More Random Catch Up

 
Here's some other stuff that went on...not necessarily in chronological order.

Rich's great nephew Lucas turned 1 year old!

He's cuter than cute that little guy! When it came time for his birthday cake he was a little overwhelmed with all the attention as a 1-year-old tends to be.

When his dad put the cake down Lucas just wanted to play with the candle!

When his dad took the candle away Lucas was not happy!

Until he got a taste of the cake that is!

In other baby news..my brothers third grandson was born!

This is Francis Arthur. I'm not saying anything about his name........! He is a cutie, though!

Until the next time!

Catching up

Well, these past few weeks have seen me extremely lacking in motivation and I have no idea why! Today I finally got my pictures off of my phone and camera so I figured I would do some catch up posts!

So as I mentioned in my last post, Shauna and Brad finally moved into their house. I didn't get any pictures of the empty new house but I did manage to snap some of the messy apartment before we started moving stuff out!

 As you can see we had our work cut out for us, but we managed to get it all loaded into a truck and 4 cars and hauled it 4.7 miles to the new house.

And the happy couple in front of their house before they went in for the first time!

I have to say that the previous owners were less than stellar homeowners.  First of all, the clean house that we first looked at was gone. It wasn't exactly filthy but there was a lot of crumbs in the cupboards and drawers and the bathrooms each needed a good cleaning. Thankfully, Sandy, Brad's mom took that task on while I cleaned the kitchen cupboards and appliances. The microwave was disgusting! I cannot tolerate a gross microwave! On a side note: 1 cup vinegar, hot water and 10 drops of lemon essential oil in a small spray bottle makes an awesome refrigerator and microwave cleaner! Works wonderful and smells so fresh and clean!

Another thing was the light bulbs. They were out all over the house! I know light bulbs sometimes have a tendency to go out at the same time, but usually only a couple.  In the light over the kitchen sink there was sockets for two bulbs, one was missing and the one that was there was out! The overhead light in the kitchen had a bulb out too. So as it was starting to get dark the kitchen lighting was pretty dim! Rich went and bought some bulbs and we replaced them and what a difference it made!

We also replaced the porch light bulb because that was burnt out, too! There were several others out around the house in the bathrooms and bedrooms. I don't think they replaced a bulb in 5 years!


But they love it and they are so happy to be out of that tiny apartment!

Plus they are only 3.7 miles from us! Bonus!

Until the next time!

6 weeks?

Just popping in to say hi and in case you are not friends with me on Facebook, I am still around..

Just busier than I ever want to be!

To catch you up:

Shauna and Brad moved into their new house last week. We worked from 7:00 a.m to 8:00 p.m. There is new meaning to the work exhausted but it looks nice and they are over the moon happy! More details later!

Work has been crazy busy but I also am taking my share of time off. I have to work through Christmas but I have New Years Eve off and don't go back to work until the following Monday.

I had 27 people at my house for Thanksgiving and trying to get a house with 5 cats ready for company is always monumental...but I loved it and we had a blast. It was so nice to see my four little great nephews runnning around!

I have the day off again tomorrow to go with my Dad to the VA hospital. I want to meet his new doctor and make sure they are taking good care of him!

I'll be back before too long with a proper post!

Until then...

Merry Christmas to all of you!

Random Stuff From Here and There

Bye bye summer...it's been a blast!

The weather is definitely fall-like now and some areas north of us have even had some snow, although we haven't seen any here yet. I'm totally not ready and praying that we don't have a repeat of last winter!

The cats can always find creative ways to stay warm though!

I saw this house on one of my walking routes. Apparently they can't bear to cut any flowers! Even if they do grow in the middle of the driveway!

And I saw this guy one time!

That was a nice surprise! This was literally a quarter mile from our house, in a small patch of woods that runs along a creek. In all my years of walking around here this was the first time I ever saw a deer! We both had a staring contest as I crept slowly closer. This was as close as I could get before she dashed into the woods!

This was a not so pleasant surprise I had recently! I hears a noise coming from the front of my car on my way home work one night and pulled into a parking lot to see what was going on..and this is what I saw! So I called Rich to be sure it was OK to drive it home like that. He said it was but to keep an eye on the tire pressure. Well, the bolt fell out while I was driving and I watched the pressure go down..down..down, so I pulled into another parking lot and ended up with this!

So I waited for Rich to come and change the tire for me! And by the time he got there it was pouring rain! He's my hero! LOL! I have no doubt I could probably change a tire myself and I do know how, but I don't know if I have the physical strength to get the spare on tight enough to drive on safely.

 We can't have tires flying off while we drive now, can we?

Finally, we booked a venue for the shower! It's is in a wonderful Italian restaurant called Antonio's Cucina Italiana! I've been to a shower there before and the food is really good and it's reasonably priced! We're excited! Less than 7 months to go before the wedding!

Until the next time!

 

Good Hart

We took a drive along the Tunnel of Trees, which is a pretty,  windy drive along the lake and it's literally a tunnel of trees. It was a nice drive but the colors aren't peaked so it was nothing special.

Anyway, along the tunnel of trees is a very small town called Good Hart. When I say small I mean the downtown consists of  a few small stores and an outhouse!

The post office is part of the general store.

This little cabin store is so cute but everything inside was ridiculously expensive. I saw a Petoskey stone Michigan shaped charm I wanted to get but at about $25 for a 1/2 inch charm I decided to pass!

In this store we met this little guy.

His name is Rocky and he belongs to the owner. He waits at the door and greets everyone who comes in, escorts them around a little bit and then goes back to wait at the door again! So cute!

Everyone was worried he was trying to get out, but the owner says he never goes out, just stands at the door!

All in all it was a nice trip and it was great to spend quality time with my oldest friend!

Currently I am waiting to meet Shauna and her future mother-in-law so we can check out a venue for the bridal shower in April! 

Until the next time....

Petoskey and Me

On Tuesday we spent some time in Petoskey, which is a small town close to where we were and right on Lake Michigan.

 

I didn't take any pictures of that actual town so I took this one off the website. 

We wandered around the various shops looking at the quirky things they sell. 

Like these cool Michigan oven mitts that had the LP on one side and the UP on the other. I should have bought one but I was being cheap and did not want to spend $12 for one! I wish I would have, though!

One store had an olive bar which I definitely took advantage of. I love me some olives!

We had lunch at a cute little sandwich shop called the Roast & Toast. I love how they had cups and plates embedded in the walls. 

They were on the inside, too! All around the menu. 

After lunch we decided to take a stroll down to the water. 

We thought it would be fun to take pictures of each other standing by those rocks. So I walked over to them, intending to climb up and sit on top, lost my footing and fell right on the rocks, right on my face! I have a small scrape over my left eye, scrapes on both of my hands and a large scrape on my right shin. Plus I hurt my right hand from the impact! It's still pretty sore. I'm just glad I didn't break my wrist or my glasses! I scared the daylights out of poor Karen! After she was sure I was OK she sat down next to me on the ground and we had a good laugh! 

Then we took the pictures! 

Here's Karen (it was sort of cold and very windy by the lake)

And me, smiling through the pain!!

Next time the really tiny town of Good Hart!

Until then.....

Week Off

I have had the past week off of work so of course, the week went by fast! At least it's Friday now and I am happy for everyone who had to work this week!

I spent a few days in Harbor Springs MI with my friend Karen but before I get into that the big news is that Shauna and Brad bought a house! The better news is that it's in Canton, only about 4 miles from us!

 

Its a quad-level.

With an awesome kitchen! Shauna and Brad are over the moon excited!!! They should be moved in and settled before the holidays hit!

Anyway, last Monday I went up north with my friend to celebrate our 50 years of friendship.  Her and her husband own a condo in a resort called Bay Harbor right on Lake Michigan.

This is the front of the condo. Their entrance is on the right. There is 4 units per building, two on the lower level and two on a upper level.

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This is the view of the lake from her porch.

And this is the view towards the parking lot. As you can see we didn't have clear skies most of the time. It didn't rain, though so that was good.

  

It's really nice inside, too. Even though they own the condo, they are in the rental program so the resort company rents the condo out all summer long. They keep the maintenance on it too. 

It's very clean and comfortable.

This was my room.


We basically just hung out, ate a little, drank a little and walked around the shops in Petoskey, the closest town to Harbor Springs. Every night they have a fire on the beach and they make smores. We took advantage of that both nights!

The colors weren't all that brilliant because it's a little early yet but there was some color here and there. 

 
Next post I'll show you more of the little town of Petoskey, tell you how I fell on my face on the rocks, and also show you the really, tiny town of Good Hart!

Until then......