery, watched the whole thing unfold from his window. He said: “The water came in to the roads like a mini tsunami. We’re at the lowest part of the beach and I just sat right here, watching about four inches of water roll right in. But, it only came up to the first step outside, so we didn’t have any water damage inside. The problem was, every time a car tried to drive through the floodwater, it would send another wave to slap up at the door and we got a little under the door from that, but not much.”

The water came in a half hour before high tide at 12:08 p.m. and receded a half hour after low tide. According to Wass, the D.O.T. arrived about 15 minutes after the storm surge spilled into the street, along with the sheriff and fire department. Before that point, with no one cordoning off Route One, cars were still trying to drive through the floodwaters. A postal truck even stalled out at one point.

To complicate matters, huge chunks of ice were also drifting along Route 1.

“Some of the ice chunks were hitting the cars going through,” said Wass. “Those things were heavy; a hundred pounds. I came down the next day with my plow truck and it was all I could do to push them away.”

Nanette Gionfriddo, who owns Beyond The Sea bookstore, has closed her shop for the season. After inspecting the damage, she said, “We had some water in the back, which only damaged the rug.  It popped a circuit and killed our many strings of Christmas lights that we typically leave on until the end of February, but the café furniture is still in good shape.  Dwight and my neighbor, Marilyn, had a very interesting day as they were both there when it happened. There were quite the stories of huge ice floes from the marsh coming up the driveways towards Route One. Ice bergs on Route One!”

On Lincolnville Beach, the Whale’s Tooth posted photos of the flooding, which covered its parking lot, but their Facebook post indicated that they hadn’t sustained any damage.

 The Lobster Pound looked as though it had been floating in the parking lot. Attempts to reach the owners have been unsuccessful, so there’s no news on whether the interior sustained any damage.

Besides Lincolnville Beach, the high tide flooded harbor front roads on Vinalhaven. Likewise, Buttermilk Lane, in South Thomaston, and the Rackliffe Island causeway in St. George were submerged for a time around the astronomic high tide.

Related story: Astronomical high tides coupled with blizzard floods Midcoast, island roads

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

SPRUCE HEAD — Gordon “Skip” Connell, 59, was one of two people who’d found he’d drawn the lucky ticket for the 2017 Lobster Trap Tree Raffle this year. Out of 255 tickets sold, the lucky winners were announced Friday, January 3, in Rockland’s Mildred Merrill Park by Gordon Page, Executive Director of Rockland Main Street, Inc.

Connell had the choice to take 50 traps or $2,250 in cash and he chose the traps. 

“I was smiling pretty big when I’d found out I’d won,” he said from his home in Spruce Head. “In fact, I’m still smiling.”

A $50 ticket bought two chances to win.

“I buy a ticket every year,” he said. The other winner from the raffle was Donald Schwab, of Port Clyde, who chose to take the cash.

For Connell especially, the gift of traps comes at precisely at the right time. Rather than shell out $80 to $100 for new traps, he planned to spend his winter building 200 new traps from materials he gets from Brooks Trap Mill to supplement the 800 traps he fishes with annually. The fact that Brooks Trap Mill provided the lobster traps that constructed up the Lobster Trap Tree couldn’t have worked out any more perfectly.

“That probably just saved me a couple of weeks,” he said of the new 50 traps.

The process of building traps takes patience. He also makes his own trap heads from shrimp netting.

“To start it’s a lot of prep work,” he said. “There are a lot of small things to do that make the assembly go much smoother. Once the heads are made and the cages are clipped together (ends and bridges with the hole cut for the side heads ) then comes runners, bricks, bridle end corner reinforcements, (made from the pieces cut out for the side heads) heads and doors, bungee cord door closures, and two vents. There are a dozen other things that I haven't mentioned. I would guess that I might spend a couple of hours at that point putting it all together, maybe a bit less as the kinks get ironed out. I do know that I put the cages together at about six an hour. That is about twice the rate that I built wooden traps when I was in high school.”

The Lobster Trap Tree has been called “The Most New England Christmas Tree” in the nation. It took nearly 15 volunteers several days to build the structure with more than 155 traps on the tree when it was completed decorated with approximately 2,500 lights, and more than 100 authentic lobster buoys topped off with a giant lobster and star and the entire structure is put on display for the annual Festival lights. After the festival of Lights each year and the raffle, the tree is dismantled trap by trap. “Stephen Brooks [owner of Brooks Trap Mill] told me they were all set to bring them to me before the latest storm hit, so that put it off for a few days,” he said. 

Other organizations who supported The Lobster Trap Tree raffle included Camden National Bank, Hamilton Marine, First National Bank, and Rockland Savings Bank, FSB.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

UNION— At first, the main priority was putting out the fire. Six months ago on July 9, Jean Stevens, from upstate New York, was heading home with her family after a visit in Union. The camper was packed, but there was smoke coming from somewhere as they traveled along Route 17. They stopped, and found the car being hauled behind had developed a fire under the hood.

If that weren't enough of a disaster, their six-year-old cat, Myla, managed to jump out and ran into the woods west of North Union Road — a nightmare for any family who lives six hours away.

After days of searching, Jean had to go home. But she drove back, again and again until all of her vacation days had been used up. She managed to find Myla once at farm on Overlock Hill Road before a bolt of lightning scared Myla away, and again Jean went back home to New York, without her and brokenhearted.

If there is a playbook on how to find a missing pet, it first starts with a post on a Facebook community Maine-Lost Dogs, Cats & Pets. From there Stevens also posted on a service PawBoost, which allows a free posting and allows the user to spend money on promoting that post to a larger audience.

One of the group members Martha Johnston-Nash said Stevens spent money on Paw Boost to further spread the post about Myla.

“It costs money, but Jean was determined. You know keeping the word out there is imperative to getting people to look.”

With technology and online communities, this is a much more powerful tool than putting up flyers just in the neighborhood.

Several women were instrumental in organizing the first phase of finding Myla including Kathleen Thornton. Mary Butler, of Warren, took it upon herself to create a private Facebook Messenger group of approximately 8-10 members calling it “Team Myla.” “There were a couple of people before me looking for Myla and fielding the initial calls; I just thought it would be easier if we were all on the same group exchanging information.” Team Myla includes: Martha Johnston, Ariel Patten, Katie Hemenway, Beth Earl, Mary Butler, Diane Gallant-Marion and Kathleen Thornton.

During the fall months, there were several false sightings of Myla. Every tip came back to the group, but given that Myla was a fairly common looking torti-tiger, it was difficult to ascertain whether the sightings were of her.

“I got involved around September, October,” Johnston-Nash said. The second successful thing the group did was game cameras on Clarry Hill, Overlock Hill, North Union Road, Pound Hill, Bump Hill and Whittier Farm, where Myla had been spotted. “Mary had Myla’s cage that Jean had given her, so we set the cage out on Overlock Hill, so Myla would be attracted to the smell of it. The camera would pick up pictures of what we thought was Myla, but a lot of times it was was the wrong cat. And we weren’t getting a clear picture of her face. And sometimes it turned out to be the neighbor’s cat.”

By December and January when the cold set in and the snows were deep, most people would have given up, but Stevens wasn’t ready to and neither were “Myla’s Team.”

“I told Jean on her last trip up here at the Whittier Farm that I would be her contact; I had game cameras and I would not give up,” said Butler. “I saw the look on her face and felt the compassion in her heart. I felt if if had been the other way around, she would have done the same for me.”

“I’ve lost two cats to predators myself, and there were a lot of naysayers telling us that it was pointless to keep going. But Stevens was so sure Myla was still alive. Sometimes, certain people can just feel that connection,” said Johnston-Nash.

“I figured if she were no longer alive, that she would come to me in a dream,” said Stevens.”That’s happened with my other animals. But, I knew she was still out there and I was going to get her.”

In a random turn of events, a woman named Ariel Patten, in Union, had been feeding a stray cat for months, without realizing whose it was. Social media, once again, provided the connection, and soon Patten joined Team Myla and made a plan to trap the cat and get a photo. On January 2, one of the game cameras had gotten a clear snapshot the cat’s face.

“I call Ariel ‘The Missing Link,’” said Butler.

On a Facebook account of the story, Johnston-Nash explained:

“Team Myla brought the group together for the first time. Individually we studied the cat's markings against those in the ‘Lost’ picture of Myla, and individually came to the convincing conclusion this was what we had dreamed and prayed for, what Jean had been hoping beyond all hope: Myla was found, alive and well.  By the afternoon meeting, the excitement was overwhelming, but caution and prudence told us we needed to be patient and develop a strategy to ensure Myla was caught safely.”

“We knew the cat’s schedule to come looking for food at certain times and we figured we had one shot,” said Butler. “By Sunday morning, we set the trap at Ariel’s house and by 11 a.m. she called me back and said ‘we got her.’”

The third thing that ensured the success of this effort was that Stevens had gotten Myla chipped.

A friend of Myla’s Team, Shannon Nachajko, from Catahoula Rescue, examined the cat and found she was chipped, as well. After a few tries with her chip reader, they retrieved the number: it was a match. Group members then tried to contact Stevens in New York, but she was away from her phone. Everyone was on edge for about a half hour before they got ahold of her.  Stevens drove immediately back to Maine.

“When I walked into that room and saw her in the cage, I burst into tears,” said Stevens. “I felt like this tremendous weight had been lifted off my shoulders. Even though her running away was an accident, I’d felt so guilty that I hadn’t protected her.”

Myla walked out of the cage and into Steven’s lap, and began kneading her arm. “My heart was dancing,” she said.

“We all watched as Jean came in the room,” said Butler. “It was surreal. Jean sat on the floor and opened the cage and Myla came right out to her. Some of us were fighting back tears. We’d hoped for it for so long.”

Stevens said she still can’t believe how dedicated people in Maine were to finding Myla.

“I was blown away,” she said. Speechless. They didn’t even know me, but between Team Myla and the phone calls and emails I got, I was amazed at this tremendous dedication of Mainers to helping me bring her home.”

Butler said, “I just want to thank everyone who got involved especially the community and farmers in Union who let us set cages and cameras on their land. We all have animals and know how important to us. we’ve all had missing cats and we know the feeling.”

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKLAND—There was a time Ariel Birke, 28, was so unhappy in her job working and designing for a prominent outdoor clothing company, that she would cry on her commute home.

“I felt like I was selling my soul to the devil,” she said. “I was learning a lot, but felt like I was contributing to everything in consumerism I hate.”

Birke changed her life’s direction moving to Midcoast Maine from Lowell, Massachusetts, the winter of 2015 after a visit with her high school best friend, Mack Duke, who lives in Rockport.

“He and his wife showed me around Camden and I knew I had to be here,” she said.

Coming to Maine was a 180 degree pivot from where she started. She grew up in a 1,000 person town in the middle of New Hampshire and when she turned 18, she moved to New York City and went to college for fashion design and design and management.

“I was tired of being the weirdo in my home town and this was the perfect fit for awhile,” she said, smiling.

Like many young people in the Midcoast, once she settled in, she had to cobble together several jobs and work in ones that weren’t a great fit just to pay the rent.

“I worked at a bank for about a minute,” she said. “I knew it wasn’t for me, but I had to work to live here.”

She took a job in retail after that and within two years of moving to Rockport, she saw the opportunity to own her own business on Main Street in Rockland.

Daughters, a vintage women’s clothing and handmade goods shop, opened November 1 as a place for women. Everything in the shop has either been put together by Birke, or has been made by a woman. It has become a welcoming spot for many women in the area, not just to shop, but to hang out on Birke’s comfy couches and shoot the breeze.

“I really have a passion for vintage clothing and items that are well made,” she said. “After my experience in designing for other companies, I really stopped caring for new consumerism. After my time in New York and the outdoor company I’d worked for, I saw the dumbing down of goods and the cutting corners of manufacturing that made for obsoletion.”

Daughters is not a consignment store as Birke purchases all of the vintage items outright. 

“When I was coming up with the name for the shop, it reminded me of daughters hunting for something in their mother’s closet,” she said.

All winter long, Birke takes trips around Maine to thrift stores, and when she travels to Florida to visit her mother, as well.

“I really love the hunt; it’s always like winning the lottery for me,” she said. “And I have to hold myself back sometimes.”

Nothing is haphazard in the shop: items are grouped according to color. The shop has a collection of vintage blue jeans like Levi’s, shoes and boots, and accessories. 

“My personal aesthetic is toward an androgynous style—a cross between Jane Birkin and Paul Newman—so you’ll see a lot of boy’s jeans like Levi’s and white t-shirts.”

Several areas in the store that feature the handiwork of local artists and crafters.

“We have a community here for women who are incredibly talented in what they make, so be able to have a place to showcase it is something I was really excited about,” she said. “I feel that it lends itself to the nature of ‘vintage.’ At the beginning of the handmade good’s life cycle; it is a quality product, such as beautifully made ceramics, which will eventually become vintage, but its structure will be timeless.”

Follow her Facebook page for future events she’ll be holding at the shop this winter: Daughters

 Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

The shift from the frenzy of the last two holiday weekends into the first week of 2018 kickstarts for many people a natural desire to change up old patterns and start fresh. And for many people the first thing on that list is to shed some of that weight from the holidays.

We all know the pudge ain’t gonna budge until some movement happens, so here are five of the biggest calorie burners the Midcoast area has to offer.

Ice Skating

(Calories burned 400-600)

If you have your own skates, the best places to skate outside include Chickawaukie Pond in Rockport/Rockland and Megunticook Lake and Hosmer Pond in Camden. Don’t have skates? Maine Sport Outfitters does for a reasonable rental. Midcoast Recreation Center in Rockport offers Friday night pick up hockey for adults ($10), a variety of  figure skating classes and good old-fashioned public recreational skating Monday through Friday 1-3 p.m. and weekends (1-2 p.m). It’s so affordable ($5 for skating and $4 for skate rentals.) And, to get you in the mood, MRC is holding an Aloha Session of skating and live music with local artists on January 6 from 4:30 to 8:30 p.m. FMI: Midcoast Recreation Center

Snowboarding

(Calories burned 230 to 650)

Snowboarding is not just for the cool kids. Without breaking the bank you can try a day of snowboarding without the intimidation of a big mountain at the Camden Snow Bowl. With three lifts (including a new triple chair) With a full day adult pass of $33, you get a board, boots, poles and a helmet.  Never snowboarded before? They do a Group Lesson twice daily ($30) as well as a Beginner’s Special, which gives you a 1.5 hour lesson, rental and lift ticket for $60. Make sure you have some kind of wrist guards and don’t try to do the snowboard cross, which is basically an all-out race downhill. You’re looking to burn some calories not break a hip. FMI: Camden Snow Bowl

Sledding

(Calories burned: 413 to 651)

Everyone has his or her own favorite  hill in the Midcoast to take the plastic sled down, but if you want to get serious, pull out Gramp’s old runner sled from the barn and meet up with , the New England Runner Sled Association meets at Hogback Mountain in Montville for some serious old-fashioned sledding.Meet at Hogback Mountain Farm or the Frye Mountain gate.

Swimming

(Calories burned per hour 413-651)

Swimming in January or February when the wind and snow is whipping outside feels like you’re cheating winter, and that’s only one of the benefits. It’s one of the most high-energy, low-impact exercises you can do (especially people recovering from injuries or who have arthritis) and it keeps your heart rate up and muscles toned without too much impact stress on your joints. The Country Inn has a health club welcome to the public as well as a heated, 20′ by 40′ pool with a lap lane, a hot tub and dry sauna with memberships for three months ($200), six months ($255) and one year ($330). Likewise, Penobscot Bay YMCA also has an 8-lane pool with dedicated adult swim lap times as well as a therapy pool. An adult day pass is $10; a week-pass is $40 and a monthly pass is $48 to $58  with  $50 wear and tear fee. New this are extended weeknight weeknight pool hours until 8:15.  FMI: Pen Bay YMCA And Waldo County YMCA also has an aquatics program with adult swim times, therapy pool and aquatic aerobics. FMI: Waldo County YMCA

Hottest Fitness Trends

Circuit Training

(Calories burned 472 to 745)

CJ Strength and Conditioning has a Cardio Blast class for men and women who just want to get a good hour workout before going home. The one-hour drop-in class does several circuits of strength training. This class is held at 6 p.m., Monday through Friday for a $15 fee. FMI: CJ Strength and Conditioning

Snowshoeing

(Calories burned 472 to 745)

Want to take it outdoors? Beyond a state-of-the-art fitness and bowling facility, Point Lookout Resort and Conference Center in Northport has nearly four miles of snowshoeing trails that lead to the summit of a mountain overlooking Penobscot Bay. For only $7, people can rent snowshoes for a few hours (the unisex sizes even fit kids) for an enjoyable workout. FMI: Point Lookout

Jumpstart Your Weight Loss

(Calories burned TBD)

Penobscot Bay YMCA and Rockland Harbor YMCA are offering an integrated program starting January 9 which not only gives you more awareness on your health and eating habits, but also offers a free 8-week adult membership, free Fitness Center orientation, and free personal training session for $120. (Some of which might be offset by your insurance provider.) FMI: YMCA

Y Cycling

(Calories burned 472 to 745)

The Waldo County YMCA has a Y-Cycling program can help to make your fitness goals a reality. With no complicated moves to learn, a motivating group setting, enthusiastic instructors and invigorating music, you will find yourself having a blast while you ride your way to a leaner, stronger body. Day and times vary so consult their website. Only $8  per class for non-members. FMI: Waldo County YMCA

Calories burned source: http://www.nutristrategy.com/caloriesburned.htm

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKPORT—When she was seven, Olivia Gelerman moved up to Midcoast Maine with her family from south of Boston. Homeschooled, she had a natural passion for literature and at an early age, devouring The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings and other timeless novels. But with classics like Huckleberry Finn, she sometimes found it difficult to  plow through so much text and the concepts were not always interesting enough.

As she got into the Pokemon craze like so many tweens, a new interest was building.

By the time she as 10, Olivia developed a fascination for manga and anime, as well as graphic novels. Now 11-years-old, she has amassed and read nearly 500 volumes  in those genres, collecting them in her own home library, having become an expert on their various stories.

Olivia is working an entrepreneurial angle in her family’s soon-to-be-open 47 West, a specialty bakery, espresso, wine-beer and home goods store.

On the second floor, in the back of the room, multiple bookshelves hold an extensive collection of genres for sale one could not get anywhere else unless one drove several hours away to Portland or Brunswick or Bangor.

The fact that she selected them is noteworthy; the diversity and quality of these titles could have been chosen by someone twice her age.

Olivia has read and can recommend every single one of them from horror classic (such as a manga variation on Edgar Allan Poe), to sci-fi, fantasy, girl-centered, alternative, apocalyptic, hard-to-find and best sellers.

“As I was homeschooled after Pokemon and other stuff like that and I started to get interested in manga,” she said. “Then I’d go to bookstores like Barnes and Noble with my mom to see if they had anything.” Eventually she explored and found a whole new world of books online.

When her mother and father began to put together the ideas for 47 West, they told Olivia she could have her own corner for books.

It took her the better part of a year to begin researching the ones she thought kids would like and filling orders. Nowhere in the Midcoast (or even withing a 50-mile radius) is there a bookstore with a collection as huge as Olivia’s now is at 47 West. “We wanted the ones that were high quality and were popular sellers,” she said. The collection has a diverse range of smaller comic book paperback styles to hardcover collector’s items.”

“I know not many people in Midcoast know about manga and anime and I’d be so happy if anyone took an interest in it,” she said. Olivia is open to ideas and has even considered if there is enough interest to host discussions up in the cafe section of the second floor on various subjects.

Penobscot Bay Pilot will now work exclusively with Olivia on monthly book reviews of manga, anime and graphic novels from a tween perspective to be posted in regular columns.

For more info: www.47west.com

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKPORT— This is the week when the trees come down, the decorations and lights come off and the excess of packaging materials get taken to the dump. But, hold on there a second. There needs to be some prep work first unless you want to anger the Dump Gods.

“This is the time of year when a lot of stuff that belongs in the trash wreaks havoc in the recycling bins,” said Jim Guerra, Manager of  Mid-Coast Solid Waste Corp.

He cited an example of finding a boxes in the cardboard recycling bin containing several stacks of old dishes.

“We didn’t see it go in and it got dumped onto the bottom of the bin and broke everywhere. Because corrugated cardboard is our most valuable material by volume, we could have had a situation where all that broken crockery caused the entire truckload of baled materials to be rejected.”

Remember Highlights for Children magazine? Here is a Goofus and Gallant Guide to bringing your stuff to the dump after the holidays.

Cardboard boxes and packing materials

Goofus will bring in cardboard boxes still intact with packing materials of Styrofoam peanuts and encapsulated-air plastic (bubble) sheeting and try to shove the entire thing into the corrugated cardboard recycling bin where Styrofoam bits and pieces fly out, get picked up by the wind and get deposited in waterways.

Gallant will separate out the packing materials, re-use or recycle them where he can; break down the boxes and deposit them flat into the cardboard bin.

“A lot of people don’t know this, but you can pop the sheet plastic and it can be recycled at the sheet plastic collection at Hannaford Supermarkets or at Walmart,” said Guerra.

Christmas Trees and Wreaths

Goofus will bring the entire tree to the dump with loads of tinsel, fake snow spray and other decorative bits and pieces still attached to it.

Gallant will remove every piece of tinsel and deliver it bare to the dump—or recycle it into the woods. Better yet, if he lives in Camden-Rockport, he can leave it out on the edge of the yard for a free Christmas Tree pickup on January 6 or he can take it to Appleton Creamery’s January 7 Christmas Tree Drop-off Day.

“We do take Christmas trees, but prefer to have them be recycled and re-used, because we grind them down for fuel or compost, but it doesn’t yield much. the thing people need to keep in mind is that we also can’t have tinsel or any decorative items on them because any bit of plastic can’t go into the boiler. And it takes a lot of our staff time to pull that stuff off the trees.”

Holiday wrapping paper

Goofus will ignore the directions on the paper recycling bin and throw Mylar wrapping paper, ribbons and bows into the bin.

Gallant will dispose of the wrapping and bows separately. He always like to see a good fire burn in the fire pit.

“Just thinking toward next year, I’ve seen a lot of packages wrapped in decorative cloth or burlap bags, which are re-usable. Likewise, those holiday gift bags can always be used again and again; just switch out the tags.”

Appliances and toys

Goofus takes his old coffeemaker, which still works, and throws it into the dump without a second thought.

Gallant thinks of other ways to give the older model coffee maker away to someone who can use it or to thrift stores or consignment stores.

“There’s a lot of upgrading to new stuff after the holidays and it’s sad to see the older things chucked into the trash or metal bin when they still work,” said Guerra. “Typically during the year, we have our Swap Shop open and they can accept it there, but there’s no heat this time of year. Even if the cord on an appliance is damaged or broken, there are Repair Cafés that happen from time to time, where you can bring an older model that’s damaged and have it repaired and donated to someone else.They do it in Europe all of the time and we’re trying to get one going here as well.”

The author of this article recognizes that Goofus was over-the-top obnoxious and Gallant was insufferably good and hopes there is a happy medium in between.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

SEARSPORT—Mixed Media artist Sandi Cirillo has two sea-themed artworks hanging in her kitchen that are almost 3-D, it is compelling to want to touch them. Both are felted using wool, soap/water and agitation to get the wool fibers to fuse together.

"Colorful Corals" is an underwater seascape with vibrant blues and purples. The coral is dyed sheep’s wool left in its natural state, so that the curly fibers seem to spring from the canvas. Cirillo simulates additional movement, positioning a piece of wool “coral” that bleeds onto the matting of the framed portrait. In the second piece, a stormy lighthouse scene, “The Coast of Maine,” she uses white wool fibers to evoke movement in the frothy waves of the ocean.

“Working with felt is similar to painting when you’re adding or subtracting to a certain piece,” she said. “A lot of people call it ‘painting with felt.’”

Cirillo dyes all of her own wool, which she gets from Halcyon Yarn in Bath.  “I’m a very tactile person,” she said. “Sometimes, when I’m in a fiber store, all I have to do is see a the raw materials and I can see what it needs to be. I have the entire picture in my head and then I usually have the title for it.”

Cirillo is retired from elementary art teacher, and now makes her living teaching seven to eight classes a year in fiber, mixed media and drawing in her Searsport home studio and through various universities and adult education classes. Hanging beneath a bookshelf of books on dyeing felt, drawing and other instructional guides, is a sign “Live the Life You Imagined.”

At 45-years-old, she went back to college, getting her bachelor’s and master’s degree as an artist. As an undergraduate, Cirillo discovered fiber arts as a course and she was hooked. She took more felt-making courses in felt making as a graduate. She then taught herself how to dye the wool with natural dyes as part of her degree. “In my work, I strive to achieve a delicate balance between spontaneous design and exact execution, thereby creating a constant challenge to produce something fluid within a static structure,” she said.

But she knew one thing: the life she imagined wasn’t going to be long-term in New York.

“When I was a teacher in upstate New York, I’d come to Maine on my school vacations for about 15 years,” she said. “By the time I came up the second year, I knew this is where I wanted to be. I really worked to make that happen and now I’m living the life I imagined being retired and feel very blessed.”

After looking extensively for the right house for her, she found a home in Searsport with an in-law apartment, that she converted into her entire basement studio and moved up permanently in 2011.  Open shelves hold a variety of materials that line the “kitchen” of the sunny studio with more boxes and bins of supplies neatly stacked in the bedroom.

Her framed pieces can be found at the Lupine Cottage in Belfast, Southwest Harbor Artisans Gift Shop and at Beyond the Sea Gift shop in Lincolnville, ME as well as at Franklin Street Gallery in Watkins Glen, New York and on her website, www.especially-for-ewe.com

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

Where do you go when it’s 3 p.m. and Happy Hour is already starting on the Midcoast? (Hint: Nautilus Seafood and Grill in Belfast; Sea Dog Brewing Co. in Camden; Archer’s ont he Pier in Rockland).

Where do you go when you want Happy Hour on the weekends? (Hint: La Vida Mexican Restaurant in Belfast; Fireside in Camden; Myrtle Street Tavern and Trackside Station in Rockland).

And what new Happy Hours are happening this winter? (Hint: Ondine Oyster & Wine Bar in Belfast; Fireside and Vintage Room in Camden; Ada’s Kitchen in Rockland).

We’ve updated our winter Guide To Midcoast’s Happy Hours for the 2018 winter season, including what establishments are now closed for the winter or under new ownership.

Don’t get caught and the happiest hours without your handy, mobile Penobscot Bay Pilot guide!

Restaurant/Bar owners contact Kay Stephens at news@penbaypilot.com for any changes/additions.

MONROE—No one expects to wake up one day and discover everything you’ve worked for in life drastically ripped away. A stroke at the age of 36 years old completely derailed Pamela Hedden’s life. An architect, married with children, living in Birmingham, Alabama, at that time, Hedden remained in a coma for eight days. When she emerged from it, she was paralyzed on the right side, unable to speak, talk or walk. She had no understanding of where she was or what happened: in fact, for a long time, she thought she was still 10 years old.

There would be more devastating challenges ahead.

"I lost everything," she said. "My marriage, my kids, my career, and my home."

It’s a story that could have continued to go down a long dark road, but 18 years later, Hedden is sitting in a cozy, shingled house in Monroe, built by her boyfriend, Mark, a tiler, wildlife photographer and potter. She exudes gentle radiance.

"I view myself as having come through this amazing transformation,” she said. “The stroke also caused me to lose vision out of the right side of both eyes, so that has changed my entire perspective. But, when I look in the mirror, all I see is the whole me. I never see the paralyzed me. That vision has carried me so far."

When she got back on that horse again, she literally took the reins. Within three years, she took up horseback riding, learning how to do it with one hand. She even jumped out of a airplane.

“I wanted to be alive again," she said. "I have incredible parents and friends. Their encouragement and help lifted me up and got me walking again. My courageous spirit is how I got through it all. "

She moved from Alabama to Maine in 1999 and revived her career as a residential architect. One day, just taking a walk around the small town of Wayne, where she lived and began to pay close attention to architecture.

"I was just walking around my little town one day and noticing the detail on these little buildings, the General Store, the library. These buildings all had the this unique character. And I began to paint them."

With an architect's analytical precision, she drew the buildings free hand and added watercolor to them. Never formerly trained as a painter, she had to not only teach herself all of the fundamental techniques—but had to do it left handed. A right-handed person all of her life before the paralysis, she worked with a number of physical therapists and slowly, began to gain back motor skills to draw to get the tiny details just right.

"I am so detail oriented, I have to constantly shift my head a certain way to see the right side of the paper," she said.

"As an architect of residential houses for 27 years now, I'd worked with drawings of course, but never with color,” she said. “Getting the detail down on those buildings was an intricate process. Her artwork progressed from buildings to landscapes. "When I do landscapes, they are just an escape," she said. "They are so freeing and simple."

Hedden has put together a compilation of four year’s worth of paintings together for a new show she plans to unveil at the Belfast Co-op, starting January 4 through January 31. The work ranges from buildings to landscapes and seascapes with bright, splashy washes of color.

For Hedden, this feels like a direction she would have never imagined herself on..and a triumph. I don't think I've done my best work yet," she said, smiling.

To learn more about the show visit The Belfast Co-op’s Facebook page.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

For those already thinking ahead to where to go on New Year’s Eve, Penobscot Bay Pilot has the complete rundown on what’s happening in the Midcoast. Enjoy your night and stay safe!

Belfast

New Year's by the Bay

This is the 21st anniversary of the New Year's by the Bay and this community grassroots event starts at 2 p.m and goes until 12:30 a.m., mostly in eight indoor venues within walking distance. One button admits you to all performances and activities of the New Year’s by the Bay chem-free, family friendly, cultural celebration. Food purchases are separate. Adult tickets: $20; children under five are free. For more information visit nybb.org.

Front Street Pub

NYE festivities will be happening from 5 p.m. until 2 a.m. $10 cover with a free food buffet until midnight and champagne toast. 

Bowen’s Tavern

DJ Harold will be in the house, playing your favorites from 9 p.m. to  2 a.m.  Their kitchen will be open until midnight with a Sunday special of $.50 wings. Free champagne toast at midnight. No cover.

Camden/Rockport

16 Bayview

Join 16 Bayview for a high energy music video dance party with special guest VJ Danny D. of Northeast Event Design. One of New England's most sought after Video DJs, Danny D. will be bringing you the biggest and best New Year’s celebration, underground dance party style! Dress to impress because you'll walk the red carpet upon arrival. Once inside, you'll be dancing the night away to Danny D.'s masterful mixes and music videos on two large screens. Tickets are $30/person, and includes a red carpet entry, party favors, hors d'oeuvres and mini-desserts, countdown and balloon drop, as well as a champagne toast at midnight. Guests will also enjoy a premium cash bar. Advance purchase is required. Only 100 tickets will be sold. This is a 21+ event. Doors open at 9 p.m. Music and dancing until 12:30 a.m.

Cuzzy’s Restaurant & Bar

For a good time, locals kind of New Year’s Eve, Cuzzy’s will be throwing a New Year’s Eve party with karaoke, starting at 9 p.m.

Rockland

Ada’s Kitchen

Ada’s Kitchen is throwing their first New Year’s Eve party with the theme of Studio 54 featuring DJ Chef Sid. For an unforgettable night of dancing and fun to ring in the new year, dress like it’s 1977 as they celebrate 2018. $15 cover includes a glass of prosecco. Goes from 9:30 p.m. to 2 a.m.

Trackside Station

Drink, dance and count down the year with a complimentary champagne toast at Trackside Station. Watch the ball drop on their 11-foot screen and other TVs.  Music by DJ Wallace starts at 9 p.m. No cover.

Fog Bar and Café

Join everyone at Fog Bar & Café by welcoming the year 2018 in style with local legends, ‘The Blind Albert Band.’ Masquerade Masks & Festive Apparel are Suggested - But Fog Bar will also be offering (as in past years) fabulous masks as well! No Cover for this event. Entry is through their Oak Street Entrance.

Rock Harbor Brewing Co.

The Karmaceuticals will be playing at the pub to help everyone ring in the new year with a triple dose of rock. There is no cover charge. Starts at 8:15 p.m. and goes until midnight.

Myrtle Street Tavern

They’re throwing a NYE party starting at 9 p.m. with the band Shizzle.

Samoset Resort

Note: If your establishment isn’t listed here it’s because either we were unable to find any details of your event posted online or it was restaurant seating only, not a public party. We will be adding more details and more New Year's events as they become available. Please check back! To contact me with more details, email  news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKLAND—The week between the holidays and New Year’s Eve has a lot of folks pondering the waistline and trying to find that perfect balance between healthy and delicious. What to bring to the New Year’s Eve party? Chef Annie Mahle, who owns the schooner J. & E. Riggin with her husband, Captain Jon Finger, has just the ideal recipe.

“I make a poached salmon with tri-pepper salsa,” she said of one her most popular recipes with guests of the schooner. “If I don’t make this for some of our returning guests, they start to clamor for it. It’s really versatile; you can make this into the entrée itself or you can size down the portions and make it into a side dish or appetizer that people will just love. And, after the holidays when everyone is feeling the need to head into the new year with more healthy options, it’s the kind of thing you just make for yourself on a weeknight.”

Mahle has been cooking and writing for nearly 30 years. This recipe is part of her second, revised and updated edition of “At Home, at Sea: Recipes from a Maine Windjammer” (2017, Baggywrinkle Press). The first edition was published in 2004. She also penned “Sugar & Salt: A Year at Home and At Sea (The Blue Book and The Orange Book).  “I have really evolved in my cooking since the first book, although I use recipes from it all of the time,” said Mahle. “In this updated version of the book, I’ve got 100 new recipes and variations with all new photos. I like to riff on recipes all of the time; so you’ll see maybe six variations on my classic biscuit recipe or six variations on my bread.”

For the salmon, she sources it from Jess’s Market in Rockland. “I switch back back and forth between buying wild caught and Scottish farm-raised salmon,” she said. “There are pros and cons to both. On the one hand, buying farm-raised means you’re not contributing to overfishing; on the other, you want to make sure if you’re buying from farms that are sustainable and that the water quality is very good with limited use of chemicals and antibiotics.”

As it is nearly January, she buys the peppers from the local supermarkets. “The only time that those peppers would truly be in season to buy locally would be around August, but we are lucky to have such a diversity of food choices in the Midcoast,” she said.

Mahle has made appearances on the the local NBC affiliate station WCSH’s “207” program numerous times, as well as on the Today Show, New England Cable News, the Food Network and multiple appearances on the local NBC affiliate WCSH’s 207 Show.Annie’s cooking has been recognized by Yankee Magazine as a one of the “Top 10 Places to have Dinner with a View” and as the “Best Windjammer Fare” in the Best of New England series.

To find out when Mahle’s next book signing is follow J. & E. Riggin on Facebook.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKPORT—Having moved to Camden from south of Boston four years ago, the Gelerman family wasn’t looking to start a new business.

“We came up to retire,” said Theola Gelerman, sitting at the oval granite bar under mullioned windows on the sunny first floor at their new business venture.

“We had run a specialty grocery store for 18 years,” added her husband, David. “And we thought we were done.”

That notion changed when the Gelermans learned that the Cellardoor Winery Tasting Room on the corner of Route 90 in Rockport was up for sale this past year and the gears began to turn again.

“We started thinking about it once again, only more scaled down,” said David. “We also wanted it to be a place where our kids, who are also entrepreneurial, could be involved in the family business.”

Their 11-year-old daughter, Olivia, is home-schooled and will help with the operations of the store, along with assisting with the extensive collection of the manga and anime books she has personally picked out for the second floor, which offers mostly café-related items, home good and hard cover books.

Their sons, Noah, 21, and Alan Wong, 20, run a global tactical supply online store and will help out with social media and other aspects of the business.

“We all have our strengths and we’re all just trying to meld them into one place where everyone can bring something to the table,” said Theola.

47 West still has much of the same interior as the Cellardoor Winery had set up.  At the helm of the espresso bar is the Rolls Royce of coffee makers—a Victoria Arduino "Adonis.”

”I really believe in offering good, organic fair trade coffee and I roast our own beans, which we source from New Jersey,” said Theola. “We will only have three or four selections of coffee, something for the people who just want cream and sugar and something for the die-hards, who want the perfect espresso or the caramel latte. We will also have non-dairy options and cold-filtered coffee.”

Knowing that people still associate this location with Cellardoor Winery, Theola said: “We are serving poured wine and beer, but we’re not selling it by the bottle, so that other establishments nearby can reserve that as their niche. 47 West is going to be a place to stop by, have a cup of coffee or espresso, have a glass of wine, read a book, and talk to people across the bar.”

The back of the first floor was renovated with permits to add a kitchen.The Gelermans are working with a good friend, baker Pam Huard, on baked goods that will pair well with both coffee and wine and beer, as well as carrot cake, scones, biscotti and cookies.

“Our vision for this place is to dabble a bit and see what people want, “ said David. “We may add panini sandwiches and more of a rotating menu as we go. As we progress, we are also planning for private events that can be catered, and down the road, public events involving more food. We even have space outside in the summer to do more outside seating.”

“We want this to be an eclectic mix of food and home items you can’t really get anywhere else and just give a level of customer service that makes people feel that they can just pop in and have a great experience,” said David. “For that reason, we’re not even adding a tip line on our food items, because it’s about making it affordable and easy.”

47 West has now officially to the public from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday with extended hours in the summer. Stay tuned to their Facebook page for more details.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com 

BELFAST—Within the high-arched studios above the Belfast Post Office on 1 Franklin Street, a little shop draws people from around the world. Rooms are awash in hand-printed kozo and linen botanical lampshades, with a myriad of textures radiating luminous coastal blues and greens, mellow earthy and amber hues, rich jewel tones, soft neutrals, and vibrant bold block print colors pulling from Japanese, Thai and nature themes.

Interestingly, there's a demographic of regular customers who routinely come through the doors just to bask in the light and color, and they happen to be hospital employees, doctors and educators. Stuck all day in somewhat aesthetically sterile environments doing highly demanding work, they often come drifting up the back stairs and ask owner Dina Petrillo: "Can I just walk around, maybe just sit here for a while? I just need to be surrounded by all this light and color right now."

Petrillo, A sculptor, printmaker, and designer since 1980, opened Belfast Bay Shade Co. with her husband in 2013.

"I do think this place is a full sensory counterpoint to a long day inside white walls for people with high-intensity jobs," she said.

As close as Belfast and as far as Hawaii, Belfast Bay's typical customer is  anyone who wants to bring the outdoors inside all year round and tends to draw in people in the healing arts, acupuncturists, midwives, masseuses and naturopaths who want illuminated colors into their offices and home studios for their own clients.

Petrillo’s lampshades are functional artwork molded into cylinders of Thai Unryu Paper, a lightweight, semi-translucent paper ideal for overlays and lamp shades.

"The imagery, the plants and vegetables–all of that comes out of a sculptural process," said Petrillo. "I especially love found materials, particularly industrial things."

She points to a lampshade dominated by greyish circles, reminiscent of a foreign coin.

"Believe it or not, that was made with a disc of hardware cloth mounted into a mixed media plate," she explained. "My family business was a hardware store, so I tend to gravitate toward metals, power tools, and all manner of construction materials. People walk in though, and have their own associations with it: they see a manhole cover or a 45 album. In others they might see a fingerprint or the growth rings of a tree."

Petrillo has been exhibiting and teaching in the Midcoast since she moved to Maine from New York City in 2000. She taught sculpture and printmaking with the University of Maine's Hutchinson Center since 2003.

"My work has always toggled between two- and three-dimensional, mixed media and sculpture," she said. "I create plates or molds first in my production studio and with every inking, get a new incarnation. I started making metal plate intaglio prints while I was a grad student and then faculty at Columbia during the 1990s, and then really dove deep into mixed media printing at UMO while teaching printmaking and sculpture. I had access to the print studio and I'd make these high relief collagraph carborundum plates that riff off the pressed and textured clay slabs used in sculptural forms. And out of that process, I experimented with using the textures that would eventually become the high-relief patterns on the lampshades. The textures are important, but I wanted to figure out how I could infuse them with color. In 2007, I spent a month in Vermont on a fellowship tethered to a large Charles Brand etching press. I brought along a huge number of plates, and worked feverishly day and night trying to figure how to print them. Experimenting with ink viscosity and modifiers, I layered papers and played with multiple pulls and ghost prints, until I got a result that qualified as a successful print. When I returned to Maine and the post office studio, these prints evolved into on-site art installations and commissions for sculptural light forms in April, 2012.”

Petrillo's show of collagraphs and light forms "Creature Botaniche: Piante e Forme Umane Congiunte" opened at Castello di Galeazza, Pepoli, Emilia-Romagna, Italy. By August, the light forms had become "lampshades" and in January 2013, the company was launched as Belfast Bay Shade Co. in NYC at the Javits Center's winter market NY NOW.

Her shop carries products that range from floor clothes to room screens, throw pillows to table runners, unique lamps and a wide array of wall and ceiling fixtures. Belfast Bay sees the evolution of the company as a collaboration with other artisans and their customers. "Bring Your own (old) Lamp" or BYOL engages folks in the design process themselves as shades are selected or designed for the very specific and often funky lamps they tote up the post office stairs.  An extension of their on-site light consultation, Belfast Bay can see growing into event lighting and pop-up installations.

"I'm happiest when I'm inventing and I work with people who share that excitement,” Petrillo said. “The maker movement in Maine is vibrant and I feel blessed every day that this is my home and the cultural garden where we can grow innovative applications for technologies and honor the life's work of so many deeply creative artisans!"

For more information visit: belfastbayshadecompany.com/.

For the holidays, we’re continuing our series to shine the spotlight on Maine craftspeople who make products by hand and work out of their homes and kitchens to make quality products and work. Here are three last-minute ideas that can be found in the Midcoast and online before the season is upon us.

Lovin’ Cups

Handleless pottery that’s part of Waterfall Arts’ Handmade show

The back story:

Linda Stec has been teaching clay at Waterfall Arts for over a decade. She has a degree in Fine Arts and has taken many masters’ level classes. Along with clay, Linda has been a performing puppeteer for 18 years and practices calligraphy, cartooning, and weaving. She is a master gardener and the Director of the Starrett Childrens' Center. These handleless, glazed mugs are all affordably priced and all proceeds go back into Waterfall Arts’ programs. Win-win!

Where to find it/price range:

$7-10 at Waterfall Arts Handmade show, only open until Dec. 23. She’ll make more after the holidays. Contact her at waterfallarts.org

In her words: “I do wheel work and I’m cold all of the time, so I always have one of these cups filled with something hot beside me and without handles I can’t accidentally knock it over,” she said. “They’re glazed to withstand heat and the dishwasher, and I just wanted to make them affordable for everyone. Each one of them is one of a kind.”

Laurie Bellmore Arts Photographic print

Birch Trees, Enhanced photography

The back story:

Laurie Bellmore, a Maine native, who has recently retired from being “back to the land” farmer with her husband, lives in Owls Head. She is a self-taught artist and jeweler. This artwork was printed in-house, an archival print on paper, along with a 5"x 7" mat with black core, in a plastic sleeve. “In my photographic work, I use the digital platform to enhance my photograph and create an entirely new piece of artwork; some call it digital painting,” she said. “My digitally enhanced work starts with my own photo, which is manipulated and transformed into a new image with the help of digital tools. I do all of the enhanced painting, photography, image editing, archival giclée printing also the matting and framing in my studio, with only my hand touching the work.”

Where to find it/price range:

$15 on Etsy or visit: www.lbellmore.com

In her words: “I took this photo on a back road somewhere in Midcoast, Maine. When I am out taking pictures, I often follow the beauty of the moment, and don't pay much attention to where I am, until I try to find my way toward home,” she said. “I love this picture; it is so exciting when you are in the right place, the lighting is exactly right and it all comes together and makes a great image.”

Balsamae

Wintermint handmade soap

The back story:

Allie Bowman, who works at the Camden Hannaford Supermarket, has a side business at his home in Swanville, where he makes all of handmade soaps, beard care and essential oils in his kitchen. Wintermint,  one of his most popular seasonal soaps, is SLS ( sodium lauryl sulfate) free, dye-free, all natural and vegan and made with a hemp seed oil base. Hemp seed oil is an amazing moisturizer for the skin.  It contains vitamin A, D, and E, and minerals  which help keep the skin smooth and soft. The oil is also known to soothe rashes, reduce redness, and itchy, dry patches on the skin.

Where to find it/price range:

$6 online or visit KatWalk, a boutique store in Belfast, which carries Wintermint, as well as other soaps in his line.

In his words: “It’s made with multiple mints and to me it smells like winter,” he said. “It smells like freshly falling snow. When you shower with it it just makes your senses come alive.”

Related: Shop Local: Three unique handmade Maine goods

Shop Local: Three unique Maine edibles

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

Through December, we continue our series to shine the spotlight on local people who make their living by their home kitchens and small production facilities, using unique Maine flavors and ingredients no one can get anywhere else. Best of all, all of these items can be picked up locally and shipped.

Graffam Bros. Maine Seafood Rockport

A fresh Maine caught lobster roll delivered to your door with Maine’s Deep River Snack kettle chips.

The back story:

Maine Lobsters are 100% hand-harvested from small day boats one trap at a time to protect their quality and the marine habitat. And this time of year, it’s important to support Maine lobstermen as they go into their winter. What better way than to buy a fresh lobster roll through Graffam Bros. Seafood Market in Rockport. They’ll ship fresh live lobster and prepared seafood all across the country. They’ll send you a Country Kitchen bun and more than 4 oz. of flavorful lobster salad along with a 2 oz package of Deep River Snacks Potato Chips.

$20.00 online or locally at Graffam Brothers

In their words: “Just toast the bun, add the lobster and it will be almost like being at our Seafood Shack in the summer!”

Maine Chefs, Rockland

Citrus Rosemary and Ginger Sauce

The back story:

Maine Chefs, based out of Rockland Maine, is part of a “Neighbors Supporting Neighbors” model of housing local specialty food businesses under Pen Bay Distributors, run by Terri Mahoney, Terry Lawry, Rob Splaine and Richard Thompson. "Keeping with our motto, our all natural products are produced in small batches at commercial kitchens in Maine and New Hampshire,” said Mahoney. “Our distribution company has grown with support from other similar minded specialty food producers and can be found throughout New England. We also ship throughout the United States.”

Where to find it/price range:

$7.99 online or locally at French and Brawn, Market Basket, State of Maine Cheese Co., Jess's, Keag Store, Thomaston Grocery, Renys, Wentworth Family Grocery, Swanlake Grocery, Tobey's, Hope General Store and Red Barn Marketplace.

In her words: “Our Citrus Rosemary and Ginger Sauce is a nice thick sauce that you can drizzle on pork, chicken, beef and seafood,” said Mahoney. “I love putting it on potato salad, but it’s also great for grilling, baking and even the crock pot.”

French and Brawn Fresh Roasted Coffee

Bayview Street

The back story:

Camden’s specialty marketplace (in business since 1868) offers great coffee with historical roots. All of F&B Coffees are fresh roasted in small batches by Green Tree Coffee & Tea in Lincolnville and include: Bayview Street (French Roast); Chestnut Street (Medium Roast); Elm Street (Breakfast Roast); Main Street (Decaf Roast)

"We picked those street names because we are either on or can see those streets from our front door," said President Todd Anderson. "Most people from Camden or familiar with it would recognize the names. Many people currently or previously lived on one of those streets or know someone that does/did."

Where to find it/price range:

$10.99 at their store on 1 Elm Street or visit: frenchandbrawn.com

In their words: “Bayview Roast is consistently one of our top sellers of all of the beans we offer. It is also one of the brewed coffees that we offer by the cup every day.”

Related: Shop Local: Three unique handmade Maine goods

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

UNION — Sweetgrass Farm Winery and Distillery had a sweet idea this year: Invite the public and students from the Midcoast School of Technology culinary department to create a gingerbread house; put it on display. Invite the public for cocktails and vote for the best one.

Throughout the weekend, December 9 and 10, as holiday shoppers drifted through the tasting room, enjoying cranberry gin and Bixby Bar drinking chocolate with rum, one gingerbread creation stood out, drawing the most votes.

Rachel Nichols, a full time artist from Newcastle, won $500 for her elaborate rendition of the Rockland Breakwater. Having moved to Maine from California a year ago, she has walked the Breakwater many times. It took her nearly three weeks to assemble the entire piece.

“I went through so many batches of gingerbread,” she admitted.

The detail of her culinary artwork has to be seen up close to be appreciated. The granite “blocks” are made from caramel. The shingles of the lighthouse are something out of the game, Candyland. The raging surf was created from three layers of frosting and sprinkles. But, the real wonder is in the back of the house attached to the lighthouse. Deep inside the house, Nichols created a miniature candy Christmas scene within a scene with Santa, a tree, presents, and even a tiny clock on a peppermint made from edible ink.

“I always loved to make little doll houses when I was a kid,” she said. “This was the most fun part of creating this gingerbread house. If you look at it through the side window, you’ll see a candy fireplace with flames and little coals out of jellybeans. I love creating little details like that.”

The $500 prize is a big boost to help Nichols with her Christmas shopping. “That, and more art supplies,” she said. Nichols is currently working on finding a temporary home for the gingerbread house to be on display for the rest of the season.

The student winner of the contest had just as creative an idea. When Thomas A. Akselsen put together his gingerbread house, unfortunate circumstances caused it to collapse. So, he made the most of the disaster by turning it into a candy crime scene—winning the popular vote.

Constance Bodine, co-owner of Sweetgrass Farm Winery & Distillery said: “This is the first year we’ve done this and people loved it. None of the participants were professional bakers, but we had a lot of creative entries. And proceeds from our specialty cocktails benefit the MCST culinary program.”

Rounding out the event, Appleton Creamery offered samples of chèvre in olive oil; Bixby Bars had samples of candy bars and drinking chocolate and Sugar Spell Sweets offered mini bites of cookies, candies, and treats.

For more information on Rachel Nichols visit: rayfaithnichols.wixsite.com/artist

For more information about Sweetgrass Farm visit: sweetgrasswinery.com

For more information about the Midcoast School of technology visit: midcoast.mainecte.org

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

For the month of December, we continue our series to shine the spotlight on local craftspeople who make things by hand. It’s important to shop local and to support the innovators and entrepreneurs who keep the creative economy alive in the Midcoast. So each week, until Dec. 25, we will bring you this series until you can’t take it anymore. Ready. Set. Go.

Mainely Naturals, Belfast

“Bambi” White Tailed Deer Ornament

The back story:

Kris Chapman grew up just outside of Boston and moved to Belfast 18 years ago. She lives here with her husband and two kid, works in the kitchen at the Edna Drinkwater School in Northport and runs her Etsy store.

”I love creating gifts using local photos and ingredients found in nature,” she said. 

Where to find it/price range:

$10 online or locally at the Country Blessings shop in Belfast.

In her words: “The photo in this ornament was captured on the East side of Belfast. So sweet, the baby whitetail deer fawn ornament makes the perfect nature lover gift.”

Olio Designs, Belfast

Nautical Napkin Rings

The back story:

Meg Reilly is nspired by color and texture—anything from a beautiful piece of fabric or a great piece of paper to the unique shades found in the summer forest or on an ocean beach.

“I am proud to have been featured at marthastewartweddings.com as one of Martha Stewart Wedding's Favorite Etsy Crafters and included in the 2010 summer issue of Martha Stewart Weddings article ‘In Love With Etsy’,” she said.

Where to find it/price range:$12 Onlineor in Belfast at her store The Sail Locker.

In her words: “My nautical designs are inspired by summers sailing with my family growing up on MDI. Each piece is tied by hand using traditional maritime techniques.”

Jessica Schnell Knite, Monhegan/Rockland

Hand knit black and white wool fingerless gloves

The back story:

Jessica Schnell Knite has been knitting, crocheting, and beading since she was eight years old.

“I lived on Monhegan Island for almost a decade before graduating from the University of New England and moving to Rockland,” she said. “Monhegan Island is a very small community, including approximately 50-60 year-round residents, most of whom are involved in lobstering. Much of my inspiration comes from the colors, seasons, and people on Monhegan as it is both a beautiful and vibrant place in terms of scenery and companionship. It is also a very spiritual place that I am deeply connected.”

Where to find it/price range: $25 Online

In her words: “The white and black variation in these gloves is reminiscent of the ocean spray coating the island’s rocky coast in the winter and I chose wool because it’s a warm, sturdy fiber for what can be very bitter cold island weather throughout the season. I made the gloves fingerless, or wristlets as they’re often called, because there’s no better way to keep your hands warm and still retain the dexterity needed to do everyday tasks around the shop, fish house, and home.”

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

THOMASTON—There are ladies who lunch and then there are ladies who knit.  Likely the conversation and camaraderie are the same, but the half dozen women who form “Knit Happens,” an informal knitting group who meet once a week at the Thomaston Public Library, are doing their part to make Maine stand out for the 2018 Special Olympics Maine State Winter Games at Sugarloaf Mountain January 28-30.

For the last two years, Trish Smith and Ellen Schooley have gathered in the library, opening up their group to fellow knitters have met at the library, starting in the summer, knitting together once a week, all throughout the fall, in order to have a certain amount of hats and scarves ready to ship to Maine Special Olympics athletes before the games. Knit Happens is one of many informal knitting groups and individuals across Maine doing the same thing, so that 500 to 800 of Maine’s athletes will be wearing the signature colors of black, purple and charcoal colors with pride.

Katheryn Wilde, a volunteer for the project in Buxton, said that once the announcement went out on Facebook, the idea spread far and wide, nationally with the farthest donation coming from Honolulu.

“We have a lot of Mainers in Florida and Arizona, knitting stuff at home and sending it to us to represent Maine,” she said. “I think it’s the coolest thing in the world.”

Using color combinations specified by the Maine Special Olympics Maine, the ladies buy all of their own yarn and spend their time turning it into stylish hats, scarf and mittens.

But, the group isn’t all about work. “We chat about politics, religion, books, dogs and community—all the things you’d expect,” Alice Dashiell, said laughing.

“And anyone can join us,” said Smith. “We’re here to teach anyone who wants to learn some skills. You can even make a project with these colors from home and bring it in.”

Beyond the project, Knit Happens works all year long to provide items to other community organizations. The knitters are beginning to knit warm hats, scarves, and mittens to donate to Thomaston residents of all ages who are in need through the Thomaston Inter‑Church Fellowship Food Pantry has graciously agreed to distribute the items. In addition the library will add the knitted items to the donations collected at the library's monthly CommuniTea.

For more information: somaine.org/2018-scarfhat-project/

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

BELFAST— When Melanie Tingdahl was young, like many kids growing up, she always turned to the comic pages of the newspaper first. “I was always a huge fan of comics like Peanuts and Calvin and Hobbes and when when I was a kid, I wanted to draw comics like that,” she said. “When I got into my teens, I got more into the superhero comics like X-Men and Captain America.”

The 31-year-old Portland artist plans to do a talk and workshop at the Belfast Public Library, Monday, December 4 at 3:30 p.m. "I don’t actually have a formal background in comic illustration," she said, "but I’ve been working at Casablanca’s Comics in Portland for the last eight years and being there has really inspired me, especially when surrounded by the level of good comic books and art that comes in the shop.”

Tingdahl said that in the past dozen years comic books for kids have really broadened in scope with graphic novels and more diverse and sophisticated subjects. “Even as an adult, I still love to read the kids’ comics, because the lessons they teach kids are amazing," she said. "Some comics are scary, some are scientific, some are educational and there are some great social and emotional-type stories.”

Tingdahl created and sold illustrations for two mainstream comics, Lumberjanes, and My Little Pony.  She has also taught classes across the state. Her workshop is geared toward tweens and teens. “This is geared primarily to kids 11 to 17 and what I’ll do is give a little talk about the comic industry, which is fairly small. Then, after that I plan on doing a small illustration workshop for any kids interested in trying out some drawing skills. I’ll give them some tools to work with.”

For more information about her work visit: www.meltingdoll.com

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

LINCOLNVILLE BEACH— Hot chocolate, a huge stack of discarded pallets and sunset at Lincolnville Beach: that and a big community turnout is all you need for a good old-fashioned winter beach bonfire.

Andy Young in his Santa hat, worked with a number of local building suppliers, boat repair shops, tree service companies and volunteers to stack up the the giant pile, beginning at 12 p.m. Saturday, December 2. “We had donations and help from Back Cove Yachts, Rankin’s Hardware & Building Supplies, Viking Lumber, EBS, Bragg’s Tree Care, and Goodridge-Lerman Tree service,” he said. “And the guys from Bald Rock Builders were a huge part of the building team.”

Lincolnville Family Dentistry set up a table with complimentary hot chocolate, candy canes, and of course, toothpaste.

At 3 p.m. Young and a friend torched up the base of the bonfire with a propane tank and within about five minutes, the smoke was billowing and the heat could be felt from the parking lot.

“Do you know the real reason we do this every year?” Young asked. “What most people don’t realize is three weeks before Christmas, Santa does a test run with a sleigh and puts each of the reindeer through a workout. Every year, he’s flying around Labrador, Newfoundland, and as far as Nova Scotia. Used to be he never came this far down the coast. But, we started building our bonfires, he noticed and started coming down. The problem is, the first year we did this, the reindeer didn’t like the sand on the beach. Now, they land up the road at Mike’s Alignment and a fire truck goes up to meet Santa and bring them all down. So, you see, our bonfires have to keep getting bigger and bigger each year so that Santa knows how to find us.”

As the fire burned on, caroling commenced at 4 p.m. with a brief lighting of the Christmas tree followed by Santa Claus, who apparently, had no trouble finding the beach.

Drone footage courtesy Terry Boivan

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

BELFAST— There’s a decidedly more introspective feeling going on during the last art walk of the season, particularly after the sun goes down at 4 p.m. Friday night, December 1, a few galleries rallied to the last challenge, while others remained closed because they had planned an Early Bird opening Saturday morning.

At Parent Gallery, artist Joanne Parent was busy hanging up new smaller original oil portraits in her family’s gallery, while her mother, Linda set up refreshments. “The theme is ‘Little Gems,’” said Linda. “Next Friday night, we’re going to have an opening reception for the ‘Little Gems’ show Friday, Dec. 8, from 5 to 8 p.m.

Belfast Framer and Betts Gallery and Belfast Bay Shade Company and Belfast Clay Studio also kept the lights on and the spread festive.

Maine Farmland Trust Gallery displayed one wood cut portrait of a farmer gathering onions (with a real bushel of onions beneath the piece) in the lobby to preview their opening show on Saturday called In The Interval Between Snowflakes, a multimedia exhibit by Bruce McAffee Towl “in honor of all of us who bend down to raise food for many of us.”

In the midst of the evening, a small group gathered silently in front of the post office holding candles. Meredith Bruskin, from Swanville, said,  “Tonight is 29th anniversary of World AIDS Day, and we’re all gathered here to remember the people we’ve lost and to celebrate the living — people living with HIV/AIDS.” Across the circle from her, Christopher Szarke, a priest over at St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church in Belfast added, “I worked in the AIDS Ministry from 1987 to 1995, and as we’re gathering tonight, I’m remembering about 400 people that i knew that died by the time I was 31. I feel a lot of their presence around us tonight.” At the foot of the group was a handmade sign listing some of those names.

And now that winter is here, it’s time to let the creative mindset take hold once again.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKLAND — Instead of the typical cranberry-infused holiday cocktail this year, we’ve decided to profile something a little more sophisticated for December — the Negroni, made by Ada’s Kitchen, newly opened in Rockland. This complex cocktail has roots in Italy, with its origins thought to have been invented at Caffe Casoni in Florence, Italy in 1919. According to Gin Foundry, “Legend tells that Count Camillo Negroni asked his friend, bartender Forsco Scarselli, to strengthen his favorite cocktail – the Americano – by replacing the soda water with gin.”

Justin Kinney, a bartender at Ada’s Kitchen, shows us how to make the classic cocktail. “It’s a cocktail of three components: sweet vermouth, Campari and your choice of gin, topped off with a bit of squeezed grapefruit juice,” he explained.

Watch the video to see how the cocktail is made. You’ll need:

• 1 shot of gin
• 1 shot of Campari, a liqueur
• Yzaguirre Classic Red Vermouth
• Fresh squeezed grapefruit
• Orange peel

Add a jig (or shot glass) of all three components into a shaker full of ice. Shake and pour the drink neat, into a cocktail glass. Add a jig of fresh-squeezed grapefruit and rim the glass with orange peel. The Italian cocktail fits Ada’s Italian flavor profiles and has just been added to their cocktail list.

“This is an old-school cocktail making a comeback,” said bar manager Stacy Campbell. “The Negroni, with just a squeeze of fresh grapefruit at the end, softens the flavor and rounds it off a little bit. Your nose picks up the citrus first, which goes well with the herbaceous flavor. You hit more than one sense.”

Make the cocktail yourself for your next holiday party, or have it made for you. Ada’s is introducing Negroni Night Friday, December 1, where patrons will be able to try this cocktail’s recipe–the Ada’s Negroni– along with two other “secret” versions.

Related: See some of our past stories on “What’s In That Cocktail” recipes.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

CAMDEN — At the last Pecha Kucha night held at the Camden Opera House on November 10, a Camden-based comedy improv troupe took the stage, giving a PK presentation that departed from the typical format of a slide show. The Cool Kids’ Table, a troupe founded by Heather Ellsworth three years ago, did a live performance in tandem with their 20-second-per-image, 20-slides format.

“Instead of showing slides explaining the process of improv, we decided we were just going to do comedy improv right on the stage,” said Ellsworth. “We wanted to show people how it worked as an art form.”

One of the troupe members emailed the PK organizers 60 words and asked them to pick 15 words randomly. 

“We didn’t know which words would come up every 20 seconds or how we would incorporate them into our improvised scenes.”

Watch the video of the performance to the right.

What they performed for the audience was a game called Four Corners, a short-form game.

“Comedy improv is completely spontaneous,” said Ellsworth. “It’s not like stand-up comedy, where jokes are rehearsed ahead of time. There are structures within improv, such as the structure of the Four Corners game, but within that structure, you don’t know what you’re going to say until you jump into the scene. Normally, a new word introduced every 20 seconds isn’t part of the game; we just blended a traditional game with the Pecha Kucha format.”

The idea of getting up on a stage in front of an audience and making up a scene as you go can be a terrifying concept.

“I first saw comedy improv 20 years ago in San Francisco,” Ellsworth recalled. “I said to myself ‘This is one thing I’m never going to do.’ It’s strange how that turned out.”

The Cool Kids’ Table performs at various local events throughout the year.  They have performed at The Strand, Rockport Opera House, and most recently, the Next Generation Theater as part of the annual Improv ME Festival. Depending on the event, the troupe can range from three to six performers and a show lasts one to two hours.

They usually spend two hours per week rehearsing and according to Ellsworth: “it’s a lot of fun to relate to other people in a way you would normally not get a chance to do in your daily life.  We all need time just to let go and play!”

Ellsworth was also hoping the Pecha Kucha performance would inspire more people to join the troupe.

“Some people will come on board and try it out for just a little while,” she said. “Three of us have been together from the start and a couple of people expressed interest in joining after the show. It can be an intimidating concept, but we assure people they don’t have to perform until they are ready. We probably rehearsed a full year as a troupe before we had our first performance.”

Contrary to the assumption that comedy improv performers are all class clowns and effortlessly extroverted, Ellsworth said: “I look at our group and I think that, except for me, everybody is an introvert. A lot of improv is just about connecting with your scene partners, connecting in the moment.”

The Cool Kids’ Table will be performing again at Rock City Café on Dec. 2 at 7 p.m.

To learn more visit: https://www.facebook.com/groups/TheCKT/

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

Now that it’s officially fall and gets dark at an unholy hour of 4 p.m., we’ve updated The Midcoast’s Guide To Happy Hours.

Gone is: Ebentide in Camen and new to the Midcoast HappyHour/Social Scene is Ondine in Belfast, Hoxbill in Camden and Ada’s Kitchen in Rockland.  Bookmark this Guide to Midcoast’s Happy Hour link when you want to figure out where to go on any given day of the week.

BELFAST— Order up! For the third Thanksgiving in a row, Traci’s Diner (57 Maine Street) is the place where people come for a hot Thanksgiving dinner of turkey, squash, mashed potatoes, cranberries, and a choice of apple, pumpkin or chocolate pie. The price of the meal is just a donation. Some can only afford to give less than five dollars; others plunk down a hundred.

All of this food has been donated by local companies or made from scratch and every single person, from the cooks to the servers to the Red Knights of Maine Chapter IX, a non-profit motorcycle club for fire fighters, EMS personnel, and their families, are volunteering their time this Thanksgiving. No one is making a dime or any tips off this special day. From 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. their focus is on feeding people and making them feel welcome.

Brandy Watson Bowles, a server at Traci’s Diner, finishes up bringing hot plates to a couple at a table and sits down briefly for a chat. “We’re doing this for the Adoptive and Foster Families of Maine, based out of Orono,” she said. “It’s not a state-funded organization, but they go a step beyond. They buy Christmas gifts for children in foster care and they also fill backpacks for school.”

Watson Bowles adopted two little girls of her own and became involved with the organization several years ago. “They really helped me out when I adopted my girls, so when they reached out about working with The Red Knights of Maine, they were the ones we [at Traci’s Diner] wanted to give back to. This is the kind of organization that does what they say they are going to do—100% of proceeds aren’t going to some corporation. The money all goes to buying gifts for kids in foster care.”

Traci Mailloux, owner of Traci’s Diner, is busy working with her cooks and the Red Knights to keep the food coming. “We’ve all known each other for years and years,” she said. “After the first year we did this, I thought afterwards, I don’t think I could do a Thanksgiving without offering this again. I love it. The people coming in absolutely love it. And it’s not about how much we get in donations; we don’t turn anyone away. It’s what the holidays are all about. I just want to thank not only the Red Knights, but my whole crew here at the diner. They’ve really been my family as well as our customers.”

To learn more about Adoptive and Foster Families of Maine visit: www.affm.net

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

This Saturday, November 25, is Small Business Saturday, a day to celebrate and support small and entrepreneurial businesses and all they do for Midcoast communities.

This national “Shop Small” movement, sponsored by American Express, began in 2010. It’s about: “sharing your support for the spots you call your own, whether it's your barbershop or even your one-stop garden supply store. Places like these keep your community strong and vibrant, potentially employing your friends, family and neighbors.”

The movement was born a a counterpart to Black Friday and Cyber Monday, both of which typically generate huge revenue for national big box stores. When shopping for the holidays, consider the benefits of patronizing brick and mortar stores over online giants.

Locally, a number of businesses are participating in this movement, including on the traditional side, Warren & Warren Associates, Frantz Furniture and Bedding, and Kernal Panic Consulting and on the creative economy side, two Vinalhaven microbusinesses, Island Spirits and Windhorse Arts, along with Belfast Clay Studio, hello hello books, Dulse & Rugosa and Red Cloak Haunted History Tours.

Claire Weinberg and her daughter Carly Weinberg, co-founders of Dulse & Rugosa, a plant-based skincare line, are avid supporters of the Shop Small movement.

“I took a road trip with Carly from Texas to Maine and we stopped at this little town in Oklahoma that was beautiful, architecturally, but it was completely empty, except for one restaurant,” said Claire Weinberg. “If you want to have a vibrant town, a place that you still want to visit in the winter, you have to support your local and small economies. I believe that supporting small  local indie and businesses, supports innovation and change to a community.”

The Penobscot Bay Regional Chamber of Commerce encourages everyone to stop by a small business on Saturday. Downtown Rockland is also participating heavily in Shop Small/Shop Local initiative. Gordon Page, executive director of Rockland Main Street, Inc. said, “During the holidays and all year long, downtown Rockland offers a vibrant community connection with city residents, friends from neighboring towns and merchants that are known by their first names.” This year, Rockland Main Street, Inc., distributed more than 200 shopping bags and point-of-sale materials to more than 35 businesses during their November Morning On Main meeting. They organized it to coincide with this Friday’s Festival of Lights, which kicks off on Friday with Santa's arrival via Coast Guard vessel.

To find out who is participating locally visit the Shop Small Saturday in Rockland Facebook page and scroll down to the Discussion comments.

For businesses outside of Rockland and statewide, here is a map of who is participating. 

 Another way to check and see who else is participating in Maine is to log onto twitter.com and search with the hastags #shopsmall and #maine

And finally for the small businesses, here are three ideas to make the most of Small Business Saturday.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

BROOKS— Napolean is a 20-pound commercially bred turkey who was rescued from being on the menu one Thanksgiving. He was seized by the state in a cruelty case and brought to Peace Ridge Farm Sanctuary, a haven for farm animals. Unfortunately, the abuse he suffered from his original owners affected him so profoundly that by the time he was brought to a safe place on the farm, he was deeply mistrustful of human contact and would fearfully charge at anyone who tried to approach him.

Unlike the other geese, ducks and guinea hens that roam free during the day, Napolean has the privacy he wants and needs behind a fence with his own bird house to retreat to. Each day, he stomps back and forth along the fence line and has worn the grass down to dirt.

Cheryl Miller, a friend of Peace Ridge Sanctuary stands outside Napolean’s cage and talks to him.

“In 1998, I was working at Farm Sanctuary in Watkins Glen, New York, and I’d never met a living turkey before,” she said. “I was charmed by how sweet they are. I’d been a vegetarians since 1980 and that Thanksgiving, I’d participated in their ‘Gentle Thanksgiving’ event in which the staff and volunteers fed the turkeys a feast of greens, cranberries, squash, and pumpkin pie. It was so delightful for me to watch the honored guests gather round, cluck, and peck at the offering prepared just for them.”

This is our third story in a three-part series on Peace Ridge Sanctuary. •Rescued animals get a Better life at Peace ridge Sanctuary
•What a tiny Angora rabbit and a 700-pound pig have in common

The National Turkey Federation estimates Americans eat approximately 46 million turkeys on Thanksgiving day. So, Miller started painting small scale watercolors of turkeys to honor those that ended up as meals on Thanksgiving tables, and she has done so for the past 18 years. In 2013, she got an exhibit at a gallery in Hallowell, who wanted more portraits than she had, so she initiated a community art project to create more. That project spurred a worldwide movement to paint turkey portraits.

Toward that objective, the 46 Million Turkeys project invites members of the community as guests to a virtual Thanksgiving table to help create 46 million mini turkey portraits as a reminder that every single one of those animals was unique individual. “Through my website, I don’t ask people not to eat turkey,” she said, “I just ask people to participate in the project.” Anyone can contribute and join in—participation is not restricted by age, artistic ability, or diet.

Miller loves to spend time with all of the animals on her visits, but has a soft spot for Napolean.

“He’s five years old now, which is very old for commercially bred turkeys to live, especially males, but Napolean gets to live out the rest of his life in a safe space,” she said.

To learn more about Miller’s art project visit: 46millionturkeys.com/

To learn more about Peace Ridge Sanctuary and how to volunteer visit: www.peaceridgesanctuary.org

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

SEARSPORT—In a recent story behind the origin of Maine’s iconic vintage postcards, I learned of an incident that happened in the 1990s in which 35,000 negatives of historic Maine photos used for many of those postcards were almost lost forever.

Kevin Johnson, the photo archivist at Penobscot Marine Museum, is the man familiar with the intrigue.

“I thought everyone had already heard this story,” he said.

Turns out, not everybody. In case you haven’t heard it, here it is from the beginning:

A century ago, a Rockland man, Herman Cassens, started a postcard printing business in Belfast, calling it the Eastern Illustrating and Publishing Company. He sent his crew to all of these small New England towns with their box cameras asking local citizens what they should photograph and ended up capturing scenes of small towns and rural byways . 

According to the PMM site: “The Eastern collection is the largest single photographic collection in Maine, consisting of nearly 50,000 images of Maine and the rest of New England and upstate New York. Most of the photos are on glass-plate negatives.”

The company stopped making real photo postcards in the 1950s. Here’s where Johnson picks up the thread.

“The owners of DownEast Magazine purchased the company and negatives in the 1980s,” he said. “They had the idea of a vintage postcard line and access to the old images to use in the magazine, but neither came to be.

“Then, in the early 1990s, they donated all of the negatives to the Maine Media Workshop in Rockport. I came to the Workshops in 2003 as a student and learned all about photography. I wanted to stay in the creative bubble at the Workshops in Rockport, and got offered a job digitizing and cataloguing the negatives, and figuring out a plan to market them. When the recession hit in 2006, we were all laid off. On Super Bowl Sunday in 2007, one of my friends called me and told me that there had been a flood in Union Hall where all of the negatives were stored and I needed to get down there right away. The basement was soaked and they were going to throw all of the negatives out.”

An interesting twist for someone who no longer even worked for Maine Media Workshops, but Johnson decided what needed to be done.

“So, I dragged all of my friends who were coming to watch the Super Bowl at my house and brought them to Rockport and we spent between five and six hours bringing up all of the negatives from Union Hall and depositing them up to the dining hall,” he said. “I made some calls to the Eastman House and found it was OK for the negatives to get wet. The catch was that they couldn’t be allowed to dry touching each other or in the archival envelopes that I’d been putting them into for two years, or else the emulsion of the images would peel apart and they’d be destroyed.”

Johnson, who now gives this talk as a slideshow, laughs about it now.

“I spent five and a half weeks hand drying each one,” he said. “I had to wrap everything in plastic to keep it wet before it could be dried properly. During this time, the school had changed hands to the Maine Media Workshop and the new owners did not want the collection. David Lyman, who owned the Workshops donated them to the Penobscot Marine Museum and the only catch was: they had to take me with them.”

Johnson has now been with Penobscot Marine Museum for 10 years and has orchestrated a number of photo archive events, including the 100th anniversary of Maine Postcard Day in 2016, with its exhibition “Wish You Were Here: Communicating Maine.”

“Postcards are the third most collected item in the world following stamps and coins,” he said. “People are kind of obsessive about them.”

The people of Maine have Johnson to thank for that obsessiveness, as well.

For more information visit: www.penobscotmarinemuseum.org

Related story: Traveling back to 1845 in the film ‘The Home Road’

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

BELFAST—Recall the 1980s in Maine when you wanted a cold beer. There wasn’t much variety—or taste. There were approximately 100 companies in the U.S. making beer with 20 massive facilities producing nearly 95 percent of the beer. Only two Maine craft breweries existed around that time with D.L. Geary Brewing Co. the first to open in 1986, since the end of Maine’s Prohibition laws.

According to the Maine Brewer’s Guild, as of October 31, 2016, Maine has 89 active, licensed breweries, with more set to open in 2018.

On Nov. 14, Maine Farmland Trust’s annual meeting brought together people to eat, drink and be merry, of course, but also to focus on an interesting trend: h\How the growing Maine grain economy and Maine brewers (and other businesses) are working together to reinforce and reinvigorate each other.

Within the last five years, a number of Maine breweries began seeing the potential for sourcing their fermentables—barley wheat and oats—locally, rather than import from gristmills and farms out of state. Allagash Brewing Co., which began in 1995, and was founded by Rob Tod in Portland, crafts a beer made with grains grown and processed exclusively in Maine, which we wrote about initially in a 2016 summer edition of The Wave, A Maine beer so good, it had be made from 16 Counties.

On the night of the Maine Farmland Trust’s annual meeting, that beer, “Sixteen Counties,” stood out among the many edibles and offerings, not only for its herbal, crisp taste, but also because it embodied everything the gathering centered around – forging symbiotic relationships between brewers and farmers and millers to create an excellent product while elevating the economy. 

On hand to speak that evening was Allagash’s founder Rob Tod, Amber Lambke, Maine Grains and Sara Williams, Aurora Mills & Farm, as each had a hand in creating Sixteen Counties.

"The special thing about the brewing," said Tod, "is that it's becoming less industrialized. Instead of leaving communities like many other industries, breweries are coming back. And by returning to communities these breweries give people the chance to see, touch, and smell the process, and know who's making their beer. Seeing the passion and value the brewers are bringing to their work makes people more willing to pay a higher price for the product. If people weren't willing to pay a slightly higher price, these breweries, and the communities they're creating, wouldn't be sustainable. That extra support for local beer also helps support other local industries, like Maine agriculture."

Beyond the beer industry, the emerging grain industry has fostered many more interconnections. As Lambke said to the audience, “We’ve milling grains for about 12 years now and the demand for high quality grains keeps growing. The process actually benefits even more people than you realize. Beyond the farmers and millers, we’re employing bakers, oven builders, and that network keeps growing and growing.”

So at your next gathering place, break some Maine bread with your neighbors, hoist a Maine beer and toast to the ingenuity of the hardworking people of this state.

 Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

ROCKPORT—It’s taken nearly six months to complete, but the Hospitality House’s first tiny shelter prototype is open for public viewing this week. The 190-square-foot shelter, located in the back of Hospitality House’s red barn on five acres of the property, has a welcoming micro-front porch with a window box of fall gourds and bittersweet. The structure, which cost approximately $15,000 to build, is not exactly a “home,” but instead, more of a warm, safe, supportive place for homeless clients to stay, adding additional capacity to their shelter program.

It doesn’t take long to take a tour. The interior is similar to a rental cottage or motel room with just enough room for a twin bed in the main room, (functioning as both the sleeping and living space), a small dresser, a bathroom (not yet plumbed) and a kitchenette area.

“We are planning to build a communal kitchen as part of our community building where everyone in the tiny structures can gather and take turns making food,” explained Ev Donnelly, a volunteer coordinator.

Nationally, affordable housing shortage is at a rate of only 29 units available for every 100 extremely low-income family renters. In tight housing markets like the Midcoast’s where Maine State Housing Authority statistics show that the average monthly rent for a two-bedroom apartment with utilities included in Rockland is $1,033, it’s more than what 67 percent of Rockland residents can afford. The concept of “Tiny Home” communities has caught on nationally, with the ideal number of structures in each small town totaling six to 15, providing economic relief for those who can’t afford high rentals or mortgages. The tight-knit community model would also provide built-in education and peer support.

“We hope with funding we’ll be able to build 10 to 14 of these total,” said Donnelly. ”Half of them would be temporary shelters, say three or four nights for someone or a small family in an emergency situation and the other half to be transitional supportive shelter, for someone who might be coming out of the Hospitality House, but isn’t quite ready to be self-sufficient in their own apartment yet, but is working toward it.”

Last May, Tia Anderson, executive director of Midcoast Habitat for Humanity and Stephanie Primm, executive director of the Hospitality House, were brainstorming ways to collaborate in order to provide sustainable temporary shelter to the number of homeless clients in the Midcoast. With the help of a half dozen volunteers and their Women Build team, they built and raised the exterior walls, framing them up in may. The rest of the finish work took place over the last few months.

The public is invited to view the new structure all this week from 12 to 2 p.m. each day or by appointment.

For more information contact Midcoast Habitat for Humanity at 207-236-6123 or visit: www.midcoasthabitat.org/

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com

BROOKS—Nearly every type of farm animal at Peace Ridge Sanctuary has its own barn and space to roam. And each animal has its own story, which reveals both sides of human nature: from people who’ve treated them carelessly, cruelly, and the compassion of others, who see their intrinsic value.

 The pigs  

This is our second story in a three-part series on Peace Ridge Sanctuary
• Rescued farm animals get a better life at Peace Ridge Sanctuary

Inside the heated barn, the larger breeds of pigs are content to lie around and lounge. Missy is their largest, weighing 700 pounds. “Missy was discovered wandering down a rural road in Lincoln County covered in ice,” said Andrews. “The state went to investigate and found the farmers had no shelter for any of their pigs, so she was seized. And because of her, all the rest of the animals who were also severely neglected were also taken, so she rescued them all. She is a super hero.”

The cows

Theo is a brown and white cow who Peace Ridge volunteers discovered when they went to investigate a dog cruelty case. A woman had bought Theo on the side of road for $10 to keep him for veal. She had been raising him in such deplorable conditions, the state stepped in. “Veal is naturally depleting,” said Andrews. “When a young cow is raised for its meat, it’s fed an iron-deficient diet to keep the muscles lean and they become anemic. He’s doing so much better now.”

Learning how badly so many of these rescued animals were cared for hits some people hard.

“We don’t tell these stories to bum people out, but to explain what these animals have been through, and even though that discomfort may be there in hearing it, it drives the work that we do,” said Andrews. 

She explained that Theo and his companion, black and white Sammy, were the typical victims of the dairy industry. The dairy industry is primarily interested in producing milk from cows, but to do that, the cow has to be pregnant. Once the calf is delivered, its value is lessened, because the mother cow’s milk is reserved for the industry, not for the calf. “The calves are pretty much worthless in the industry, unless they are raised for veal, which is how we are able to bargain for their lives so easily,” she said. Andrews emphasized that Peace Ridge has a policy not to outright purchase a neglected animal, lest it become part of the commercial process they are trying to save the animals from. Often, they are seized by the state—or surrendered by owners happy to be absolved of the responsibility.

The horses

Two draft horses seized from an Amish farm stand next to one another by the fence, allowing people to brush their mane and touch their muzzles. Both draft horses have visible scars on their muzzles from harnesses that once bit into their flesh. “The state went to investigate a horse who’d starved to death and found these two,” said Andrews. “Max was half the weight then as he is now, 1,100 pounds. He’s twice that now and doing very well.” 

Beside them are retired race hoses, who never have to run again, unless they feel like it. And no one ever rides them.

The goats

The goats have the most disturbing story of all. In 2014, (before the farm moved to Brooks), nearly 30 goats were discovered on the second floor of a barn that had not been cleared in a decade. The barn was stacked so high in waste and filth, the goats were trapped and couldn’t get out. Many broke their horns on the rafters, just trying to squeeze through, and may of their horns had to be amputated. Seventeen of the female goats were also pregnant at the time, but so depleted, they weren’t healthy enough to nurse. So after they gave birth, the staff and volunteers of Peace Ridge bottlefed 12 of the babies round the clock for two months in the kitchen of the main house, sleeping in shifts. The happy ending to this story is that all of the babies survived and were reunited with their mothers and today, all of the goats share a barn with the sheep and they have (number of acres) to roam.

There are more types of animals and more stories, but this is a snapshot of what bonds the staff and volunteers to the creatures they care for. From one of their 50 adoptable rabbits to Missy, the 700-pound pig, each animal is no longer a beast of burden. Each has an identity and a guaranteed future.

“The hardest thing we ever have to do is make the decision not to take an animal,” said Andrews. “We have 790 acres, but it’s the financial aspect: the money for food, medicine, and individualized vet care. Sometimes we have to take an animal out of state for surgery, because the field is so specialized.”

Peace Ridge Sanctuary operates as a 501-C3 and animal shelter runs mostly on volunteer power with 15 to 25 volunteers year round, but winter tends to draw fewer volunteers. Their next volunteer orientation is November 18 at 11 a.m. for people interested in joining us for consistent weekly volunteerships.

To learn more visit: Peace Ridge Sanctuary.

Look for our next story coming soon in this series: Napolean the 20 pound turkey who hates humans and the woman who loves him

Related Story: Rescued farm animals get a better life at Peace Ridge Sanctuary

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com