Headin' North

You may remember that last summer we went up to Boyne Mountain, Michigan to spend some R. and R. at our friend, Bob's, cottage. Well, we are heading back there this weekend for another MUCH NEEDED rest before the final run for moving south.

I'm looking forward to relaxing by the lake.And just enjoying the beauty of Northern Michigan.

But, before we head north, we will spend the day at the Detroit Highland Games where we will meet up with some friends, some Clan Montgomery members, and spend the day working in Alex's booth selling CD's.

So, I guess what I'm trying to say--I won't be blogging a whole lot next week. See ya in a week or so.

Franklin Park Conservatory, Chihuly Glass and Butterflies

Yesterday my friend, Marta, and I went down to Columbus for a day of shopping and sightseeing. On the recommendation of another of her friends, we went to the Franklin Park Conservatory. The conservatory several rooms which are set up as tropical, desert, rain forest etc. Among all of the beautiful plants, there are displays of the beautiful Chihuly Glass. I must admit that I had never heard of Chihuly glass before yesterday but I became an instant fan!! One of the exhibits was called Blooms and Butterflies. The room had an abundance of tropical plants, flowers, waterfalls, Chihuly glass and butterflies. In another room, we walked through a tunnel and looked up to see the most beautiful ceiling ever!There was a really neat display outside. Here are a few shots including a picture of the guy who has to clean all that glass!Perhaps the highlight, though, was the release of butterflies into the tropical room. The conservatory buys cocoons of various kinds of butterflies. As the cocoons hatch each day in a special room, they put them in a carrier to be transported to the tropical room where they are released. The young man who released them also told us about each of the kinds of butterflies. It was really neat.Here are just a few of the butterflies released yesterday. This little guy chose to land on my pant leg. This is after I transferred him from my pants to my hand.It was an amazing day topped off with some shopping at a couple of the Columbus malls with lunch at Cheesecake Factory and dinner at Max and Ermas.

Mellow Yellow-Rubber Ducky

Several blogs that I follow participate in Mellow Yellow every Monday so I thought I would give it a try.

When we visit our daughter in San Diego, I love going to Old Towne. They have neat shops and all kinds of picture ops. I took this in one of the gift shops there.

Busy as a Beaver

I have been busy, busy, busy lately. We went up to Michigan on Monday to see friends from 50 years ago. Mr. Snowbird and I met in a YMCA Young Adults group called Coffee Breakers. Many couples met and married from that group. We all had kids and raised our families. Then about 10 years ago, some of the group decided to get together once a month for dinner. We have tried, when we are in Ohio, to make the hour and a half trip up there to have dinner with our friends. We know that we won't be making too many more so we went up on Monday, went out to dinner with 11 of our friends, spent the night with our friend Bob, then came home yesterday. I immediately went to the barn where I put the finishing touches on yet another garage sale.

This morning, the appraisers came to look at the house. A couple of hours later our real estate agent came to have us sign yet another paper and to introduce us to our auctioneer. We then spent a couple of hours with Trent going through stuff that will be auctioned and just talking. My garage sale is tomorrow, Friday and Saturday. Not only do I have a garage sale on Saturday but at 8:00 AM!!--the inspector, both real estate agents, and the buyers will arrive for the inspection. Ugh!! That is supposed to take a couple of hours. IF all goes well, the Sale Pending sign will go up and we will be good to go. If not, then I don't know what we do!

We are going to go up to Detroit again on the 31st to see our friend Alex, who we went to Ireland with, at the Detroit Highland Games. We will then go on up to northern Michigan with our friend Bob who has a cottage up there. We'll spend a few days having a much deserved R & R before we head back to the craziness of closing, preparing for an auction and the auction on the 1st of September. Our daughter is coming from Sept 3-8. Unfortunately, the cupboard will be bare when she gets here but she can help me clean the house, see her friends, etc. Then we are OUT OF HERE on September 12th and will head home to Florida.

So, as you see, we are Busy, Busy, Busy!!

Mellow Yellow-Colorful

Several blogs that I follow participate in Mellow Yellow every Monday so I thought I would give it a try.

This was one our my tour mates on our trip to Ireland. I guess this could go for Mellow Yellow Monday and Ruby Tuesay both huh?

Meet the Coach

Every summer for years I volunteered on the Annual BGSU Hockey Golf Outing. This was a time when many of the BG Hockey Alumni would come back and would be joined by community people for a day of golf, a lot of fun and a great fundraiser. I cooked many a brat and hamburger for these guys. A few years ago BGSU decided that all of the athletic teams had to have a joint golf outing fundraiser since they were kind of draining the local merchants dry for donations. Then a couple of years ago, the hockey alumni decided they still wanted a day of shinny hockey, golf and fun even if it couldn't be a fund raiser. My friend, Marta, has been very active with the hockey program and these outings for many years. The annual outing was today so she invited me to come up this morning to see some of the players who I knew from years past. I saw quite a few of the players I knew when they played at BG. There was one guy who came back who became quite the local hero this summer. Since he would have been inundated with fans, it wasn't advertised that he was attending but Marta told me. So of course I took my camera and of course after I got my usual big hug from him, I had my picture taken with him. Meet Dan Bylsma, Head Coach of the Stanley Cup Winning Pittsburg Penguins.

We Have A Buyer!!

Well folks, two weeks and one day after the sign went up, we are going to be able to put a Sale Pending up on the sign. Every person who came through wanted the house. One gal gave us a bid but it was waaayyy under what we wanted and she wouldn't budge. Another gal wanted it and had the financing but lost her job. Another liked it but didn't feel she could do the necessary work that is needed to update it. But her nephew came through on Tuesday and gave us a low offer yesterday. We countered and he wanted to come through again last night. Our agent called this morning and said that he was still waiting to hear from him. Late this afternoon, he called back and said that he had been working all afternoon on this. The guy made an offer and Greg said we were as low as we could go, so he made a little higher offer and Greg said no. Finally the guy got the message and took our offer. So---if all goes well, closing is August 14th and we are out of here Sept. 12th. In between now and then, we have a lot to do. We will be having an auction to get rid of most of our stuff so that is next on the agenda. I can't believe that it only took two weeks. I don't think Greg does either. All I can say is "Thank you St. Joseph"!!!

The little guy will go back to Florida with us and hopefully his good vibes will protect our house down there from any and all hurricanes!!

Wordless Wednesday-Dublin Graffiti

I know you are all busy checking out everyone's Wordless Wednesday but take the time to bookmark me and drop back to check out my blog. I am a retired Special Ed teacher who now spends most of her time on Sanibel Island, Florida volunteering for a Wildlife hospital rescuing and rehabbing wildlife. I even dumpster dive for injured Raccoons!! I am also the proud grandma of 5 wonderful grandkids and brag about them often!! I also have a blog called Branches and Roots where I talk about genealogy and my ancestors. OK, enough about me. Back to Wordless Wednesday.

Enjoy more Wordless Wednesdays at Wordless Wednesday.

Jaunting Car Tour in Killarney National Park

After we returned from our drive around the Ring of Kerry, 5 of us decided to go for a ride on a Jaunting Car into the Killarney National Park. Nigel called a Jaunting Car to come then dropped us off in downtown Killarney when the car came. We started off driving through traffic. I wasn't too thrilled being surrounded by buses and cars!

Once we got into the park, it was much better--and prettier!

The driver was a hoot and kept us laughing with his jokes. He drove us to Ross Castle and said to take our time. Ross Castle was built in the 15th century and was one of the last castles to surrender to Cromwell's army. You can tour the castle but we decided just to walk around it--and of course, take pictures. Ross Castle is on the banks of a very pretty lake with a stream leading from the lake. Obviously there was more picture taking. We decided that it was getting late and we needed to head back to town. Our driver took us all the way back to our hotel.

Even though it was a bit chilly and did rain from time to time, we were all so glad that we had taken the time to go on our Jaunting Car Tour.