Winter gatherings bring warmth, community and smiles.

Carrie Jones and Shaun Farrar

Feb 01, 2026

BAR HARBOR—Just outside the Bar Harbor Congregational Church in downtown Bar Harbor, Saturday afternoon, a bundled up family member tried to get a baby stroller over a parking lot snowbank so that it could go onto a sidewalk and then out into Main Street.

It wasn’t going easily. The carriage’s front wheels hitched; the angle was a bit wrong.

“No, here, let me. Let me,” a smiling man in a dark parka called, rushing back down the sidewalk toward them.

A moment later, he lifted the front of the stroller as others took care of the back. Another moment, everyone else was on their way, safely on the sidewalk, all wheels and feet (except the baby’s) on the ground, heading to their destinations.

It was a tiny act, but it was a kind act in a day where multiple groups created community.

Inside the Bar Harbor Congregational Church, Game On! celebrated gameplay and competition of multiple kinds: games that used miniatures, Dungeons and Dragons stories raged in the downstairs hall. Pastor Rob Benson and Susan Sassaman greeted those who entered.

“Welcome! Welcome!” Benson called out as some bundled up men strode down the hall, ready to join in.

That same refrain—Welcome! Welcome!—came from ArtWaves’ founder Liz Cutler as she scurried through the nonprofit’s Kaleidoscope Studio greeting the many attendees of a free community day event, open house, and art show that featured multiple workshops, music, dancing and a potluck.

“Welcome! Welcome!” She twirled between felters and painters, focusing on the tables before her and all the people at the open house felting, making mosaics, watching artist Rick Osann in a corner painting.

She paused and asked each newcomer, “What would you like to do?”

In another portion of the Town Hill campus a bonfire blazed in a fire pit. Further in Don Lamon taught a line dance.

In the parking lot, a young girl waited impatiently for her family to finish parking the car.

There was just so much to do, to see, to create, to welcome.

Throughout the town, Oli’s Trolley transported Bar Harbor Winter Beer Festival attendees to one of the many bars and restaurants participating. Routes began at The Ovens at the Pathmaker Hotel and moved through the downtown.

People clinked glasses, told stories, laughed together, and filled out their beer Bingo cards.

“Welcome,” they said. “Welcome.”

As the afternoon faded toward evening, the snowbanks, sidewalks, studios, churches, and bars all held traces of the same quiet message: that winter does not have to mean isolation, and cold does not have to mean distance. In small gestures—a lifted stroller, a shared game, a dance step, a painted tile, a raised glass—Bar Harbor residents and visitors reminded themselves what it looks like to take care of each other.

Again and again, in different voices and different spaces, the word echoed through town: Welcome. And for this winter weekend day, it felt less like a greeting and more like a promise.

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All photos: Shaun Farrar/Carrie Jones/ BHS

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