Tom & Brenda's Family Journal

Today is a cool fall day and when the sun is shining everything looks beautiful. Tom and I like to take a ride around the fields often. With the outside rows of corn picked, we have a road to follow and most times our rides are rewarded with lots of deer sightings. Today there were none. Bow season opened in Michigan on Friday so maybe the deer have been scared off. This is the back view of our new home. We have about 20 acres in corn by Butch Nordhof, a local farmer and long-time friend of ours. His crop looks great this year. He will be picking it as soon as he gets his soybeans harvested in the area. There are woods surrounding our fields. We frightened up a large flock of ducks this afternoon who were enjoying the water from all our rain. The woods are 'lovely, dark and deep.' The beauty of fall seems to be growing every day here on the farm. We're keeping busy every day with work both out in the schools and at the farms. The shot below is our kitchen drywalli...

Tom and I had a very fun day right before I had to go back to work at the schools. We started by visiting Rowsters Coffee. It was started by Stephen Curtis, the owner of our favorite spot for many years in Caledonia-Essential Bean. Stephen has opened a new coffee spot in Easttown Grand Rapids. We enjoyed our visit and Stephen whipped up great drinks for us. We then went into Grand Rapids for lunch at San Chez. I know there wasn't much time between morning coffee and lunch but we did walk around down town GR for a while too. The memory of that day will linger with me long into the cold weather. Since that time we have been working hard. I'm working in three school districts-Hopkins, Caledonia and Byron Center. I've had to set a more predictable schedule so I know where to go. Monday/Wednesday/Friday I'm in Hopkins. I split both Tuesday and Thursday between Caledonia and Byron Center. It depends on which teachers I will work with. Makes the week go by very qui...

We are at the cabin now and enjoying it even though it is very wet and cold. The National Weather Service is even giving a wind chill of 41 this morning. We're going to be outside all morning watching the Bells show their horses at the fair. I will be digging a winter coat of out the closet soon. We traveled up to the Soo on Thursday evening. Our plan was to avoid the heavy traffic of the weekend and it worked well. As we were coming close to Gaylord on Alba Road, we spotted this beautiful rainbow. I wonder if the farmer who works this big farm noticed found the pot of gold that must have been in his field. This is a u-pick strawberry farm that always looks so well-maintained to me. So I guess this field is a pot of gold for the owner. The weather has been really interesting since we got here. We arrived in a very heavy rainstorm on Thursday night. The rain continued off and on all during the night. Our yard is too wet to mow which it real...

We are back in Alto right now. I've been working a few days at my schools. Right now I'm working at four different middle schools. Hopkins, Byron Center and two in Caledonia. As I did last year, I'm working with teachers investigating ways to increase their students' achievement in reading and writing. But until school gets going in full swing, I'm doing lots of fun things. When we were up at the cabin two weeks ago, we attended the Boys and Girls Club Ping Pong Tournament with Mom and Dad. It was a fund raiser for their reading lab which my sister Susie runs through the EUP Learning Center. Here's Susie in the first round. She won her first round and had to face her husband Roger in the second round. I felt sorry for Roger because Susie is extremely competitive. It was a hard fought battle with the 2 of them. Roger won the first game and Susie won the second. The playoff game went to 24 -22 before Roger beat her. She didn't take it well. But it...

Since returning to the cabin our days have been fun. Some have been busy and some are simply relaxing. Thursday we took my mother and dad out to celebrate my dad's 82nd birthday. They are always a fun time. Yesterday was our time to work in the yard between the rain storms. One benefit of working in the yard of the cabin is that you have a great view while working. Here I took a short break to watch the Paul R. Tregurtha, a 1,000 footer, pass down the river. You can also see how well my flowers are doing in spite of the little care I give them. Last night we went to the Bay Mills Boys and Girls Club to attend the Ping Pong Tournament. We didn't play but sponsored some friends in this fundraising event. My sister's EUP Learning Center has put a reading lab there and this event was to raise funds for that. Susie & Roger both won their first round and ended up playing each other. That was fun because Susie is highly competitive and she hated eventually losing to ...

We traveled back to the cabin on Monday. We passed through a pretty heavy thunderstorm just south of the Mackinac Bridge. The sky was clearing up as we drove over the Bridge and I took this photo of the sunset. When I looked to the east I saw a beautiful rainbow over Mackinac Island. Yesterday we drove to Escanaba for the UP State Fair. Our good friends, the Bells, were showing their draft horses and we watched the various events all day. Plus we had time to explore the fair and eat some of the best fair food I have ever had. This is Owen Bell, Arlen and Lovada's son, driving in the cart class. This Belgium horse did very well. The Bells who were showing yesterday were Arlen & his brothers Don & Bob. Several of their children and grandchildren also took part. In this competition, there were 5 Bells in the ring at one time. The State of Michigan is no longer funding fairs so the Michigan State Fair near Detroit is no longer. So the UP State Fair is Michigan's on...

I had a blood test this week and I was happy with the results. Let me tell you the whole story. I have always had high cholesterol. It 'runs' in my family. I've been taking Lipitor for several years and that always has controlled it well. Until this year, that is. In my annual blood test this spring, the numbers had skyrocketed and the doctor wanted to increase my Lipitor dosage. I asked Dr. Davis to give me three months to try and bring it down with diet. And she agreed. I was already eating what I thought was a healthy diet. I tried to be low fat and watched my portions but I needed something new. I went to Schuler's Book Store in Grand Rapids and starting looking through their food and diet sections. I came across a book called SOS Diet and it caught my attention. The basic premise is that sugar in foods and also sugar added to food turns into fat immediately. It appealed to me because it made sense and it was simple to implement. I started as soon as I g...