Not so sure about Santa

Every year we get the Santa out of the basement and plug him in for kicks. He swings and hips and dances and says HO HO Ho, and we watch Cameo go beserk! It is so funny. Sometiime in the middle of the summer she forgets he is in the basement and has a barking fit until I remind her it is "Ok " it just Santa!! As long as he is still and quiet, all is good and she will actually bring him a ball to throw as if saying" well if your just going to stand there play with me big guy"!

She can be such a blonde!!!

Happy Birthday Scott!

Sunday was Scott 48th birthday, we celebrated with the gang at our home in Saugatuck. Grissens, Baarmans, Vandeburgs, Gillettes, and the neighbors Dick & Pearl, and Grandpa Bill. Ann and Chad brought the new addition "Sunshine" along to play with Cameo. We had dog toys all over the place. Poor Mackinaw hid under the bed for most of the night!

Sunday , Scott, Abbey, Cameo and I toured to Fennville to cut a Douglas Fir Christmas Tree. Cameo had a great time running around in the snow with me chasing her. We ended up with a 10 ft tree and now we have to Keep Mackinaw away from the lights and ornaments. It looks great , even if I don't like the holidays.....

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