Cross Country Skiing

So on to the most recent week.  The work week went flying as we enjoyed an evening at Northwestern Mutual's holiday party.  Nice time reconnecting with folks I haven't seen in a while and gave me a reason to wear something besides blue jeans and sweatshirt.  I figure it is good to be forced to dress up a little now and then.  We spent most of the weekend at the Bradley Center seeing a concert and basketball game.  But before all that we took advantage of another hefty snowfall (about 5 or 6 inches, and yes, I got to snow blow again) to head out to a local park and spend a couple of hours getting some exercise on our cross country skis.  Always a bit of a learning curve the first time out for the season, but it came back quickly.  Although neither of us is a big fan of going down hills in those skinny little skis.  

Next up, was the basketball game where we watched Marquette play IUPUI (yes that is the university's initials - look it up online).  Unfortunately, IUPUI wasn't much of a match for the Golden Eagles as they easily won the game.  But we had a nice time with several of Jo's HR team as it was a group outing.  Always nice for me to put some faces with people she talks about.  We also love the Bradley Center pizza and chicken fingers.  Not that they are good for you, but they are free with the Northwestern tickets and you know me and free food.

Kathy and John were in town for an event with John's family on Saturday and they spent the night with us.  Then Sunday morning we had a family brunch with the local family members.  We were joined by Chris and Angela, Drew, and of course, Kathy and John.  Always fun to catch up on what the young folks are doing.  We whipped up a sausage and cheese strata along with a spinach and mushroom frittata.  However the biggest hit was the monkey bread, none of which was left for me to nibble on later.

Afterwards we headed back to the Bradley center to see the Tran Siberian Orchestra play their Lost Christmas Eve show with our friends, Steve and Kathy (they had treated us to the Badger football game in November and this was our return treat).  As usual it was a great show with stirring music, cool laser light show and amazing fire effects.  Afterwards we headed to Mader's for some great German food before coming home tired but having had a great weekend.

Time to use the Snow Blower

We had our first snowfall, of many I'm sure, that required getting out the old, trusty snow blower.  We are having quite the introduction to winter this year as our December has been frosty and snowy.  I already have a pile 4 feet high in the front yard where I push the driveway snow and given that in Wisconsin the snow doesn't melt until April it could mount up to quite a snow hill by the end of the season.  But I did enjoy getting out in the cold and throwing some snow around.

I skipped writing anything last week, so I'll catch up a bit.  We attend a local production of Les Mis on the 6th with our friends, Tim and Rosalie, and were amazed by the quality of singing and the stage production.  While we have seen the Broadway version multiple times, Jo and I both thought this compared quite well especially since many of the actors were from the local area.  Before the show we enjoyed a nice dinner at Benelux although the walk to dinner and back to the theater was bit nippy since it was only 3 degrees at the time.

The rest of that weekend we pretty much hibernated except for doing a little decorating around the house and getting our Christmas letters into the mail.  Jo is in her year-end fun at work with making sure the performance process is running smoothly as well as doing them for her direct reports.  And yes, I'm still waiting for mine from her - I'm hoping for at least a meets expectations, maybe if I'm lucky an exceeds.  We'll see.

The only other fun event worth noting was my saga of getting a splinter that got buried into my finger surgically removed.  This involved three doctor visits, an X-ray (don't ask), and three stitches all for a piece of wood about one mm in size.  My advice, if you think you got a splinter dig it out right away it will save you a fortune in doctor bills down the road.

First Shovel Worthy Snowfall

Well it had to happen eventually, we had our first snowfall that required breaking out the snow shovel.  Note that it wasn't enough to warrant firing up the snow blower, but I gave that serious consideration - mostly because it is just so much fun to shoot snow everywhere.  As the snowfall happened the Monday before Thanksgiving it is somewhat worrisome what this might mean for a blustery winter but since the temperatures warmed up this week, I'm hopeful we won't be buried every three days in the white stuff for the rest of winter.  Although it would be nice to get several good snowfalls for some cross country skiing.

We headed over to Madison for the turkey weekend and while there did a little house shopping.  Didn't find anything to buy, but we always enjoy looking.  Jo's sister, Kathy, did her usual phenomenal job with Thanksgiving dinner, the turkey was noted for its moistness by all, and we were joined by several of Jo's relatives (one brother, one brother-in-law, one nephew and his wife, and of course Drew was there so really two nephews).  I did as little as possible during the time in Madison except for some serious time playing computer games and some serious over eating.  Between my laptop and IPad there seems to be a lot of opportunity to waste major portions of my day.  I got in several great long runs including a 8-9 miler which has happened in a long time.  Unfortunately, Jo's knee continues to bother her so she is off running until it feels better.  She actually hurt it in yoga, not running (although, running might be a contributing factor) - so that what you get for stretching.

We came home on Saturday after a morning hike in the Madison Arboretum to watch the Badger/Penn State football game.  As the Badgers played horribly we lost making my father happy and me having to avoid him until he is over the gloating moment - which might take several weeks.  We should still make a bowl appearance so we should get one more opportunity to watch them in action around New Year's Day.

I'm spending the week finishing up my Christmas shopping and getting the house decorated for the short holiday season.  Also made my first batch of Christmas cookies on Sunday - yum.

Go Badgers

I'm a little late this week with my post and no excuse except for limited desire to be writing earlier this week.  We had a busy weekend as we headed over to Madison on Friday to spend some time with Jo's sister and take in a Badger football game on Saturday.  Unfortunately, the weather was a little less than ideal as we woke to rain Saturday morning.  However we had seats that were protected from the direct rain and just had to deal with the cold mist blowing around.  What made up for the poor weather was the exciting game in which Wisconsin was victorious.  It certainly helped all the fans to see WI score twice within the first 3 minutes of the game.  We also did a little house hunting while we were in Madison since, as anyone that knows us, we love going through other people's homes.  We eventually landed back up at Kathy's place which after some Rocky Rococo's pizza for dinner we headed home.

Sunday we got in an early morning run and then picked up my parents and sister at the train station for a brief visit.  We had a wonderful brunch at the Lake Park Bistro although the tornado warnings and torrential rain made for a few worried moments.  Especially trying to decide whether we should head to the basement or continue eating our meal.  We managed to finish our meal and get home without incident and only got partially drenched.  We spent the afternoon catching up on the family news and viewing our safari photos - the short version.  Then my sister headed back to Chicago while we enjoyed a delicious roasted carrot and parsnip soup using our freshly harvested parsnips and the last of our earlier harvested carrots. 

Monday while Jo headed off to work, poor Jo, my Dad and I watched the safari photos - the long version.  Afterwards we packed up and headed to the Milwaukee Public Museum.  We had to take in the butterfly exhibit since that is always one of my favorites.  We spent the bulk of the time in the section on the history of the planet (movement of the land masses and the dinosaurs - because how can you ever get tired of seeing dinosaurs).  Then it was back to the train station for them to head back to Chicago for a few more days before heading home.

First Snowfall

Well there has to be a first day of it every year, but does it have to be in November?  We are in the middle of receiving our first snowfall of the year today.  The yard is all white and while it didn't stick to the road or trees, it is a sure sign of what is to come.  While it isn't predicted to stay around long as temperatures will climb out of the freezing mark later this week, I did spend time last week putting away the lawn mower and getting the snowblower tuned up.  Another exciting 4 to 6 months of throwing snow.  No reason to get it out today, but I'm ready for the first big, driveway covering snow.

We had a nice weekend enjoying a visit from Jo's roommate in college, Mary, and her hubby, Greg.  As part of the weekend festivities we finally managed to get to the Sprecher Beer plant to take the tour and do a little beer/soda tasting.  It is quite a great deal, for $5 you get a tour of the plant and then all the soda tastings you want and up to 4 beers to taste.  Plus you get to keep the serving glass.  Jo figured you could spend an entire afternoon there with lunch for around $9.  It is an especially good deal if you take someone like me along that doesn't like to drink beer all that much - although, I did enjoy my share of the soda.

The rest of the time with Mary and Greg was spent catching up on the happenings of their first year of marriage along with all the news from Quincy - Jo's hometown, in case you forgot.  We also bored them with having to sit through pictures from our safari, but we were semi-kind and only made them do the 230 photo version. 

Milwaukee Bucks Basketball Game - Round 2

A pretty quiet week in Milwaukee.  Weather has been cool, but hey we live in Wisconsin what should you expect in late October - but fortunately no snow as yet.  Although, I'm getting the snow blower out this week to get it ready for another fun winter moving snow around.  I spent the week continuing to clean up the various gardens to get them ready to head through another winter.  Jo spent the week making sure we could continue to get food on the table.  Also squeezed in our usual mix of exercising although Jo's knees have been bothering her a little bit so she is trying to take it a little easier on the running front.

Our big weekend event was seeing if the Milwaukee Bucks could actually complete a whole game of basketball.  We received tickets from the Bucks to make up for the cancelled game the other week, so we headed back to the Bradley Center to enjoy an evening of sports.  The team decided to use the old floor, not the new, all-to-slippery brand new floor (there's some serious dollars wasting away somewhere - although we've been told they are trying to refinish it), and apparently the old floor worked just fine as the game managed to make it all the way to the end.  We had great time although the Bucks lost the game - we aren't sure if we have ever been to a game where the Bucks won, maybe we are bad luck for them.

On Sunday, Jo headed to Phoenix for a business trip while I puttered around the house doing some of my work week chores ahead of schedule.  I then took the afternoon off, watched a little football and did a little reading (which might involved some amount of time with my eyes closed).

To close this week's post, if you want to understand just how frugal Jo really is - here is a picture of her slippers that I finally managed to convince her needed to be tossed out.  Understand that they have looked like this for over a year!  Some early childhood lessons can't ever be unlearned, but you got to love her.

Post Traffic

I just checked and Malaysia and Poland have surged into second and third place in viewing the blog.  Still not sure why, but that is what Google says is happening.  Not sure why I'm no longer that popular in Russia.

Really Short Basketball Game

We had tickets to see the Milwaukee Bucks play a pre-season game last Friday using Northwestern Mutual's suite at the Bradley Center.  We snapped a few pictures of their new playing floor and we were enjoying watching the beginning of the game with our pizza and chicken nuggets when all of sudden play stopped.  Players milled around on the floor for a little bit before the entire opposing team headed for the locker room.  Everyone started wondering if it was some kind of crazy TV time out or the team needed some weird equipment repairs (blown out shoe bottom anyone?).  Next up, the Bucks head for the locker room - still no announcement on what is happening and why all the players are gone.  Finally after about 20-25 minutes, they announce that the brand new floor (just installed this year!!) is too slippery for the players to safely play on.  So instead of a nice evening watching some basketball live, we got to see 10 minutes of play, enjoy the food and company in the suite, and get to bed by 10.  Not exactly how we thought the evening was going to go.  We have apparently gotten another set of tickets for this Saturday's game to make up for the lack of a game on Friday - but they don't come with complementary parking, free food, or the nice padded seats in the suite (do I sound a wee bit spoiled?).  I continue to maintain that football remains the most dedicated sport - they play in any kind of weather on a too hard (think Green Bay in the winter) or too soft field.  And the fans remain despite the weather. 

The rest of the week for us consisted of trying to overcome the jet lag we both suffered - this was due not only to the time zone changes but also the fact we were no longer on vacation (mostly the latter cause would be my guess).  We also adjusted our schedules back to our home routine.  This meant getting to the gym a couple of times and starting back up our running after a two week break.  Amazing how hard it is to keep in shape and how easy it is to lose any endurance and conditioning. 


Since we had several frosts last week, it was time to get the flower and vegetable beds ready for the winter.  So we harvested the last of the onions from the garden and cut off the dead plants.  We still have rutabagas in the ground and we are waiting a while to pull our parsnips and Brussels sprouts.  Time soon to start thinking about what next year's garden will have in it.  Since we aren't going to do cucumbers next year, that opens some space for something new.  I might put in some potatoes next year - although I'm not too sure how they will do in our raised beds.

For the rest of the weekend, we took it somewhat easy.  Saturday after the gym we walked to a deli for lunch that we hadn't tried before and had great sandwiches (a club for me as I continue my clubs across America campaign) followed by hiking up to the frozen yogurt shop.  We figured we could afford the calories since we walked about 1.5 miles to get there.  Sunday we spent some time winnowing our safari pictures down to about 240 photos that capture the highlights of our trip (this is what you will be shown if you ask to see our photos - unless you volunteer for the full 1,300).  I'll continue to post a few new photos for the next several weeks before you tire of hearing about our trip.

More Pictures from Botswana

I was informed that I didn't post enough pictures by you know who.  So to show my responsiveness to feedback (which is always a gift), here are a few more photos from our trip.  Hopefully this will meet the expanded picture needs by the boss.  Hope you enjoy.

Carrots, Carrots, and more Carrots

We came home to wonderful Wisconsin weather - cold.  We went from 95 degrees in Africa to 40 degrees here.  Quite the change to your system.  As there are multiple nights below freezing predicted we decided to harvest anything from the garden that wouldn't survive the frost.  That meant bringing in the last of the tomatoes, carrots, squash, cucumbers, and onions.  This lead to quite the harvest, we brought in over 10 lbs. of carrots alone.  While most of our carrots have unusual shapes (not exactly sure what is causing that problem) they still taste great and we enjoyed a delicious and warming carrot soup on Sunday night.

We are trying the trick of ripening green tomatoes in a paper bag in the house that Jo read about in our local paper.  Hopefully this works and don't just land up with a whole lot of rotting tomatoes in the basement. 

We are all nestled into our blankets at home and will be changing over to our flannel sheets for the chilly nights to come.  Quite a re-entry back into the part of the world that enjoys a winter.

Safari in Botswana

We are back from our trip to Botswana where we enjoyed two weeks away from the hustle and bustle of our daily lives while seeing amazing landscapes and watching animals we had only ever seen in zoos before.  We stayed at four different camps with environments ranging from an inland delta to river front to dry salt pans.  We arose each day around 5:30 to head out for an early morning game drive then back around 10:30 for a short break before lunch.  The afternoon we spent lazing in the heat in our tent or around a pool before heading back out in the late afternoon for another opportunity to see the game with an evening cocktail in the bush watching the sun go down.  Then it was back for an evening meal, an occasional night game drive, and to bed under incredible stars.

  While there we many memorable moments during our trip, the one's that really stuck in our heads were as follows.  Elephants walking outside our tent at 2:30 in the morning.  It is really something to wake up in the middle of the night and see a massive elephant shadow pass by 3 feet away from your canvas tent.  Especially after seeing during the day the full grown trees that they had pushed over.  We had elephants around our tent 3 different nights moving around and eating, and I must say we never really got used to it.  It was a great experience but also a wee bit scary.

Sleeping out under the stars in the salt pans.  The camp had put out cots with just sheets and blankets for cover (that's the sunrise over the pans in the photo).  The complete lack of any man-made noise was amazing not to mention watching the full moon track across the sky along with the star display that you get to see when there aren't any lights.   Watching hyenas feed their young pups, especially when the female hyena passed right by my side of the safari jeep so close that I could have reached out to touch her (which I choose not to do since I really wanted to keep all my limbs attached). 

Enjoying a cocktail while sitting 6 feet away from two lionesses catching a nap.  Getting charged by a female elephant protecting her young.  Fortunately our guide had this well in hand, but not before both Jo and I felt our hearts in our throats.  Since having a multi-ton wild animal with big long tusks running at your side of the vehicle does tend to get one's heart racing.  And lastly, celebrating Jo's birthday under the stars with a private dinner, listening to the animals settling in for the night and enjoying a birthday cake and champagne.

I have included just a small number of photos from our trip and I'll have to leave it at that since we took a little over 1,300 pictures during our trip (a new personal best for us).  We also met a lot of interesting, well traveled people, were hosted by highly knowledgeable guides who were able to track animals through the woods, desert, and grasslands, and ate way too much great food 

The easiest way to express our trip, was it was probably the most memorable trip we have taken  Also, for anyone that visits us in the next year, be prepared to be bored to death watching countless photos of our trip - you were warned.

Quiet Weekend

I had a very quiet week since Jo was on the road traveling almost the entire week.  I simply puttered around the house putting the finishing touches on a couple of small projects, tended to the weeds and grass outside, and did a little bit of harvesting in the garden.  We now have tiny little brussel sprouts (emphasis on tiny and little!) growing which is a nice surprise since we didn't think we were going to get anything but plants this year.  We continue to harvest large amounts of cucumbers as our plants seem determined to produce 10 of them a week.  Jo is keeping her work colleagues well supplied.  The only big news for the week, is that the painters finally got around to painting the second floor windows on the north and south side of the house.  I decided this year to stop climbing really tall ladders and pay professionals to climb up and paint my upper floor windows.  That now completes all the windows on the house except for a few basement windows - which will be subject to a post next year.

As I said above, Jo was on the road this past week.  She spent most of the week in the LA area visiting sales offices in the area and attending some events for the Northwestern Mutual foundation which reports into her.  One of these events had some celebrities and she was able to meet Jimmy Kimmel and saw Bob Saget.  Didn't see any other major celebrities, or if she did - she didn't recognize them (which brings up the question, if you don't recognize a celebrity is he/she really a celebrity?  Sort of the tree in a forest making sound kind of question).  Anyway, she had a nice time on our western coast enjoying the warmer weather but came home very late on Saturday (really Sunday morning) and so Sunday was spent recuperating.  We did get in a really nice long walk around town on Sunday so we didn't spend the whole day vegetating.

All too soon it was time to head back to work, well for Jo anyway.  For those keeping track, Poland has moved into third place for viewers of this blog (after the US and Russia).  I don't know why this is so popular with Eastern Europe, but I'm just glad to have the readers.

College Room Mate Weekend

Another cool temperature week has gone by.   We are barely making it into the low 70's lately and it is looking likely we might have to actually turn the heat on before October is even here.  I usually don't like to start the heat until Thanksgiving (just to be clear, I've never been able to convince Joann to wait that long, it is just what I would like to do).  Our garden continues to pump out cucumbers and we harvested our first acorn squash this week.  We are in the midst of enjoying carrots from the garden along with summer squash.  Our freezer is full with green beans and we have sun-dried multiple batches of tomatoes.  So after a rocky start this spring, we are ending pretty happy with our garden's output.

We had a busy weekend starting Friday night when enjoyed dinner at Greg and Rhonda's place.  Dinner was a pepper flavored roast with whipped sweet potatoes.  I overate a bit since I haven't had a roast in a long time.  On Saturday after our morning exercising we headed down to the Chicago area to see our college room mates.  The main driver was Jo's college room mates deciding to hold a reunion in the Hinsdale area (she lived with 9 girls at one point, you can't imagine the mess - I can since I got to see it first hand).  Since John and Linda live right next door in Elmhurst I came along and we spent some time with them (John was my college room mate).  As you can imagine there was a lot of discussion of our long ago college years over the last few days.

Sunday we headed home to catch the tail end of the disappointing Packers game (fortunately the Badgers won, and the Illini were idle so not a complete blow out for football this week) and to prepare ourselves for another work week.

The squirrel was just catching some sun while we were out walking in Elmhurst.  It couldn't even be bothered to move when we came over to check out whether it was alive (it was, it blinked).

Crayfish - Yum?

We had a very quiet week and weekend - for once.  During the week we did our usual exercising and I puttered around at a couple of small chores, none of which involved picking up a paint brush.  Although, I'm already starting to plan my winter indoor painting as several new cracks have appeared in a few walls since last winter's repair work.  We did enjoy a mid-week dinner at Sala (a local Italian restaurant) with our neighbors Josh and Lisa.  The food was excellent - especially my extra large cheese ravioli.

Our big event for the weekend was a party at our neighbors across the street.  He is originally from Sweden and apparently Swedish Crayfish parties are all the rage in Sweden.  So they decided to hold one in Milwaukee.  It was amazing how many people who originally came from Sweden were at the party since the population of Sweden isn't that large (must be like people of Irish decent in the US as compared to the population of Ireland).  Anyway, the main course was as advertised boiled crayfish (or crawdads as we called them growing up).  I must say these probably won't be showing up anytime soon in my cooking repertoire, they were delightful.  Although, it is way too much effort for how little meat there is in a crayfish.  Why not just eat lobster - more meat, looks about the same, and tastes way better.  Anyway, it was a fun party as most of the neighborhood was present and the aquavit was flowing liberally.

Sunday was a rainy day so we enjoyed watching our WI Packers win and got caught up on some future vacation planning - always fun.

Fun note, Google provides statistics on blogs.  Right now Russia is the second leading country accessing/reading this blog after the US.  Didn't know I was so popular over there.  Of course, when you only have about 10 people reading it a week, it doesn't take a lot of people to accidentally find the blog to move a country up high on the list.

Fall Football Season

Not much news to report from last week.  The weather has been on the warm side as the end of August/beginning of September is trying to make up for all the cool weather in early August.  We are still plugging along with our daily runs and exercise and Jo has been relatively busy at work.  Most of my outside projects have finished up so I' have been concentrating on getting the gardens cleaned up for the coming winter and a few chores inside.  Otherwise nothing too exciting happened in Milwaukee last week.  Our garden continues to chug along and is producing copious numbers of cucumbers right now and the green beans keep on coming. 

We spent the weekend in Madison enjoying a Badger football game.  Kathy had some friends who were tailgating before the 11 AM game so we joined them bringing along some excellent monkey bread (thanks to Linda and John - mostly Linda - for introducing us to this quick to make dessert).  Since we aren't likely to get a picture with the actual Wisconsin mascot, we settled for his blow-up version.  I must say that some tailgaters really get into these before game festivities - such as bringing along a generator to blow up your inflatable Bucky.  But that paled in comparison to the person who purchased an ambulance, redecorated the outside in Wisconsin colors and emblems and used it as a mobile tailgate. 


We had a great time at the game although it was incredibly hot throughout the first two quarters as the temperatures was in the high 80's-low 90's and naturally, the humidity was high.  Fortunately, some clouds built in later in the game to cool the fans down a little.  Wisconsin won which is always nice when you attend the game.  For those who haven't experienced it, Jo made a video of the Wisconsin student section rocking out to Jump in the third quarter.  The video doesn't do justice to seeing all those students just jumping up and down in person.  After the game we enjoyed some Rocky Rococo's pizza which is my favorite U of W pizza (although it can't hold a candle to U of I's best pizza - Papa Del's).

Cucumbers, the gift that just keeps on giving

I'll start with garden news this week.  As you can tell from the title, our cucumber plants (of which there we only put in four this year) continue to pump out new cucumbers.  We have already canned 5 batches of pickles so far this year and I just harvested another 10 pounds of cucumbers yesterday.  As we don't eat that many raw cucumbers (maybe one a week at most) and there is a limit to how many jars of pickles in storage one family needs, we are in the usual home gardeners state of having to give some of our produce away.  Thanks goodness Jo is still working so we can tap into her co-workers to help consume our garden's output.  Along with the yesterday's cucumber harvest we got another batch of beans which we froze for this winters consumption and near the last of our tomatoes, which will be sun-dried for pizzas and pastas.

On Thursday, I had a visit from my sister up from Chicago.  We got caught up on all the family gossip, which for some strange reason we both love to do, and then took in the latest art show at the Art Museum.  Our plans had to be modified a bit since the Harley Davidson 110th anniversary celebrations had already started and there were motorcycles parked everywhere (just a small example parked by the Art Museum).  We finally found a place to park on the street but it limited our time in the museum.  After touring the show and seeing an exhibit on a Milwaukee tattoo artist (who was extremely talented), we had a great lunch at Beans and Barley.  The afternoon was spent lazing around the house and then after dinner we headed over to Copps for frozen custard - yum!  Then it was back downtown to struggle through all the motorcycles to get my sister to the train.

We spent the long weekend primarily in Madison with Jo's sister (it was our week for sisters) and several of our nieces/nephews who were in town for a wedding or just to visit.  We didn't venture out too much but there was lots to do chasing around the kids as their energy easily exceeded the sum total of all the adults present (and we outnumbered them by a factor of almost three).  I also learned that shucking corn is a treat for kids who think it is actually fun.  As opposed to a pain for adults who just want to enjoy sweet corn without having to tediously peel away all the silk.  Also, picking up hickory nuts can be turned into a game to save my sister-in-law from having to break her back getting them all up.    We enjoyed a nice run on Sunday morning with our niece, Christine, and were joined by John who has recently taken up running.  We came home Sunday night and then spent Monday exercising, puttering around the house to catch up on things since we've been busy the last few weeks, and getting ready for the upcoming week.

Lake Geneva in August

I forgot to post in the last blog that we had enjoyed a visit from one of Jo's colleagues from our Pfizer days.  He was over from England and is motorcycling across America.  He purchased a bike in Ohio, where his brother is currently living, and made a stop in Milwaukee to catch up with Jo.  It was interesting to hear his plans for a nine week bike trip and Jo certainly was a little jealous to have the freedom to take that much time for a vacation.  It was also interesting to hear his views of America after spending a couple of weeks on the road so far.

Then after a busy week, we got to spend a weekend relaxing with our good friends, John and Linda, at their Lake Geneva digs.  The weather cooperated nicely by being hot without too much humidity so being out on the boat on the lake was really enjoyable (our last visit to the lake required us to be bundled up due to the cool weather).  We arrived Friday night and headed out quickly to the boat to enjoy dinner on the lake and then an evening cruise around while there wasn't a lot of other boat traffic. 

Saturday morning after our run along the path the encircles the entire lake, we donned our swimming suits, packed a picnic lunch, and got the boat into the water.  We spent most of the day anchored at Big Foot beach enjoying naps, playing in the water, talking, or just reading.  In the afternoon, once the beach area started getting crowded, we pulled up the anchor and headed to downtown Lake Geneva to sample some frozen yogurt (notice the theme today, relax and eat too much food, especially dessert).  After a nice stroll around town we took the boat out into the middle of the lake and then just floated for a while.  Then all too soon it was time to head back and prepare dinner.  We enjoyed hamburgers/veggie burgers along with some of our home grown beans and delicious sweet corn before finishing everything up with two different berry crisps from the Elegant Farmer.

Sunday Jo and I decided to get another run in, mostly to help counter-act everything we ate the day before, and then we all had brunch at Daddy Maxwell's.  Afterwards it was time for another boat cruise which consisted mostly of just stopping in the middle of the lake and floating.  Several of us braved jumping in which was refreshing given the air temperature but with a lake temperature somewhere in the 70's was bit bracing.  After a light afternoon snack, it was time for Jo and I to head back to Milwaukee to prepare for another work week.

Hiking Milwaukee

I'm a week behind since last week was busy and the one day I had time available to write my blog, I just wasn't in the writing mood.  So I'll post twice today to make up for the gap last week.  The cause for not having time last week was I wanted to finish up this year's outdoor painting.  So I put in a little extra effort and can now enjoy, until next summer, not needing to go outside and scrape, sand, or paint some exterior piece of wood.

We had a busy weekend two weeks ago.  It was our nephew Drew's birthday and Kathy came over from Madison to help him and his girlfriend, Amy, to celebrate.  We started the festivities with a stop at our favorite beer garden in Estabrook park.  We were joined by our other Milwaukee based nephew and his wife, Chris and Angela.  Jo and I enjoyed our usual pretzel with cheese sauce along with some great Hofbrau house beer.  Afterwards we came back to our house for a pizza dinner and the obligatory birthday cake and song.  Then all the young folks headed out for their evening celebrations while those over 50 sat around and caught up on life.

Sunday morning Kathy joined Jo and I for a hike in Grant Park.  We did a portion of the Seven Bridges hike (even though as mentioned before, we have counted way over seven bridges).  It was a nice morning to hike through the woods along Lake Michigan and try out our new safari hats.  The highlight of the morning was seeing a hummingbird moth (we at first thought we saw a baby hummingbird or some sort of midget hummingbird, but a little searching on the ole internet explained what it was) which I never new existed until this hike.  After our hike we joined Drew and Amy for brunch at Café Hollander before everyone heading their separate ways.

On the garden front, we are finally having some of our crops come in.  We have enjoyed picking beans for several weeks and now have a healthy supply frozen for our winter meals.  Our cucumbers have also started arriving and we canned 2 batches of pickles so far.  We have also enjoyed several meals of fresh tomatoes along with sun drying the extras to enjoy on future pizzas and pastas.  This year we actually had success with our onions and harvested several that actually look like onions and not just big garlic clove sized bulbs.  The yellow squash is starting to ripen up and our acorn squash is looking promising so far.  So the good news is there is still hope for our garden and we have harvested enough to make me start dreaming of what to plant next year.

Hiking in Colorado

We spent last week in Colorado seeing family and getting in a week of vacation.  We started in Boulder for several days where we took advantage of our downtown location to enjoy the many of the fine restaurants on the Pearl Street mall.  Our days were spent out on the local hiking trails, we tackled Mount Sanitas our first full day there (not the brightest move on our part since we certainly weren't used to a low oxygen environment and anything with mount in the hike title usually implies going up a lot of hill) and then the next day did a 8-9 mile hike through the Chautauqua Park.  We stopped at the National Center for Atmospheric Research along the way to check out their museum and learn about the research going into weather predictions - according to one of their displays, weather forecasting is getting more accurate, contrary to what our local forecasters seem to be able to do. 

These two hikes got us a little toughened up for our hikes to come later in the week.  When we weren't hiking, we stopped in for a visit with Jo's brother and family who lives nearby to Boulder.  It was great catching up with everyone and enjoying a great Italian meal (Pat is wonderful with pasta!).  That evening, to settle our dinner, we played bocce and then sat and watched the hummingbirds that visit their backyard.  A couple of days later, Pat took us to one of her favorite spots.  It is a local restaurant that has 20-30 hummingbirds all flitting around.  I managed to get one to land on my finger but only briefly.  It was amazing to stand there with five to ten hummingbirds zipping around you.

We finished up our stay in Boulder with walking around the University of Colorado campus and touring their natural history museum.  Then later getting a massage to ease our aching hiking muscles before heading up to Estes Park to meet up with my family.  My entire family gathered in Estes Park to celebrate my parents' sixty wedding anniversary, which in my mind is a tremendous accomplishment (especially getting through the 70's and 80's when everyone seemed to be getting divorced).  We spent our time there enjoying Rocky Mountain National Park and numerous games of cards. 

For hiking, one day we hiked from the Fern Lake trailhead over to Bear Lake trailhead with my brother and his family.  It was a great day for a hike and we enjoyed a lunch break at Odessa Lake along the way which had great vistas of the surrounding mountains.  It always amazes me to see snow banks in August.  The next day Jo and I did a short hike to Gem Lake and then everyone piled into cars to drive Trail Ridge Road to the Alpine Visitor Center.  Along the way we got to see a little bit of everything that the park has to offer:  elk, grand vistas, scary drop offs from the road, bighorn sheep, and snow.  The snow wasn't only on the ground from the winter, we actually were in the middle of a snow/hail storm for about 20 minutes.  When they say the weather can change quickly up there, they mean it.

Our last full day there, Jo and I tackled a 13-14 mile hike where we did a long loop hike from the Lumpy Ridge trailhead.  This was probably our favorite of all the hikes this week, since we went from meadows to pine forests to rock climbs and for the majority of the hike we didn't see another soul.  We took one of the side hikes into see Bridal Falls which involved Jo having to climb a few rocks - which she always loves...not.  But she made it up and more importantly back down although she had a little help from a nice gentleman from Texas on one of the rock climbs.  We were somewhat disappointed that we didn't come across any elk on our hike since it seemed like a perfect place for elk to be grazing.  But we did manage to see a doe and her fawn along with the usual mix of ground squirrels and several different types of birds - although no hawks or eagles that, according to the hiking guide, can be seen in the cliffs along the hike.

While in Estes Park we celebrated my birthday with a cake and some wonderful gifts.  But the big celebration for my parents was held at the Stanley Hotel.  We enjoyed a great dinner there, although the ambiance was less than we had hoped for - the restaurant is adjacent to the bar area without any wall to break the noise or the viewing of the three big screen TVs.  Everyone also did their bit to help the local economy by doing some shopping in Estes Park.

For us, we had a really relaxing week off getting to catch up with our families and enjoying the outdoors.  But all good things must end, so it is back to the routine, at least until we are off to somewhere else.