It’s Been A While….

  I woke up this morning to a beautiful sunrise and almost broke my toe getting out of bed to grab my phone camera to get a pic from our bedroom window…

   Ok, I know…you can see the darn screen, but oh it was soooo pretty! A great and beautiful new day!

I do believe this is the longest I have ever gone between blogs.  As our blogger friend Al says, the creative juices just weren’t flowing here lately.  With Autumn here, many of our RV bloggers are getting ready to get South for the Winter. The Bayfield Bunch is not too far from “lift off”. Elaine and Rick just traded their motorhome for a fiver and truck, and we hope to see them in South Florida again this Winter for an adult beverage! Mike and Gerri have been visiting some family in Tennessee, and doing some camping in their neat Casita at some beautiful parks there.

  This seems to be Monsoon season in South Arizona, and Jerry and Suzy have had some pretty torrential rains and thunder and lightening . They have also been enjoying the blossoming desert cactus flowers…beautiful! Bob is bursting his buttons with photos of his grandson, Chris, interviewing some of the Seattle Seahawks…Wow!!  And Bigdawg and Freeway are back at their “real home” after a great work/stay at Monck Park….What a neat place that looked to be!

  Al and Ingrid have been having some great family time in Colorado, touring with their RV, and they sure have a beautiful family! Dawn and Denise have spent the past months in Lavon, Texas, and just left their gig there to visit friends at Dangerfield State Park.  And talk about trading RV’s..it must be in the RV water because John and Bridget Hatch just traded their fiver and truck for a 40’ motorhome.  They spent the summer at Tamarac Wildlife Refuge work camping with Judy, birdlady of blogland.  Judy was there with them this summer . They just left Tamarac too, and Judy  and her brother are enjoying Yellowstone and headed to Grand Tetons…2 of my park fav’s!

   Randy and Pam, volunteers extraordinaire, have been volunteering their help all over the US…and attending a Grandbaby Reveal Party in between…It’s going to be a BOY!! And Sam and Donna are getting ready to go to Branson for a reunion of some of Sam’s Navy pals...A big THANK YOU to those brave sailors who served!! Meanwhile, Kenny and Angela have been whooping it up at a pizza place in Mesa, Arizona with friends…And our friends, Rick and Paulette, have been busy spoiling that adorable grandson Mason, and waiting patiently for their mecca to California this Winter.

What have I been doing??? Well, I washed both my chandeliers by hand….The littlest one is the BIGGEST pain, because it has about 260 Swarovsky crystals to wash!! Here it is ..all taken apart and cleaned up, ready to re-hang….

I took this picture after I had the first row hung up….and here is what is looks like after my labors…

Notice all of the color reflecting off those beautiful CLEAN crystals…As you can see by the top photo, they are all clear, but when my camera flashed it brought all of the prisms to life…

  Of course we have been watching the Chicago Bears every game…Kelly and Cindy brought their dogs,  Murph and Finley, over to help cheer them on..complete with Bears jerseys.

Finley is the boss of these two…a woman with attitude…and Murph loves to help Dennis start the campfire…

  Dennis has a new toy, by the way.. It is called a Fly Asalt gun…No, I didnt’ misspell assault…this is a gun that shoots salt at flies and kills them…REALLY!!!  The ammo, if you will, is simply table salt…(which I am swiftly running out of!)  Chris and John got this little gem for Dennis,  and all I can say is…”the only difference between men and boys…” no, what a minute!..THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MEN AND BOYS!!..

Kelly loved to play with it too…”another one bites the dust”..

   As most of you know, our wonderful niece, Leanne, lost her vigilant battle with Lung Cancer 10 days ago.   As per her wishes, there is no funeral, but a “celebration of her life” this Saturday evening at our local bowling alley.  Leanne was a real athlete, and excelled at every sport she tried, baseball, golf , bowling…and she had MANY friends. So this weekend all of the family and a gazillion friends will be remembering her great courage and infectious humor with a toast or two, and lots of photos and stories…

Den, Leanne and her hubby, Tommy…God, we’re gonna miss this girl.

Sadness

A short post to acknowledge our wonderful niece, Leanne Eisenberg Berhnhardt, who passed away yesterday after an all too short battle with Lung Cancer at age 59..You controlled this to the very end, Leo….and did it YOUR way…Now you, your Mom and brother, Scotty, can whoop it up for the Chicago Bears …with a million dollar seat from above…

Missed It By THAT Much!!

    Dennis and I are still recovering from our weekend of the Sandwich Fair…and our family get together, better known as a Cave-A-Palooza.  If you have never been to our fair, I have to say it is one of the best County Fairs in the State of Illinois. It always begins the first Wednesday after Labor Day and ends that Sunday.  This is the 127th Sandwich Fair, and I think Dennis was at the first one..JUST KIDDING!!! But he DID direct traffic during the fair when he was in high school.  We still have the bamboo cane that was wielded by the car parkers back then to direct traffic….This cane is possibly definitely an antique…at least over 50 years old!!

  The Wolff family rolled in Friday night about 7PM and the Heisers came the next day, with Kelly and Cindy coming over after 4PM..  We waited for Peyton to run in a Kaneland High School Cross Country Track Meet Saturday morning and then we all went out to the fair together…(This group can be overwhelming when you actually meet up with us on the narrow sidewalk.)

Peyton is 14 years old and a Freshman in High School this year.  I know….He looks much younger, and this is his first year of Cross Country in High School.  In these meets, he competes with all 4 years of High School kids, Freshmen through Seniors.. He finished 12th out of 40 runners, so I’d say he did REAL well!!  Yet another Cave runner in our family!WOOT!WOOT!

We arrived at the fair about 1:30PM, just in time for the “heat of the day”...    Actually Cindy had to be at the EMS Medical Tent everyday at 7AM and leaves at 4PM, and Kelly was out there with her already.  She is in charge of this and has been doing it for years. If anyone needs any kind of medical attention, they end up either here, or in the ambulance.

 

 

  

Look closely at this photo of our daughters, just in between their heads, and you will see the best “photo bomb” ever, courtesy of Iron Man John Wolff!

Spending most of my life living in Sandwich, this fair has grown unbelievably…and so have the prices. I use to go out to see old friends and people I hadn’t seen in a while…now I don’t see ANYONE I know!

Saturday night, the adults went back out to the fair to watch the Tractor Pulls…Not “moi”…I prefer to stay home with all the kids and have a campfire. A little of the fair goes a loooong way with me. I’m not a big fan of the crowds and the noise of the Tractor Pull…I can hear it just fine from my house!!

The kids and I stayed back at the campfire…Cindy stayed back with me as well…Enough fair IS enough fair!

As you can see, the traffic going into the fair was backed up past our house again this year…

 

On their way to Sandwich, John Wolff stopped in Hammond, IN and picked up some great shrimp, already breaded and ready to fry…He and Kel cooked it up in our cast iron skillet…AWARD WINNING! …and it sure beats that fair food by a long shot. Not only is it less costly, but you don’t have to eat it standing up!!

After everyone left on Sunday, we had more visitors arriving…They missed our Cave-A-Palooza by THAT much!!! and here is what they arrived in…

….Yep, that would be John and Bridget Hatch (FD5)..driving their new to them 2007 (I think that’s the year) Monaco Diplomat…FINE LOOKIN’ RIG!!! We have met them a couple times before and they are just a great couple. Currently, they are volunteers at Tamarac National Wildlife Refuge in Minnesota and working with the birdlady of blogland, AKA Judy.  They just missed the crazy Cave Clan, but were still in time to go to the Sandwich Fair, so we walked out for about an hour and did the “tour”.

John and Bridget enjoyed the fair, though we didn’t linger long…The sun was hot , and being the last day of the fair, it was PACKED with people!! We got our fill of the fair and walked back to our house for some adult beverages, a campfire and some left over lasagna and Italian sausages…John and Bridget did get to meet our son and his wife…and Fred met their 2 dogs, Finley and Murph..

 

 

Fin (female Silky Terrier) and Murph (male Weimaraner) are the same age,  came from the same kennel and they were raised as brother and sister by Kelly and Cindy. Finley is a “wild child” and Murph is a “cool dude”. And just for the record, they have both been neutered, so no worries about “Silky Weimaraners” running around the house…They roll and tumble and play together great, but if Finely gets in trouble (which frequently happens), Murph scolds her by putting his big mouth around her head…very gently..He never hurts her, but just reminds her she needs to settle down.

I’m pretty sure Fred had his pants Beagle spots scared right off him when these two rolled in…However, after a few “hairy eyeballs” and sniffs, they all settled down as friends….well, they accepted each other as equals…Well……Finley was satisfied that Fred was NOT going to knock “Her Highness”off her throne any time soon.

 

  

Monday morning, after some Casey’s breakfast  pizza, John, Bridget and Fred prepared to get “on the road again”..I hooked them up with some home grown tomatoes, potatoes and my world famous “rub”….

How  many retired Firemen does it take to program a GPS??…and OOPS! Someone left the key on in the “toad”…tehee….

 

Never hurts for McGyver to learn how to hook up a toad, right??? Just for possible future reference….

Now we see who is “the lady in charge” of this organized bedlam…YOU GO BRIDGET!! …and….THEY’RE OFF!!!!!

SAFE TRAVELS TO OUR GOOD FRIENDS..UNTIL WE MEET AGAIN!!

Sandwich Fair and a Cave-A-Palooza…

Just a short blog to touch base with the blogosphere… Actually we are doing nothing right now, but our street has gotten very busy…The DeKalb County Fair A.K.A. Sandwich Fair started today and ends Sunday. Our family of Wolffs from Zionsville arrive Friday evening, and that means the other two kids and their kids will be here to partake in family activities this weekend….another Cave-A-Palooza in the making! 

Our grass is still very green and growing like a weed..which is mostly what it consists of! Dennis mows about every 5-6 days. Today he went to our garden and dug a few hills of our Yukon Gold potatoes…

NOW THAT THERE IS WHAT I CALL A MEAL FOR A FAMILY!

I have been pressing the envelope by getting out my Autumn “decor” and making it festive for campfire on the deck.  I have to slap my hands to keep from grabbing any Halloween decor’ yet…Well, maybe I DO have a couple items out…

Yes, gourds are allowed for Fall…                 However, the witch’s “brewpot” may be a little premature, but I LOVE that sign!

Is that a PUMPKIN I see ?? Well, the one in the red shirt is a real “punkin”…As for the one behind him, someone must have snuck that one in…tehee.

My brother and his wife stopped by Monday.  They brought me a nifty gift…an induction hot plate cooker…I know absolutely NADA about using this…the only thing I know about “induction” is the Hall of Fame…

Somehow it cooks with magnets at a much faster rate than regular stoves do…AND,  you MUST have the correct cookware that will act as the magnet…which I didn’t have until….

….My brother and his wife think of everything…!! and they know me oh so well.

Thanks Mike and Helen…If I can figure this out, I’ll boil me up some water!

So I am getting ready for the “group” to arrive…Rumor has it we might have a couple “surprise guests” visiting this weekend too!…Hope they can handle this Cave Clan…..We tend to party hardy and fall asleep just about anywhere!!

…and you gotta know I’ll post a blog about our family shenanigans…hope you can handle ONE MORE CAVE  PARTY!

(I gotta get ME an Elmo blanket!)