New House

Dining room

Family Room
Front of house.

Well, here are a few new pictures of the Florida house. Yes, it's coming along. Sometimes I wish we were there...but the builder is really good about sending us weekly pictures.

I will put more on later.

Master bathroom...tub

Julie and Ken,.....Helen and Anissa

The 4 of us, Julie, Ken, John and I.

Out on the boat ...John in the middle of his "girls".

Brodie also joined us.
Anissa, (Helen's great niece) and Maddie and Kate.

Ken

Julio!

What a week! Ken had the week off so Julie, Brodie and Ken came to the lake. They had a chance for a couple days alone and also got to visit Ken's uncle down the road from us. We had a pretty decent weather week...a couple cloudy days where we shopped and read! Helen and her grand niece came for an overnight. Anissa loved the dogs..and also neighbor Lauren. Suzanne took her tubing and they had a ball! They only stayed overnight because Helen was going to Camp Foley to visit Anissa's brothers who were there at camp.

Julie, Ken, John, Mike and I went out to dinner to Iven's on Saturday night...we were missing Suzanne..but she took the kids to Ely to visit her parents. Summer's are so short, it's hard to fit everything in.

Our camera's battery went dead and we forgot the charger so we are missing a few pictures...Ken might have more I can add later.

The Bracken bunch...minus a few.

Jane and I...concentrating on our "duets".Ok...so I screwed up!!!

John, Chuck, me and Jane....oops...there is Maddie too!

Jane and Chuck came to visit us for a weekend. Jane came early because she was up in the Alexandria area with her book club. Chuck came on Sat. am....with boat in tow! The weather was really horrible...we read, played duets, shopped, and had lovely steaks on the grill provided by Chuck and Jane. Chuck did go fishing...but didn't have a lot of luck. Of course on Sunday when it was time to leave.....voila...it was sunny! Typical.! :)

The highlight for me was playing the piano. It is so fun to sit and play with someone that can read music so beautifully. We even serenaded the neighbors for awhile on Saturday night.

Our dear 4 legged friend Kate

Not too many dogs get to drool on John's T-bird.
Kate's favorite place.

Our special Scottie.

We found out two weeks ago that Kate had lymphoma. We have consulted with our vet and have decided not to do chemo for many reasons. We are, however, doing prednisone and she is responding fairly well. We will probably have her through the summer but I don't expect much more than that. We are sad but have truly enjoyed every minute of her...even the porcupine incident, her late nights out in the woods and her aloof attitude.

Great visit with a life long friend.

Nancy and I
Nancy, me and Quincy..Nancy's dog.

Nancy and I have been friends since 1975.....we had a bout where we were on the outs for 9 years and have managed to put it all back together. We stopped in Illinois where she lives now on our way back from Florida this spring and now she came to visit us at the lake. We had a great visit...and managed to get pretty caught up in 7 days. She will be back the end of August so will have more time to "talk". It was fun that she could see Sharon, Denie, Patty and Doug and also Holly and Carol and Tom. Timing is everything!!!! Maddie loved Quincy....Kate....not so much!

The sisters! At least 2 of them.

Sharon, Denie, John and I, Patty and Doug.

Sharon, John and Patty

The 6 of us.

Nancy, Denie and John

Nancy, Sharon, Patty and Denie.

Finally! John and Patty mended fences and came up to the lake with Sharon and Denie. We had such a good time coming off a terrible week before. Sharon's oldest son, Jeff died on July 1st so it was good to get together to try to keep their spirits up. It was a very sad funeral, but Jeff really gave it his all and really suffered for a lot of years through lung cancer, chronic pancreatitis, Ostergenisis Imperfecta, Diabetes...just a LOT to overcome, but we were proud of him for getting this far and seeing all his children married and he also saw many grandchildren. Kathy Jo's life will be empty but she is grateful for the time she had with her "soul-mate".

Old friends from Airborne Freight

John and I on the deck.

Carol and Holly

Holly, Carol, Nancy and I.

Carol

Tom

Nancy, Holly, Carol and I all worked together at Airborne Freight in 1975 and beyond. Carol and Holly stayed with Airborne and it became DHL. Well, this last Dec. 08 and Feb. 09 DHL decided to close down their domestic operations, which meant the Carol and Holly were out of jobs after 30+ years. The sad part is Holly has been battling cancer and doing well, but it has been quite an ordeal for her. Anyway, since Nancy was in town to visit me, we decided to get together. Carol and Tom have a cabin up on Borden Lake about 45 min from us, so Holly was visiting them and Nancy me, so they drove down for the afternoon. We so fun to talk about old .... and new...times.

Oh my!! I am behind. 4th of July for starters.

One of my favorite pictures of Chase and Bella.

Chase eating corn on the cob.
Jackie



Mom and Don...(think this is an old picture)..oops.

Little David

Amber

The grand kids. Ryan, Jackie, Amber, David Chase and Ashley.

Let's not forget Princess Bella!

The whole crew.

Ryan and Heather...this after Heather and I

gave Ryan his buzz!@!@!

Two of my brothers...Chris and Kyle

The brothers and the daughters.

Chris and Kyle and me.

Grandma Rose and her girls....(and Amber's friend

Stephanie.)

Jac and Grandma.

Amber, Ashley and Steph at the center island.

Wow, where does the time go? I will try to get everyone caught up. Yes, we had a great 4th of July...17 of us. It was fun and also busy. We boated, grilled, went to see fireworks, skied, tubed and generally had fun. We will always remember the 4th of July here on Pelican.

To fill you in...we listed our lake home the week after the 4th. The business really needs a boost and we have to do whatever we have to, to get through this sag in the economy. We are all sad, but life does change...and who knows what lies ahead? Life does change and no one really likes it but we have to be pro-active and try to survive this economy.

They morning of Monday after the 4th this house was shown....boy did we scramble to get it in shape after 17 people inhabited it for 4 days. The brothers were awesome and kids too....we did it and got out of there by 0730 on Monday.....clean and ready.!