Labor Day Weekend – Goodbye, Summer! 9/7/2010

Wow!  Three nights without writing! 

Should I even mention how many times I thought of something I wanted to tell ya’ll – or about when Ted said, “Let’s go out to eat Sunday night”, and I said – “You know I blog Sunday nights!”  To which he replied, “Remember – you’re ‘off’ this Sunday”. 

It’s really strange how addictive blogging can become – and sometime, how constraining.  I needed the break though – I admit it, and now I’m back refreshed!

The weather up here for the last few days has really been fallish.  Three days of 20+mph winds, off-and-on rain, temps in the high 50’s and low 60’s.  At first we thought the Labor Day weekend would be a total washout, but – just like that – Sunday morning dawned sunny and beautiful – which made me very happy because I had spent Saturday evening baking eight dozen cookies for church fellowship.  At Little Stone Church we have a get-together after services so we can mingle a bit, chit-chat about the week past and the week to come, and greet visitors.  Ted and I joined the church about a month ago as associate members, and I was asked to co-host the fellowship this past Sunday.  Since it was the Labor Day weekend, we were expecting large crowds at church, and they did come – including the Governor of Michigan and her family.  So cool!  I made four dozen Southern Tea Cakes and four dozen Peanut Butter Pecan Cookies.  Brought home five cookies, so I guess they were a hit!  Ted was really pouting about not having any leftovers, until I showed him the dozen of each kind I had “saved” for him.  That made his day – it takes so little to make us happy when we get to a certain age!

Friday night on Main Street - a damp start to a Labor Day weekend that turned out just great!

On Saturday, the University of Georgia played their first football game of the season.  Oh my gosh, Ted was excited.  Now let me just set the stage for you.  We live in Michigan.  You know – University of Michigan and Michigan State country.  When we go on and on about our “Dawgs”, people up here think we’re talking about Maddie and Bear.  One of the reasons Ted said we would have to go home to Georgia in September (when we first moved up here) was because he wouldn’t be able to see the Dawgs on TV (we can’t get satellite at the condos).  Well, after 11 years of being the Pink Pony’s best customer, Ted not only has his own engraved bar stool (not seriously, but they are thinking about it), but every Saturday they reserve one of their eight widescreen televisions just for Ted.  We have our own little private “box” – kinda over in the corner at the end of the bar – out of the way enough that we don’t get attacked by fans of either Michigan team, but out in the open enough that there is still an occasional, “Hey, bartender, why is this TV showing the University of Georgia, for pity sakes (that, of course, is the G-rated version of that question)?!

The Bulldog corner of the Pink Pony.

We got to the Pony just as the game was starting, ordered lunch, ate at the bar as we watched the game, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.  At half-time, I went home to bake cookies for Sunday, but Ted was there to watch the Bulldogs beat the University of Louisiana at LaFayette 55-7.  Go Dawgs!!

The beautiful weather on Sunday brought over everyone who had wanted to come to the island for the weekend, but didn’t come on Saturday because of the threatening weather.  Around 4 p.m. we decided to walk the dogs to town to see what was happening.  We had watched carriage after carriage come up the hill all afternoon, so we knew downtown would be busy.

View from the condo porch on Sunday afternoon.

Carriage Tours had a great Sunday. One of these filled wagons came up the hill to the Carriage Museum approximately every ten minutes - all day long.

"Mom! If you didn't stop every two minutes to take a picture, we'd be in town already! C'mon!!"

We walked down Turkey Hill, got to the corner of Main and Fort Streets, took one look at the crowds, and said, “Let’s go to the Marina!”  We could not believe how many people were on the streets – which we were very happy to see for Mackinac Island businesses.  With Maddie and Bear with us though, we chose a little less congested route.

We stopped in to see if Captain Bruce was aboard the Mackinac Breeze catamaran, but he was off-island for the day.

This "little dinghy" was docked right next to the "Breeze". I wonder if people with boats this big stay in hotels when they get to land. I wouldn't!

We ambled on down to the Mission District, then up to the East Bluff, by way of Mission Hill. 

St. Anne's steeple from the East Bluff. I have at least 100 pics from this same spot, but I never stop here that I don't take another one. One of my all-time favorite views of the island.

The harbor was like a beehive Sunday afternoon - ferries coming and going as fast and as often as they could load and unload.

I've never seen ferries "stacked up" like this before - there are three Shepler ferries in this photo - two are leaving the dock full of people, while another empty ferry waits to dock and load.

 

Gulls flying over Fort Mackinac and the Grand Hotel.

 

A late summer day on the Straits - sparkling blue water and kites flying overhead.

Ted left with a friend at 7 a.m. Monday morning to do the Mackinac Bridge Labor Day Walk.  I did it last year, but when I rolled over and saw gray skies, I rolled right back over and said, “Have fun, honey!”  As soon as the back door closed, Bear took over Ted’s side of the bed, Maddie curled up at my feet, and we all slept another hour. 

I’m off to Cheboygan on Tuesday for a grooming appointment for Bear.  He is in full shed right now (something he does twice a year), and I’m vacuuming twice a day.  Whew!  Hopefully, he’ll look like a new dog by tomorrow afternoon ’cause right now he looks like he’s having a very, very bad hair day – all over!

Happy Birthday to two beautiful island friends!

Happy Birthday, Frankie!

Happy Birthday, Joan!

Personal Note:  Please keep Blake in your prayers as he continues his job search.