Kids & Pumpkins

Holy Halloween! Cole whose pumpkin do you suppose this one is? I think it has your name on it just waiting for Halloween. I am sure you will be able to carve a great face on this pumpkin. I hope it is not too scary.

Oh here is another one, who do you suppose this one is for? We also have some small ones for pumpkin pie. We are looking forward to seeing you in a couple of weeks.

This is from earlier when the kids were visiting. Grandpa and Cole working hard with the Bota. We sure had a good time in the Bota didn't we Cole?

This of course is Quinn and Grandma. I'm not sure what the look is for but you never have to wander long with Quinn. He will let you know real quick what he is thinking.

We are trying to get caught up with chores around the farm, but it seems they are never ending. With the head of grounds and maintenance hard at work on her new job there seem to be a lot of things that need attention. She did manage to get the depot scraped and painted in between the showers. It looks great but now she is talking about the barn, maybe next year. We started moving things around to get ready for winter. We try to put more things inside during the winter but it always is a chore getting them to fit.

Not much else to report so will sign off now.

UP VACATION

We went to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan right after Labor Day. We drove to Escanaba first to attend a lumber trade show so that the trip was deductible. We spent three nights camped at the Upper Peninsula State Fairgrounds where the show was located. We were right across from the exhibit field so was nice to go walk around for a while then go back to the camper to rest for a bit before going on to more exhibits both inside and out. We spent part of one afternoon watching the lumberjack & lumberjill competitions which was very interesting. They can saw through a 10" x 10" cant three times with a two person crosscut saw in less than ten seconds, its pretty amazing. In the modified chainsaw competition one guy made three cuts through the 10" x 10" cant in less than four seconds, that is starting with the chainsaw on the ground not running. I would hate to be cutting firewood with him and trying to keep up loading. But probably the most exciting was the guys standing on a 10" x 10" cant and chopping it in two between their feet as they are standing on it. The axes they use are extremely sharp so you don't want a miscue. It took them about 40 seconds to chop through the wood.

Next we went up to the Keweenaw Peninsula to visit Matt & Seri. We stayed at McClain State Park right on Lake Superior just outside of Hancock where they live. We had a beautiful view of Lake Superior right across from our camper. We enjoyed a campfire with Matt & Seri on Sat. night just talking and relaxing with them. Then Sun. Matt took us up the Keweenaw sightseeing. We stopped at Eagle Harbor and toured the lighthouse facilities then went on to Copper Harbor via the Brockway Drive which is an absolutely beautiful drive. From there we went to Fort Wilkins which is a recreated military installation dating back to the early times of settlement of the UP. The UP and especially the Keweenaw is a beautiful place and the weather was great. We really enjoyed the time we spent with the kids.

Next we travelled to the other end of the UP and spent a couple of nights at one of our favorite campgrounds Muskellonge Lake State Park. It is northwest of Newberry about 25 miles out in the middle of nowhere, maybe that's what we like so much. It is also just across the road from Lake Superior but the weather had turned windy and the Lake was a lot rougher than it had been over on the Keweenaw. I will put a link to a web album at the end of this which has a variety of pictures of Lake Superior, some beautiful vistas as well as some of us and the kids. Hope you enjoy. Just click on or cut and paste into your browsers address bar the following link:

http://picasaweb.google.com/dewwoodp/UPVac?authkey=Gv1sRgCNnrs9T81YTELQ&feat=directlink

Kids & Kittens

Jennifer and the boys came up for a couple of days and we really enjoyed having them here. I think the boys and Jennifer had a good time too. It is a well known fact that Cole is an ice cream lover but apparently Quinn is also. The first photo shows Quinn eating ice cream but the spoon was too slow he decided to just use his hands. That was interesting watching him eat ice cream with his hands.

Cole uses a more traditional approach and used his spoon and I think you can see he was enjoying the ice cream too.

Since I mentioned kittens in the title I thought I should show this picture of Quinn with Blackie, Sophie, Shadow or whatever name we eventually decide on. At present Shadow is ranking right up there as the black kitty is just like a little shadow following you around. Quinn is enthralled by animals and he and Cole both just loved the kitty. They played and played with it out in the barn. It would go into its little hiding place and stick its head out and the boys would laugh like crazy. They would play games with it and they all had a good time. Quinn thought the kitty was thirsty so everytime the kitty moved he would move the water bowl closer to it and was apparently telling him he should be drinking more. Friday night as we were sitting by the campfire we noticed something up by the barn and there was another little black kitty sneaking around. It is definitely not related to Shadow because it is quite wild and smaller than Shadow. We have no idea where it came from but it is sharing the cat food in the barn. This morning we found it in the live trap I keep up there for raccoons. Marcia would like to tame it but I am afraid it is too wild for that.

The last photo is one of Jennifer with the boys and Grandpa tooling around in his new tool, the Bota. The boys thought it was fun to go flying around in it with Grandpa. Jennifer took off in it on her own and was flying around the farm also. I wasn't sure she would give it up cause she was having a good time too.

We had a lot of fun with the Bota and really enjoyed having Jennifer and the boys visit. Brian was busy at work so was not able to come but we missed seeing him. Brian should be happy with the outcome of the ND game yesterday, he is a big fan and they won big.