Autumn is upon us!

The trees have been changing fast here and we are seeing more and more color by the day. Peak of color is still a week or two away, but it is amazing how fast it is coming.

We are seeing a lot of salmon fisherman along the Crystal River and the fish are there as well. I have not had a chance to go after them lately, but thanks to Mike we still have some fish in the freezer.

Wwe are working on the house getting ready to tile and get the cabinets delivered. We are putting cement board down and are continuing with the painting. The more we do the more we realize we have a huge job ahead of us!

Hope everyone is doing well. A special note to Ben.... You better be careful what you eat, you hardly have any teeth left to chew with!!

Monday, Monday

We had a great weekend downstate with the kids and grand kids. We celebrated Laura's birthday on Saturday and saw Mike and Amy and the girls, Becky and Ben, Kate and Trevor and Tom was there too!
Its amazing how quick Nolan and Trevor are progressing, they are both running all over the place like they have been walking for years!

On Sunday we had breakfast with the Wrights and then drove to East Lansing and spent time with Jenny and Kyle. Jenny took us to Uncle Johns Orchard on US 127 and we had cider and donuts and wine tasting and a wagon ride. What a great way to start the fall season.

We made it back to Wheeler Road by 5:30 and threw some steak on the grill for a nice finish to the weekend. It was wonderful to see everyone.

Laura's cake

The gang in Brighton.

Kyle, Jenny and Nancy at Uncle John's orchard in St. John, Michigan.

The wagon ride through the orchard.

A model T at the orchard.

We've been getting lots of rain up north and the grass seed is sprouting all over!

Back in Southeast Michigan

We came down state today to celebrate Laura's birthday and to see the kids and grand kids. We left a cool day at Wheeler Road. It has been getting cooler and a little wetter up north and we are really hoping for an extended Indian summer this year. The trees are turning more day by day and it is starting to get pretty with the little bit of fall color. Full color is still about a week and a half to two weeks away in my estimation.

We have been getting more painting done and are anxious to start working on the floors in the kitchen and utility room next week. Progress is moving along.

Hey Mike, that buck came by again and gave us a good look as we drank our morning coffee and watched him out of the camper window. A really nice six point buck and he was right next to the north side of the house!!

Drywall is almost done throughout the house. We are expecting them to be done by late in the next week.

I sure hope they leave the scaffold for me to use to paint the ceiling in here! 

How exciting! Waiting for the grass to grow!

A view out of the bedroom window onto Camp Wheeler.

Fall is Coming!

It may not be fall yet, but the maples here are starting to turn colors fast. We are seeing more and more tints of red in the trees although the hills are still green. We are starting to get some rain finally, and not a bit too soon as I have grass seed planted in the front and back yard. Hopefully it can get a good start before winter sets in.
We got the kitchen and utility room painted and today Team Emmet's crew was here and paved the driveway! After three houses with gravel driveways we finally have pavement!!
Things are going good here, we saw Rick and Lori Lozen this week as they are here visiting Lori's mom. She only lives about four miles from our house!!
Hey Mike, today I was standing at the road talking to our builder (that's what I have to do to get cell phone reception), and a six or eight point buck ran across Wheeler road between our property and the neighbor's to the north! I guess he was reminding me that bow season is fast approaching!
Here are the latest pictures showing the paving job.

Team Elmers is one of the larger paving and excavating company's in the Traverse City area. Sort of a John Carlos of the north!

They did the circle in front of the house first.

This is what it will look like.

Our road through the woods. We kept thinking of the song that goes "today paradise put up a parking lot".

Happy Sunday!!

We had a gorgeous weekend and the weather has finally warmed up a bit. Back in the seventies today and sunny.
Tom and Evey came up this weekend and Tom helped us move ALL the furniture and remaining stuff from storage on Saturday. I rented a U-Haul trailer and between the trailer, my truck and Nancy's van we managed to move everything to Wheeler Road. We started at about 10:30 am and didn't get done until about eight in the evening, but we got it all! I don't know how we would have done it without Tom's help.

the house is coming along, with the drywallers working away and us painting behind them. We have the garage painted and will be painting the kitchen and utility room this week and also plan to start flooring in those rooms. We know the cool weather is coming fast, so we want to get in as soon as possible.
We wish everyone well.

Tom and Evey were a HUGE help this weekend moving furniture and everything else out of storage!!

The house is coming along.

We had the excavators here this week and they put in the septic tanks and septic feild and final graded the lot. We started putting in grass seed and are trying to get outside work done so we can start painting on Thuirsday (tomorrow). We want to put the furniture from storage into the garage this weekend.

The drywall is all up now and the finish drywallers are mudding and taping. They should be done after next week.

The outside of the house is all done now and we miss the carpenters coming every morning. We still get a lot of activity though.

Two septic tanks! No sh#%&!!@!!

The septic feild looks big enough to put in an olympic size in-ground pool!

Lots of Activity on Wheeler Road

We had a lot of activity at the job site this morning. The carpenters came out to load up their equipment since they are done with their part of the job. The plumbers came in to work on hooking up the water heaters, outside faucets, and all of the drain pipes. They should be done with everything except finish work later on. The drywallers showed up, three to hang drywall and two to start taping and patching joints. The electrician was also scheduled to come in later this afternoon to work on the service panel. We also had the painter here this morning to paint the hard to reach areas of the exterior walls and overhangs before the SkyTrack left the property.
We will start our painting chores next Tuesday as the drywall boss said he will be done with our side of the first floor by then.

Hope all is well with everyone!!

A sunny afternoon on Sunny Suttons Bay

The south side of Suttons Bay Harbor