Fake Life...

...where the calories don't count and someone else makes your bed.



Every once in a while, my Dear One and I need to get out of Dodge.

Sometimes it's as close as the Hampton Inn a mile from the house.  Other times we venture a bit further.

This past weekend we took our Fake Life, as we like to call our time away, in Grand Rapids.

A cousin was turning 50 so we went to join her celebration.

We asked if we could bring some party crashers and Jen agreed, so we picked up our son Michael and his best friend Zahraa and we all got to eat wings, pizza and dessert and enjoy the music of "Ryanhood".   They are a two man acoustic band.  I had never heard of them, but they were pretty good!


We left the party early to take a short road trip.

As my regular readers know, we vacation in Grand Haven every year.  Well, Grand Rapids is so close to Grand Haven that we couldn't not visit.  So we drove to the beach!  Just driving into the town makes my blood pressure drop.

It is so beautiful and peaceful.

We got there a little before 9 p.m. which happened to be enough time to park and walk to the beach to see the sunset.

I got a couple of terrible photos (faceless bodies and electrical wires and a pole) but it's enough to remind me that we were there.

The kids can take better ones when we return together. 

I'm not a corn dog fan, but the place the kids frequent, Pronto Pups, was doing booming business. I've never seen the line as long as it was Saturday evening.  My cousin (a different cousin than the birthday cousin) reported that her hubby stood in line for 1.5 hours waiting for corn dogs for the family.  According to those who would know, it's totally worth it. 

After the beach we hit IHOP.  It's a late night tradition Wayne and I have when we are doing Fake Life.  

We stayed at a nice hotel where the sheets and towels had been washed by someone else.  We slept in and ate a nice breakfast that we did not have to prepare and then went to Mass at the lovely Cathedral of  St. Andrew.

Internet Photo

We drove home enjoying quiet conversation, lunch prepared by someone else and I got a short nap in the vehicle. 

Fake Life ended rather abruptly. We walked in to a trashed kitchen and laundry that needed to be done. We forgot the all-important "heads up, we're on our way" phone call, but that's ok.   It was enough of a breather that I didn't even mind doing some dishes and letting Wayne cook me some supper. 

Next Fake Life coming up soon.  

Paint Job

This week I was blessed to have a professional painter paint the master bedroom in our home.

We have 12 rooms with painted walls in this house.

All but two of them have several coats (many, lots, inches) of paint on them. You get the picture.

When you have nine children and they swap rooms at least yearly (Mom gets bored!  Plus you really have to vacuum under the beds and dressers once in a while) you tend to do a lot of painting.

I have painted, my hubby has painted, each of the children has had a turn or two wielding a roller.

Some of the colors have been beautiful. Some challenging to live with.  For example our U of M room with maize and blue walls.  Or our room with the purple ceiling.  We even had a pink closet for a time when our tenacious one wanted her own room and that was the only space left to put her.

This week, all that 'self' painting took a back seat.

We hired a professional.

"Wow, isn't that expensive?"  I can hear you asking.  Remember I said only two rooms don't have several coats of paint on them? Those two rooms would be the master bedroom and bathroom which we added on to this house when we moved in 21 years ago.  The paint that was applied then is what was just covered. The bathroom has not been done yet.

So, if you figure we've only painted twice in 21 years, I would say it was very affordable...and I did not have to do it!!

I have to explain that our bedroom has a pitched ceiling and a beam running down the middle of it.  That requires a lot of trips up and down a ladder and a very steady hand so you don't wreck the stain on the beam.

The gentleman we hired came highly recommended by the project manager of the company who is currently putting a new bathroom and laundry space in my mom and dad's house.

Here is his card:

I am terrible with "before" photos but great with after!  Here's what it now looks like.  I got a close up of the ceiling/wall seam so you can see that straight line!!  

Not only did he paint, he repaired a crack in the drywall, filled all the holes from our wall art and put a bead of caulk around the base boards, and all of the door and window trim so that no paint touched any wood. 

I am in awe of how beautiful it looks.  

Thank you, Thoma!! 

Sibling Retreat

My three sisters, my brother John and his wife and I had quite a weekend.

While cleaning a few months ago, I came across a fifty-year-old photo of some of my siblings and me on the back of a stone turtle. The photo was taken in Grand Haven on a family vacation when I was 6.

That's me in the back. 

Since it's been 50 years, we decided it was time to take another photo.  

I contacted the family from whom we rent our summer vacation spot and they were able to tell us where to find the turtle.  They were also kind enough to let us rent the house for our weekend getaway. 

So we set a date and last weekend it was finally time to go do a reshoot. 

We had a blast taking the new photo.  Please note the white socks on John and Margaret. 😂

I'm not quite as limber as I used to be and so I'm just faking actually sitting on the turtle.  My big sister was able to get up there though.  Way to go, Terry.

Unfortunately, getting down posed a small problem. Laughing didn't help matters. 

No one was hurt in the process! 

We let Connie and Michele have a photo with Mr. Turtle, too. 

After the turtle photos were done, we headed back to the cottage were we had to have a stair photo. It's tradition. 

We walked on the beach, ate, baked cookies, ate, talked and laughed. 

We got to FaceTime with our brother Dave who lives in California and could not be with us. 

It was very relaxing and so much fun that we decided we need to do it again next year, this time with David along for the fun. 

A reporter name Becky from the Grand Haven Tribune has taken our information and plans to run an article in their paper-the same paper we were in the first time.  Our 15 minutes of fame, 50 years apart. 

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Gumption

Our tenacious one is at it again.  She keeps me young!

Big sister Erin, got our 7th grader geeked on running.  Last year they ran the Martian Marathon "together".  Erin ran the 1/2 marathon and C. ran 1.2 miles.

The 1.2 miles was the culmination of running, up to 2 miles at a time for weeks before hand,  to get to the 24 miles needed to round out the 26.2 miles for the marathon.

Last year was a struggle.  She was in pretty good shape but there were unexpected hills and she was pretty pooped when she was done.

Nonetheless, she decided to run again this year.  She took it up a notch and decided to run the 5K all on race day.

Thankfully she had gym last semester in school and was in much better shape for this race.

The weather (cold and snow)  and a 10 day upper respiratory infection that started two weeks before race day kept her from practicing as much as she would have liked.

The weather forecast was daunting:  a cold 36 degrees and 100% chance of rain.

I woke up at 4 a.m. to the sound of a steady downpour.  I also woke up hoping she would decide not to run.

No such luck.  She was pumped!  She wanted her t-shirt and her medal!

She had her running clothes on including  a raincoat, winter hat and gloves and she was ready.

Erin helped me get her to the starting line as there were road blocks and little parking (runners are diehards who don't let a little rain stop them).


She did it!

She got her t-shirt and her medal and a great run time: 43 minutes and some odd seconds.  She was drenched, tired and happy.  

Keep it up no-so-little one. Your tenacity will take you places. 

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Rhonda's (Open) House

My friend Rhonda is creative, talented and devoted to helping missionaries spread the Gospel throughout the world.

A couple of the several ways she helps are:

    1) To have an annual Christmas Open House.  Rhonda spends months preparing and her husband Russell,  sister Ginny and her daughter-in-law Sherry are her right, left and extra arm in helping make things happen.    

Rhonda and Russell live in a fabulous home.  The ceilings are very high and thus conducive to large trees and lots of decorations.

The staircase to the second floor has 21 steps and the banister can hold a LOT of stockings.  I will let the photos do some of the talking:

(Disclaimer: I'm a terrible photographer and the photos that look like they are videos are indeed videos--with lots of talking--so I just left them as photos.)

I neglected to take photos of the trees in the kitchen, the master bath and one important one in the master bedroom.  

However the next photo will give you an idea of what was on the second master bedroom tree and is a nice lead in to my second account of her fund raising activities. The tree was covered in creations like this. 

A gift from Rhonda: my Irish Cottage 

Rhonda makes putz houses and Christmas decorations (see photo #3) and sells them at her Etsy shop: 

ChristmasNotebook.etsy.com

As if creating putz houses and shadow boxes to sell at the open house, putting up at least one tree in each room on the first floor, and decorating every inch of available space to make her home beautiful, isn't enough, Rhonda also spends weeks baking up a storm.  The following photos show a fraction of the goodies she created to share with guests. I should have taken  pictures of the kitchen tables, counter tops and inside the oven where she stored the extras to be set out as needed.

 (See disclaimer 😋 )

Rhonda is the hostess with the mostest and it was so nice, after hearing about the open houses for 21 years, to finally be able to attend and see for myself how much she loves Christmas and the missionaries. 

Please check out her Etsy Shop, pick something special for those special someones on your list and help spread the message of the Gospel throughout the world.  

The Day I Became THAT Person

I consider myself a seasoned traveller.

I have been on numerous plane trips, often with a baby, toddler or youngish child along.

I've been to Metro, LAX, Logan International, SFO, Orlando and Will Rogers Airports.  I've ridden the tram to get to my gate, and taken the shuttle to get to the car rental location.

I know to take my luggage to the gate because I will likely be invited to leave my bag at the boarding door and pick it up there when I deplane, thus avoiding the baggage pickup line.

I always get there EARLY so I have time to find the restroom meaning I will not have to get up when the plane is in the air, or find a quick snack so I don't die of starvation on my 1.5 hour flight.

Last weekend I was blessed to be able to attend a friend's annual Christmas Open House. The only catch was she lives in Sparta, IL.  Having been to her house once before (21 years ago for an online-moms'-group-finally-meet-each-other party), I knew that the best way to go was to fly to St. Louis, MO and drive to her house.

I planned my whole get-away weekend: flight, rental car, hotel, me-time book and journal, and directions to Rhonda's house.

And, I got to the airport (nicely decked out for Christmas)  EARLY.

So early in fact when I got to my gate there was another plane, going somewhere else, boarding before my flight.  No big deal.  I sat down and waited for the airport employee to change to the sign to my flight number after everyone else boarded and the plane took off.

While I waited, I watched all the passengers jump up to get in line when their zone was announced.

Once everyone who had been waiting was on the plane and a few minutes had passed, someone came strolling up to the gate, showed their boarding pass and walked on with no wait and no crowd.

Wow! I thought. They are brave!!  How can you just show up right before the plane takes off and board with no fuss and looking as calm as can be?  No running, no apology for showing up at the last second.  Just calm and composed and barely on time.

Then two more people showed up right before the door closed and they got on, again with no wait and no line.  Whew.  Never. I'm not that brave.

The plane took off and the sign changed to announce the next flight.  It departed at NOON and was not going to St. Louis.  Hmmmm.

I must have remembered the gate number incorrectly.  It was not on my boarding pass and I had had to find it on the monitor when I got to the airport.

I quickly checked on my phone (thanking God for technology) and realized that my actual gate was A-59 not A-56.

I knew I still had a few minutes so I strolled over to gate A-59 and lo and behold everyone else was already on the plane and the door was going to shut in 5 minutes.

Up I walked (no running, no panic).  There was no line so I flashed my boarding pass and walked up the ramp to the plane all by myself.  I thought to myself, after I found my seat and realized they had shut the door behind me, that I had just become THAT person.

Though it worked out just fine and I didn't miss my flight, I don't plan on going that route again!  I will still get to the airport early and still sit around for 45 minutes waiting for the boarding doors to open and I will again stand in line and check my bag at the door.  Once on the quick and easy was enough for me.

Bath Bombs

Well, school is in full swing and with it comes the necessary homework.

Each student in the 7th and 8th grade has to do two science projects per year.  They have to write a lab report and present to the class.

Our tenacious one, hearing for years on end to volunteer to go first with projects at school, did just that.

The first day of projects is Friday, September 8th.

At first she was going to take alkaline metals and drop them in water to show the kids how cool the reaction is. (I believe she had help from an older sibling for this particular idea.)

When we discovered that the metals were expensive and took two weeks to deliver, we talked her into something a little more on her level.

So she decided to make bath bombs with two different sets of ingredients and see which recipe works best (meaning-gives the most fizz in the tub.)

She looked up recipes online and found a youtube video of two very cute little girls whose mom lets them experiment and put their finding online for others to try.

Wayne took her shopping for the ingredients, most of which are normal household items with the exception of citric acid (unless you can your own food), and molds.

I wish I had a video of the first bomb she tested.  I was watching the proceedings and saw that the tall container they were going to put the bomb in was full almost to the top with water. I kept my mouth shut because this was not my gig.

It was epic!  And they both figured out that they need a whole lot less water in that container next time around!

Round two with a different recipe happened today.  It was a success.

Now that she is close to being ready to present we found out that her science teacher quit.  He is moving to the public school system.

So all this fun may be for naught, but she and Wayne want her to be ready just in the case the substitute teacher (or new hire) isn't quite ready with lesson plans and (s)he needs this plan to fall back on.

Whether she gets to present or not, she is excited and that is what counts.  I think I see bath bombs in our future as possible Christmas gifts.


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