More Catch-up---Week-end in Iowa

The last week-end in September we went to visit the Wissinks in Iowa.  Jeremiah's daycare was closed on Friday, so we got to spend the day with him.  He had at least part of our day planned for us, as he had explained to Rachel the day before. He said that we were going to go the the park, and that Grandpa would pull him in the wagon.

He also said that we would bring fruit snacks to eat on the way home, which we did. (no photo to prove it, though.)  And he said that Grandma would bring her camera to take a picture of him on the straight slide.....

 ...and we also got one on the curvy slide.

Mastering the climbing wall, with a little help from Grandpa

And a few other playground shots:

Don't we look like we should be on the cover of  Spark?  :)

Jeremiah was very excited to find that someone had left a bunch of sidewalk chalk at the park.  He had lots of fun drawing on the sidewalk and "coloring" some bricks. 

Friday evening we picked up our dinner at Subway and then went to Jester Park to have a picnic with the elk and the bison. We ate our sandwiches in an area where we could watch the animals. (Apparently it was not really intended to be a picnic area because there were no tables and not even any garbage cans.)

Jeremiah and the "fake" elk

Jeremiah and the "real" elk

We did see bison, too, but they were being rather camera-shy. There were some fun things for Jeremiah to play on.

After such a gorgeous day on Friday, it was kind of disappointing to wake up to a chilly, rainy day on Saturday, especially since Rachel and Adam were having a garage sale that day.  We had been busy Friday night pricing things, and hauling things into the garage, so we opened the garage door and figured we'd see if we'd get any shoppers.  We were pleasantly surprised by how may people came, and they got rid of quite a bit of stuff. These pictures were taken near the end, after the biggest item--a love seat--had been sold.

Jeremiah kept trying to "rescue" things from the sale.

Grandma loves reading bedtime stories to Jeremiah....and Molly.

It's sort of become our tradition to go to Panera for lunch after church on Sunday before we head back to Wisconsin.  Jeremiah pretty much made my day (or maybe my whole week-end?) when he claimed a table for two and announced, "This is for me and Grandma!"  We did allow the others to pull another table over to join us. 

And another tradition....

...posing for a picture just before we head for home.

Playing Catch-up---Waandersfest 2013

Waandersfest 2013 was held at The Shack near White Cloud, Michigan from Sept. 9 to 12.  We left right after church on the 8th and spent Sunday night at the Diekemas. We got there in time for a gorgeous Lake Michigan sunset.
  

We had a relaxing morning with Tony and Jeane, and drove up to The Shack around noon, stopping for lunch at a cherry pie place near Fremont. Jeane rode with us, because Tony had a meeting and joined us at The Shack later.

There are several of these "flower beds" along the driveway as you come in.

For some reason I found them to be quite amusing. 

The accommodations at The Shack are NOT at all shack-like.  There is a definite log cabin/lodge feel to the place.  Our rooms were very spacious and comfortable.  There is a main lodge building with guest rooms and a large dining room, but our rooms were in a separate building, called the Livery.  There were 10 guest rooms in it and also a large gathering room with a full kitchen, tables and chairs, etc.  We pretty much had that room to ourselves, because there was only one other couple staying in our building.

The Shack is on Robinson Lake, a small lake just a few miles north of Crystal Lake and the Wierda cottage. There was no beach for swimming, but there were pedal boats available, and some of us took advantage of those.

Bill and Pat doing some pedaling.

I thought the orange life vests were a nice fashion statement. 

Pedaling the boats was about as strenuous as our activities got.  There was lots of visiting going on in the various gazebos around the grounds and on the big porch of the lodge.  And there was lots of reading going on, as well---couldn't be a Waanders gathering without that. And another activity that some of us enjoyed--jigsaw puzzles!

 

They serve breakfast at The Shack (I wouldn't recommend going there mainly for the breakfast---it wasn't that great.) but we had most of our other meals in restaurants in the surrounding towns---White Cloud, Fremont and Newaygo. We did have one dinner at The Shack--they only do dinners if there is a larger group. One evening there was another group that had requested a meal, so we were included in that, but were given our own room. 

Every evening they serve banana splits---probably the best thing about the place. :) The elderly couple that runs the place are there to serve them---she slices the bananas into the "boat" dish, and he scoops up the ice cream, up to 3 generous scoops---they offer about 6 different flavors and different toppings.

They sell these night shirts--I thought the ladies should all buy them and pose for a picture.  No luck on that.

One afternoon we had a visit from one of our Heynen cousins, Marilyn and her husband Bill Vanden Heuvel.  She had seen my flower bed pictures on facebook, and she commented that they don't live too far from there. So I encouraged them to come over to see us.  It was nice to see them and catch up a bit. 

I think that this was Waandersfest XVIII.  (We missed the first one because we were still living in California.) We've been to a lot of different places in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin.  No matter where we go, we always have a good time.  There were 14 of us when we started, now there are 13, and we miss Herk every time we are together.  And as we all get older, each year that we are together our time seems more precious. I'm so thankful for all my siblings!

So......what have we been up to since vacation?

I'm making a valiant effort to get caught up on my blog posts!  It took me WAY too long to get the vacation posts done.  And yes, there is life after vacation.  So here's a look at what we've been up to the last couple of months.

We took in a Brewers game in August with the Brassers when their neighbor game them some good tickets.  August was a good time to go to a game. Even if you didn't see a good game, you got one of these:

Yes, that is a $10 voucher which was given to every one who came to a game in the month of August.  You could spend it on concessions or at the gift shop. So in addition to free tickets, we also got free food!  There was some speculation that the amount that the Brewers spent on these vouchers was about equal to the amount that they would have paid Ryan Braun for the month. Nice that the fans got to enjoy it!

On the Friday and Saturday of Labor Day week-end we had the first of (hopefully) many outings with Roger and Sheryl, since we are all retired now.  We call them
"field trips without school buses and kids."  But we are kind of surprised to find how hard it is to find dates that work out for all of us, considering that we ARE all retired! Our first outing was to the Paine Museum in Oshkosh to take in the Chihuly exhibit.  We really enjoyed it!  It was great to watch the video that shows what goes on in his studio where these spectacular pieces are created. The museum was great, and we also enjoyed  having Roger and Sheryl spend Friday night with us.  Oh, and of course we hit a couple of good restaurants, too.

If Rog ever shaves his beard, or Bob decides to grow one, we'll have a hard time telling them apart!

I had seen an article in the Milwaukee Magazine about various trails---hiking, biking, walking---in the Milwaukee area.  So one nice sunny day in early September, we decided to go check out one of these places.  We chose Lion's Den Gorge Nature Preserve, which is right on Lake Michigan north of Milwaukee. We had a nice walk there and enjoyed the view of the lake from the bluffs . By the way, we have no idea how they came up with that name---there were definitely no lions to be seen!  (and I was quite relieved about that!)

After our hike/walk we drove a bit farther north to Port Washington.  We had never been there before---just drive past any time we go Sheboygan or Door County. We walked around by the marina and out onto the pier, and then enjoyed a great outdoor lunch at the Dockside Deli.

Yes, Bob was there, too.

The picture above shows our view as we ate our lunch.  We speculated a bit about how it might compare in price to our house.  And yes, we know that our house would come in on the low end of that comparison!

On our way home we noticed a sign for Cedarburg and the Cream and Crepe Cafe.  Well, that certainly was calling MY name!  So we took a side trip and enjoyed a dessert crepe there.  No picture---I didn't want to be too cruel to my daughters.

The week-end of Sept. 21-22 there was an event in Milwaukee called "Doors Open Milwaukee."  On those days there were about 130 buildings around the city that were open to the public.  Many of these are building that you would not normally be able to get into or would maybe have to pay to get into. There were many on the list that sounded good to us, but we had to pick just a few.  We started with a tour of a Frank Lloyd Wright home on the south side of Milwaukee.  There are six of Wright's homes on one block, and this is the only one that has been renovated and is open for tours.  There is another one currently under renovation, and the other four are occupied.  The plan is that all six of these homes will eventually be renovated and open for tours, as they raise enough money for the project. 

Our next stop was the Clock Shadow Building, which is quite a new building that has been designed with many "green" features. It includes a roof-top garden with a very busy bee hive. (sorry, no pictures of the bees)

 The view from the roof-top garden.

From there we went to a rather new museum, called the Museum of Yesteryear.  It is in a big old house near Marquette's campus, and each room features a different store or something as it would have looked in the 1920's.  And our last stop was at the US Bank Building, which is one of the tallest buildings in Milwaukee.  We were able to go up to the 41st floor where they have an observation deck. By that time the clouds had gone away a bit, which made the views a bit nicer. 

Apparently people are not allowed up on the observation deck very often.  Amy Jeninga works in that building and she said that she has never been up there.  They do have a "stair climb" there once a year or so, to raise money for some charity, and the people who do that get to go up there---if they can make it!  I was happy for the elevator. :)

And yesterday we had our second field trip with Roger and Sheryl.  We went down to Oak Park, and toured the Frank Lloyd Wright home and studio there.  It was very interesting!  We had a guided tour through the home and studio, and had a great guide who had lots of interesting information for us.  And then we took a walk through the neighborhood using headsets, to see more of Wright's homes and other interesting architecture.  We ended the day with an early dinner at a restaurant nearby.  A fun day!

(I sort of went out of order here---there were a couple of trips that will get a post of their own.)