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Man, I had a busy week! It felt like I was just doing things nonstop or it was cloudy and miserable. What happened to just hanging out in a hammock with a good book?!

    Sunday night we had some rain. Maybe about 2 inches. But hey! It’s not like I’m a weather man! All I can say, is that the radar was probably blowing up.

    Monday was actually the only day this week that was normal. We had a little bit of rain in the morning, some turkey watching, but for the rest of the day it was just on and off cloudy. So I had a long nap.

    Tuesday I had skating in the afternoon, so at about 1:30 my dad took me to go meet mom outside a post station in Lake Linden. I took my bag from one car to the other, and had chicken for dinner in Houghton!

    I also had skating on Wednesday, but my mom took me to work with her. I went to the library after going to the doctor’s, and getting a shot. Then my mom had a work meeting and by the time it was done I had to go to the dentist. Busy day!

    Thursday my uncle came over. We took a bike ride to the beach (about a 4 1/2 mile ride each way) and I went swimming. We got home with just enough time for me to change and fill up a water bottle before going to a picnic with Flora and her mom. Get what I mean yet? BUSY!

    On Friday I went swimming at Kate’s house. My mom was still at work when I left, and I biked there. Flora was also invited, but she brought her mom. We went paddle-boarding and swimming, so we had a lot of fun!

    Yesterday we went to the Farmer’s Market in Calumet. We bought maple syrup, and my dad ordered a fire poker! Oh, did I mention that I bought Maple Candy? I LOVE MAPLE CANDY!

    Today my mom helped me bring the last bookcase up to my room. My dad had made me three of them, but the other 2 had been brought up earlier. We also had the best dinner ever. I ♥ BEETS!

    Well, that’s all for this week. Next week I am handing off to mom for MY break. Then, who knows, Dad might want a break!

                                                                                      –Grace

You have the old-man again this week! Although there is a strong push going on to get Nora to step into the writers chair! Just kidding, there is no strong push going on. She said she would write whenever I asked. Perhaps next week or for sure, sometime soon. I have some material and pictures this week, so it was an easy decision for me to write. I really do like it when I have the time and material. I can remember reading similar journals before I moved north to God’s country. The real inspiration for me to start the journal was a pair of persons hiking the Appalachian Trail. They would write just about every day and then when they got to the next spot of civilization, they would mail the entries back to a friend or family member, who would then type them up and post them to a web page. It was such a nice escape from the big city life for me that when I was suddenly able to do the same, I jumped on it, in hopes it would provide the same entertainment and escape I got. I sure hope that I am still able to accomplish that! It has been 21 years since I started doing them and have only missed doing at least one a week a handful of times.

So what has been going on in the Keweenaw this week.. We started the week on the chilly side, with highs in the 60’s both Monday and Tuesday, then warmed into the 70’s for Wednesday and have been in the 80’s since Thursday. The humidity started to kick in on Thursday and has been pretty unbearable yesterday and today, with dewpoints in the mid-70’s. Temps and humidity will be dropping behind a cold front that rolls through late this evening. It then looks like the humidity will be fairly low (for summer) through Wednesday and then creep a bit by Wednesday, but remain tolerable. The humidity is really the thing that I watch more than the temps. I can handle hot temps way better than high humidity. I am not yet ready for autumn to arrive, but have grown tires of the high humidity that has visited us a lot this summer. 

Hard to believe that in 3 weeks we will be on the second to last day of August and not too far from the traditional end of summer, Labor Day. The schools start up here the day after Labor Day and right now it is looking like the students will be going into the schools and not doing virtual. Any parent that does not want their child to be in the school can always sign up for online learning, but is a different avenue and will not be conducted by the teachers in the school. At least that is my understanding of things via listening to Nora. I also believe that there will be times when the children need to wear masks and I believe the teachers will always nee to be wearing a mask. 

This will be a big year for Grace. She is going to be a middle schooler AND in Nora’s building. Nora is the administrative assistant to the middle school principle. We joke about Grace going to have to see mom when she gets into trouble, but Grace is not a trouble maker and there are no worries. Still, it’s kind of a cool thought that Grace and Nora are in the same building for the next 3 years and then Grace moves on to the big league!

I had actually forgot that I wrote last Tuesday and not last Sunday, so I had to do a little re-shuffling of the pictures, as I had some from the last entry in there. Anyway, she ended having a wonderful birthday. Spent most of the day with friends at the beach. Just like her old man, she really loves the water. I know I am rarely seen in it these days, but that is more because of the water temp and not a loss of love for water. I am hoping that one day we can get back to having a pool in the yard and not one that has to be taken down and put away every season! Until then I will just have to pick my swim events accordingly. 

Another day this week, Nora and Grace headed over to a friends place that is on the waterway for a swim. They also have a nice golf cart and her and her two friends get such a kick from riding in the back seat of it. The three of them are such good friends and have perma-smiles on their faces when ever they are together. I was fortunate enough to grow up with some friends like that too. I still have lots of great memories of my younger brother and I doing lots of fun stuff with them. I have a feeling that Grace will carry the memories of her summer fun (and winter too!) growing up in Jacobsville.

On Thursday, Grace and I traveled all the way down to Houghton to get a ski rope at Walmart, only to find out they were sold out! We were about to order on online, but when I was at the hardware store in Calumet Friday, I saw one there and was able to pick it up. That made Grace’s day, as we were able to get it hooked up to the boat and then hit the water so that she could try the kneeboard that she got for her birthday. She had gone once last summer with some friends and loved it so much that when we got access to a boat, it was a no-brainer to get her one for her birthday. She really loves adventure and new things (like her old man) and was all smiles as we headed up the waterway to the spot where she could go. She managed to get right to her knees and get all strapped in right away and had a blast. The spot we chose was a nice protected area of the Portage Waterway and not part of the main channel. It also happened to be right in front of one of her friends house. She and her mom were swimming when we got there, so we gave her a spin around the water as well. Grace probably could have gone for hours, but needed to save her energy for a big event on Saturday, so we packed it in and headed home.

The big event on Saturday was Grace’s first organized run. It was the second annual Bootjack Fun-Run. Now to me, the words “fun” and “run” do not fit into the same box, but Grace has always liked the idea of being a long distance runner. Even when she was just a 4 or 5 year old kid, she would run along side Nora, the pups and I when we were walking. She could actually go most of the 2 mile walk without stopping! She was not going very fast, but still jogging and not walking.

So for the past 2 months or so, she has been doing a little bit of “training” for the race. First going on a 2 mile jog with a friend of ours who is a runner and coincidentally is going to be her principle for the next 3 years! She also has gone a few times with my brother and I also have been going with her, although I am on my bike. Yesterday morning, she ran the 5k portion of the race with my brother. The weather was a bit iffy when we woke up at a little before 7am, with lightning, thunder and pouring rain. By the time the racers were getting ready, it was down to just a steady light rain and completely stopped for most of the time Grace and my brother Jim were running.

During her training, it had been taking her just under 30 minutes to do the 2.8-3 miles, so Nora and I walked down to the finish line when they had been running for around 20 minutes. Sure enough, at the 27 minute mark, the two of them were rounding the bend and came into view and about 30 seconds later, were close enough to snap a picture of at at around 28 minutes, were crossing the finish line. I was a little surprised to see that look on her face in the picture, as she was not struggling much at all to finish. It must have caught a weird moment. 

She does want to be on the 6th grade cross country team and also wants to be in band. When I went to school, those were probably the two least popular things to be in, but not in her school or other schools up here. They both are pretty popular. Not as popular as hockey, but I think only eating out ranks hockey in the Keweenaw!

So I guess that about covers it for this one. We’ll see what kind of fun and adventures lie ahead for us this week and will be sure to fill you in!

Good Night from the Keweenaw..
–JD

They say that time flies and your children will grow up so fast. It is true. I find it hard to believe that 11 years ago today, I was on a flight to Dallas TX to join Nora and a newly born baby girl. The nurses gave the baby a “nursery name” of “Baby Happy”. Little did they know that the baby would take that name to heart and live it each and every day of her life since.

The memories of that day are still as clear as they were 11 years ago. I can remember dropping off Huck and Millie at friends and then driving off to the airport. Thankfully, the pups were distracted and did not see me pull away, or I would have really struggled driving away while looking into their eyes. I remember keeping in touch with Nora as I sat to catch my flight from Minneapolis to Dallas. I can remember getting off the plane and being picked up at the airport by one of Nora’s friends that she had made through an adoption group. I remember driving north on the interstate to Denton and then pulling off the interstate and into the hospital parking lot.

I remember my legs shaking and heart pounding as we entered the hospital and I got closer and closer to laying my eyes on my new baby daughter. I remember the shock, disbelief, fear, joy and melting of my heart as I held her for the first time. So much beauty, so innocent, but yet so much responsibility. Would I be a good enough father for her? Would she be healthy through the beginning stages of her life? Would she love us as much as we loved her?

Eleven years later, I can thankfully say “yes” to all of the questions that rolled through my head that day. Our family has been faced with many challenges in those past 11 years. More than many families will face in a lifetime, but as I watch that little girl play in the yard with her friends today and when she gives me a big hug and says “Good Night Daddy” at the close of each day, I cannot believe how blessed I am to have the life I have.

None of it would have happened with out the super glue in our family, Nora. She has held us all together through the ups and downs, good times and bad. She watched me cling to life several times while Grace was off being taken care of outside of the hospital with friends and family. She spent many, many nights not getting more than an hour or two of sleep so that I could rest and heal from all of my health issues. She read to Grace every day and every night and that I believe formed the foundation for Graces love of reading books. Grace learned how to be kind, giving and caring for others from Nora. A book could be written about our life’s experiences the past 11 years and would have no problem keeping it’s readers on edge to see what lie in the pages ahead. Perhaps it has already been written in a way, on the entries of this weekly journal. 

The book isn’t over yet, hopefully not even close. No one knows how it will end and that is the exciting, scary and fun part.

The past week was a fairly busy one for us. I continue to chip away at getting things done in the shop. Grace has skating on Tuesday and Wednesday and Nora and I each take a day at bringing her down to the MI Tech Hockey arena for that. Early Friday morning, Nora’s two brothers and her nephew came up to spend some time at her brothers place just down the road from us. He had bought a nice little fishing boat to bring up here and use. We are keeping it in our garage when he is not hear and he is going to let us use it whenever we want. 

The three of them, as well as Nora went out for the inaugural fishing expedition Friday evening. No fish were caught, but for the four that were on the boat, just wetting a line and being with family was needed. The 4 of them returned to the waters before sunrise Saturday morning and not long after the sun had risen on the eastern horizon, they had a fish on. They were fishing the outer limits of the south entry and managed to land a lake trout while trolling. The fish was landed by Nora, so she got to hold it while pictures were taken on land. 

My turn took place Saturday evening. Saturday during the day was a hot day, with temps in the mid-80’s, but by the time we hit the water, it has cooled off nicely, with temps in the 70’s. Only one fish was caught on that trip and it was not by me, but I had a lot of fun just getting back on the water again. I have always loved to be in a boat on the water. I grew up on boats on the inland lakes and some of my fondest memories as a kid are those spent on the lake. I am so excited to use this boat to do lots of exploring of the differing waters of the Keweenaw. It is the perfect size, being small enough to trailer easy enough, but big enough that we all can fit comfortably. Saturday’s fishing trip took me to some places I had never been, the sloughs of the Princess Point area of the Portage Waterway. 

We had rain Saturday night and Sunday morning, so Sunday morning was spent doing some work. Nora’s brothers and Nephew helped us clean up the disaster zone that was our garage and in just an hour or two’s time, it was completely organized and clean!

The weather did clear enough Sunday afternoon and evening so that they could fish and this time they took Gracie. While I love to boat, Nora and Grace love to fish and I was thrilled when a picture arrived through a text message of Grace holding her first fish of the season. The smile says it all. 

While today is Graces actual birthday, we held a family celebration last night, because the uncles and nephew left early this morning to head back to lower MI. We also invited my brother, so all of her uncles were there. We had Grace’s favorite meal of “Dad’s” bbq’d chicken, fresh green beans and fresh potatoes. Nora baked a nice huge sheet cake for the celebration and Grace handled the candles pretty well!

This morning after breakfast, Grace opened her first present. She got to kneeboard for the first time last summer and could not stop talking about it. So with the boat’s arrival this past week, Nora and I decided she would love to have one of her own. I kneeboarded as a young lad and even through my college years. I am sure I still could if a boat existed with enough horsepower to pull me! My brother who passed a few weeks ago sail boat is arriving next week, courtesy of a great friend, and I cannot wait to introduce her to sailing. I spent hours and hours sailing the waters of Lake Geneva. To me there is nothing better than sitting is silence as the wind propels the boat across the water. Hopefully she will love it as well, and will learn the ropes and take her friends out in the coming years. 

I realized a few weeks ago that I had been remiss in not mentioning the newest members of our family. The sled dogs! They are doing very good. There is no longer any friction between them and the the other two. They still are reluctant to play with Bleau, but they really do not play much with each other. Perhaps it is because they are senior citizens or just that they were mainly work dogs. In either case, they are happy and love being outside. They still are marking the house when given free run, so we are working to break that habit. We have also learned that they love to pick at Nora’s garden as much or more than the other dogs and that they both can run extremely fast! Especially Dune. When he puts on the after burners, he can outrun Bleau, even tough Bleau’s legs are about 2.5 times as long and he is no slouch in the running department. 

So I guess that about covers it for this one. Have a great rest of your week and be safe!

Good Night from the Keweenaw..

–JD

    Grace here. Again. I had so much fun writing last week that I couldn’t help but want to do it again this week.

    On Monday, we had to decide on someone to cut the grass. Makes sense, it was up to our ankles! Guess who got picked. Me! I had driven the lawn tractor before, but had never cut grass. I hope I did a good job! Later that day, we went to the beach. We saw this one plane fly over at least three times! It was low enough to see the pilot eating a sandwich inside! 

    On Tuesdays and Wednesdays, I go to skating at Tech. I did this week, obviously. Tuesday I went to school with my mom, and spent the whole day stacking boxes which is one of my favorite things to do. After that, we left for Houghton. On the way, we stopped for tacos.

    On Wednesday, a squirrel ran up one of the trees in the backyard. I wonder if it used my ladder! Well, maybe it ran up, or maybe Bleau chased it. Probably option two! Meanwhile, Huck was having a slow day.

    On Thursday, my mom and I went swimming at a neighbor’s house. I had just started a new book that I was reading in the hammock, and when I looked up, my mom was pointing a camera at me! Oh, and guess what book I brought to the neighbor’s house.

    Friday was a beach day. My mom took Flora, her younger brother and I to the beach, around 11. We stayed till 4. Later that evening Flora’s parents were having a bonfire, so, DOUBLE PARTY!

    Today, my dad had a cucumber for lunch. Bad news with a tall dog. I guess Bleau was in the mood for cucumber!

    Well, signing off for the week. Will write again soon, although I think next week is mom’s turn!

    

Sorry folks you are stuck with the old guy this week. I am glad that you all appreciated Gracie’s first journal and equally glad that she enjoyed writing it so much. It is actually her aspiration to become a writer for a profession. She sure has read enough books to know a thing or two about it. You will probably be getting some of Nora from time to time, as the journal can be a little stressful on me to do every week. Not all the time, but there are certainly weeks when I have very little to say and it brings a bit of anxiousness to put something together on those occasions. Pleas do not take this personally. I have never felt pressured by anyone that I HAVE to write, but just feel like so many folks enjoy it, that I hate to skip a week.

Unfortunately, I do not have much to share with you this week. It was a busy, but sad week. Last Sunday evening, while we were at the evening church service at the Jacobsville Chapel (held outside), I got a call that my older brother, Ed, had passed out and fell to the ground and hit his head, causing bleeding of the brain. He is the one on the far right in the picture above. They called 911 and got him to the hospital quickly, but too much damage had already been done and the prognosis was not good, even if they could have been able to operate.

He had made it clear that he did not want to live in a state where he needed to be kept alive by machines, or even not be able to take care of himself. I think a lot of us can identify with that, so the decision was to take him off the respirator. There were some things that first needed to happen, so he stayed on the respirator until Tuesday afternoon. Around midday Thursday he took his last breath and passed away peacefully.

He was 6 years older than me and since my younger brother was just 4 years younger, I did not do a ton with him when I was growing up, but once I finished college, we did much more. Sailing on Lake Geneva, going to some of the festivals that Milwaukee has and he traveled with me to the Keweenaw my very first time back in 1991. He was probably the most generous persons I have ever known. Always first to reach into his pocket to pay, or the first to step in and help someone do a task. 

Back around 7-8 years ago, he was diagnosed with leukemia. He fought hard and with a bone marrow transplant from my sister was able to beat it and the odds. There were many complications from the chemo and the transplant and he was never able to recover to his full active self before the leukemia hit, which was hard for him, as he was very active, including having a 3rd level black belt and riding his bike 20+ miles several times a week. 

A few weeks ago he learned that he was going to need a heart and kidney transplant, due to damage done by the chemo. So in a way, his death was a bit of a blessing for him. He no longer struggles with his severe health issues and does not have to face anymore. His faith was strong and I have absolutely no doubt that he is in a beautiful place now.

As far as the Keweenaw goes, it was another hot week. Highs well into the 80’s and very high humidity. We had two rounds of very strong storms roll through as well. One early Thursday morning and the other in the middle of the night last night. The one last night knocked out power to quite a few of the residents of the Keweenaw, but thanks to the super men, otherwise known as the UPPCO linemen, our power came back on in around 20-30 minutes and most other power was restored before the sun rose this morning. Everything is either green again, or turning green. The forecast for this week looks delightful, with highs in the 70’s, lows in the 50’s and lower humidity. I almost forgot what true Keweenaw summer weather was like!

So I guess that covers it for this one. 

Good Night from the Keweenaw..
–JD