T Stands for Shopping

 Hi everyone from frigid New Hampshire. Tonight (Monday) is cold but tomorrow they say our temperatures will be close to 0 degrees F (about -18 degrees C) with wind chill making it feel like it is about -15 degrees F (-26 degrees C), if not colder. I can tell you where you will find me on T day this week, next to the woodstove. (smile).  Luckily it is only suppose to be this cold for a day, because we have had times it's gone on for a week or even a bit longer. 

Since it is Monday night/Tuesday it is time for T over at  Bleubeard's and Elizabeth's blog once again. I always look forward to seeing what drink everyone is sharing, never mind all the other interesting things too. 

Last week was certainly a fast week.

You might remember I mentioned in my last T Day post that my daughter was on vacation before she starts her new job this coming Friday. I also mentioned she wanted to go shopping.

One day last week we had sunshine and some cooler temperatures (in the mid-twenties  degree F or around -3 or -4 degrees C). It was the first sunny day in awhile and certainly the first sunny day in January, so we decided a little shopping roadtrip would be a great idea.

We headed off to Freeport, Maine. 

If you aren't familiar with LL Bean, they are a northern New England fixture. Back in  1911 their original owner, Leon Leowood Bean, made these "hunting" boots (as seen in the photo above) with rubber bottoms and leather uppers to keep feet dry while tromping around in wet woodlands. Somewhere along the line these boots even became stylish for day to day wear on college campuses and for others in the ever changing New England weather, as well as other places too. 

I had a pair in college, and I have 3 pairs now: ancient clunky felt lined ones for winter (that they no longer make) that are good for shoveling and mucking around in the snow, a low pair of slip ons, and a pair like this statue only they are fleece lined. I'm not sure what happened to my college pair; sadly, somewhere in my 20's moving around they vanished. 

One thing about these boots is that if the sole wears out, they can be replaced.  My ancient felt lined winters ones had to be replaced once when the dog we had at the time was mad I left her and she chewed the soles off both boots, all while my husband was in the other room doing something and didn't notice. My husband was pretty happy he didn't have order me new boots because at that time they fixed soles for free. I'm not sure if it is still a free service now, although they still fix and clean boots for you.

Here's the LL Bean page about their boot sustainability in case you are interested: LL Bean boots.

The flagship store is in Freeport, Maine, about an hour and 40 minutes from my house. LL Bean now has stores and outlets in other places. Beans (as many New Englanders call it) sells a variety of outdoor gear, clothing, housewares, etc. My first ever visit to Beans was when I was a teenager, and the store was in a multistory wooden sided unremarkable building. After several renovations and enlargements, Beans is now fairly big and drives a whole shopping experience in Freeport. 

In one of the open areas in their store complex, Beans still had their holiday decorated tree up.

I thought the reflection in one of their giant shiny balls would make a good photo, even if we are  distorted from the curvature of the ball.

And yes, we had done some shopping. If you're curious, I bought a pair of flannel pillow cases that match the flannel comforter/duvet cover I received for Christmas in 2020. Not very exciting I admit. 

I have digressed a bit from the drink theme of today's post, so let me share my drink with you.

It was very warm inside of LL Beans. The outside  air felt nice when we walked to go to a few other stores.  As it was a Tuesday morning and not particulary warm outside (like 24 degrees F or -4 degrees C), the stores were not very crowded and we had our masks. At the end of our shopping, we were thirsty, and my daughter, the Starbucks girl in the family, wanted a strawberry acai drink. She offered to buy me a drink. I never go to Starbucks on my own. Usually if I am at Starbucks I get a hot chai latte, but since I was warm from walking and from being inside LL Beans, I tried the peach-green tea-lemonade, light on the ice. You can see my drink in my hand in the photo above. It was delicious and refreshing too.

We had a fun day out with a few other stops along the way, including at the Big Indian (yes I know that is not politically correct at all but that's what it is called) that stands at the south end of Freeport. There must have been a tourist gift shop here back in the days when these kitschy statues were all the rage.

He is now a Freeport landmark along with LL Beans.

With our other stops,  we didn't get home until just before 6 PM.

All that shopping and driving was exhausting too.

(I just noticed how dirty my backseat is-smile!)

Have a great T day and week ahead. Thanks for visiting.