A week in the summer

It's summer for just a little while longer. Skylar goes back to school on the 11th. Thank goodness Michigan passed the law that doesn't let kids start school until after Labor Day. I think I'm on that band wagon. The 11th of August is too stinking early.

I brought Skylar back with me on Sunday. On Monday we cleaned the house and went grocery shopping. We had tacos with Heather and Skylar ran through the sprinkler. Then we went and bought ice cream at Jersey Junction, my favorite place to go!


On Tuesday we headed to the beach! We went to P. J. Hoffmaster State park in Muskegon. Bill had told me it was more of a family friendly beach. It was beautiful! The lake was clear, the weather was perfect and there weren't too many people there when we first arrived. It wasn't too busy when we left either. Skylar and I built sandcastles. I didn't have any buckets or shovels, so we improvised. I think we did pretty good.

Skylar loves the water, and even though there were tiny minnows swimming around, we didn't let that stop us!








Wednesday, we drove over to Detroit to Greenfield Village at the Henry Ford Museum. It rained a little on the way there, but by the time we finished our lunch in the car, it had stopped and there was blue sky peeking out from behind the clouds. It soon cleared up all together!

We didn't know until we got there, that July 30th was Henry Ford's birthday!











This is Skylar, next to the oldest windmill in America. It's the Farris Windmill. I don't remember how old it was, but it was old.
















Of course she rode the carousel. I did not. It was starting to get a little hot, and I just felt like sitting while she had fun. We learned that this frog is worth $200,000! It's one of four left in the world. Frogs weren't often used on carousel's. The designer who created this one made them as his trademark. He designed only frogs and they were the only animal on a carousel to be dressed in human clothes!





We met Uncle Bill and Jenny for dinner at Dick O'Dow's in Birmingham. Then, of course, we had to go get ice cream! We found Kilwin's which used to be one of the premier spots on Mackinac Island to buy fudge. I'm not sure if they're still there, but they have an ice cream/candy shop on old Woodward. Skylar and I enjoyed our second ice creams of the week. She's enjoying Superman on top of Play-dough! She had quite the blue tongue when she was finished!




Thursday we went to Meijer Gardens. Skylar bought a bonnet at the Greenfield Village Museum and she wanted to wear it. It helped keep the sun off her face!

M.G. currently has a Monet exhibit. In the Children's Garden, you can "experience" what it might have been like to be in one of the paintings. You can't see them, but Skylar is counting the lily pads in the little pond.




The last time Skylar was here it was much colder. I don't remember if we saw the waterfall or not, but we stopped by to see all the fish this time. They swim right over to the edge, hoping that they'll get a nibble. We didn't feed them, but some other kids who were there threw carrots into the water. I didn't know fish liked carrots. I guess they do.

For lunch we went to Marie Catrib's, my other favorite place to go. Skylar tried the cream cheese and jelly sandwich, which she loved. I had my usual; the Trenton. It's basically a B.L.T. with three fried eggs. All the food comes fresh from local farms. We went back home and got all the pictures ordered so Skylar could start her new scrapbook. This one she made for her sitter. Friday morning, Bill came home and the house was invaded by girls. I had a scrapbook party/sleepover. It was fun. We scrapbooked, watched movies and ate junk food until our tummies hurt!

Saturday, I took Skylar to my Grandma's where my parents and Cyndi met us. We enjoyed a nice dinner out, and then I went back home to the peace and quiet. I miss having her. There's a big difference between eight and nine years old. I hope she'll keep coming back and remember the little girl inside her.

She made a sign and taped it to the door of my office (also the room she slept in). It says: "I will miss you Auntie Em, Uncle Bill, Jouliete & Felix." She left kisses (with her bright pink lipstick) all over. It's very cute. I didn't see it until I arrived back home from dropping her off.

That was my week in the summer with Skylar

A summer visit

My niece is coming back for another week! I am excited. It's going to be warmer (by about thirty degrees) and there's no chance of snow (that I know of)! I'm planning on taking her back to the Zoo because the Lion exhibit is now open. I'm also planning on taking her to Detroit; to see Uncle Bill and to visit Greenfield Village, which I've never been to. I'm really looking forward to that! We'll go to the beach one day, and of course we'll go to Meijer Gardens. I looked at Whitecaps tickets and they only have one home game which is Monday night. I don't know if we'll go or not. There's always Michigan's Adventure, Craig's Cruisers and Holland. Check back to see our pictures!

U.P. trip '08

Last year the Jr. High youth group went to the U.P. (upper peninsula for all you non-Michiganians). I believe I posted pictures from that trip. Here are this year's pictures!

We had a late start... that's another story for another blog. Let's just say it involved me, the rental van and a illegally parked moving truck...

I digress, Wednesday night we drove to St. Ignace (located on the north side of the Mighty Mackinac Bridge) and stayed the night in the St. Ignace UMC. We popped popcorn and then basically crashed.

We got up Thursday morning and drove over to Gladstone UMC. Gladstone is basically an hour away from Wisconsin. (if I'm wrong, will a yooper please correct me?) We unloaded our vans and got a tour of the enormous and glorious church we were staying in for the next couple of days.

After a yummy lunch of homemade cheese steak sandwiches, we started work at the church. We moved a gravel pathway. The rocks were about four to six inches deep. We spread them out around the church and then filled in the hole with dirt (that was actually done the next day, we had to get the top soil delivered). We cleaned up and had pizza with the Gladstone youth group. Then we all went to the Balloons on the Bay, located at the U.P. state fair grounds.

They had log rolling

ICE CREAM!!!

And hot air balloons! It actually turned out to be the nicest night of the Balloons on the Bay, so we were happy we got to see some balloons take off.


Friday:
I didn't take any pictures. We worked at the Salvation Army. In the afternoon the group separated into two smaller groups. One went hiking, the other went canoing. I was in the group that canoed. I wasn't sure I'd be able to, because instead of going on the river, we went in the Bay. I thought I'd pee myself, but we stuck to the edge and Heather didn't tip us. In fact she did an AWESOME job steering us! But neither of us wanted to risk dropping our cameras, so no pictures.

Saturday:
We worked at the Alliance Against Abuse in Escanaba. We broke up into four groups, one group weeded, one cleaned all the toys in the play area, one group painted the stairs to the basement, and the other group cleaned out the garage. It seemed like a big task, but our kids work together and work fast. We were finished by lunch!

After lunch we went to the Big Spring. a.k.a. Kitch-iti-kipi....

David (pictured below) said the quote of the trip when he exclaimed, "That's the prettiest pond scum I've ever seen!"

Last year the Jr. High youth group went to the U.P. (upper peninsula for all you non-Michiganians). I believe I posted pictures from that trip. (l-r) David, Heather, Lexie and Lindsay pose while we waited for the "boat" to come back.

The spring.

What you do, is ride this craft across and look down. I think the guide said at the deepest that you can see it's forty-five feet. But it's a dome and there's more water under that. It bubbles up. In the center of the "boat" it's open so you can see down as you glide across the spring. You try not to drop anything because it's gone forever. A woman, not with our group thank goodness, dropped her ice cream cone. The guide made it very clear that the gulls would come and that would be bad. Shame, shame! We were so happy no one from our group dropped anything!

After the spring, we went to Fayette State Park and hung out between rain storms. It rained several times, but anytime we were outside it stayed away long enough for us to work!
Kayleigh and I snap our own photo at the beach.

We had a camp fire with s'mores that evening! Yum!!

Sunday:
We attended service at the church and left afterwards. We went to the Oysti's for a cookout! Too bad it was rainy and in the 50's. But there was enough room for the kids to hang out in the living room. We ate yummy food and played games. We left Ishpeming and headed back towards the bridge. We made one stop to splash in Lake Superior.

Heather and I are freezing!

Brent decided he needed a "drink" and took a dip in the very cold Lake Superior!

Then we left and headed for Mackinaw City where we were treated to a night in hotel rooms.


Monday:
Mackinac Island!

We had a reservation at the ferry, so our group name appeared on their sign!

The ferry ride over. (l-r)Emily, Emma, Sarah, Lexie, Lindsay and Nick

My group wanted to ride bikes around the island. No cars are allowed, so this is the normal thing, not just touristy thing to do.

Brent asked if I'd share the tandem bike saving us $.25 each. I'd never been on one before but he convinced me it was easy. Then about two miles into our trip he informs me, "I've never successfully ridden a tandem bike before!" Well, we made it! It was loads of fun. The entire trip around the island is only eight miles. I think everyone in the whole group ended up taking a bike ride!

Lindsay and I stop and take our Fudge picture! It was pretty yummy! (I still have some...)

And that was the trip. We made it home, only a half hour late due to random road construction that wasn't there on the way up.

big fan

This past weekend, Heather and I drove to Gaylord, Michigan to attend the Big Ticket Festival. We had a great time. We got to see Matthew West, David Crowder Band, Leeland, Barlow Girl, Fireflight and our favorite boys, Needtobreathe.


l-r Bo, Joe, Emily, Seth, Bear (Needtobreathe)

As you can see, we had our pictures taken with them. The best part was when I got my umbrella case signed by all of them and mentioned that we've seen them four times. (Bear had asked the audience who had seen them before and Heather and I screamed and there was one other person who also screamed, so Bear said, "that's what I thought, no ones knows us." I had to let them know at the signing that we did know who they are.) Bo then said, "I thought you looked familiar." *sigh* We've met them before as you can read about here. It's nice to be recognized. Especially because we consider them to be big stars...

Check them out if you aren't familiar with their stuff. Visit their website where you can listen to snippets from their newest album. Their Shine On video on YouTube is amazing. I'll let you know when we'll be seeing them again. Because we won't be letting too many days pass without a Needtobreathe concert. Not when we're their biggest fans!

Downhere for free!

Check this out, Downhere is giving away their album "Wide Eyed and Mystified" for free! Here's the link

http://www.downhere.com/splash/

Go and check it out. I downloaded it, and added it to my iTunes, only to discover I have their self-titled album from 2001. I have no idea how we got it. I don't remember ever borrowing it and I'm pretty sure we don't own the actual c.d. Oh well, we do indeed have it.

I'm listening to them right now. Spread the word, share the love!