#71: Walk on the beach, 20x

First, let me say that I am posting this from a fort! It's a pretty grey, sad looking day, so I built myself a fort, taking over a corner of the living room, and blocking off the bathroom from Robert (bwahahaha, there's no way his giant self can crawl through this fort!). It's complete with couch cushions to lay on, lots of pillows, and twinkle lights strung up to make it extra-cozy. I'm loving this thing.

In the past few weeks I have gone on two camping trips on Lake Huron. One with my friend Jess and her 2-year-old daughter, Lively to East Tawas ("The Cape Cod of the Great Lakes", apparently). We hung out on the beach, I flew a kite, and we went swimming in the lake, but didn't necessarily go for a walk on the beach.

The lake was beautiful there, we were sort of in a bay, and the water was so clear. We walked out probably about 1/4 mile and the water was barely up to our hips, and we could still clearly see our feet.



Then, the next week, I went camping with my mom in her RV, to Sleeper State Park, in the thumb, right outside of Caseville. (Okay, so, Michigan is shaped like a hand, right? I think everyone knows that. Us Michiganders use our hands as maps quite often, pointing to places on our palms and fingers. So, the area that is in what looks like the thumb, we literally refer to it as "The Thumb".) We went for a walk on the beach both nights that we were there.





That's Mom explaining to me the scientific theory of arches. She was such a scientist on these walks. On the other walk she explained to me that zebra muscles are bad because, "They eat something or do something." But seriously, Lake Huron, in most places, is pretty murky these days, and I'm pretty sure it's because of the invasion of the zebra muscles. Just another reason why Lake Superior is the best Great Lake, we didn't have zebra muscles, and our water was very clear!


That's Professor Debbie herself.

We also went to a farmer's market while we were in the thumb, thereby checking off another one from list item #60: go to 50 farmer's markets. (I really gotta pick up the pace on this one! I've only got 8 down)


I think we did it wrong. First of all, it was the weirdest farmer's market I've ever been too, because there were way more flea market/antiques/sunglasses/knock-off louis vitton handbag booths than there were actual produce booths. Plus, puppies for sale! We spent time wandering around all the booths, not looking at much, other than antiques and a book/cigar box booth that kept us occupied for awhile. By the time we got to the actual food booths, they sounded the horn that the vendors could start packing up. To top it off, we had brought a lot of produce with us on the trip, so we didn't need any more for our trip, and we couldn't remember what we had at home or what we'd need. So, by the time we left, I had bought a cigar box, and Mom had bought two cigar boxes, a few books as gifts (including one for me about airplanes in the '40s. Let me tell you, that is all sorts of right up my alley), a plate of brownies, and a cinnamon roll. Oh well.

Here's a couple more cute pictures from Mom and I's trip, mostly on a walk through the hiking trails in the park. (I went for a jog through them at dusk...I was doing my cooldown walk until I looked over and saw a deer staring at me...and promptly screamed and ran! I'm not interested in talking to any wildlife at nighttime! If there's a deer looking at me, there's probably also a bear or bigfoot with its eye on me.)

#7, #43, & #71.

#43: Go on 5 vacations. Vacation #4, 12.26.10-12.30.10, Robert, Chance and I went to Marquette (where we used to live until a year ago) to visit his Mom and friends, and I made a day trip down to Escanaba to see my friend Barbi. We stayed at the hotel I worked at for 2 1/2 years, and it was great getting to see my old co-workers, because they really were my friends and family when I lived there. We had a great time seeing Robert's mom and her boyfriend, and a few of Robert's friends. The dog really loved all the extra snow, and jumping around/climbing snow mountains, and he was such a good travel dog, very well behaved.

#71: Walk on the beach 20x: One morning I took Chance down to the shore of Lake Superior. He had a lot of fun exploring the lake, beach and rocks. We also jogged down the beach, thus knocking off another one from item #7: jog 20x.

Chance really loved playing on the beach, and I felt so happy to be there. Being back at Lake Superior, I just had this feeling that I was "home". I spent so much time on that beach the almost four years I lived in Marquette, and it was always where I was happiest, most at peace. It's where I went to reflect, write, called loved ones that lived far away, gain perspective. I miss it so much. Like Deb from the hotel said, "Lake Superior gets in your blood."

Ice along the shore. Lake Superior doesn't really start to freeze over until February or March. It's so large that it doesn't start to warm up in the summer until about August, and conversely, takes a long time to cool down, so it takes a long time to start freezing.

Frozen rocks and a view of the lighthouse at McCarty's Cove.

My cute little guy in his winter sweater. Love those big ears.

Pure beauty.

Rock island at McCarty's Cove (not the same ones pictured above). In summer of 2009 my mom and I waded out to these rocks, the water so cold our bones hurt. But the water line receded and a little land bridge allowed Chance and I to walk out to them.

#71: walk on the beach 20x

walk on the beach #2

robert's work sent him to manistique for the week, and forgot his work boots, so one night i drove out there (it's about an hour east along lake michigan) with his boots and we went out for dinner and went to the beach. he drove back to the hotel, and i walked back along the beach on the boardwalk.



knowing how to swim is always a good place to start!





notice the scarf from item #34!





this little section of the beach had thousands and thousands of little shells washed up in one spot. this is robert pointing it out to me.