Fri/Sat, August 8-9, 2026
This year's start to Michigan began with 3 people! Dave, Eli and I drove up together Friday. We left town at 9:30am. We stayed with Ted & Cindy (in their nice camper!) on Friday night. They had pizza, pecan pralines and a sweet grape salad waiting for us. A storm rolled in which caused the power to go out, so we slept well. We drove the rest of the way to the cabin Saturday, arriving somewhere between 4:30-5pm.
Calvin, Vanessa, Violet & Drew all stayed back in Iowa to go to their good friend Solana's wedding. Her wedding is Sunday May 9, and their plan is to party hard at the wedding, and drive through the night to come here. The last text I got was that they plan to arrive somewhere around 6am.
It was certainly comical for Dave, Eli and I to drive up in our big 9 seater van full of space. We grocery shopped and filled up the whole floor!
The start to today (Sunday) has been very relaxing. We had breakfast sandwiches, chipped beef on toast, tater tots, strawberries, blueberries and coffee. We watched Wellspring Community Church online at 10am, then we watched Bethany Bible Chapel online at 11:30 both of them with Ted and Cindy. We sipped coffee together and enjoyed the teaching of both places - both very different. Wellspring's speaker covered topics in Matthew about how important it is to do the things we learn in God's word. Obedience should be held at a higher priority than knowledge. Bethany's speaker covered lessons in Genesis 37-42 about the life of Joseph.
We are rolling slowly through this Sunday at a nice vacation pace. I gave Dave a haircut, we both showered and "got ready" for the day with no plans, munched on a little for lunch, and are chilling enjoying the overcast quiet day. A very strange change of pace - one that I need some time to adjust to.
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| Eli with Daisy |
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| their new roof off the house |
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| look at all those groceries |
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| cabin 12! |
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| first sunset |
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| Eli and me! |
Monday, August 10th, 2026
The wedding crew took off around midnight. They arrived at the cabin somewhere around 8:10am. I can't believe they made it! From what they told us, Violet drove the first two hours til about 1am, Calvin drove 3 or 4 hrs, then Drew took the last hour or two. There are some stories of people sleep-talking, stopping for gas way out of the way because they didn't get gas at a more opportune time. Some blasted music while others tried to sleep...who knows. Calvin said they dodged deer on the road like it was a video game. No contact though.
I woke up at the cabin about 7:30am and checked their location which was about 45 minutes away. Drew said nobody would be hungry and they'd want to just crash in bed, which was true. They hobbled in one by one and gave some tired hellos and went straight to bed to crash. We were expecting Don and Cindy (Ted's brother and his wife) to visit so we let them sleep a few hours and made sure they were awake enough to greet our guests to hang out for a few hours.
I started the morning slowly with coffee, Dave and I attended to a few work things we needed to move the ball on, and I made biscuits and gravy. Eli and I went out on the paddleboat to fish but a few deer or horse flies ruined the moment.
Older kids started to appear. Vanessa and Violet found themselves in the sun on the dock. Dave and I found a few eating some breakfast. We saw Don and Cindy pull up so we all gathered to meet them and hang out for awhile. Cindy had intended for us to stop at their place on our way up or the way down - neither of which were possible given our different driving situations. We didn't arrive as a group and we won't be leaving as a group, as Dave is heading to his annual fishing trip after this and I'm heading back to Iowa with the crew.
Cindy brought up a pile of food for lunch, which was so kind. Sloppy joes, grape salad, taco salad, chips, dip, and oreo fluff. We enjoyed that meal together, took a couple laps around the lake on the pontoon, and they took off. Their intention for coming to visit was to visit with family, especially Violet and Drew, since they didn't get a chance to during the wedding.
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| Don and Ted had a little adventure exploring a tiny cabin that looked abandoned and closed the front door of it for the owner, whoever it is. |
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| Drew and Calvin had a good night fishing. They caught 13 fish! |
We are changing it up this year - not fishing to eat them. We are throwing back everything - not cleaning fish or anything. It is a bit of a relief!
Vanessa and Dave went out and caught a couple big ones too. Apparently they were biting hard tonight!
Violet and I prepped dinner - pasta with chicken alfredo and tomato sauce, garlic bread and Caesar salads - we ate in a couple waves with some fishing and some eating later.
