Back on the blogosphere

I noticed that it has been a couple of weeks since we have been on the blog.  I suppose that means we have been having too much fun this summer!

One of those weeks, we were gone and without internet and phone.  So I will use that as our excuse.  [Our phone service is through Cricket, which is new but cheap.  Once we went north of Grand Rapids, we had no service.  You get what you pay for!]

We spent some R&R in northern Michigan.  First we camped at a state forest near Interlochen, which is the site of the famous fine arts camp.  I think we did it just so we could take a picture worthy of a magazine ad with our Prius. 

Actually, it was also nearby the Cherry Republic, a cherry-themed restaurant/shop that we had been 3 years prior; this afforded us the time to stock up on cherry jam, cherry salsa, cherry BBQ, etc... Yum!

It was not only about shopping, though.  We did enjoy being in the woods again.  It is no Boundary Waters, but it is worlds away from Chicago.

We had some encounters with wildlife, though not the way we expected.  It was not in our walks in the woods, or out on the lake near our quiet campsite.  At a beach near Traverse, we stopped for a snack.  There was a lone seagull walking, but it was soon chased off by a mother duck and her 3 ducklings.  Surprisingly, they headed straight for us, and circled our feet as they squawked for food.  Just a bunch of city ducks, begging!

We also had a nice fire as we read from our spooky story book.

From there, we went on to spend a few days at Karen and Phil's cabin in Bellaire.  We got a good re-introduction into Midwestern life, thanks to several games of bags [aka "cornhole"].  It was a competitive time all around, as we played a lot of cards and some Catan.  Phil proved that Allmens cannot be beat, as he won several times despite being a rookie at the versions we played.

I also tried to water ski....unsuccessfully.  It was not pretty.

This week has been a continuation of our home-making adventure.  We have moved more into the decoration phase - pictures, artwork, shelving, mirrors, clocks - there has been a lot of work getting things on the walls.  Add to that some more new furniture to put together, and you get the idea of what's been going on here.  There are tools everywhere and the junk needs to get put away.  Hopefully we will be cleaned up by Sunday, when we leave for a week to visit Michigan.

Finally, a fun purchase - our new grill!

I can't wait to eat tomorrow :)

Also on tap, I will paint our bathroom tomorrow.  That is the FINAL part of the apartment that we will be painting.  I can't wait to dump all these paint cans and supplies.

-alan