Makeba's Time Back on Lake Michigan

Makeba escaped from the museum! She ran away for some much needed time on Lake Michigan between her two exhibit stints. Our exhibit at the Porter County Museum of History ended on June 15th, but the exhibit time was extended to include a second runnnig of the exhibit starting in early July. Hmm, three weeks when Makeba didn't have to be on display at the museum...what to do, what to do...the next day, we disassembled everything and took Makeba back to her home of last summer - Lake Michigan! We decided that we would take Mabeba out on the water for some casual paddling and sailing, while we put together the second installment of our exhibit in an upstairs space at PoCo. We were able to take some good friends and family members out on Makeba on several occasions. Each time we were reminded of how hard she was to paddle, how fun she was to sail, and how amazing our trip had truely been.

When we first brought Makeba back, we put her on display for the day at Beach Glass Cafe in Long Beach, IN. Our fantastic friends started up their own adorable coffee and ice cream shop by Stop 24 - be sure to check it out sometime! They offered to have some photos of our trip up in the shop and serve as the sending off place for Makeba's final launch. As the evening neared, we planned to set off for an evening sail, but Mary's back had other plans. We were getting ready to pull Makeba down to the water, but Mary's back just flat out said, "Nope." She has had problems with her back before (imagine that, hacking away at a tree for 4 years and then hauling said tree in and out of the water all summer), so we decided not to risk it. We would try to voyage out in a few days when she was feeling up for it!

The mascot/boat companion we always wanted! Ahoy, June-Bug! Care to join us for a sail, please?

A successfully happy day despite Mary's spastic back! Time with friends, pizza, beer, ice cream, warm air and a cooling rain, and a beautiful sunset! That's something to celebrate - very carefully so as to not trigger one's back again, of course. Raise 'em up!

A seriously beautiful sunset. Bravo, mother nature. You did it again.

A few days later we were ready to try again - this time with some friends to help haul hefty Makeba down to the water. Thanks guys!

Oh, she is so ready to play! A slow fun sail with Mary's oldest brother Kurt, then we were off to take Makeba from Long Beach to Beverly Shores.

Just the three of us, just like last summer :)

A PBJ, PBR, blowing bubbles kind of day, wouldn't you say? We brought along some tubes of bubbles to blow to celebrate the occasion as we sailed home.

We made it back to Beverly Shores, where Makeba would stay for her few weeks vacation from the museum.

Just Mary and Makeba, holding hands like the best of pals.

It's good to see that sail on the water again :) Makeba's time on the beach included some days of bad weather. Some heavy rains led to her being full of almost 8 inches of water. Bath time?

We took Makeba out on as many day sails as possible, even if we could only take her out for a few hours before more heavy storms rolled in.

We were able to take several other friends out on the boat including two of Amy's brothers, Erik and Neal, and our friends Kevin, Dillon, and Jake. Highlight adventures included racing another sailboat and winning,
and seeing the super moon with Dillon and Jake while out on the water  - 4 people in Makeba was a new record for Makeba! Video coming soon that will feature all of Makeba's new friends!

After a few weeks of fun, Makeba moved back into the Porter County Museum of History and will stay there until October 25th. Come visit!

New Surfboard Project and Photo Shoot by Carhartt

A few weeks ago we were contacted by the company Carhartt. They had heard about our circumnavigation of Lake Michigan and were impressed with the trip, and even more impressed by the handiwork done to create a boat of our own. They reached out to us in hopes that we were still creating things - enter the Blue Heron and our new surfboards! We let Carhartt know that our new projects lately include fixing up our new sailboat and also shaping some surfboards - they thought that these projects, along with the construction of Makeba and the circumnavigation, would be great to feature in their new blog about women and their work.

You remember the Blue Heron:

And here are the surfboards currently - which so far have consisted of us designing templates, cutting the rough outlines with dangerous blades, and slowly shaving and sanding away lots of dusty foam until we get the shapes we want:

Mary's 5' retro puffer fish and Amy's 6' oldschool longboard-shaped shortboard. Possible names include Pudge the Puffer, and Gidget the Fidget. These boards are our first attempt at shaping so they may have a bit of character when finished, but we are having fun with the process and are excited to fiberglass, give them some sweet paint jobs, design some fins, and get them out on Lake Michigan this fall.

Since we had these crafts in process, Jennifer with Carhartt came over for a photo shoot! We were able to do some work on the Blue Heron and our surfboards in their clothing line while she shot some pretty fun photographs to be featured on their blog, Crafted in Carhartt!

 

Check them all out here. They also put up some of the same photos on their tumblr and pinterest pages. Thanks for reaching out to us, Carhartt!

The Blue Heron

One of our newest projects! Meet The Blue Heron, the newest addition to our fleet. Donated to us by our friends, Jeff, Jan, and Rob, this baby bird is going to receive some much needed love and attention. How fitting that this boat has sat unused for 25 years just as the two of us will be entering our 25th year of existence. So excited to see what adventures unfold!

Loading her up along with our other water sport equipment :)

We already decided as we were driving that The Blue Heron was a perfect name...what a perfect coincidence that this painting was in the restroom of the gas station in Beverly Shores after we coined our boat's new name. It was meant to be I guess.

She's a bit dirty and worn from sitting on the beach for so long, but man does she still look good.

Sporting the patched look.

Sporting the sandy look.

Sporting the cobweb look.

Sporting the exposed foam look...we're going to have to change this look quickly!

Checking her out from all angles...

So stoked!

Just sneaking back into the Catterlin's backyard for awhile.

Whoops. Sorry, Mom and Dad. Looks like Mary brought another boat home again!

Sitting in Makeba's old work zone.

Time to start cleaning! Mary, get the shop vac!

Amy, get the power washer and sponge!

She looks pretty good after an initial cleaning, eh? We'll do about 3 more cleanings before we start the fiberglass repair :) More updates soon!