Dirty Roads

I love driving on the roads when they have new snow all over them. Not too long though and they come through w/ the plow and around here they dump this aweful black mixture containing cinders and salt. Monday afternoon it started snowing and it snowed a good amount Tuesday as well, it looked beautiful. About midday Wednesday they came through and dumped that junk. What a tragedy! I would love to live on a road where they only plowed it, or better yet did nothing to it at all. We don't get enough snow around here that it would be a problem. I have a friend up in the U.P. who lives on a seasonal road. I'm sure he doesn't think that's so great always.

After school I took Laura and Adam and the neighbors girls out sledding. I got a toboggan this summer so we had to try it out. It's difficult to find a place to sled with all the fences and most of the hills ending in the pond, which isn't frozen enough yet to be on. We did find a place and did that toboggan ever fly. Faces burning full of snow and butts falling off and back on again with no thought from the toboggan of slowing down were the only two painful things and the latter was only experienced my Matt and I. Yes, Matt went down too, once. We got him to bring the 4 wheeler over after we had dragged the tobo. up 3 times. Then we just hooked it up to the back and got a bonus ride. Fun time.

I know it's been awhile. But hopefully we're back into some kind of normal here. I do enjoy a sense of routine.

I made it back from my vacation and Matt did great. What a wonderful man I have!! He actually did the dishes everyday and was slightly disturbed when I acted so surprised.

We took the kids skiing the other day and wanted to show you some pics. This was our first time out this year. We were there from 11am till 9:30pm stopping for lunch and a supper break. That was a lot of skiing. You should've seen Adam shuffling around in the morning. Of course they fall quite a bit and twist themselves up which makes a person sore.

Here's Adam and Matt on one of the ski lifts:

There's only one picture of me and it's not that great. but here it is. oh, that's how adam's hood was when he was skiing and i'm surprised he did as well as he did.

Here's the partial family pic at the top of the "slope":

Until next time...

This was our hike for today. It was 12 miles out of town and there was no sign saying this was the place other than the directions said "12.5 miles will be a bridge over the Garlic River." So we parked and headed in. There was suppose to be a "fisherman's path" but we found no such thing unless that means hacking through and making your own way b/c that's what we did. I even had to knock a tree down, well I wasn't planning on it but it just came down.

I'm glad we braved it despite the fact of not knowing for sure we were in the right place b/c it is now one of my favorite waterfalls. When we got to it, it began to snow and it made the view that much more beautiful. It was like God giving us a picture b/c the snow only lasted a short time. I wish you could've seen what we saw but the pictures are all I can do.

If you'll look at the pic above and follow the water back it takes a 90 degree turn up a hill of rock which was approx. 20 ft. This next pic is at the end of that 20 ft.

Well, here, I might as well put another picture in here. It was a very unique cascade of falls.

My sister has been spoiling me. Tonight, she got a foot bath ready for me and we had a little pampering time for our feet.

Today there were snowflakes although the sky was blue?? We went hiking at a few trails. This one is Sugarloaf. The terrain was pretty easy but it was all uphill. Here we went off the path to see this overlook:

This hike was to Dead River Falls. It was pretty difficult. We were going to go along the sleep hill and follow the river which would've been the shortest route but we couldn't. Amy so graciously let me wear her hiking boots and her Army boots were no match for the icy hill. so we blazed a trail of our own that was less threatening.
We finished the night off with some season 1 Gilmore Girls and Thai food.

I made it to the great U.P. (Upper Pennisula of Michigan for those who don't know). I had sad little kids saying goodbye at the gate. And then I was off...to wait. My flight was delayed so I had to take a later connecting flight once in Detroit. It's good to be here with my sis, Amy, and I will try to put some pics on this week. Matt will be taking care of the kids this week so those of you who pray-Pray. Those of you who don't-Pray. No really, he's going to do a fine job. But I think they already have their schemes in mind.

Here's what the house looks like right now. Of course there's nothing inside except the wall between the garage and the rest and then the stairs going up. We cleaned up all the scrap piles and burned that. Now we're ready to go get a wood stove and then 2x4s to frame up the walls.
Matt wanted to be sure everyone knows that the pukey color is just primer. We will have a more attractive color come Spring.