A maelstrom of runaway days

If time usually flies, then the vortex of runaway days that has us caught chasing our tails to try and catch up is the reason we haven't posted an update in nine full days.  Between the 11th and now we have had visitors at the house and visited houses, parties at church both to welcome and to send off, trips to parks, festivals, and stores, and just a general business that has kept us on our toes.  And if you are looking for an eddy of your own to get swept up in we suggest summertime in Ann Arbor.  That, at least, is what has done it for us.  We spent at least one night a week at the Summer Festival on campus, then soon after close of that event the Rolling Sculptures Show drove into town on July 13, once again drawing us out into the sunshine and crowds.  Calvin loves the crowds.  He was not as in love with the old Model Ts, Mercedes, or R.E.O. Speedwagons as we were, but he loved the tiny fairy car that ran on Vernors.  And close on the heals of the Rolling Sculptures show was the arrival of the Ann Arbor Art Fairs - more sun and more crowds, and again Calvin was more interested in the crowds, and in the manhole cover, than he was in the art, but each person enjoys art in their own way and at least he had fun.  With all of the goings ons lately we haven't even been able to get back to our zoos and visit our animals.  Yes, the one thing that keeps us somewhat grounded and sane is the twice daily occurrence of nap time - some days for all of us - but even this is about to give way to the "more mature" once daily nap occurrence, at which time we are somewhat like to combust, so be prepared. 

All the car show pictures are in the July 7-13 album

All the Art Fairs pictures are in the July 14-20 album

Best seats in the house.

There are a number of things that we love about our house.  We love the high ceilings, the ground floor laundry, the fenced yard, the deck, and the seating we get for varoud fourth of July events.  The first year that we moved in we thought the wonderful fireworks displays that we enjoyed from our deck were a fluke, but lucky for us the excitment has been annual event.  We're still not sure how many of the multiple points of fiery splendor are professional (and legal) shows versus the many backyard pyrotechnics that light up our skies, but we enjoy them all, and there is no show we would rather take in (who can beat fireworks without the traffic and bugs???).  And as if the yearly display on the fourth wasn't good enough, this year we got an extra treat - great seats (minus the traffic) to the Blue Angels air show.  The show was the first in this area in many years and was held at Willow Run Airport, and we got to see all the major tricks, and even got some very close (and very loud) views, right from our own driveway.  Several times they made their turn right over our house before heading back to the show.  Thankfully Calvin is a really good napper so he got enough sleep (regardless of the noise) that we were still able to head back to Ann Arbor for the last evening of Top of the Park, and an iced coffee from Border's.

Strange Fruit

We spent both last night and tonight in downtown Ann Arbor taking in the sites, smells, tastes, and sounds of the Top of the Park Summer Festival.  We look forward to this local annual tradition and try to make it to the month long festival evenings as often as possible, and both the weather and the entertainment this weekend made it the perfect opportunity.  Who can pass up the chance to watch people performing a modern theatrical dance routine from atop 4 meter fiber glass poles?  We enjoyed them enough the first night to take them in again tonight, this time from much closer seats, and the second time was the charm - being almost underneath the performers made all the difference and Calvin even sat still for 15 out of the 20 minutes of the performance, sitting in his stroller, bouncing up and down in time with the music (yes, we swear that he is already developing a good sense of rhythm), his eyes glued to those strange people high over his head, a wide smile glued on his face.  This wonderful performing group goes by the name of Strange Fruit, appropriate since strange would definitely describe it - strange and really cool.  Coincidentally, that is probably what Calvin thought of the raspberry sorbet that his gram was feeding him - with each tiny bite he would shiver, then giggle, then ask for more.  That continued for only a few bites, though, before he decided that darting in and out of the sidewalk traffic was way more fun and got him way more attention from his adoring fans (read: strangers walking by).

There are, of course, lots more Strange Fruit pictures in this week's photo album. 

Disc golf anyone?

It was another beautiful day for the zoo... that we had to pass up.  Our littlest dog, Moose, had rather extensive oral surgery (read: removal of 20, yes 20, infected teeth.  He doesn't want to talk about it) and we thought we'd better stay close to home, and we opted for another afternoon hike instead.  So today was our first visit to Rolling Hills County Park.  Actually, we'd both been there prior to today's visit but that was 15 or so years ago during our oh so cool middle school experience that each of us would rather forget, so for the sake of our current coolness status (don't laugh) we are pretending that this was our first visit.  Calvin might have been just as happy to skip the hike and spend the afternoon exploring the play structure, but we wanted some exercise, too, and let's face it - the static nature of the kiddie slides just doesn't cut it, so we suited up and headed out on the trails for some beginner style hiking.  The only problem was that we didn't have a map of the wooded trails and continuously found ourselves in the middle of the disc golf course, and sometimes some disc golfers.  We had no idea how serious the sport was - some of these people were stretching between tees, had official disc golf bags and water bottles, and carried with them a plethora of discs (I think I'll use the 9 disc for this hole...), so the experience was definitely an eye opening one at the very least.

A Father's Weekend Hike

Ninety degrees!  Ninety!  Without trying to tell Mother Nature what to do, can we gently remind her that it is June?  The dog days of summer don't come until August!  With weather like this it was too hot to make the 45 minute (or more) drive to any of the zoos because Calvin gets so hot in his carseat, so we took a 15 minute drive to a nature area for a shady picnic and hike instead (and by shady we mean tree covered, not suspect).  Lunch was good, the terrain was gentle, and the shade was kind.  Calvin hiked like a champ, spending most of his time urging his dad to go faster from the relaxing seat in his backpack carrier, although he did get a chance to do some of his own hiking (read: playing in the dirt).  And we played a great game of I spy when we found this waiting for us around a corner...