Snow time!

We had a great Thanksgiving with Tom and Louise Vandeburg at the cottage. My first Turkey turned out great! Tom cut the bird while Louise burned the buns in the oven. Who could ask for more??? Thanks guys for joining us. Make next year we can do this will all our kids too!

Friday during the day I road tripped down to Fremont area to meet my Friend Annie and her sons Kyle and Taylor to see a rescue dog. I found the lab/goldnen Mix on petfinder.com and she was a perfect fit for them! It was love a first sight for us all . Sunny traveled home with them and has taken over the home and hearts of them all. She will be a great companion for Cameo at the cottage when they visit...Heres the one I wanted to take home but Scott would have killed me! Full blood, registered St Bernard named Xena if you know anyone iterested call me. She is a real lover!

Friday Night we all ventured to the Oasis for Pizza and JJ did a great imitiation of Kid Rock for us. Thank goodness they like us there are we took over the side bar starting with qty 7 , add 2 , add 2 more, move some tables, add 4 more... etc...By the time we had everyone at one big ol table you could hardly move around the room! We end up back at Jalvings to play cards and watch the race....

Saturday was a relax day and Sunday also. Scott worked a bit on our new entry way log and peg shelf that will be installed soon and I shopped , watched movies and walked in the snowfall.

Happy pre Turkey day

We kicked off the holidays this weekend with the Javling Family in downtown Holland on Saturday night. Tammys cousin-Christina is here from Germany, so to help her experiece Traditional American Holiday cheer we headed to Downtown Holland. We started at the Brew pub, but soon the moved on to 84th East Pasta to enjoy $2 beers and 3$ Martini's .( yummy) Downtown Holland was all lit up with trees and and luminaries so had it not been 19 degrees we would have stolled the shops a bit more. (Believe it or not I can not shop in extreme colds!) Thank Tammy and Jeff for including us in your Family night! It was great fun! Fa La La!

Sunday afternoon the kids and there perspective others ( Rob and Chelsea) came over for pre Thanksgiving. After catching up the latest with Scott Mom and Dad ( Tom and Eve) , we played Apple to Apples for a bit and then enjoyed a great meal. Hard to beleive it will be December 1st . We ae looking forward to a short work week and Thanksgiving day at the Cottage with the Vandeburgs!

I know many of you will not agree with me but ....

THINK SNOW! -- DEC 1 STARTS THE YEAR RIDING SEASON!

Hunting season

Once again we headed north for the weekend to hunt for "trees". All the girls except for myself stayed home or had other plans. Scott, Dave, Austin , Shane, JJ , Jordan and Shasha headed out Saturday to get two more trailers of wood . ( Cameo to much of a wanderer to go along) . It was a beautiful day and by nightfall we had a lot of wood cut, split and stacked again.

The leaves are still falling and Saturday while Cameo played/dug in the sand I vacuumed them up with the mower. I've offically decided yard works sucks but I needed the exercise!

Saturday afternoon I headed into town to get some supplies and house bombs for Dave and Pam Swift. They have a serious yellow jacket problem at their cottage and we can not figure it out! We resorted to catching them with the shop vac!

We'll be up again in a few weeks for opening gun season. Some of the guys hunt, but Scott and I are planning on getting some projects done inside the house. We're actually looking forward to a weekend home for this weekend with the kids and friend from around home.

Running with Chain Saws

This past weekend was our annual wood cutting weekend for the Walhalla gang, We cut 6-8 cords of wood every fall and then let it "season" for the year so that we have fuel for the woodstoves/fireplaces and campfire wood. Scott and I were entertaining my brother Scott Slagh from North Carolina Friday and Saturday am, so we took him out on the snowmobile trails in the tracker and up to Na Ta ka for a cocktail/beer. This is one of our typical trail stops with the group when we are out snowmobiling as it is about 20 minutes from the cabin and has great food. .Friday night we did our usual Oasis Tavern thing and headed out for pizza with the gang. We took Scott with us and then afterwards headed to Pam and Dave Swifts for a campfire. It was a great fall night and thanks to a borrowed coat from Tom Vandeburg my "southern" brother did not freeze.

Saturday am we all had "garage breakfast" at Javalings thanks to Tammys griddle. The guys "tweaked" all the chainsaws ( 5) and we headed to the Manistee Nnational Forest with maps and permits in hand. We cut two huge trailers of wood Saturday, split it all and then stacked it all at each families home by dark ( ish). We were never more than about 20 minutes from the cabins. Sunday am a group went out again to get 1 more trailer full . This sounds like a lot of work be we had a great time. Even the dogs had a good day! Heres some more photos :
(Oreo team: Shasha,Cameo Lexee)

Londi, being in "one" with the woods.

Moving crew taking a break

JJ and Dave ( aka wood junkies)

Tom V multi tasking with chain saws

Trailer 1 full and ready to split

Punkin time

What a great fall weekend in Michigan. It was probably our last of the 70's temps for 2008. You never know through. I recall one christmas day in the 80's that was quite warm! I am hoping for another one next weekend so Kate, Emmy and I can do a great color tour. We of course being snowmobilers start to "think Snow". Scott and Spencer went the the snow show/grass drags in Hastings this weekend with some of the other Walhalla guys to get supplies and some new gear. Abbey worked most the weekend but came by on Sunday to hang with us. I tried to get a nice picture of her and Cameo but Cameo was being camera shy or was it just she was being her usual pistol mode??? Any way heres what I was able to manage.


Saturday I did some organizing and cleaning around the house and made some banana bread and pizza crust with a no wheat flour that actually tastes good! I have entered back into the world of "bread Products" due to Flax seed flour! I finally feel like I have won the battle with my wheat allergie issues! My test products look good and taste good without falling apart. Not a big deal for most of you but give up bread and pasta for 4 years and see how it goes..... Now If I could only find a no wheat beer that tastes like Rolling Rock......