Christmas Greetings!

I am spending this Christmas in Michigan with my brother Tim, missing my girls but getting my corgi 'fix' from Elvis.   He is quite the boy and loves Tim more than life itself.    He also loves gifts - not just his gifts but anyone's gifts.   He sniffs them and pokes at them, trying to figure out what is inside.   It's hilarious.  

He loved the Greenies and jerky he got from Princess and Dee Dee, and they will love their new tennis balls when I get home tomorrow night.   I am so grateful for neighbors who care for them when I'm gone.    Christmas blessings to all!

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning.  Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.  In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.  The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

Busted!

The day after Thanksgiving (aka Black Friday) is a day for me to STAY HOME!   Not being a crowd person, it often is the day that I put up Christmas decorations.   But Thanksgiving was so early this year that I thought it was too soon to do that.   So I worked on some Christmas gift/favors to share with my rubber stamping friends and take to Christmas dinner at my aunt's house.    After cutting, scoring and taping the sides of the little 'jar' together, I wrapped three Hershey nuggets in Christmas paper and put them inside the jar.  

I was spread out over the living room floor, and eventually needed a bathroom break.   When I came back, this is what I saw!     Dee Dee is my usual troublemaker but this time it was Princess.   Doesn't she look guilty?!?   She knew she was in trouble!    When I said, "Princess!!" - her ears went straight out to the side and she wanted to crawl up in my lap (her refuge of choice!)   It's kind of like spanking a toddler.   They need the swat to help them 'remember' (as my Dad used to say) but when they look at you with a face like this, it's all you can do to keep from laughing.

In Memory of Sadie

Sadie was our next door neighbor; a black lab mix who was the same age as Princess, and a couple years older than Dee Dee.   When Princess was still a puppy, the two of them would chase each other around and around my garage, the path worn bare beneath them.  Princess was the chaser and Sadie was the chasee.  Princess never stood a chance, but it didn't keep her from trying.   They had so much fun.

Then Dee Dee entered our lives and gave everyone a run for their money.   Sadie's gentle lab temperament was put to the test many a time, as Dee Dee fought to be top-dog.   There were a few occasions where Sadie put her in her place, but over time they became great pals.  Dee Dee would run to greet Sadie,  her butt wagging as only a corgi-butt can wag.  She'd jump up and kiss Sadie's face and then roll over in a submissive posture.   I saw that sequence play out hundreds of times and it always intrigued me.

Mike and Gina have a great bay window and nearly every day Sadie would sit there around 5:30 and wait for me to come home.   When she saw my car round the corner, she'd run to the back door and bark.   Gina would let her out, and by the time I pulled into my driveway she was standing on my front porch.   I didn't need an interpreter to understand what she wanted.  "Can the girls come out and play?"   My girls did the same.  I would be in working in some part of the house, and suddenly they would start barking and come looking for me.   I knew 'that bark'.   Sadie was outside and they wanted to go play.

Over the years, we dog-sat when Mike and Gina had to be gone, and those were the only times Sadie wasn't glad to see us.  Her world was upset, and she paced the driveway, waiting for them to come home.  The joy in her eyes was gone, and she didn't want to play.   As soon as Mom and Dad returned, she was back to her old self!

Recent years brought two bouts of Lyme Disease and a steady decline in her health.   On Friday, October 5th, it was time to say goodbye.   A few days before that, we took some final pictures on my front porch.  It is hard to come home and see Mike working in the yard without Sadie by his side.  We miss her. RIP sweet Sadie.

Fall Foliage

Everything on last weekend's calendar got scratched on Friday night when I added 1+1+1 and came up with THREE compelling reasons why we were going to go to Maplewood State Park on Saturday.   1)  Fall colors - which are early this year due to the mild winter we had - were at their peak  2) Temps were forecast to be 80 degrees with SNOW in the forecast for the following week and 3) my State Park sticker was due to expire on October 1st!  

I knew parking would be a challenge, so we were on the road by 9:30 and got there just ahead of the big rush.   We even caught the very first wagon ride through the park - which was decked out in full autumn splendor.    It was a bittersweet day for me, as I realized this was Dee Dee's last hike to the Hallaway Overlook (an annual trek).   Her back legs are all but lame at this point, and when she attemps to climb steps, they no longer lauch her forward, but sprawl out sideways.   So we did most of the hike with my hand on her butt for support.   It was a long walk, doing it that way, but we were rewarded with a view of Lake Lida surrounded by Sugar Maples and Sumac that gave the shoreline the appearance of being on fire.

We had lunch at the main shelter  (pulled pork sandwiches ... yum!) and then went off in search of a lake that was clean enough for the girls to swim in.  Lake Lida (at least the section along the beach) had a layer of thick, fluorescent  green foam ... blue/green algae, which is not only gross to look at but can be toxic to dogs.    I did find Trout Lake, just a short hike off one of the back roads, and it was relatively clean,  so Princess and Dee enjoyed one last dip for the season.   

 On our way home, we stopped at Sherin Memorial Park in Pelican Rapids, which was also lovely.   That area is especially known for the sugar maples, while back home in Fargo/Moorhead, it is the golden ash trees along the Red River that almost take your breath away.     The drought conditions and early hard freeze that we had this year have made the colors more vibrant than I've seen them in years.   Unfortunately, a couple of windy days this week have caused the leaves to drop very quickly.  

Wind, Waves and Camping on a Dock

In my last post, I mentioned that we were camped on a dock at Tim's vacation home in Au Train, MI.   The night we got there, it was warm and calm and also very late - so the dock seemed like the best (easiest) place to pitch our tent.    The following day was a gorgeous one; perfect for taking the kayaks a short 1/4 mile down the Au Train River to the beach - which I'm quite sure is the largest on the Great Lakes.

The following day we awoke to rain.  Badly needed rain, so we dared not complain.  It was a slow steady rain with an occasional crack of thunder, and the men decided to hike to Chapel Rock.   Since I'd been there a couple times before, and wasn't as eager to do a 7 mile hike in the rain, I hung out at the Falling Rock Cafe in Munising.  Later, when the skies started to clear, I took the girls down to Bayfront Park.  That's where Tim and Dan found us about 4:00.  The skies were brightening by that time (or at least we convinced ourselves they were) so we decided to drive an hour to the eastern side of the Pictured Rocks National Seashore, check out the beach at Hurricane River, and have dinner in Grand Marais.   When we got to the Hurricane River, the waves were huge.   I mean, huge.  This is one of my favorite spots in the U.P. and it did not disappoint.   We enjoyed a leisurely stroll along the beach while the dogs allowed the waves to intermittently swallow them up and spit them out as they played with a stick in the water.

After a time, we went into Grand Marais.   The waves there were equally formidable and by now the skies had grown dark, with heavy rain off on the horizon.   We had a brief discussion about the state of our 'campsite' but there was nothing that could be done about it at that point, so we enjoyed dinner and headed back.    My car was in Munising, and I had the guys drop me off there so I could go to a gas station to wash up while they went back to Au Train.   I honestly thought that the tent would have blown into the river (along with all the stuff that was in it) - in which case it would be somewhere along the beach by now.   So when I pulled into the driveway and saw shadows of two men, carrying a tent in the dark, it was actually good news.


The tent had blown into a tree - which is a decidedly better place to end up than in a river.   At that point we weren't sure how badly it was damaged, if at all - but at least all the stuff in it was safe - and relatively dry.   Turns out, the tent wasn't damaged at all!   I've been camping for over 50 years and never had a tent blow down before - until this year.   And now it's happened twice, in nearly identical circumstances, 1200 miles apart.

We were left with just one  problem - where to sleep?    There weren't a lot of options.  And so we climbed over tool boxes and plywood, rolled out our sleeping bags and had an innaugural 'sleepover' in the new cabin.    The wind was howling and it was black as pitch but we were happy to be safe and dry.  We look forward to many more sleepovers there - in more comfortable accomodations - in the years to come.


 

UP in the U.P.

My brothers and I are enjoying a few days up in the UP (Upper Peninsula) of Michigan, after a week of hard work, sorting through family pictures and memerobilia.   Tim is building a vacation home on the Au Train River, but it's not finished yet, so we've been camping on his dock!  The weather hasn't been great, but we're managing to make our own fun.

On the way up here on Tuesday, we shot some pictures of the dogs at Mackinac Island.   Whenever we take a picture of the three together, Princess has to be in the middle, because the other two fight.   She IS smaller than Elvis and Dee Dee, but not as much smaller as she appears in this photo.   She tends to slouch for pictures, while the other two totally ham it up.   Corgis smile rather naturally, but we get them to all look at the camera by saying, "Do you want to go to the PARK?"   And then, of course, after the photo shoot is over - we have to actually take them to the park.    I have a low tolerance for deceit - even for dogs!

Our next stop was Kitch-iti-kipi (Big Spring) at Palm Book State Park, which is a really cool place.   You take a barge across the lake, which is so clear you'd swear you were looking through glass.  You can see the springs bubbling up off the floor - which is 40 feet down!   It was fascinating.   It was getting dark by the time we left, and we wanted to get to Tim's place with a bit of twilight left to put up the tent.   So my brothers found a shortcut on a map.    It was a decent gravel road at first - but I could tell from the map, that it was going to deteriorate into something less navigable.   Turns out I was right.   Suddenly the road came to an abrupt end in a field of thick, muddy clay in somone's dumpy yard.   A pack of dogs (at least two of them pit bulls) charged our car, barking furiously while we attempted to back out of our predicament.   I wish I'd gotten my camera out because it felt like we were part of a movie script at that moment.   Fortunately, the owners chased off the dogs, we were able to back up and went back around via the main road.   And no, we did not have any twilight left to put up the tent.  Not even close.

Buffalo Adventure

What would a camping trip be without a little adventure?   We didn't have anything major happen on our trip, but we sure had a lot of little adventures along the way.

When we were in Idaho, we met some people who were doing essentially the same trip we were - but in the opposite direction.   They told us about some 'must see' things in the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone; one of them being Kelly Hot Springs, just outside Grand Tetons National Park.
So, after putting up our tent in the Tetons and having supper, we went off in search of Kelly Hot Springs.   First of all, it's not Hot Springs; it's Warm Springs - and even that is a stretch.   We were drawn to the fact that it was natural and it was free.   It took us a while to find the place, and by then it was starting to get dark.   Nonetheless, we waded in and the girls went swimming while I soaked my very sore feet in the warm water.    My brother Tim (who was with us the last part of our trip) was taking pictures.   Suddenly, he glanced over at our car, which was parked along the highway with the trunk open and said, "Umm - I'm not sure how we're going to get back to our car."    In the few minutes we'd been in the water, a herd of wild buffalo (probably 20-30 of them) had congregated around our car!   We had seen buffalo earlier in the day along the road, and they appeared to be quite tame - and very oblivious to humans.   Unlike deer, they just stand there and stare at you, claiming full ownership of the road.   Still, many of them had young calves in tow, and we weren't about to attempt to reclaim our car.   So we waited.



Outhouse refuge

After a few minutes, about half of the buffalo decided to walk down to the pool - the pool we were standing in!   I had no idea how the dogs would react to them (or vice versa) so we made a dash to the only safe place of shelter we could see - a very smelly outhouse!

There we took refuge, with occasional peeks out the door, until they all had sauntered away from the car and down to the water.   Tim bravely left the outhouse at that point, got in the car and backed it up to where the girls and I were waiting and we made our way back to the campground, humming "Oh give me a home ...where the buffalo roam...."