Step Up!

Living in a lake cabin has its ups and downs, and this is illustrated no better than in all of the stairs on the property. Case in point: Last weekend I made the weekly run to the grocery store and arrived home with the husband nowhere in sight with a trunkful of food (fortunately only 4 bags and a cooler, but they were heavy bags!):

Upon unloading the groceries I faced a staggering climb down these:

Now, that's not so bad, but keep in mind I had to make another trip up and down, carrying at least 15 lbs. worth of stuff!

(I do have to say that my legs are looking a lot more toned ;-)).

We also have two other sets of stairs in the house (not to mention 3 more staircases outside connecting the decks). This one leads to the loft/bedroom area:

And there's another spiral staircase that leads to the basement/laundry room:

And it's guarded by this guy:

Big Rapids doesn't have much in the way of job opportunities. I've been checking the newspaper and the university's employment site. I really hope I find something soon because I'm getting BORED!!! Kobe and I walk 3-4 times a week at the park, but that only takes up so much time. There's usually not much on TV, and I'm quickly reading through my books.

I finished reading The Man Who Loved Books Too Much, The Hunger Games, and The Lost City of Z (all were excellent). I've moved onto to reading Outside 25: Classic Tales and New Voices from the Frontiers of Adventure.

Will and I did have a couple of excursions last week. We went to the football coach's house for a cookout with the incoming freshman class, and went out to eat at the Blue Cow Cafe for our anniversary on Friday. The Blue Cow was very good-I got the pan-seared duck breast and Will got the whitefish filet. WE finished our meal off by sharing the fudge brownie sundae (it was so good!). Guess it's a good thing we can burn off all those calories by climbing all these stairs!

I'll leave you with a lake view and a super cute photo of Will and Kobe.

Road Trip Recap

Our road trip to Michigan took three days. We left South Carolina late on a Friday after we finally closed on Will's house.  We drove a couple of hours to Virginia where we stayed with my brother- and father-in-law.

South Carolina must have been sad to see us go because it rained and rained and rained. I wish I could say the feelings were mutual, SC!

We got up early on Saturday and went to breakfast at Cracker Barrel before we headed out. We made sure we had Samantha, our trusty Garmin navigator, to lead us down the right road.

The road started with a twisty drive through the Appalachian mountains .Unfortunately it was foggy so we didn't get a great view of the views :-(.

And we got to go through a couple of tunnels...

Before we crossed the Ohio River in to Ohio!

Ohio was really pretty-- I had never been to this state before (except for a layover in the Cincinnati airport). The eastern part of the state eventually gave way to flat farmland...

We stopped in Findlay for the night where we stayed at a Country Inn and Suites. It was a really nice hotel and the rooms were huge with high ceilings. It felt really opened and not cramped like some hotel rooms.

Kobe was pretty tired. We gave him tranquilizer pills to make the long ride easier for him and for us. (The pills were prescribed by the vet in preparation for the trip).

He was so tired he didn't even stand up to eat!

We woke up early on Sunday to complete the final leg of our journey.

Yay! We made it to Michigan!

We arrived at our house around 1 p.m,. and started moving everything in from the car. We are almost finished getting settled into our house (that's AHEM, by a lake). It's really quiet-- we can hear the pair of loons that summer here and there are swans that swim by.

I'll be posting more information about our new town, but it'll be a couple of days before my next post (still having internet issues).

Technology Hiatus

Still no internet on my computer yet (I'm borrowing my hubby's work computer to post this) and we still don't have satellite, so we're getting a whole five channels, and of those three are PBS stations. Needless to say, I've had to find other ways to occupy myself since there's not much to do other than stare out the window at a lake ;-).

So far this week I've gotten my car insurance, license, and registration all taken care of. I was very excited to see my lettuce sprouting out of its pot today (still no photos since my laptop is offline).

Kobe and I have been for a couple of long walks in the park, and I'm currently reading two books: The Hunger Games and The Man Who Loved Books Too Much. Both are excellent reads.  Additionally, I've started a Lord of the Rings marathon (I love sci-fi/fantasy movies) which I should be able to finish by next week. I'm watching an hour here and there since they're such long films.

I'm off to get caught up with Google Reader. Hopefully I'll have pictures tomorrow!

Looks like we made it!

We finally made it to Michigan on Sunday afternoon after driving over 900 miles from South Carolina! There are tons of pictures on my cell phone from our road trip, but I'm having issues getting online at our new place. The past two days we have been busy unpacking and getting settled in to our LAKE house (um, yeah, it's pretty cool), planting a veggie/herb container garden (updates to be posted over at Goode Taste), and getting all the little things taken care of after a move (taking a tour of the area, restocking the pantry, car insurance, new license/registration).

The road trip went really well, and the only problem we have has been our timid puppy. Kobe got stuck in our upstairs bedroom yesterday and refused to come downstairs for SEVEN HOURS. Yep, he was scared to come down the steps (in his defense, our last house was one story, and the steps in our our new place are steep and narrow).  We figured the best way to get him to come down was to ignore him-- he's so needy we thought he would come down to get some attention eventually. The couple of times he peeked up at him, we was laying at the top of the stairs with his chin resting on the floor with big, wet eyes and a look that said "Help me, I'm such a wimp, I'm scared to scoot down the stairs!!!"

Will finally got him down after we were sitting outside and realizing that we needed our dog by our sides to really celebrate Memorial Day. All Will did was get Kobe's leash and the dog followed him right down on his own. Crazy puppy.