Category: Moving Relocating to Maine

Maine Made Christmas Presents

Maine made Christmas presents.

Something not from across the pond or with a “made in China” sticker on the bottom. Low tech not high tech and made in Maine. When you think something unique to Maine, what comes to mind? Christmas tree or wreath to be part of your holiday tradition? Or presents with something from LL Bean? Maybe a wild Maine blueberry scented candle or pie or jar of jam?

Maine is famous for it’s lobsters, variety of fish from pulled in from deep in the sea.

The Only Fish Fresher Is Still Swimming In The Maine Sea!

With all this coastline, 228 miles but 3,478 miles of inlets, coves, harbors and other watery hide aways, Maine fresh shellfish is part of a lot of Christmas celebrations.

Growing up oyster stew, shrimp cocktail or crab melts all showed up on the Christmas Day or Eve tradition. If you were born and raised along the coast of Maine, seafood of all types could be a regular meal time staple. Digging for clams, shucking oysters, cracking lobster legs and filet of all kinds of native fish.

Chances are someone you are related to has a commercial fishing license or back in the family tree did.

Or you run a boat heading out to sea and are born for the salt air and sea swells as you head out of the harbor in search of a big catch.

Fish Fresh From The Maine Coastal Sea. Barnacle Billy’s Crew Ham It Up For Tourists. The Maine Coast Has Lots Of Seafood Eateries.

Further inland, up into the belly of Maine and away from Boston, traveling to interior Maine. The holiday meal time Christmas celebration is pulled from old tattered and fade recipe cars. Gooseberry and mince meat pies. After hearty farmstead country style servings of vegetables of all kinds.

Venison from hunting season and pulling from root cellars for bread and butter pickles.

Deviled eggs, sticky sweet cinnamon buns and trays of home made sweets. Thinking about losing weight? Not during the holiday season in Maine. The feast is part of the one size fits all Christmas present the entire family enjoys. The big fat evergreen fir or pine tree in the living room corner is loaded down too. With fragile, precious decorations from Christmas past.

Artistry Thanks To Mother Nature. What You See On A Walk In Maine Over The Holidays In A Maine Peaceful Winter.

Photos of your brother or sister glued behind colored construction paper hanging on the boughs with multi color twinkling lights.

The power of a Christmas tree ornament you inherited from the growing up collection is immense. Memories and reminders of family members are spiked from these tree decorations enjoyed as a child. Throwing money at new flashy decorations is not needed when you hang on to and cherish these Christmas family ornaments.

This year’s tree hunted down, cut fresh and straight from your own land out behind your house.

Maine Is Real, Peaceful, Not Crowded. Winter Is Peaceful, Time To Hunker Down.

Christmas of yesteryear in rural Maine was not determined by how far into debt you went to pull it off on December 25th.

Home made hand knit mittens, sweaters, scarves. Carefully stitched quilted blankets worked on earlier in the year completed just in time to wrap up and slide under the family Christmas tree.

Practical gifts purchased with lots of thought because you remember the family member saying they wished they had this or that item. Money manged better when less of it to spend. Because of how hard it was to earn and save.

Thought and time put into what paper to use wrapping the gift up not parked by the tree in a gift bag with only tissue paper concealing it.

And the stockings as big a deal as the presents carefully wrap, ribbon and bowed under the Maine Christmas tree. Did you start first with the Christmas stockings?

How do you start the opening up of the wrapped presents in your home growing up? Free for all every man for himself? Or oldest or youngest goes first and then rotate around the room? Waiting for the grandparents to arrive and quite a breakfast spread served up first? Growing up in Maine…

Did you leave cookies and milk, a carrot for Santa?

Elf on a shelf and family parties, watching the same old Christmas films? Was there a Christmas Eve service in your holiday celebration? When did you stop traveling and started having Christmas celebrations in your own home? It is all about having yourself a Merry little Christmas with the ones you love.

Enjoying the child made gifts from school. Remembering when who made them had that small of hands and was lower to the ground. Home made items, decorations hand strung, Christmas cards taped around a doorway, putting on a feast of sweets and no one possibly able to go hungry.

A lot of the Christmas celebration one of gratitude like the Merle Haggard song “If we make it through December”.

Knowing despite it all, you and I are luckier than most.

Reaching out to help ringing the Salvation Army kettle bell. Knowing what families or individuals are suffering this holiday season. Doing anything possible to make things brighter for them. No doubt you know of some family where Christmas is not going to be so easy this season because of a loss. The hole, the missing family member that won’t be part of the Christmas celebration.

Delivering a cut, split cord of wood to help with the heat.

The Amish in my area have every Thursday designated as community day. Taking turns delivering the labor, materials and services needed to keep every household a float. Not a check from Uncle Sam for relief. A helping hand and a strong back the Christmas gift given all year long. Not just at the tail end of days marked on the kitchen wall calendar.

Getting off the couch, replacing feeling sorry for yourself with fresh air, outdoor scenery going for a walk in the woods. You never know what you will find hidden in the back forty acres of a Maine farm property.

Treasure In The Woods Getting Your Firewood To Heat Your Home! Old Cars Past Their Prime. Hanging Around For Hunters, Hikers, Land Brokers To Visit.

Maine made gifts for Christmas.

What items did you shop for on your list this year? Books, magazine subscriptions, movie tickets, museum passes and donations to local libraries, the animal shelters, food pantries. Know anyone in your community that needs a warm winter coat? That has no winter boats, hat, scarf and mittens or gloves? There are so many private ways to brighten someone else’s Christmas to secondary gain your own.

Thank you for following our Me In Maine blog posts through out the year and Merry Christmas, Happy New Year!

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

December 20, 2023
High Food Costs, Lessons Learned In The Maine Potato Farm Field.

High food costs.

It’s not the Maine potato farmer or organic grower making a killing. Not just inflation. All the middle men is where the extra grocery food costs come into play. Your household family food budget. There is no way anyone pushing the wire cart with the one squeaky wheel in their local Piggly Wiggly has not noticed. Grocery store checkout sticker shock. Higher prices and getting less for more. Not the other way around.

When you live in a built up city landscape, you are beat. No matter which market the wholesale food supplier is pulling from in the country, the cost is higher on both ends. Wholesale to retail to the consumer is concerning. And not just the high cost of food but what you are actually buying.

Where did it come from, what was it sprayed with and food safety.

Lots to consider before preparing a meal to put on your family supper table.

All Ages Picked Maine Potatoes In The Farm Field.

When you are raised in rural Maine, frugal simple meals are the norm.

Easy does it applies. But meat and potatoes simple does not mean the taste needs to be forgotten. The way the food is put together with love and attention and a creative spirit and the seasoning can all transform the simplest of meals. Welcome to the Maine country kitchen. Here’s an apron to tie on.

Fresh produce out of your Maine garden or farm field to can, preserve and stored to be drawn from your root cellar or food pantry.

That is the corner stone of wholesome, healthy and tasty. But what if you have no garden, do not have local farm producers to buy your home grown food to place on the family table? Then eating right when it’s from a grocery store outlet is going to be even more expensive these days.

This image from potato picking in Northern Maine over the weekend.

Picking Maine Potatoes, Using Local Kids To Hand Pick The Spud Crop!

Potato harvesters on Maine farms leave a lot of spuds behind.

I grew up and own the Maine potato farm where my youth was spent. Potato harvesters cover a lot of acreage in a short period of time. But they leave a lot of spuds behind. All the wind rowers and mechanical handling can also ding or dent the delicate skin of a Maine potato. Some potato varieties more susceptible to abrasion than others and tender skinned.

Hand picked potato field workers do the best job leaving nothing behind on the Maine farm.

Maine Potato Farm Field Pickers Do Better Job Than Mechanical Harvesters!

Less handling or bruising or scrapes! It is all about The Maine potato farm fields that are harvest mean let’s go gleaning!

More on that a little later in this blog post. First things first. Back to high food costs and trips in and out of the automatic doors at your local Maine grocery. Convenience items, time saving but they have always been expensive.

Reaching for that five pound lasagna pan in the cooler case does not come cheap. Loaded with sodium but voila, quick and easy. Once warmed up, dinner is served.

So Many Varieties Of Maine Potatoes. Like Pinto Golds Washed, Sliced Up And Ready To Put Into The Meal Plan.

Time.

It seems regardless of grocery store prices high low or in the middle, you have to plan your week’s meals. Searching for simple, delicious, affordable recipes starts with your family members. My mom had lots of cookbooks. Some of the best ones in print were from church groups where many cooks submit their collective piece de resistance.

Early Maine Farm Life At The Homestead, Surrounded With All The Land. Pot Luck Suppers At The Grange Hall.

Enjoying the home cooked meals that you had a hand in creating helps the Maine household meal time creativity.

This blogger does live in Maine and has access to farm to table locally grown produce, Locals can glean farm fields and harvest the bounty of what is left by potato harvesters.

Maine Potato Farm Field Workers Hard At It! Working Around The Weather.

On a Maine farm I own Russian banana, French fingerlings, amarosa, all blue and more potato varieties are free for the taking.

Russian Banana, French Fingerlings, Other Potato Varieties Grown On The Maine Farm!

It’s help yourself but be aware as temperatures dip and exposure to the sun will only lessen the quality of your farm field gleaning.

Being out in the fall air surrounded by tree leaf explosion of colors only adds to the joy of farm vegetable gleaning. Stay tuned because red and golden beets, turnips and rutabaga are next up. Looking up recipes on all the ways to create tasty low cost fresh not heated up frozen meals. Maine potato picking … wonderful experience, totally awesome taste, a lesson in working outdoors doing manual labor.

High grocery store prices have stirred a desire to find healthy alternatives and people are discovering the joy of cooking in Maine.

Kids Learn Work Ethic In The Maine Potato Field! On Your Knees Or Bent Over Standing Up. This Is An Entry Level Job!

Field gleaning these organic vegetables creates a small window of opportunity to help yourself.

Whatever you do glean is served up hot and ready fresh for the family table. But canning, preserving, freezing for future meals has to happen to extend the good tasting food budget savings. No grocery October is practiced by many in Maine agriculture regions. Those lucky enough to live near farms take a break from the automatic doors and Muzak up and down the store aisles.

Instead, gleaning fields, collecting apples, hunting for game. Pheasant, deer, black bear, moose gets to play along in the grocery cost meal planning savings. Making cider, apple sauce, pies and milling grain to weave into baked goods. It’s all around you in rural Maine. And those lucky enough to live close to the sea, hoist up other local, close to home meal time savings.

Fish, clams, mussels, lobster all get to take a turn being the star of the Maine family meal table.

Clams, Seafood, Outdoor Dining At Street & Company, Old Port Maine.

So ho hum about what gets served at your house at meal time?

Want to ease away from $200 plus weekly grocery store bills? Local farm to table in Maine locations offers many advantages. Plus you know what you are eating, where it came from and the peace of mind that no chemicals were used.

Where I live, there is a local dairy too, a vibrant farmers market to shop. We Mainers tackle the high cost of fossil fuels by heading to the woodlot. Heating our homes with hardwood cords of fuel is good exercise. Are these options for simpler living available where you live?

Used to be go in three weeks early. Then three weeks off from school to pick Maine potatoes.

Everyone took part in the Maine potato harvest whether you grew up on a family farm or not. The smallest child just as important as the oldest in the potato picking fall harvest tradition. Getting up early, going to bed early and wearing layers of clothes. Because there might have been a frost this morning. But by noon time, stripped to your t-shirt and the sun hot overhead as you pick baskets of potatoes. To pour into the cedar or plywood barrels.

Maine Youth Working The Maine Potato Harvest. Did Not Hurt Their Work Ethic!

Four baskets per barrel that weigh 165 pounds.

The pickers take a section, a length of potato field that is your job to keep picked up as the digger pulled by a farm tractor squeaks by row by row. You don’t want to be “caught up” and waiting for the digger to unearth more spuds. But you are out here to make some money and stay productive. The trick is to take a section from here to there that you can complete just as the digger makes another pass.

Getting behind, row by row happens in the Maine potato farm field.

Too big a section, or ran out of barrels to fill to stay caught up. No one leaves the field until everyone is picked up, all the potato sections in the field are caught up and ready for the next day.

No one will be left in the field when it’s pitch black still picking.

No one can head for home until every potato picker is caught up. Here’s a video of what happens on the other end… when the potatoes leave the Maine farm field and get deposited in the potato house.

Your lunch prepared in the early morning with lots of energy snacks.

Fresh air, hard physical labor as the leaves change color to red, orange, yellow, brown and a million shades of green. Food takes extra good. Hunger improves the taste. When you do run out of barrels and as you slowly get behind, that’s the time to pivot. To make good use of your time.

Head to the woods to go to the bathroom. Time to have an early or late lunch. Or pick the potato tops off your section so when you do get barrels, you can fill those baskets quicker.

Your full barrel of potatoes marked with a numbered ticket.

Maine Potato Picking. Passing On The Tradition Of Filling Up Potato Barrels.

To show this is my barrel, I earned the money for this one. A Maine potato farm truck with flat staked body on the back cruises the field picking up full barrels. Taking full trucks of 50 or more barrels to the potato storage facility.

Watch the video on Maine potato picking in Sherman.

Lessons learned in the Maine potato field?

Work ethic, responsibility to show up, to work around the weather that you can not control. Earning the money to buy school clothes, to save for college, to buy something you really want that Mom and Dad encourage you to go for it. Work hard, save and don’t let the money sift through your fingers. And take better care of whatever you do buy.

Years ago, when you moved out of state, and raised your hand when asked “who is from Maine?”

There is healthy discrimination. The good kind where you hail from Maine, picking potatoes as a kid growing up in rural areas of the state. You are hired because you knew how to work, like to do a good job without complaining. You show up and pitch in, are dependable. Pride in your labor and enjoyment from the outdoor work in the potato field all absorb in your entry level job learning curve.

No matter how old or young, everyone picked in the potato field.

All were needed to get the crop out and into potato house storage. To load up and ship down the road to out of state markets. Skills were learned in the potato field and lazy was not one of them. Work hard, pick them clean and don’t miss any.

The more you pick, the more you make and it becomes a field competition.

My personal best was 88 barrels and was paid 25 cents for each with my ticket slid in the crack on the top.

Those barrels in every other row for the truck to hoist and deliver to the dark potato bin miles away.

My four kids all picked potatoes and it was by far the best experience any of them ever had.

Your first job, your development of work ethic and gotta have a system out in the field was invaluable. My kids learned you don’t buy it if it is not worth it.

They know how hard a dollar is to earn and make sure to get value or wait. Keeping looking until you find some worth four, six or more barrels of potatoes that took to earn it.

Local Maine apples are ripe, ready and all they need is you to pick them.

Beat the high cost of Maine grocery store food items!

Make into apple cider that is freshly squeezed. Instead of reaching for a quart of orange juice from concentrate for $7.99. Make the effort. The fruits of your labor can be fun and tasty and wholesome.

Switch it up from OJ to Johnny Appleseed nutritious Maine wild fruit of all kinds when you are lucky enough to live, work, play in Maine.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

October 16, 2023
Pot Luck Suppers, Covered Dish Meal Dining

Potluck suppers, covered dish meal dining!

In rural Maine, it’s go easy on the host. Everyone brings a covered dish that is known community wide as their piece de resistance that gets rave reviews. Look at that long row of covered dish surprises at a potluck supper in Maine. It’s never take you chances or settle for “potluck”. No no, only the finest from each chef, cook, household prepared with love from the many Maine kitchens.

Early Maine Farm Life At The Homestead, Surrounded With All The Land. Pot Luck Suppers At The Church Or Grange Hall.

At Maine potluck suppers, it’s remarkable how the selection of items is perfectly balanced too.

Not three bake bean pots and no potato salads. From past experiences and because everyone has a signature dish to create and bring, everything rounds out on it’s own. Plus you have several dining variations on a theme. More than one of everything for a true home made hot and ready buffet.

Grange Hall pot luck covered dish suppers also required your BYO silverware and plates.

When done, slide them all in a bag. Return them to your home to wash and put back in the drawer and up in the kitchen cupboard. Nothing lost and way way less wear and tear on the pot luck supper host.

Fresh Farm To Table Locally Sourced Meals Prepared At Home Not A Maine Restaurant. What Dish Would You Bring To The Potluck Covered Dish Supper?

The potluck covered dish come and get it delivered to the venue carried in with pot holders and oven mitts.

Zipped into insulated warmers. Maybe tucked away in a picnic basket. These pot luck suppers not a once a year tradition but held on a regular routine. It’s social too, more than another just meal to brain storm create and put together all by your lonesome.

It is a lot of work to host a party at your home in Maine. House cleaning, grocery shopping, decorating. The tidy up and set the stage, tear down the extra tables and folding chairs is a lot of work.

Maine. Small Word, Big Place, Lots Of Unspoiled Space. Folks Are Neighborly, Friendly, Socialize. Community Pot Luck Suppers Happen Around Small Town Rural Maine .

Attending a potluck supper, toting a covered dish with serving utensils is one efficient buffet variety meal to enjoy.

The lots of people who come together at the pot luck supper makes the meal memorable. Not just a table for two tucked away in the corner of your favorite restaurant haunt experience.

Some cooks excel at pastries, breads, your pasta salad, their artichoke dips. Others are grillers, their skill set is for casseroles, soups and chowder. Crock pot jack pot slowly simmered and ready to serve at the community meal. Who brought the smoked salmon or toasted crab cakes or brook trout?

Small Towns, Food Vendors Working Community Events. MMmmmm Good. Sometimes The Dining Is Pot Luck Covered Dish Home Made!

Maine garden home grown farm to table platters of vegetables, fresh fruit with a floral center piece completes the menu.

Dig in but leave room for the buffet array of desserts of all kinds. Carefully created by many that migrate one by one, two by two and more to land in a small Maine community or family pot luck supper location.

Add a couple local Maine musicians for background music and the setting is complete.

Tap Your Toe, Sing Along. Music Made Locally And Live Is Huge In Maine Communities. Some Potluck Suppers Offer Live Local Background Music.

The lack of shelling out a hundred dollars or more to settle up the bill only improves the take away taste from the potluck supper, covered dish experience. Maine is 450 small town communities and villages, plantations and only a handful of cities.

Small towns in Maine are masters at simple living, keep it friendly and neighborly. “Excuse me, can you pass the sweet potato casserole? Did you make it Marge?”

If you are moving, relocating to Maine, get ready for an invite for the potluck supper in Maine. The more the merrier.

Attending Local Sporting Events, Alumni Games Are Popular. For Fans Of All Ages. Potluck Suppers Happen With Covered Dishes In Small Maine Towns.

Would you be ready for a potluck supper where everyone totes a hot or cold covered dish to your home in Maine?

All take a turn and today, many might say no way. Not at my house.

I’ll contribute something good to eat homemade or store bought and gladly ring you up at your place. Just not mine. My house is a wreck, has been for quite sometime really.

Maybe a potluck supper, opening up your place to take a turn would be just the fire lit under you to make it ship shape. Clean as a whistle and the housework done for the week or spring cleaning now complete. The potluck supper can be a holiday tradition with decorations to make it festive.

Finding Your Way Home In Maine. Is A Victorian House The Goal? Would You Invite People In For Easy Potluck Covered Dish Suppers?

Growing up, my Mom from a family of 11 living on a Northern Maine farm who stayed close for life.

Each Sunday noon after church, each family member took a turn. This week Uncle Frank and Aunt Charlotte hosted the event at their Benn Hill in Hodgdon farm location. Or opened up their Nickerson Lake summer camp for the family meal time tradition. Kids splashing, boats plying by and the folks inside waving. Outdoor fire pits at night for the talks after the potluck covered dish supper time meal. Like group therapy!

The cousins socialize just like the parents.

Every Sunday it was a different family venue and we all stayed in touch growing up in a small Maine town. Each and every one of us in the family got to know each other better. In part due to the pot luck supper covered dish tradition and the variety of food it offered us.

Check The Locally Sourced Maine Farm Produce At Whole Foods Portland ME For Your Potluck Supper Contribution. What’s Your Covered Dish Contribution?

The ease and simplicity of the bring your own plate, cup, silverware and covered dish contribution.

Not a small group, but the best way to handle a large one. So one cook is not overwhelmed with the meal time task.

Public or private, the take away is the same. Too much home cooked food. Lots of people grouping together for a family event meal or a public fund raising supper. We did not go to a restaurant to open up the menu and dine with a few people.

Simpler Living In Maine. Slow Down, Live More Pitching Into The Community Lifestyle. What Can You Bring To The Covered Dish, Pot Luck Supper To Eat?

You opened up the Grange hall and arranged the tables and chairs.

Turned the heat up a little higher in the winter. Or opened up the place in early morning to bring in the cooler air. For lower temperatures that noon or by supper time when we used fans, took a dip in a Maine lake to cool off. Not just cranked up the AC when the weather was hot in our cars, office, homes.

Grange Hall In Maine Repurposed Into A Home. Hosted Lots Of Covered Dish, Potluck Suppers.

Maybe too many cooks in their own familiar kitchens creating what’s for dinner or supper is a good thing.

When they wrap the dish in a towel or slide it in an insulated cozy. Bring it hot out of the oven wearing mitts or chilled to perfection right out of the refrigerator. To beeline to the pot luck supper. Families in Maine had the standing invitation. This week’s pot luck supper is at this Aunt and Uncle’s home. Next week, we trek to Aunt June and Uncle Cecil’s camp or home depending on the season.

Bigger homes, larger families, more people living nearby in small Maine towns.

The pot luck or potluck suppers help families stay in touch. To not just break the bread and dine together. But to exchange what’s new in each and every family members life and to help each other share joys, endure setbacks. You don’t feel alone living in a friendly, neighborly tight knit Maine small town.

Wild Blueberries From Maine. More Delicious Than Bigger Ones Not From Maine. Ideal Potluck Supper Dessert Item To Bring.

These covered dish meals were like group therapy sessions in some ways.

They avoided isolation and created regular contact with family members and anyone else invited to come along. Card tables set up, crock pots plugged, lots of potato, pasta, green, three bean salads.

Coleslaw, fresh from the garden platters, relishes, dips. Home made rolls and breads. Casseroles, trays of finger food. Samplings of small portions to fit on your plate. Better double up that plate if it’s paper to carry the load. Too much good food. Way way too much variety makes it like holiday dining. Large, 2nd and 3rd size helpings expected from the local cooks who “super size” everything.

Pot Luck Suppers In Maine, Using Natural Ingredients. Get Them At Your Farmers Market In Maine.

Do you eat too much at a covered dish, potluck supper?

It’s tempting, hard not to over indulge. Those paper plates are pretty flimsy when overloaded like a Maine trucker’s trailer load of Aroostook County potatoes. Who brought the home made lemonade or iced tea? Is that gluten free? You eat plenty and can say because you don’t want the cook to think it was not the best you ever had. Often it is and you hunt down that same meal selection for the potluck supper because you are addicted to their style of cooking.

Save room for the hand churned ice cream.

I think it’s grape nut and chocolate for choices. To ride high a top that warm, hot out of the oven slices of blueberry, raspberry, strawberry rhubarb pie. Is that cheesecake? Gotta get her recipe and print it out to share on the Maine cooking blog I follow.

The Beauty Of Maine. Some Have Trouble, Can’t Find Their Way Home To Maine So Easily. Get Below Radar In Maine. Unplug, Recharge In Vacationland.

Oh look, are those date crumble squares? Home made pumpkin, chocolate chip cookies, whoopie pies.

Picnics along the road traveling. Had to before the Interstate and those canopied table rest stops to munch on a chicken salad sandwich. Maybe grill a hot dog, burger, some chicken.Marsh mellows on top of the sweet potatoes. More of a Christmas dish but might as well let me try a small scoop.

Jello with carrots suspended inside. Lemon squares. Everyone contributed to the potluck supper. 2nds? Heck 3rds. It’s all cook and makes the covered dish cook smile ear to ear.

Lucky To Live In Small Town Maine! Me In Blog Author Andy Mooers, ME REALTOR.

The pot luck or potluck covered dish tradition applied to weddings, funerals, graduation, reunion, anniversary event too in a small Maine town.

Or maybe to celebrate one of the four seasons, a successful harvest or holiday as a community. When is the last time you brought something home cooked to a potluck supper, covered dish event?

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730

July 17, 2023
10 Best Maine Towns To Visit, It’s Not What You Think

10 best Maine towns to visit, it’s not what you think.

Maine is loaded with small towns. All unique and special but not all get the press and attention that a small handful do.

You Hear Them, Admire Them And Shoreland Zoning In Maine Protects Them. Maine Lake Loons, Other Wildlife, Fish!

So when you see the headline 10 best Maine towns to visit highlighted in a blog post or splashed across a magazine cover in a grocery check out line, it happens.

You and I are looking for shortcuts, suggestions to save time. Some free or paid advice. Maybe it’s a little bit of FOMO, fear of missing out mixed into the decision making. Watch out for the here it comes, the spin. Or it’s more simple than that. You just have only a short amount of time and traveling to Maine from many hours away to pack it all in. That’s a major component creating all the added vacation planning pressure.

No People, No Man Made Structure Or Noises. Welcome To Baxter State Park’s Mt Katahdin.

Like going to the Moon, you just get there and well, better thing about packing up and returning to far away planet Earth.

Maine is like that to many. Like planning a trip to the moon or a far away galaxy. That little extra drive or flying time away from the hustle bustle is what insulates, not isolates us. So back to the 10 best Maine towns to visit. It’s a list you chisel out for yourself because of personal preferences through life in Vacationland.

Small town charm, Maine has nearly 500 communities that are all top ten, worthwhile to visit in that department.

Technically, you count up 721 cities, towns around the state of Maine. So many are unorganized territories served up in six by six mile squares of woodland. Maine is 91% wooded remember? Some want to homesteading in Maine.

Wide Open Space. More Farms, Wooded Land And Fewer People. That Is What It Is Like In Maine.

So who decides which are the best towns in Maine to visit?

Advertisers do. The publications generating the press about Maine get paid for what and where in Maine gets promoted. You want coverage, you need advertisers to pay for the ads wedged in between the tourist information.

The Maine information promotion rides on a business chassis fueled by advertising.

The thickness of your newsprint edition or four color glossy magazine publication all revolves around advertising. Underwriting, subscriptions, donations, advertising dollars to carry the overhead expenses.

Downeast Coastal Lobster Boats In Maine.

But why wouldn’t a great community or any area of Maine be kept such a secret?

It isn’t now that everyone is a cub reporter that can share experiences around social media platforms.

The blog post image from Gulf Hagas, long form video from the dog sled races below or Maine soap box derby race, short video or reel on a small town dance recital.

Which small Maine towns make the list as the best of the bunch?

Besides advertisers who have enterprises in the top 10 Maine towns panned by the hot bright promotion spotlight, location comes into play. The southernmost coastal towns in Maine get the visits.

You can sample Maine easily with the up and back across the big green bridge in a small manageable amount of time. But the “what’s on the menu” for best Maine towns to visit expands greatly.

Budget a little more time to arrive at and enjoy a new list of top ten Maine towns to experience. The southern most towns and cities in Maine are the low hanging expensive tourism locations close to population center.

I’m happy for the handful of Maine coastal towns that attract tourists to visit and spend money in the state.

Because each new dollar turns over six to seven times to feed the local economy.

But I suggest to you, budget a little more time, venture deeper up into Maine.

See small Maine towns that host spring kayak canoe races.

Grab A Paddle, Load Up The Canoe, Launch The Kayak! Spring High Water Time Is Here!

Take in an event seen by 55 million people from around the globe, a World cup biathlon.

Sample a friendly, small Maine ski area mountain.

Try out a bigger Maine ski area mountain.

Watch a farmers market video and meet the friendly people, your local farmer.

Climb in a boat. Take a spin, fish, enjoy a Maine lake.

Learn about cross country skiing in Maine.

Take a bog walk in Orono Penobscot County Maine.

Sample a lighthouse in Maine.

Maine Lighthouses, Collect Your Favorite! Revisit Every Season!

Float Your Boat, Lots Of Places To Do That In Maine, “Vacationland”. Somehow Water Is Involved In So Much Of Our 4 Season Recreation!

Maine has lots of top 10 experiences, towns to visit.

There are a handful of cities in Maine to enjoy. But small town, quaint and friendly Maine communities. You and I decide what the 10 best Maine towns are and for a slew of reasons.

I service daily a certain set of Maine communities. But there are so many to explore and expose which is what this Maine blog post platform strives to do.

Maine has what you need.

Vacationland is the way life should be but travel up into Maine. Budget some extra time. To experience what is most personal and private and to areas of Maine that don’t make the default list as most worthwhile to visit.

Growing Without Sprays, Chemicals. Organic Maine Homesteading Happens Around Maine!

10 best towns to visit in Maine.

Don’t stop at ten. More than you can count using both hands. Create your own list and never think it’s only 10 or 5 or 3 as the absolute list. We all gravitate to a different list of what we enjoy in Maine. And depending on which of the four seasons the calendar hanging on the kitchen wall reveals, the what to do for fun changes.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

May 23, 2023
Small Town Living In Maine

Small town living in Maine.

If you’re a life long native, you’ve known many of those in your daily small Maine town circles for life.

Had a classmate drop in who was looking for a piece of Maine waterfront lake property, land just land.

He and his wife think parked next to a Maine lake and watching the seasons change is direction he wants for quality of life. And in the course of sharing information on where he would like to build a waterfront retirement home on a small Maine lake property acreage, we started childhood flashback experiences.

He had roots in Calais, Downeast Maine and his family rounded up the kids and relocated north.

Downeast Coastal Lobster Boats In Maine.

His Dad worked on the border at a custom’s brokerage house business.

His friends called him Ace. I remember his mom working at Day’s Jewelry Store where I bought black and white Poloroid film in expensive packages of only eight exposures each. Small town living in Maine is like that. You don’t just know the person but everything, anything about his or her family connections. In small Maine towns, you bump into each other often several times a day.

Attending St Mary’s catholic school in Houlton ME until high school and said he was a cold lunch bagger.

Some in his Water Street school enjoyed hot lunch. Delivered via bus, created each day at Lambert School, the old high school brick building next to Central.

One day snowballs pummeled at a school lunch bus seemed entertaining for he and a group of his friends.

All fun and games until a sister wearing a habit learned about the activity. Hauling in the crew, using a thick wooden paddle with individual helpings of discipline. Designed to make sure the activity did not occur again.

Early Maine Potato Farm Machinery At Local Littleton ME Museum

Hands extended to receive the one by one down the line punishment.

Remember the spare the rod, spoil the child adage. The punishment dished out down the line leaving no snow ball throwing hand left out from the cure. My friend’s mother reminded him at home he and his crew got just what they deserved. Kids had a lot more responsibilities at school, at home and working to earn their keep.

We moved on to Maine fall harvest picking potato experiences, making your own spending money.

Kenny’s first day was almost his last picking potatoes.

The field boss on the Maine farm had assigned him an end section in the potato field. All by himself at the end of the row.

If you have never picked barrels of newly dug potatoes laid out in two rows by a mechanical digger pulled by a Maine farm tractor, you wonder what’s the big whoop?

Early Maine Farm Life At The Homestead, Surrounded With All The Wooded And Pasture Field Land To Scratch Out A Living.

An end section extends and contracts with the surrounding tree line defining the Maine land potato field shape.

Not only do you get behind as your potato picking field section grows larger. But you get discouraged with fewer potatoes and wrestling to find them under large dirt clods where they are hidden.

It truly is one potato, two potato pick ’em up and put them in the woven basket and your barrel production suffers greatly with an end row section.

It takes four big heaping baskets made of brown ash and dumped in a plywood or cedar stave wooded potato barrel for the 25, 60 cents or whatever unit payment. Mark that barrel with your ticket number for the daily count back in the farmer’s house kitchen tally.

Agriculture, Farm Food Grown Close To Home, Locally Sourced Is The Best Tasting.

If your end section shrinks row by row of unearthed potatoes to pick, low barrel count for you that day in the hot harvest fall sun or rain, maybe spitting snow.

Kenny had enough and slipped away, hiding in the woods to avoid detection on this way walking home.

Potato picking was not for me he surmised. The was a potato field MIA loose, sound the air raid alarm. His Dad got wind of the news, found him, put him in a car, delivering him back to the field with a stern warning. Don’t do it again.

Small Town Public Suppers! Great Meal, Friendly Servers, Good Causes. Win, Win, Win!

The beauty of potato picking besides making your own money to manage as a kid, no one leaves the field until everyone is picked up is a valuable lesson.

We are all in this together to clean up before we can go home. The money you make in the potato field used to buy your fall school clothes. Kids helped shoulder some of the household expenses and learned to shop wisely, develop spending impulse control. To take care of whatever they “earned” with their own money a potato barrel at a time.

Meet Neighbors, New Friends, See Family Members. Local Public Suppers That Kind Of Experience.

No one is abandoned and left behind alone in the Maine potato field.

No rows and rows behind discouragement howling at the moon for anyone on the potato picking crew.

Pick ’em clean. Helping the local Maine potato farmer get the crop out experience was part of growing up in Aroostook County.

Hard Work With The Right Tools Is The Most Productive, Rewarding In Small Town Living In Maine.

I think small town living in Maine makes your connection with others in it much stronger for lots of reasons.

One, knowing a person in your class or neighborhood growing up provides a wealth of experiences. We are more connected, have spent more time together through out life so we know each other better.

Second, working on local community events whether coaching a youth hockey team or raising money for a Rotary project just helps strengthen the connection. When you have personal experiences with someone, you understand them better. They accept you too. Each know where the other is coming from, their strengths and weaknesses and why or how they react to anything.

The many Maine small town experiences through out life help the community.

Oh sure, there can be differences and personality clashes. But first hand personal knowledge of all the skills and talents in a small Maine town can be a beautiful thing. Like a team that pulls together and knows what has to happen for success before the buzzer sounds.

Makes for a better working relationship, the quality of life too because nothing is surface or unknown about the others in your small Maine town.

The small town community members understand each other deeply because there are not strangers. Accepting, needing, proud of where we live. Knowing we all have an important role in creating and sustaining the small Maine town living experience.

Simple Survival And Quality Of Living In A Small Maine Town.

My advice for folks relocating to Maine, is get involved.

From day one and never let off the throttle. Be productive rather than petty. No time for personality attacks and everything about pitching in and combining talents.

And for locals to realize all these new fresh ideas from folks who did live somewhere else can be weaved into what we could do to help the small Maine town prosper.

Realize there are community members who have full, rich experiences and will adopt you as one of their own. But not so much if you bitch and complain and find fault constantly. Easy does it as we all get to know each other and divvy up who does what and when.

Outdoors, Do It Yourself More Independent! That’s Living In Small Towns In Maine!

Brand new to the area transplants need to know the lay of the land and for locals to show them the ropes. To explain traditions and the history lessons they missed.

Volunteering is what small Maine town living is all about.. has to be.

No money to hire it done and what would be the fun in that?

Sure there is room for improvement and change is inevitable in a small Maine town. But easy does it on the “back home we always did it this way, that way”. It can get tedious and make locals wonder then why did you leave?

Hard Honest Work, No One Lazy! Expecting Setbacks In Rural Maine.

Something in the where you lived before location exchange before the move to Maine must have made it worth it.

But sharing and comparing what works and why or why not is important in brainstorming. Remind yourself of those reasons you moved to Maine. All this four season drop dead gorgeous beauty.

Maine is smaller sparse spread out populations, vast unspoiled terrain.

Working Outdoors In The Fields. Amish Farmers Produce Quality Local Food.

You daily travel much smaller local circles really getting to know others living in the village size population. Maine is over 450 small towns, plantations and only a handful of cities.

Here’s some reasons why I know, what I love living in a small Maine town.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

February 9, 2023
Maine | What’s It Like Living In Maine?

Maine, what’s it like living in Maine?

The state up in the right hand corner of the country, Maine.

What to expect traveling to experience Maine up close and personal.

Maine. Small Word, Big Place, Lots Of Unspoiled Space.

For starters, the further you head north, east and west to get up to Maine, the quieter it gets.

Man made noise gets replaced with song birds, a breeze in the rustling tree leaves. Waterfront settings and lapping waves, singing loons, where it just you.

Maine hiking trails where you can really hear yourself think and process life.

Spending time to unwind and get some exercise and perspective up in Maine. Space, time out. Not so hard in Maine with only 41 people per square mile in southern sections. Even less, just 11 folks per same 208’x208′ acre unit in the northern Maine region. Less distractions, sharper awareness happens when you remove the urban buzz and grind.

Maine White Tail Deer. One Of The Wildlife Sights You’ll Meet On Your Trip To Maine.

Maybe it’s the fresh clean air alone. Not just the natural unspoiled space that is the cure. Maine has lots to offer and just as much to enjoy that is missing.

Traffic, crime, rude and impersonal. Those words don’t describe Maine. Not why you come for a day and end up staying a lifetime.

We all hunger to get beside or out on the waterfront in Maine.

Maine’s Highest Mountain, MT Katahdin. Located In Forever Wild Baxter State Park.

Slowly you get away from less stress of crowds, traffic, the impatience and impersonal way of life surviving population centers.

In Maine, you see wildlife, watch out for it as you drive the scenic highways. You meet some of the nicest the down to Earth friendly hardworking people always willing to lend a hand.

Small towns in Maine are proud of their communities, their children and where they live all four seasons.

The deeper you push up into Maine, the more relaxed and personal the strong local connection grows. The space, all this unspoiled Maine land

and nature in your private backyard is never taken for granted by locals and returning vacationers to Maine.

Chances are if you love blueberries they came from Maine.

Wild Blueberries From Maine. More Delicious, Healthier Than Bigger Ones Not From Raked From Maine.

Lobsters from the coastal waters of Maine are hands down the best too. Especially when enjoyed in a quaint Maine harbor town.

But the state of Maine, it’s way more than Aroostook County fertile farm fields growing potatoes or being

the dominate producers of the World’s tasty blueberries, lobsters and spuds.

There’s lots more to this great state of Maine than one, two, three pick ’em up and put them in the basket then barrel potatoes.

Maine Farm Field Produce The Best Potato Varieties. Many White Blossoms, Some Purple Like Above Maine Potato Plant Field Photo Shows.

This blog post highlights the what’s it like living in Maine.

You can not rely on reports from online folks who have never been to Maine but have very loud and negative things to say about Vacationland. What are your expectations and everyone is not just like you and me is a good start before broadcasting the wrong idea about Maine.

Who would want to visit like 37 million folks do a year that vacation in Maine?

Those vacations and return visits are what lead to reasons to consider moving to Maine.

Often water has something to do with your picking Maine. Water is tied to your Maine vacation or relocation location selection. Nothing compares being parked on the ocean, lake, pond, river or stream in Maine. It is a spiritual experience if you are lucky enough to have the Maine waterfront for a property neighbor.

Listening To Maine Loons. Seeing Them Paddling Your Kayak On A Maine Lake. Priceless.

Breathing in the salt air, touring the Maine coast on a guide boat ride hearing and seeing the local highlights. Each trip in or around Maine is an education. Maine, you can’t say you been to a Kittery ME shopping outlet and be dubbed an expert of “what’s it like living in Maine. You barely entered the very big state. Keep going and sampling after you cross the big green bridge entering Maine.

Ever been to Downeast Maine?

Can you get there from here? Sure can. What’s it like in this part of Maine? Not the same take away coastal experience in say Wells Beach area as in Eastport or Lubec Maine.

Traveling Downeast Maine. Where Is It Exactly Along The Jagged Rocky Maine Coast?

Camping, hiking, biking, hunting, fishing, boating in Maine.

What’s it like in Maine depends on what you like to do, which of the four seasons you visit. The close knit villages and small towns of Maine offer a unique quality of life. The work ethic

develops at an early age living in Maine. Growing up, everyone in the Maine family no matter how small has a job. Mainers are productive, producers and not just consumers. Mainers are not lazy. Don’t have so much time to whine and complain. What’s it like living in Maine?

The spirit of pitching in and volunteering in Maine communities is unstoppable.

Putting On Local Live Productions Like Children’s Theatre Is One Huge Volunteering Event In Maine. Community Theatres, Bands Are Fun To Attend.

Maple syrup operations and sugar shack sap collection events in Maine.

Picking fiddlehead ferns in spring along river or stream banks. Witnessing wildlife in their natural habitat in Maine. Maine lupines and their vibrant colors. Shucking fresh farm corn. Diving into a pot of steamed clams or oysters, fresh fish right off the boat at the Maine harbor pier. Hoisting a sail on your own self propelled powered by wind boat. Lots of suggestions on the list of what it there to do in Maine. To answer the what’s it like living in Maine.

Reading a good book or better yet writing one for others to share.

Painting a Maine setting or trying to capture it from the best angle at the perfect sweet spot time of day for natural lighting. Maine is the playground to do all of this. Hobby farming and horsing around or managing a Maine woodlot. Building a camp or cabin up in Maine. To live remotely to get below radar and live off grid. Heating with wood and nothing eaten that was not made from scratch. Farm to table all natural without sprays. You know your Maine farmer or have a hand in what you eat that was raised on your own patch of fertile Maine farm soil.

The Family Farm Owned And Enjoyed By Me In Maine Author Andrew Mooers.

Cutting and splitting next year’s firewood for the Maine home or camp stove prepared a season ahead.

Following orange bouncing balls around high school college circuits. Try to keep your eye on the round black circle at local high school and hockey level hockey games. There is lots to do and enjoy living in Maine. Youth sports is big and you know, maybe are related to the players. Possible coached a few in peewee rec leagues.

Lots of good valid answers to the question what’s it like living in Maine.

Walk The Old Port In Portland Maine. Cruise Ships Seen. Take A Ferry Ride To An Island Visit.

Apple picking, making the pies with all the Maine local fruits from raspberries, blueberries to mince meat and pumpkin flavors.

Churning your own home made ice cream. Looking and see lots of Maine moose, wearing flannel in the fall, LL Bean boats tramping the Maine woods. Attending Maine farmer and lumberman museum public suppers. Maine snowmobile sled club breakfasts cure hunger. Then helping twitch the trails that always needing repair. Or a bridge repair, new short cut trail created with many hands and a few chainsaws.

Leaf peaking the amazing Maine colors of fall around farm harvest time.

Things to do in Maine suggestions? Attend A Sea Dogs baseball game.

Play Ball. See The Sea Dogs Play Excellent Baseball In Portland Maine.

Collecting Maine lighthouses.

Many Get Snap Shot, But All Maine Lighthouses Are Unique And Beautiful.

Over 60 of those Maine lighthouses to find and return to many times while on Earth. I have collected 45 Maine lighthouses and counting. Do not forget your camera and make sure the battery is charged and ready.

Head to a Maine beach.

Sandy, Sea, Salt Water Air, Swims,Walks And Talks. Maine Beaches Attract Like No Other Vacation Travel Visit Attraction Or For Life Long Locals Alike.

Check out local artists at local Maine craft shows. Maine quilts, 4H exhibits around the local Maine fair circuit. Antiquing, checking out farmers markets, take a balloon, train or motorcycle ride. Golf, fish, look up and see amazing night skies in Maine where there is no light pollution. Paddle the Allagash Wilderness Waterway and see the ghost trains.

Lots to do year round that attracts folks that come to know what’s it like living in Maine.

Downhill and cross country ski in Maine. Strap on a pair of snowshoes and easily go up and down rolling trails and fields blanketed with fresh pure white powdery snow.

Hang on and shoot a rapid in a rubber raft on a Maine river with other adventuresome sorts.

River Rafting In Maine. Hang On, Paddle Hard, Get Wet. Take Your ME Whitewater River Rafting Ride Down Penobscot, Kennebec, Dead Rivers.

What’s it like living in Maine?

Sample the state parks in Maine and start out with simple, low cost camping vacations. Picnic lunches and mini instate vacations in Maine are so common and

enjoyed by locals and new visitors alike.

Craft breweries, Moosehead Lake, Gulf Hagas, Maine’s Grand Canyon.

These are just a few examples of what’s it like living in Maine. Why we do it and what we enjoy about the state of Maine.

Biking Acadia National Park in Bar Harbor Maine. Or returning to see it in the winter walking the perimeter roads. Camping on Mt Katahdin in winter is unforgetable too.

Winter in Maine, just one of the seasons.

But remember, Mainers are outdoors everyday. Dressed a tad different but always happy, warm and filling our lungs with fresh Maine air.I love to downhill snow ski, to snowmobile on the well groomed and marked ITS trails.

More on Maine winter weather.

What you See On Maine Winter Recreation Trails. Wildlife, Scenery, A Bald Eagle, Moose.

To set you straight on lots of myths from folks repeating them who have never been to Maine, Vacationland. Folks come to Maine to stay that are wanting a better quality of life for their kids. To become involved and make a difference in their small Maine town location and community spirit of volunteerism. Retirement in Maine is an obvious choice for the Golden Years group of active seniors.

Some retirees, transplants are snow birds. Flitting back and forth twice a year to and from Maine waterfront camps and cottages to shared home locations where snow shovels are not used. Many retirees moving, relocating to Maine are from here. Natives who returned to Maine, knowing it is truly the way life should be.

MOO Yourself. Milek Cow Calves In Maine Farm Visit Say Hello.

Back to the land homesteaders and off grid living in Maine.

The living off the land in Maine is not a new movement. Some come to Maine colleges and Universities and end up staying in the town where they get their higher education. Don’t forget while vacationing or living in Maine, quick trips to Canada happen. Maine is borders by Quebec and New Brunswick Canada. The I-95 highways starts in Maine, ends up in Key West Florida and is your gateway to the Trans Canada Atlantic Maritime Provinces.

Being a Maine border town with Canada has so so many perks for both sides of the International boundary line.

Come to Maine and island hop using regular ferry boat service. Island life in Maine, books written on the topic and many movies.

Leaving you with a farmers market in Maine video.

Seeing, hearing, being taken by the hand and introduced to Maine by a local insider native is the best way to use your time in Vacationland.

Just ask, the folks are so willing to give advice and help out with suggestions. The locals in Maine love where they live, work and play.

Thank you for being a loyal reader of the Me In Maine blog.

And if this is your first blog post visit, thank you for sticking around to the end. Hope you return for more Maine blog posts on what’s it like living in Maine.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

November 24, 2022