Chris' Birthday Weekend and etc....

Wow, I have not been good about updating this at all! Looks like I'm just going to have to give you the highlights.

Chris' parents and his sister Alicia came for a visit this past July. Chris and I did our best to impress with our mad cooking skills and showed off the tourist attractions. We even put Chris' dad to work in assisting us in building a wall in our room to bring us closer to getting our closet finished.

I'm still not doing any running other than the occasional oh-crap-I'm-running-after-the-dog-and-I-didn't-even-realize-it. My foot still feels "funny," which is the word I've found to be best able to describe the kind of sensation I'm experiencing. On the upside, I did 45 minutes on the elliptical this week and thought I might pass out. I took that as a good sign.

This past weekend, our friends David and Becka, joined us up north to celebrate Chris' birthday weekend. It makes me jealous each year that he has a fun summer birthday while I'm stuck with one two weeks after Christmas. My parents' place in Glen Arbor was rented until Saturday, but we drove to Bellaire on Friday and stayed at a B&B in town. We also went to Short's Brewery, where we ended up talking to some random patrons from Dublin, OH, Jack and Libby. What are the odds, really? They were staying at their friends' place in Bellaire but their friends bailed last minute.

Jack and Libby invited us out on their pontoon boat for the day on Saturday and we readily accepted. You can never have too many friends, I say! We had a glorious time pontooning through a chain of lakes to Torch Lake, which is absolutely gorgeous. I probably would never have gone there save for this happy meeting. We swam, some of us imbibed while some of us were still recovering from Friday night's consumption, and rediscovered our mutual love of Dorito's.

We had so much fun that we missed our dinner reservation for raclette in Traverse. We showered up at Jack and Libby's quarters, downed a margarita or two, and bid our farewell. Jack said we're welcome any time! HaHA! Starving, we stopped in Traverse anyway, missing the coveted Glen Arbor sunset! We rolled in around 9:30, relaxed a bit, and then started all over Saturday with new friends and a new pontoon boat---wait, no scratch that.

Sunday we toured a few wineries (check out Circa and Gill's the next time you're touring the Leelanau Penisula), took a lot of pictures, cooked dinner and watched the sunset. I never get sick of sitting out on the deck and watching the sun sink as I blink my eyes. It's pure heaven.

Btw, while we were out of town, Elvis started up a Facebook page. Check it out and friend him if you feel so inclined. He's a busy little puppy.

The next three fun things on our agenda are our neighbors Mark and Julie's wedding, a visit from our friends Chris and Anna-Lena over Labor Day (the lucky two who are getting married this May in Sweden!) and the DIY Fair in Ferndale, the weekend of September 19. We'll be working feverishly banging out new products for sale. Hope to see you there!