Friday
- November 23, 2018 – At Home
It
is the end of November and we are getting ready to head south for the
winter. I took a break for the summer from writing and posting my
blog. Once we are on the road I will begin my regular blog posts
again. First I thought I would summarize what Dennis and I have been
up to the last few months.
We
spent the month of May as Campground Hosts at Kohler Andrae State
Park. During our stay we helped with cleaning up the park including
chipping brush, cleaning campsites, removing leaves and cutting
grass. It was nice being in Sheboygan near Sheila and Henry. However
the park is located on the shores of Lake Michigan and it is always
very cool in the spring.
We
were home most of June. We built and installed a new dock and just
enjoyed living on a lake. The end of June we helped Alex and Monica
move to a new apartment in downtown Madison. Then Dennis hitched up
the camper and headed up north to begin a month of hosting at Lake
Richardson National Forest Campground. I stayed at home for a few
weeks and after taking Henry to the Kohler Picnic I headed up north
to join Dennis. We left Richardson Lake on July 30th to
head to Michigan. We attended the Michigan Chapter of Escapees Rally
in Ludington Michigan. Our friends Ed and Jill were the rally
organizers so it was good to catch up with them. We last saw them in
Quartzite in January where we met.
We
were home a couple of weeks in early August then headed to Lake
Dalton to attend a Heartland Owners Rally. We skipped the rally last
year so it was really nice to reconnect with everyone.
While
we were home in August we worked on finishing the pump house project
we had started last year. We installed bead board on the interior,
added a door, painted, added a Reverse Osmosis System and rearranged
the water heater and water softener. It turned out really nice and
improved access to the washer and dryer. The RO System rocks! The
water straight out of the faucet tastes really bad. We were buying
water to use for drinking and making coffee and tea. Now we can use
our well water. Yeah!
Another
thing we added to the house this year is a heat pump. Its main
purpose is as an air conditioner but it will also heat. We had a
window air conditioner that was built into the wall. It was right
above the TV and was very loud. The heat pump is super quiet and is
really good at cooling the house. In colder weather it supplements
our propane furnace.
Henry and Sheila visited us often and we had lots of fun. Henry spent many hours swimming, fishing and kayaking on the lake. He also spent some time with us at Richardson Lake Campground. I took him to swimming lessons in Sheboygan and we enjoyed lunch together.
Some
of the other fun things we did while home were attend a couple of
Packer games. We took the camper up to Green Bay and stayed at the
Oneida Casino Campground. It was nice not to have to buck all the
traffic after the game. On Sept. 27th we took the camper
to a campground at the EAA grounds in Oshkosh to attend the Aerobatic
Championships. For two days we had an almost continuous air show for
only the cost of the camping which I think was only $25.
I
had always wanted to see a Polo match. I found out there is a
Milwaukee Polo Club that holds matches on most Sunday afternoons in
the summer. The Polo grounds is about 50 minutes away from our house.
The matches are open to the public and for $5 a person you can drive
right up to the field, set up your chairs and watch a couple of
chukkers of polo. Dennis and I were able to attend a couple of
Sundays. It was awesome!!
In
October mom and I attended the World Clydesdale show in Madison. The
world show is held every three or four years and attracts competitors
from all over the country. We watched two days of classes with the
highlight being the eight horse hitch class. Imagine sixteen
Budweiser hitches all in one place. It was incredible!
Also
in October we hosted a wedding reception for Alex and Monica at the
Fill-in Station in Chippewa Falls. It was attended by friends and
family and everyone had a great time. After a family style dinner of
pulled turkey and bar-b-cue pork we were entertained by singer Sean
Jordan. The highlight of the night was Alex taking over the mike and
singing Snow White Wedding. Who knew he could sing so well!
We
also experienced some angry weather this summer. The afternoon of
August 28th we met some friends for lunch in Fond du Lac.
After lunch we drove to Plymouth to meet Sheila to drop something off
for her. I was watching the weather pretty close as they were
predicting some strong storms in the afternoon. As we were driving
home I saw a tornado warning issued directly west of us. Shortly
after we arrived home our phones alerted us that a tornado warning
had been issued for our area. Since we do not have a basement we
called our neighbor Carmie, who has a basement, to see if we could
shelter there. As soon as I got the ok I headed to her house. Her son
David was already there along with our neighbors Pat and Donna.
Dennis came a few minutes later after Carmie told him to get his butt
over to her house. Carmie, Pat, Donna and I headed to the basement.
A few minutes later Dennis and David came down after they saw a tree
in Carmies' yard topple over! Shortly after the power went out.
Once
the storm passed we ventured upstairs and outside. Holy Cow! Trees
toppled everywhere, power lines down, trees and branches on top of
houses. Our road was blocked on both ends by downed trees for a few
hours until neighbors got out the chainsaws and got to work. Within
hours the roads out were open and clean up had begun. It was pretty
busy for the next week or so as clean up continued with help coming
from many sources. We were lucky and the only damage we sustained was
a small shed that went down. We were able to piece it back together.
For the next week or so we helped out neighbors and used our truck to
pull trailers full of trees and brush to the dump site at the Dundee
Sand and Gravel. They had graciously opened the gravel pit up for
people to dump their storm damaged trees and brush. We were out of
power for approximately two days. We ran our small generator to keep
the refrigerator running in the house. We stayed in our camper and
had all the comforts of home but were glad when the power came back
on.
The
national weather service identified at least 17 tornadoes that
touched down in the area but apparently our area was just hit by
strong winds. All and all we were pretty lucky.
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| HARD AT WORK AT KOHLER ANDRAE STATE PARK |
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| LAKE FUN! |
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| PACKER GAMES |
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| HORSES! |
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| WEDDING CELEBRATION |
