Arcadia Solstice Celebration.

In case you weren't able to partake in Arcadia Nature Center's annual winter solstice celebration last night, I thought I'd share a few images. A little nippy, but still a beautiful night for it. Crisp and clear, with a small crescent moon and stars everywhere. After parking your car in the very dark field at the entrance, it's a cool (and cold) luminary-guided walk to the fire. The event started with various nature history readings and songs. I'm not sure who was singing or what exactly it was they were singing about, but it was beautiful and had a bit of a new-agey feel, enhanced by the fact that we were standing in a dark field in the woods under the stars along with a couple hundred strangers and friends.

The ceremony/performance part was interesting, but the natives, a.k.a. kiddos, started getting restless about a half hour in, chanting 'light the fire. light the fire.' I must admit, I was silently chanting this too.

To most everyone's relief, that happened just a few minutes later. It took a little while for it to get roaring, but once it did, thanks to a howling wind, this fire rocked...

My fearless friend Mary, while the rest of us were another 15 feet back, still warm as toast from this big blaze...

Mary's friend popping in to make sure she was staying hydrated...

This fire definitely would have cooked up a ton of marshmallows, but I think it was just a little too hot. I guess if you had a really long stick...

One last shot as I was walking back to my truck. Note the moon in the top left...

Hope your holiday parties, plans, baking, wrapping, shopping, and other adventures are all falling into place nicely for you.

Holiday Home Stretch Hours

Can you believe it's almost Christmas already? Time always seems to accelerate to time-warp speed between Thanksgiving and the end of the year, and this year seems to be no exception.

Fear not, there's still plenty of time to order that peppermint stick ice cream pie and quart of eggnog ice cream to go with for your Christmas dinner.

Late December always seems to offer up some kind of winter weather treat for us here in New England. It seems this year it's in the form of an arctic blast... Hope you remembered to get that oil tank filled this week.

In any event, hope you're enjoying the holiday festivities, and your Santa shopping is going well. Just wanted to pass along the schedule of hours for the next couple weeks. It's a little confusing, but here it is. In a nutshell, we'll be open Mondays thru the end of the year, closing early Christmas & New Years Eve, and will be closed Christmas & New Years. And we'll be open the weekend after New Years. After that, Mt. Tom's does its January disappearing act. We'll be closed from January 4th thru the 28th.

Holiday Hours:

Monday, Dec. 21 1-7pm
Tues, Wed 12-8pm
Thurs (Christmas Eve) 11-5pm
Friday (Christmas Day) CLOSED
Sat, Sun Regular Hours (12-9 Sat., 12-8 Sun.)

Monday, Dec. 28 12-7pm
Tues, Wed. 12-8pm
Thurs (New Years Eve) 12-5pm
Friday (New Years Day) CLOSED
Sat., Sun Regular Hours (12-9 Sat., 12-8 Sun.)

There you have it.

Happy holiday'ing to you.

Bay Road Photo: Blogging Road Game.

My friend Patrick Brough, Easthampton's insurance guy and photo bug around town, and his partner in photography crime Laura Merwin have a very cool blog over at Masslive.com called Bay Road Photo. It's actually Laura's blog, and Patrick joined her last year to assist. There they share some of their amazing images and talk photography, with a good mix of light and sometimes serious photo banter. It's one of the blogs I follow regularly. In any event, I recently mentioned to Pat the idea of doing a guest spot and pitched him a little idea I had. He and Laura were into it, and a week later, voila!, a guest entry over at Bay Road Photo.

Here it is. Hope you can check it out.

Enjoy the arctic breeze today.

Can I make you a Chocolate Eggnog Latte?

Happy First Snow Day of the Season.

Well, we did get to wake up to a nice little winter wonderland this morning anyway. It's quickly turned to a slushy mess out there, as you can see from the Chrome Bear-eye's view out the window below. Hope you got out early this morning to make that snowman and shovel the driveway. Not so much fun right now in the cold drizzle. Looks to be a quiet day in scooptown today. A good day to crank out some holiday chocolate santa pops.

And make that giftbasket for the silent auction over at the Old Town Hall tomorrow night (Thursday, Dec. 10th). It's the Easthampton City Arts Annual Celebration & Open House from 6-8pm. Head on over and make a bid on this little cornucopia of Mt. Tom's sweets or one of the many other cool items donated by local artists and business folk.

Of course, you can always order one of these yourself and have it filled with whatever you desire.

The mountain did its storm disappearing act this morning, but it is interesting to see a little winding stream instead of the big old Nashawannuck Pond right now...

Guess it's the Sunday afternoon open skate at the Williston Rink this winter. Poor ice fishermen are going to have to take it on the road this winter.

The inflatable biker Santa was feeling the effects of the heavy snow, or perhaps a few too many at Whisker's last night...

You may not be motivated to leave the warm couch on a day like this, but I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't mention the cool new holiday flavors I whipped up yesterday. Just in time for your upcoming holiday party. Or just a little something to reward yourself for a shopping trip well done.

How about a scoop of Reindeer Tracks?

Vanilla with Chocolate Chips & Peppermint Pieces. (Hat tip to the anonymous suggestor for that one.)

If that's not your thing, how about Festivus, a holiday favorite, of Seinfeld fame. Brown Sugar and cinnamon with gingerbread pieces and a caramel swirl.

But wait, there's more. We have Eggnog ice cream for sure, but how about giving the brand new, Chocolate Eggnog a try. Intriguing, no?

Vienna Fingers and Mint Oreo make an end of year encore to help brighten your December too.

Drive safe, and hope to see you soon.

Regulars Rule.

One of the coolest parts of owning a small local biz is getting to know the ‘regulars’. Regulars come in many shapes and forms. There’s the one who comes in, without fail, every Sunday afternoon, for his weekly quart of cookie dough. Another brings his wife in a couple times a week. Each order up a large dish of their favorite, and the two of them sit and chat for an hour with the crew and me. It’s fun getting to know customers. Eventually, their visits start to feel like friends stopping by to say hello.

Sometimes, regulars stop becoming regulars. This is often triggered by a need to drop a few pounds, get control over some lactose-intolerance issue, swearing off sweets as a sacrifice for Lent, or just the busy-ness of life getting in the way. Then there are the seasonal regulars too. These are the folks that mysteriously lose their cravings for ice cream when the leaves come off the trees and the mittens go on the hands. Luckily, there are still quite a few year-round regulars.

I look forward to my weekly Sunday visit from a nice, older gentleman known best around town for his love of the Yankees. It doesn’t matter if it’s the dead of winter, and all his beloved Yanks are swinging golf clubs in lower latitudes. He just loves to talk Yankees, especially to a Red Sox fan this year.

Another regular whose visits I always enjoy is an equally nice older woman. She always has a smile on her face. ‘How’s it going today?’ I most often say. ‘Oh, pretty good,’ is her usual response. While she sits and leisurely enjoys her ice cream, she tells me about the exciting things she’s been doing. For a while, it was downhill skiing. Before that, it was sailing. I would occasionally bump into her at the gym I used to belong to, where she’d be lifting weights with a trainer. Most days she comes to the shop, we simply exchange pleasantries, she goes on to enjoy her ice cream, occasionally buying something to bring home, and is on her way. She’s always remarkably upbeat and cheerful. Oh, and did I also mention she’s a quadriplegic, paralyzed from the neck down? Forced to endure the worst the disease Multiple Sclerosis has to offer. I don’t know much more about her life than she’s told while her assistant fed her a dish of her favorite ice cream, but from my view, she battled MS courageously for 30 years, never letting it prevent her from doing the things she wanted to do. I say ‘battled’ because her sister, another regular, came in yesterday and shared with me the sad news that she had passed away over the weekend, at the age of 62. A nice woman dealt a really crappy hand, in the form of the crippling wrath of MS, who despite the challenges, chose to play that hand the best she could. Thanks Nancy, for the weekly dose of inspiration.

May you rest in peace, or run again like the wind, whichever you prefer.

Nancy Minton
1947-2009

Novel in a Month & other Goings-on.

I hope you had a nice Thanksgiving, and you haven't brought any gluttony guilt into the new week. December, how did that happen? And we all know how fast Thansgiving to Christmas goes. 2010 will be here in no time. I'm probably not alone in saying - here's to a shiny new year to look forward to. A lot has happened here in '09, the great BearFest, a very successful summer of ice creaming here at your favorite scoop shop, and an interesting mayoral contest, to name a few. But it also seems as if it's been a particularly trying year in other ways. Deaths, illnesses, divorces, break-ups, job losses, and this pesky recession seemed to cast a shadow over a good portion of the year. Still, there are many things to be thankful for, and in keeping with the 'glass is half-full' theme, here's to a strong finish of the year here in December!

It seems I've had a bit of blog-writer's block lately, as you may have noticed by the sparceness of posts here at the ICD recently. I think that may have had something to do with my latest little project, 'National Novel Writing Month'. A customer/friend mentioned the idea to me a few days before it was due to start (November 1). The object is to write 50,000 words in 30 days. That's 1667 words per day, in case you don't have a calculator handy. The writing doesn't have to be any good. In fact, they encourage fast and bad writing. At that pace, there really isn't time to rewrite, edit, or even reread as you go.

Having never even attempted writing a novel, although I'd certainly talked about it enough, it was definitely intimidating. Like running a marathon after a couple 3 mile jogs here and there. In any event, I volunteered anyway, went to the website and signed right up. Two days later, I was writing like a madman. I must say, it was actually good fun. You write every day, then update your wordcount on the site. They send you pep talk emails from successful (and aspiring) writers.

You can form little support groups. They even have local groups you can join, and go to writing gatherings if you feel so inclined. Umass Amherst had one that I joined, although I never did get to go there to write. For me, writing is best done in solitude, mostly on my couch at home. I did get to enjoy a little writer's retreat at a friend's vacant beach condo. A brief taste of the writer lifestyle, that was pretty sweet...

I even got a little taste of the photographer's lifestyle while I was beachside, knocking out my first novel. Can't say whether my new writing creation will ever be more than just a big Word file full of 61,267 words, but you never know. It's a long, quiet winter for an ice cream guy in New England. Perhaps I'll include a little excerpt here someday...

If you're curious about the 'Novel in a Month' thing, feel free to drop me a line or stop in. Be happy to give you more info. According to their website, they had over 100,000 participants from all over the world. In case you're curious, there were around 32,000 'winners', which is about 19%. According to the site, that's a new record.

Moving on to the local stuff, don't forget to check out this weekend's Open Studios at One Cottage Street. Many amazing local artists have studios in there, and you only get 2 chances a year to see and purchase their fine works. This weekend is one of them...

Also coming up later this week, the always 'cool in a small town way' Santa Stroll. It kicks off at the Maple School at 7 pm. Santa leads the way, making a stop at the edge of the pond for the annual tree lighting ceremony. The tree is usually floating in the middle of the pond. With no pond this year, I'm not exactly sure where the tree will be. I'm guessing at the corner of Williston Ave and Cottage. Unlike the rag shag, costumes are optional. Hats and gloves are recommended though.

Finally, coming up next week, Easthampton City Arts is having their annual party and open house. They have lots to celebrate this year, after the hugely successful BearFest. The public is welcome to join the celebration. Food by the Apollo Grill, live music, a silent auction, and more. Should be a fun night...




Ok, I think I'm all caught up now. Hope to see you soon.

Jim

Happy Thanksgiving to you & yours.

In case I don't see you today, let me just take a minute, before the day before Thanksgiving (good) chaos begins, to wish you and all of yours a very Happy Thanksgiving. May it be full of an endless supply of good family, good food, and good fun.

Safe travels, & may the most comfortable couch in the house be yours when that inevitable food coma ensues.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thankgiving Desserts & Go Mimi & Michelle!

I realize my holiday window displays won't deter anyone from their annual pilgrimages with the kids to the Macy's windows, but in general I try to give it my best shot, given the usual fairly burnt out from the full summer run mood I'm in when they start to hit. I also realize Thanksgiving is more about being thankful, getting together with family and friends, and eating until the button on your jeans pops off and hits the dog in the side of the face than being about window displays anyway. It's a tough place to be for a holiday window display, being sandwiched between Halloween and Christmas, the grand-daddies of display holidays.

So I suppose I shouldn't be defensive about the feeblest of Thanksgiving window displays I have to offer, as witnessed in the shot you just saw.


Less time for window dressing (like that segway?), more time to make all the frozen dessert delights your relatives have now come to expect from you on T-day...



Pumpkin Pie, Caramel Pumpkin Cheesecake, the surprise fall hit, apple pie, rum raisin, and the many other special and regular favorites are ready and waiting for you to drop in and say 'I'll take a hand-packed quart of...'

For those really daring, next up, just in time for the T-day sweeps, Eggnog Pumpkin Pie ice cream. Come on, I dare ya.

And if you're really planning ahead, why not give a call (413)-529-2929 now and order up your favorite ice cream pie or ice cream cake. Deer Trax, Cookies n' Fudge, Cashew Turtle, Skybar, and as many other specials as I can think of this weekend.. Pumpkin Pie, Caramel Pumpkin Cheesecake, Hazelnut Cappuccino Fudge. Do I need to go on?


If you're just looking for ice cream to scoop next to Gram's apple pie or Aunt Betty's pecan pie, just drop on by for some handpacked. The wednesday before Thanksgiving is always busy, so don't hesitate to call ahead, and we can pack 'em up and have 'em ready for you when get here.


You can always check out the current flavors list here.


And you're always welcome to stop by for gourmet chocolates, penny candy, fresh organic coffee beans from Indigo Roasters, and perhaps a bit of sweet pumpkin spice tea from the TeaGuys.


Hungry yet?


Here are our Thanksgiving week hours:

Monday: 12-5
Tuesday: 12-8:30
Wednesday: 11-8:30
Thursday: closed.
Friday: 12-9 pm
Saturday: 12-9 pm.


A final note before I end this little infomercial blog entry. Best of luck to Mimi Henault and Michelle Rousseau this weekend in the Junior Miss competition. There are only 2 Easthampton High young women entered, and wouldn't you know, they both are part of the Mt. Tom's scoop team.

(Apologies to Michelle, seems I don't have portrait of her to share here...)



Go get 'em!

Jelly Fish, M&M paintings, and Chocolates.

This weekend brings us to the 2nd Saturday of the month, and with that, another exciting ArtWalk Easthampton evening. Just hung yesterday here at Mt. Tom's, an inspiring photography/painting combo show featuring the works of photographer Rob Colclaser and his wife Allison, painter. Stop by for a look at some amazing images and beautiful paintings.

While you're out, check out the rest of the ArtWalk venues. 5 - 8pm.

I hope you can stop by for a coffee, a bit of chocolate, say a hello to the artists, and enjoy their show.



While I'm here, a big thanks to Torrie, Carleigh's mom, for the cool thank you for the birthday party at Mt. Tom's photo collage. Nice...



Good weekend to you.

Don't Leave your dishes in the sinkhole & other shots about town.

As I mentioned in the last ICD entry, the giant sinkhole that took out a fifty foot wide swath of the Manhan Rail Trail last year has been fixed. As you probably noticed, yesterday was a pretty sweet day. Nearly 70 in November, can't complain about that. Perfect day for a bike ride on the again fully intact trail. Above is a shot of what was until recently, the biggest sinkhole Easthampton's ever seen. Here are a couple more of the fix. I'm guessing if the rail trail is again attacked by a giant sinkhole, this would probably be the safest place on the 4.2 mile stretch to be.




A few more random shots from my ride...


The Ferry Street haunted house could use a little stimulus money...


Maybe someday I'll be able to dig back through my inventory of local shots and be able to use this one as a 'before shot'...



Or is it the Manhan Cat Trail?...


The old factory footbridge, now just an interesting photo opp on Lower Mill Pond...



There are still a few reminders of the trail's original use to be found along the trail...


I had a bit more daylight and couldn't resist the temptation to wander around the edge of the Nashawannuck mud flats...

A few interesting bits to be seen...

Apologies to those who live, or have lived, in Millwaukee. I'm fairly certain this isn't their best...

I opted not to dig underneath this brick and risk the chance of actually finding out what died on that date. Intriguing though...

Soas to not end on such a down note, here's another curious discovery...

Hope you're enjoying this balmy little indian summer, leaves be darned.

Manhan Rail Trail is whole once again.

You may remember the scene above from just over a year ago. Our shiny, almost new railtrail was shortened by about a mile when a giant sinkhole swallowed up a fifty foot across stretch near the Rt. 5 end of the Manhan Rail trail. This happened back in September of 2008 (seems like only yesterday), and the Friends of the Manhan Rail Trail are happy to announce the hole has been filled, and all is well with the trail once again. As the article says, it wasn't cheap, but it was still a lot less costly than some of the early numbers that were thrown around..

You can read the story here.

To commemorate the 'made all better' trail, the Friends of the Manhan Rail Trail have announced a little ceremony to commemorate the fix. Here's the info:

Sinkhole Repair Ribbon Cutting Celebration

A ribbon cutting ceremony to celebrate the repair of the washed out rail trail will be held at the site of the former sinkhole on Sunday, November 8 at 1:00 PM. Access to the site off East St. is available through the Pascommuck Trust roadside property (between Fort Hill Road and Route 5). From the Pascommuck Trust area, walk down the short hiking trail to the ceremony.

I don't have a shot of the finished job, so instead I thought I'd include another favorite from my rail trail collection...

Congrats and thanks to all the hardworking volunteers over at the Friends of the Manhan Rail Trail and key city hall folks for securing the funds and making it happen. The Manhan Rail Trail is a shiny feather in Easthampton's cap, and it's great that it's back in full operation. Nicely done.

Butter Pecan? You must be a Gemini.

As I usually preface when I actually talk about ice cream here in the Diary of Ice Cream, I'm actually going to mention something about ice cream here. At barely 46 degrees, it may not feel like perfect ice cream weather, but it's at least warm enough to talk about it.

Came across this story I thought all you ice cream enthusiasts might enjoy. Check it out to see if your own favorite ice cream flavor fits what the zodiac is predicting.

I scream. You Scream. All signs scream for ice cream.


Feel free to switch the various ice cream purveyors with (hopefully) your favorite, Mt. Tom's. And if this finds you hankerin' for a fresh scoop, we've got all the fall flavors going in full force right now - Pumpkin Pie, Caramel Pumpkin Cheesecake, Apple Pie, Double-dark Chocolate Chunk (not really a Fall flavor but still a great one), and many more.

Another helpful hint... It's never too early to place your order for those homemade pumpkin ice cream pies your family now expects you to bring to Thanksgiving dinner in a few weeks...

Just Vote.

I learned early in my entrepreneurial career that biz and politics do not make kind bedfellows. Or is it strange bedfellows. Heck, I forget. In any event, I just voted for the person I think is best to lead our little hamlet for the next couple years, and if you haven't already done the same, I highly recommend you make your away to your local polling place and put down your bet for our next mayor and councilors (all the school committee folk are guaranteed a seat unless there's one giant write-in candidate I suppose) before the polls close this evening.

Like I've said, I'm not going to endorse a particular candidate, but I will say it's been an interesting election season this time around, one that no matter who wins, has been good for the city. It should be an interesting day...

Meanwhile, I hope you're enjoying these first few days of November. It seems we are well past peak leaf peeping, but there are still a few bold and colorful trees to be had...

And it's also interesting to see the subtle collision of Fall and Winter holidays that starts to take place around this time. I happened to notice this yesterday. If there was a set of indian corn hanging on the door or a paper turkey in the window, we'd have all the end of year holidays covered...

No need to spend too much time here this morning. I'll leave you to your Tuesday morning TPR reports and perhaps a quick break to visit your local polling place of choice.

Just Vote!