Summer is whizzing by, as it always does. Bit of a heat wave in Nova Scotia right now, but we always know snow is coming – eventually, so I try not to complain too much about the hot days.

Granddaughter Noelle made her first visit to Nova Scotia earlier this month – I’d love to post some pics to show you how sweet she is, but permission hasn’t been granted😊 She did dip her tiny toes in the Minas Basin, Lake Peter and the Atlantic Ocean – she wasn’t a fan of the waves. It’s interesting seeing the differences between parenting in the age of Google, compared to our experience of essentially parenting by instinct/guess/luck/friends’ advice. Pretty sure there’s too much information available in some cases, but, of course, a lot of useful/great info, too. Happy we’ll get to spend some time with both Noelle and Ada in August in Ontario (and their parents, of course).

We’re on our 12^th annual creating retreat this week, our third visit to The Mighty Atlantic in beautiful Beach Meadows – lots of crashing waves and pounding surf music this week – and nice, cool temperatures compared to many places. We’ve been fogged in a bit, but most days the sun has appeared before dusk falls. A fox family living in the woods near the beach has been an added delight this year. Great conversation – we haven’t solved any of the world’s problems, but not for lack of trying. As always I take too many pictures, but I especially love the sand trees carved by the endless waves. Happy summer to you and yours!

“The loneliness you get by the sea is personal and alive. It doesn’t subdue you and make you feel abject. It’s stimulating loneliness.” Anne Morrow Lindbergh

“When anxious, uneasy, and bad thoughts come, I go to the sea, and the sea drowns them out with its great wide sounds, cleanses me with its noise, and imposes a rhythm upon everything in me that is bewildered and confused.”
Rainer Maria Rilke

“I have been feeling very clearheaded lately and what I want to write about today is the sea. It contains so many colors. Silver at dawn, green at noon, dark blue in the evening. Sometimes it looks almost red. Or it will turn the color of old coins. Right now the shadows of clouds are dragging across it, and patches of sunlight are touching down everywhere. White strings of gulls drag over it like beads.

It is my favorite thing, I think, that I have ever seen. Sometimes I catch myself staring at it and forget my duties. It seems big enough to contain everything anyone could ever feel.”
― Anthony Doerr, All the Light We Cannot See