BFF birding at Reid State Park!

Super excitement this weekend as my BFF Gretchen and her gf Laura came to visit us! Somehow, everything now looks even more beautiful and magical around here because we're sharing it with friends. It's been lonely for just AB and me and the kittehs.

Today, we went birding all day! Our first outing was to Reid State Park, about 35 minutes from our house. On the way there, we saw a huge Snapping Turtle:

Very cool.

We got to Reid and immediately the good birds came:

Black-bellied Plovers

A Common Eider still in breeding plumage, catching a crab:

By now, he's ripped the legs off:

Now we're working on getting it down. Going:

going:

GONE!

The most exciting bird was a Black Guillemot, which I managed to get a (bad) photo of!

There he is! Lucky photo!

Lots of Savannah Sparrows too:

We also saw my first Maine loon:

to match my license plate:

We had a great time, and I got lifebird #364! Gretchen got that one and the Common Eider.

After that we had some seafood (okay, I ate chicken tenders; G ate a hot dog, Laura had a crabcake sandwich, and AB had lobster stew), and then we took the dogs to Wolf's Neck. No photos there, but the tide was higher than we'd ever seen it.

For dinner, we made pizza:

I slapped out the dough (sorta, a remnant of my Domino's days) and topped the left one (pepperoni, onion, green pepper, black olives, mushrooms, and artichoke hearts) and Laura topped the right one (crab meat, artichokes, a light pesto, cherry tomatoes and heirloom tomato slices, olive oil, scallions, crushed fresh garlic, and mushrooms). That's also my salad there. Delicious! AB also made my favorite pumpkin pie using OnePie (it's the BEST)!

It's been a wonderful weekend, and it's not even over!

Tomorrow: Scarborough Marsh!