December Update

I know, it has been a long time since I updated my blog. I said I would have it done before everyone received their Christmas letters, and I missed that date. Oh, well. I'm going to update now.

Since the last post, it has been very busy in the household. Kaitlyn has been very busy with colorguard again this year. Her school made it to the semi-finals this year, so she was very busy with trying to get homework done and practice for that. But, that is over.

In November, we had our family pictures taken, and most of you received them with our Christmas cards. We also got a new vehicle. Our lease was up on the Escape, so we went to our dealer to see what they had. He showed us a 2007 Explorer, Eddie Bauer. It was much more then we wanted on the vehicle, but it had low mileage. We had determined that we were not going to lease again, so we knew we were going to buy a used car. This one only had 10,000 miles on it, so after some thinking, we told him we would take it. We basically paid 1/2 price for this car. The gas mileage won't be very good, but hopefully the gas prices will stay under $2/gallon, and we should be alright.



We have been very happy with the Explore so far.

Halloween fell within the last update, so here is a picture from Halloween.








Also, Patrick had his play during the last update. I missed the play because it was on November 15th, and of course, I was up north hunting. But, I did go to hes rehearsal and here some pictures from then.

That should bring me up to date for now. I should have another post after the holidays.

Update

Well, it's been a while since I updated, but in my defense, I have not been able to get on the computer lately. With homework and everything, it's been hard to sit down and update the blog.

Here is Kaitlyn at a SHS game. She is the second to last on the right.

U of D Homecoming and Dresden, Ohio

Well, this weekend was very busy. Norma was out of town on a Longaberger trip in Dresden, Ohio for two days and Kaitlyn was asked to the U of D Homecoming by Will. So, I'm posting pictures of both events. First will be the Dresden pictures that Norma went to with a friend Grace. For those that don't know, Longaberger is a basket company and Norma likes baskets. So, she tries to go there every year or so. She likes it, and then I get to go hunting, so it works out.



And now, the pictures of Kaitlyn and Will for the U of D Homecoming... This was Kaitlyn's first time that she was asked to a homecoming by a boy.



She looked very beautiful.

Stevenson Homecoming 2008 for Kaitlyn

Well, it's Homecoming for Stevenson High School for 2008. Kaitlyn and several of her friends gathered at our house before they all went out for dinner and then to Homecoming. Here are the pictures from the gathering.

Apple Picking

Well, just to update everyone, there hasn't been much changed here. Kaitlyn is getting a ton of homework and it's stressing everyone out in the house. She has Color guard most afternoons and that doesn't leave much time for homework. AP Bio is a very tough course, and she is struggling with it right now. Hopefully, it will get better.

But, we went apple picking over the weekend. We had Carla and the girls meet us up there and we all went apple picking. The weather was beautiful, sunny and 70's. The trouble is, everyone else decided to go apple picking too. We only picked Macintosh, we missed the Empire exit. So, here are some pictures.

School Starts Soon

Well, school is going to start soon, so I figured I should post some pictures from the last month. We were fairly busy in August, we went Irish Hills last weekend for our annual trip to the lake. We had fun, we invited some friends and their kids to stay there too. They rented the cabin we had last year, and we went with a bigger cabin. Kaitlyn and Patrick brought friends with them, so we had a gang of seven kids and four adults. Here are some pictures from that weekend.

We also celebrated Norma's birthday during August.

That was our excitement for August. In two days school starts and we will be very busy. So, until then...

As promised - Pictures

Well, here are the pictures I told you all I would post....

First, Fayette pictures...



And here are some pictures from the trip...




And some more from the trip...



Here are some pictures from Kaitlyn's camera...



So, as promised, pictures of the trip.

Home at last

Well, we made it home. The tour was fun, but it is good to be home again. The weather was very nice at the end of our trip, so it wasn't half bad.

Tomorrow me and Norma return to work. I'll get around to downloading the pictures by this weekend, so I may have more pictures to post.

Trip home

Well, we are on our way home. We made it to Gaylord and are staying here for the night. Tomorrow, we will finish off the trip and make it home.

Molly has not been a good girl while we were away, she has had issues with Indy, her cousin. We will have to scold her when we pick her up.

I will post when I get home.

Day 6 and etc...

Well, we did make it to Wallace. It was a long journey and we finally made it. I will post pictures when I get back home, because I don't have my camera right now. The UP is full of dead zones, so it is hard to get on the Internet to update. I'm currently at Rick and Sheila's on their Internet. I hooked up the wireless router for them and now I'm using it.

Tomorrow we are leaving for home and on the way we'll be stopping at Fayette to see the historical town there. Then we will stop somewhere on the way and finish going home.

I'll keep you updated.

Day 2, 3, 4 and 5

Well, I had every intention of posting daily on the blog, but that did not happen. The cabin we stayed at said there would be free Wi-Fi, but I was never able to find it. And, the cell phone service did not work, so I could not use my broadband card. So, I am sitting in Marquette and updating for the past three days.

Day 2:

We went to Mackinaw Island. The weather started bad and ended bad, but the middle was okay and we ended up having a good day on the island. A little cool, but it wasn't bad.



Day 2 also had us getting to our cabin in Newberry that stunk. There was not Wi-Fi and the cabin was very small. The bathroom didn't even have a door, it had a curtain. The shower also only had a curtain. The website was very deceiving and misleading.

Day 3:

Day 3 we went to Taquamon Falls. Again, the weather was not the greatest, but it was okay. All and all the weather has been cooler than we expected, but we are in the UP so the weather can be bad. We actually ate dinner at Taquamon Falls, the Upper Falls, and the food was really good. We also went to Paradise and White Fish Point. That way we can all say we have been to Paradise. The kids put their feet into Lake Superior, although it wasn't for very long. The lake was 47 degrees.



Day 4:

Day 4 was a visit to Sault Ste. Marie and a visit to Lake Superior State University. Kaitlyn had a tour of the campus and a meeting with the nursing counselor. I don't think she will be going to LSSU, but at least she is seeing what other Colleges look like. When Kaitlyn finished the tour of the campus, we went on the Soo Locks Boat Tour.



Day 5:

Well, now we are up to today. Today, we checked out of the cabin in Newberry, and headed toward Munising and did the Pictured Rock Boat Tour. During the night, Kaitlyn was complaining of sore throat and her chest hurt. So, after the boat tour we went to the Urgent Clinic and they put Kaitlyn on antibiotics. She has a sinus infection. So, we are now in Marquette, we were going to go to Baraga and from there we were going to Copper Harbor. But, with this development, we are going to head to Grandma and Papa's.




Hopefully, I will be keeping the blog updated for the remaining days.

Day 1 - UP Tour

Well, it's day 1 of our UP Tour. Today we drove to St. Ignace from home and went to the Mystery Spot. It's been a long time since I've been there, and now I remember why. It was OK, but for some reason I thought it was much bigger. Patrick was fascinated by it.

We made it back to the hotel, The Budget Inn in St. Ignace, and then we went swimming.

Tomorrow we are going to the island. Weather is calling for rain, so we'll see how that works.

I tried to upload pictures, but for some reason, the computer won't read my camera. Hopefully I will fix that tomorrow and we will have pictures.

July Update

Here are pictures of us camping. We went to Interlochen, near Traverse City, and Billy and Jo provided their camper for us to use. We only went for a long weekend.



Then we went to Becky and Jon's for a Fourth of July Party. Here are some pictures from that event.



Kaitlyn, Norma and two of Kaitlyn's friends and their mom, went to the Jonah's Brothers concert at DTE Energy Theatre. It was very crowded and they only had lawn seats, but the girls had fun. They got to sign the tour bus, along with a million other girls.



Next week, we are starting our UP tour. We will be going to Mackinaw Island, Taquamon Falls, Sault Ste. Marie, Paradise, Christmas, Pictured Rocks, Marquette, Houghton, Copper Harbour, and them to Wallace to visit family. We are taking ten days to drive around the UP and site see. Hopefully, I will be able to update the blog as we go. It all depends if I can dial in or not.

Clear the streets of Livonia

Well, Kaitlyn is officially a driver.
Today she got her license from the Secretary of State. She passed her road test yesterday and today we went and picked up her license.
She actually went to her friends house to go swimming and she drove there without adult supervision.

Here is Kaitlyn going to her friends with her new car.

So, all I can say is watch out Livonia!!

Blogger Slacker again

Well, I'm still a blogger slacker. I haven't updated in a while, so I'll update you all.

Father's Day was good here, we went to Scott and Nancy's and had a BBQ. Chicken, Ribs and lots of other good food. School is out now. The kids finished last Tuesday and now they are home doing nothing. Kaitlyn just finished phase 2 of the driving course and she is scheduled to take her driving test this Thursday. Wish us luck. She has a car, it was given to her by Jon and Becky. It's a 1999 Nissan Maxima with 168000 miles, but still runs good. Her and Patrick can drive around town for things to do when she does get her license.

Well, as soon as I download my pictures, I will be posting more. Stay tuned.

Blogger Slacker

Just a little note to let everyone know that we are alive and well, just lazy about updating the blog. School is wrapping up in a few week, the kids get out on June 10th. Work has been going good. Norma had her 20th anniversary dinner/hors devours the other night. No big plans for the weekend, we can't afford to drive anywhere with gas over $4/gallon, so we will just stick around the house and do some housework.

Well, I'll post more pictures when we take them, hopefully from this weekend.

Almost May

Well, it's almost May and it's time to add a few pictures to the blog.

First, I'm still having issues with the main computer, it has some kind of bug that just won't go away. So that's been taking up a lot of my time lately.

Here are some pictures from Patrick's piano contest. He was at a contest this weekend where he had to play one song at two different locations. The first was in front of a judge, he scored the highest mark you can get. He scored a AAA and received a trophy. Then he went to another room where he performed with about 10 other kids at his level. He will then be judged against the other kids and, if he was good enough, he can get 1st, 2nd or 3rd. We won't know if he placed until his teacher calls him. Not bad considering he just started playing the piano in September. He also had to take a written test to see how much he knows about music, but again, we won't know the results until his teacher tells us.



Now for some pictures from Patrick's birthday party. Kaitlyn's birthday pictures were already posted below, so here are Patrick's.

He went to Pump It Up, a place that has indoor inflatables to go wild on. As you can see from the pictures the kids were red faced and sweaty after jumping on all the inflatables. But they all had a fun time.



We also discovered we have a nest of baby bunnies on the side of our house. I was cutting the grass on Saturday and when I went close to the house, five little bunnies ran like crazy from their den. We were able to find three of them and get them back to their home, but we couldn't find the other two. Hopefully, the hawk didn't get them. Here is a few pictures of the little bunnies.


Finally, me and Kaitlyn are going to be in the Daddy/Daughter dance for her dance school and here are some pictures of us in the costumes. This dance studio takes the dancing more serious than the last one Kaitlyn was in.

April Update

Just updating the blog. I've been having issues the the computer for the past few weeks. And I think I'm getting closer to getting it up and running. We had some kind of virus or Trojan, not sure, but we could not keep Internet Explorer open to do anything. I had to re-format the hard drive and re-install everything, but it is working better. All my backup drives seem to have been effected by the virus though, so I may have lost some of my pictures and documents.

Hopefully I'll be posting soon, with a clean machine.

Joey's Dedication and Easter

Well, this last weekend we went to a dedication for Joseph Daniel. Kaitlyn and Patrick were named the godparents for Joey. They were very excited and very honored to be named the godparents. Here are some pictures from the dedication. There are about 48 pictures to view.




Here are some pictures from Easter at our house. We have had a very busy two weeks.

Whirlyball Party

We had Kaitlyn's birthday party at Whirlyball. It was very fun. I think all of Kaitlyn's friends really enjoyed themselves. Here are some pictures: (there are a lot of pictures here)

March Update

I know it's been a very long time since I updated my blog. But, a lot of things have been going on here. I re-did the family room from blue to green, we got new furniture and carpeting. I had foot surgery and that laid me up for a week or two and we've been getting ready for Easter.

This is the family room in the blue stage.

And now the family room in the green stage.

The old furniture was 13 years old and La-z-boy is covered with a lifetime warranty on the parts, but labor is not covered. Well, we took the chair in to have it looked at, and it would have cost us $250 to repair the old one. So, we just decided to get new chair and sofa. I think the green room turned out really good.

As for the foot surgery, I have a kissing corn removed and a planter's wart taken off the bottom of my foot. The kissing corn is doing good, but the planter's wart isn't. It's been two and a half weeks and it's just now starting to get better. I'm walking, but with a limp. At work I walk a couple of miles to do inspections on Thursdays, and it's been hard.

Well, hopefully I'll be updating sooner.

If I don't post before Sunday, Happy Easter and Happy Birthday Taya.

Joseph Daniel Linton

Congratulations to Becky and Jon on the birth of their son, Joseph Daniel today at 11:12 am. He weighed in at 7 lbs 11 ozs and was 20 inches long.

Mom, dad and baby are doing fine. We visited them shortly after he was born.

February Update

It's February and I think I'll update the blog.



I just came back from Houston where it was 72 and sunny. I return to Michigan to 32 and rain with snow on the ground. I had a conference in Houston for work. They kept us very busy, so I didn't even get to enjoy the weather. I did learn that we have a few new websites that are very interesting if you are intersted in recycling. Visit http://www.greenopolis.com/ or http://www.thinkgreen.com/. Check them out.



Norma had fun this weekend with the kids. Every time I called, they were all playing games. So, they must have had a riot without me.



We ordered our new carpet and furniture for the family room. This coming weekend, I am going to start painting the room. We are going to go with a darker carpet and one that is more durable. After ten year, the carpet is falling apart. The builder used the cheapest carpet they can find. So, we're going to get a better grade carpet. And our furniture is getting old too. We went with Lazboy again. We also found out that the old furniture is under warrenty and they will fix the old chair, all we have to pay for is the labor. So, once the chair is done, it's going to go in the basement.

I'll keep everyone updated.

January Update

Well, it's January 20th, watching the Packer's, so, I'm going to update the blog. No pictures, just an update.

We are planning our summer vacation. We are going to tour the UP. We're going to go to Mackinaw Island and Tahquamenon Falls, Pictured Rocks, Big Springs, Fayette and then visit Grandma and Papa. We are going to go the Copper Harbour too. It should be fun.

We have Monday off this week and we are going to go to the International Auto Show in Downtown Detroit. Kaitlyn is going to do a cultural event on the auto show. It's going to be packed down there, so we're going to go as early as possible.

Well, I'll post pictures when I get them.

The New Year

Well, I know it's been awhile. Several people have told me so. So I'm going to update the blog with pictures from Christmas and beyond.

We went up North after Christmas and the kids had a blast. We went to visit with family in the UP. We were greeted with a Winter Wonderland.

Even the turkeys came out to welcome us.

Here's Kaitlyn opening presents from her cousins.

The kids had a riot riding the 4-wheeler and pulling each other on the sled.



The whole family was together this Christmas, all the brothers and sister. Here's a photo to show the gang.


While we were there, me and Kaitlyn went up to camp to get the four-wheeler with papa. Here is Kaitlyn at camp and the camp made it through the winter so far.


Here are a few of the nieces and grand-nieces, with their great grandma and grandma.





Here is our snow village at home. I'm starting to run out of room on the table.


And, lastly, here is Norma and Patrick at the New Year's Party we went to. The trip home was a mess. We got about 12 inches of snow that night.

I could put a lot more pictures on the web, because I got a new camera this year for Christmas. But, I think I would run out of space on the server. I have over 500 pictures from this Christmas.

Well, got to go and take more pictures.