Vineyard Views
We’ve walked out this dirt road every morning for about twenty years…we’re up-close and personal with every stick, nest, and bump on it. We play a game while we walk called "Morning Science" — because we are the opposite of scientists, so we think it’s funny. Here’s a video where Joe finds quicksand …
This is where the road takes us; a strip of land with old fishing shacks overlooking the sound.
September moon on Spring Street.
Fall leaves in our backyard
Winter squirrel feeding — In this video, I’m returning from visiting my girlfriend across the street … to favorite little critter waiting for me… it’s true, we bribe her with cookies . . .
A fence in our neighborhood
Summer night band concert at Owen Park overlooking the harbor
The ferry coming in . . . in this video, you’ll get a taste of the ferry ride.
Tell Todd (the Captain) and Leah (the Boss) I sent you! These lovely people will take you out on their beautiful sailboat, Magic Carpet . . .
Twinkle lights decorate the arbor for summer eating outdoors
Grand Illumination night happens every August in Oak Bluffs (since 1868); the little gingerbread cottages are decorated with Chinese lanterns . . .
. . . it all lights up just after dark….and the stroll begins.
Light sticks add magic to all the Vineyard night time events.
And then, speaking of magic, the sunsets. Impossible to choose just one photo! Check out this video for another one… they’re different every night.
Hope you loved seeing the island! We’ll know we’ve really made it in computer world, when I can send you salt air, the hum of bees, the breeze off the harbor, the waves lapping on shore — and one really exciting blizzard for frosting on the cake! But, for now, imagination is everything.
My hubby and I just visited MV for the first time from TX and absolutely fell in love… we had our 25th anniversary and my first cookbook wedding present was Vineyard Seasons all those years ago. Now we were there! I’ve loved your work for years and I’m back home rereading Vineyard Seasons and Summer on my couch with my morning coffee, sighing with happiness after being on the island and daydreaming about going back. Thank you for sharing your work, your home, and your creativity ❤️
We will be visiting MV in Oct. of this year. First time and we’re from TX. Having just moved here from a cherry ranch in central CA. Whew…big change. Looking forward to seeing the sites you have suggested. Can’t wait!!!. Thank your all that you share….
It’s a luv-lee time of year on the island, you’ll have a wonderful time! Where did you move to? Is it Texas?
Visiting from Michigan today. I think I saw your house being painted.
Sorry we’re raining on you now . . . hope you find a cozy place to have lunch!
Wow…we just visited MV the last few days of September into early October…been there twice before but felt so deeply nourished this time by the invigorating but restorative energy of the Vineyard. Also, felt inspired by the creative energy permeating the area. Came across the ‘Grace Happens’ bumper sticker which I bought for my Subaru back home in Indiana and found you on her website. Had no idea you were a MV resident..would have tried to look you up! Always loved your precious work!!!
It’s truly something. I’ve felt the magic from day one, and many who came before and after me, it’s there for the taking. Yes, such creative energy there, people figuring out a way to live on a tiny island, and doing a sweet job of it. Thank you Anne, happy to hear from you!
Hi Susan!
I used to work for Patti
Who owned persnickety
She carried lots of your merchandise I remembered she came in the shop one day and said I’m having lunch with Susan in arroyo grande.
I found your books last year
And read them. I picked them up again and rereading again now.
I love your books, so fun to read
U r so fun, I love all your stories
You are so inspiring!
MV has been on my bucket list
For years. Got to make it happen.. Happy New Year
Well it’s happening I’m coming to the vineyard July 18th,I’m Soo excited to see this beautiful place!
You are going to love it. Wishing you wonderful weather, it’s been so up and down this year!
Hi Susan,
I Know we have some common interests, including history. I have yet another book to add to your reading list. It is by the “Washington” author, Ron Chernow and the Title is, “Titan – The life of John D. Rockefeller, SR”. I just finished it while visiting my son in Chappy. And though I did gloss over the political parts of Standard Oil, I came to understand where the philanthropic generosity of the Rockefellers came from….a very interesting story. Chernow is a wonderful author. And now it is my turn to visit Williamburg area this year with my husband, or maybe in the Spring. I enjoy your lovely, informative blogs and was warmed by the credit you gave the R. family!! The Vineyard is so pretty now, getting ready for the season, and I was amazed by the proliferation of TURKEYS- EVERYWHERE!!! 🙂
Thank you, I agree, love Chernow. I’ll look for that book, although my book pile has gotten way out of hand! Thank you Brenda!
Hi Susan,
I had so much fun reading your books. I ended up reading the first book last and got such a kick out of you meeting the Beatles! Each book was a special read and I laughed and cried. I read your book about England. It was super special you getting excited about some of the same things as I did. Being at Beatrice Potter’s Hilltop Farm was one of my highlights. My husband could tell my enthusiasm being there so he took me a second time on the same trip. I love how she requested that her farmhouse be always filled with flowers and warm fires going for touring visitors. She must have been quite a gal!
I just read that you lost your precious kitty and that she haunts you both. Not a scary thing, just sweet. I think she loved you so much (actually can’t remember if it’s a girl or boy) and felt so loved she comes and visits..
Thank you for sharing your joys and even your trials. that’s what girlfriends do. I think you have a lot more girlfriends than you think, you just haven’t met us all in person. Take good care girlfriend.
Linda Seattle Washington
How I love you, let me count the ways. This blog was the smartest thing I ever did! xoxoxo
I love getting your emails and reading the blog posts. I was disappointed that the video links didn’t work. I wanted to see the “scientists” walk. Thank you for sharing your life with us Susan.
Try refreshing and see if you get them!
This is one place I have wanted to go for years. I hope one day to go here with my husband. Is this place just as beautiful in the fall? I have been to Vermont, Maine and Rhode Island in the fall and loved it.
Thank you for your beautiful pictures and your books!
Sherry K
Oh yes. It has no bad side!
Just finished your third book ( and bought them all including a few cook books) I love, LOVE your style of writing and the art work. My daughter is a High School art Teacher and also loves your work.
” A Fine Romance” Really makes me want to travel to England, and stay in one of those country cottages. I also love the fact that the book is small and could be carried on a trip to England for reference. It’s on my bucket list.
I also want to travel to Martha’s Vineyard. I live in Upper Michigan and when my husband and I visited Maine He commented that Maine looks a lot like Upper Michigan. ( our Great Lakes look like the ocean, can’t see across, but no sharks and salt free LOL)
I love your Great Lakes! SO wonderful! Thank you for the kind words, Francie … I hope you get to England, AND our island, both magical places.
We are coming to Cape Cod from Oct. 12 -19. Im insisting on coming over to MV
for the day. I have been a fan of yours from the beginning. From Southern Cal and from your pictures we could have grown up together. I have all of your cookbooks and love each one. Recently retired from teaching. Have spent many times at your Arroyo Grande store near SLO. It was a regular stop when driving up the coast. Would like to buy more of your products so I’ll stop by the Vineyard Arts Gallery. Any other suggestions? Like do you speak at libraries or places? Lynda Dowlen one of your fans.
I’m speaking in Edgartown on October 26 but that will be too late! So close and yet so far! I hope the Island is full of color and charm for you Lynda!
Love the Vineyard and OB, especially OB because that’s usually where I vacation with my family! In fact, we had our week in mid July and had an opportunity to spend a good amount of time with our Island family friends! Always leaving a little piece of us behind as we head home to the mainland! Missing our favorite Island as we are well into October and looking forward to next year! Maybe I’ll make my favorite Apple Crisp recipe from my Heart Of The Home cookbook! It’s that time of the year!
Hi Susan! Love your books and blog 🙂 Planning a summer trip to Marthas Vineyard. Looking to rent a home for a week. Do you have any local travel agents that you suggest we check with? Thanks
Try the Chamber of Commerce. There are TONS of houses for rent here in the summer, and it’s good you’re looking right now. You’ll need boat reservations too, and those go fast! Although lots of the rentals come with boat reservations. Good luck!
Hi Susan,
I love your beautiful pictures of this magical place, My daughter and her friend went to MV about 20 years ago and very naughtily hitchhiked! They were picked up by STARSKY and his wife. ..from Starsky and Hutch. He yelled at them for hitch-hiking but he told them it was pretty safe on this island. He was very nice and funny too. Are they still there? I hope to visit your lovely island someday soon.
I don’t think they are here, I don’t hear of them. Twenty years ago … people still hitchhiked, but you don’t seem much of it now! You’ll love it, it’s a very special place, magical!
Hello Susan,
I found out about you 2 years ago while looking for a desk blotter. I was blown away with your designs and creativity. I am a country girl from the heart! Your drawings and lettering and sayings give me a warm grounded feeling enabling me to relax and feel good. I am currently filling and decorating my Susan Branch Cookbook Binder with my favorite recipes that I cook for my family. I so enjoy using my recipe cards and protective covers; as well as my dividers. The covers are so good to protect my recipes while I am using them. I purchased another Cookbook Binder for my daughter. My calendar is absolutely the best!!! Now, that I found your Website and Blog, I will be a constant. Thank you so much for sharing your gift with all of us that subscribe and purchase your Susan branch products. You bring so many happy feelings to us…..
I’m happy to see you here Gloria, so nice to hear from you! If you read the comments from our Girlfriends here on the blog, you’ll find yourself in the midst of some very lovely kindred spirits. xoxo
Hello Susan, hoping you are still active on this, or will at least see this note. Your work brings a smile to my face, and everyone else I’ve shared your art with. My mother l o v e s her birthday cup, and drinks her coffee from it every day! And, my sister and I were planning a trip to MV when the pandemic hit. So, I just purchased that cup for her birthday which is coming up on July 7th. She is in Westlake Village and recently lost her cat of 19 years…she’s had such a rough year. I know that the MV cup will lift her spirit* Thank you for your wonderful work, and I hope to see more cup designs to purchase for my friends and family! My very best to you! -Daniele in Dallas
Hi Susan,
I am from the Boston area, group up & an back living in the North End. Spent many summers in MV. I love your blog, but an even bigger fan of yours & your writings is my partner Cerene. She is a teacher & absolutely adores your books, your photos & merchandise.
I am bringing her to MV for her very first visit July 2nd to July 7th. Any chance we could meet you for coffee? If not, would you be willing to send her a note or letter via my email. So, I could surprise her. All the best from 2 adoring fans
Hi from Katama…staying for 3 weeks in beautiful September!! Ive looked everywhere for a signed copy of your latest book to no avail…help a girl out before i leave on 10/2… betsy
I have loved your books and whimsy for 30 years now! I am finally visiting Nantucket this Summer (its been on my bucket list for years) and my friend and I will ferry over to Marthas Vineyard. I hope to see your things in lots of stores. My very favorite that I read every year is your little Christmas book. I make your macaroon recipe. My dad loved them. Thank you for being a treasure!
Greetings from your birthplace, Long Beach, CA….
I stayed up late last night, wanting to finish your book “Martha’s Vineyard Isle of Dreams” which thankfully was available at my local library. (unfortunately, they don’t have the other two books in your autobiogaphical trilogy at any Long Beach library branch.)
I can’t recall the last time I’ve been so completely absorbed in a book, and wanted to write and let you know how much I loved it.
You are a truly gifted writer and artist with a uniquie style and voice Through each and every watercolor, word, photo, and recipe you make a very personal and wonderful connection with your reader – no wonder you have so many fans…
I admire you for persevering that winter of 1986 when you were on a deadline, working hard to finish the pages for your first book, and in so doing, creating the life for yourself that you wanted and richly deserved. And how lucky the rest of us are to enjoy your creative output.
And never have I been so happy for someone finding their soul mate as when I read about you meeting Joe Hall in 1986, and to discover at the end of the book and on your blog that you are still going strong after all these years.
On that note, I’d like to give a small token of my appreciation….
Three poems which I wrote in 2004 here in Southern California and included in a book that I put together and mailed nineteen years ago to Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark and his fiancé Mary Donaldson, a native of Australia, on the occasion of their May 14, 2004 wedding in Copenhagen. I’m a native Dane, but mostly, I simply found their love story to be very romantic. (like you and Joe, they are still going strong I should add.)
I went to a large bookstore and bought a beautiful, thin book with pages made from handmade paper onto which I made simple collages with pictures cut out from magazines that I felt illustrated poems by Langston Hughes, by myself, etc. plus some lines written by Isak Dinesen aka Karen Blixen, and more. I later received a thank you note from Frederik & Mary’s secretary which I still have. I also made a copy of the book for myself.
Here are the three short love poems I wrote for the book:
1.
I know of a kingdom
Where two rulers of the heart dwell
At a splendorous castle
In a great hall of love
On thrones of joy
Wearing crowns of devotion
And robes of tenderness
2.
Tender kisses do unto the heart
That which springtime does unto winter
3.
The sparkle of jewels most precious and rare
To my true love I would never compare
All the very best,
Shari Jensen
What a lovely thing Shari! The book sounds magical and your poems definitely hare . . . no wonder you received a reply! What a kind thing to do. And including words from some of my favorite people too! Just wonderful. Thank you!💖👏👏👏
Thank you, Susan for your very kind words!
I have a question about M.V. (by the way: the island bears a great resemblance to many coastal areas of Denmark.)
You write somewhere in “M.V. Isle of Dreams” that you heard a blackbird sing. This really surprised me. I greatly miss that magical element of summertime in Denmark when the unmistakable beautiful song of the males (with their distinct yellow beak) can be heard from late March until early August. However, I once read that there are no blackbirds of that type in North America and I’ve never head them here in SoCal.
Does this particular singing kind of black bird in fact live on Martha’s Vineyard?!
Here’s a sample:
youtube.com/watch?v=Frdx5EXIHpE
Oh that gorgeous blackbird is what I heard in England . . . so pretty! I’m not sure where I wrote that, but our blackbirds have little red patches on their wings … red-winged blackbirds… they sing, but not as beautiful as the ones I heard, maybe the same you’re speaking of!💖
Thank you for your reply!
My apologies for not including the page number:
On page 160 in Martha’s Vineyard Isle of Dreams you write this (next to a water color of a black bird):
“I was out working in my garden, listening to the blackbirds sing….”
I’ve googled a bit and sadly, I remembered correctly: the type of blackbird in the YouTube link that sings so beautifully is not found in North America. 🙁
I was ready to pack up and move from Southern CA to the East Coast had that been the case!
Wikipedia:
“The common blackbird (Turdus merula) is a species of true thrush. It is also called the Eurasian blackbird (especially in North America, to distinguish it from the unrelated New World blackbirds), or simply the blackbird where this does not lead to confusion with a similar-looking local species. It breeds in Europe, Asiatic Russia, and North Africa, and has been introduced to Australia and New Zealand.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_blackbird
P.S.
Below is a link to wonderful article with sound clips and photos of the types of blackbirds (not all black by the way) that ARE found in North America.
25 Species of Blackbirds in North America (ID and Sound Guide):
https://www.birdadvisors.com/blackbirds-north-america/