Sounds like a wonderful visit.

Awesome adventures with Annie and Lars and Kevin and Nature girl! Thanks for sharing!

Strolling the gardens, fields and meetinng your animals would keep me happy!!!

Yes to your salsa, and munchies. You're a better/more knowledgeable person to ask when it comes to attractions, than the official ones!

I'm glad that the weather held (albeit too hot, as this summer has been).

Annie, always the gracious host. I'd make a heart symbol, but don't think it can be done on the computer :-)

❤️

(Jasdip - can copy/paste if nothing else!)

Annie - I’ve often wished I‘d find myself in your neighborhood some day so I could pop in for a visit and a first hand peek at your life!

Midwest hospitality!

Hope y'all had fun ... even if you cain't members what cha did that one day ...

And no pics? Not even the scenery?

Does read like a good visit though. Seems like yesterday when the trip was in the planning stage. Time does fly.

Annie and Elery were the perfect hosts - much better than my own family (except for Kevin). Annie and I did have endless talks every evening, and we got along famously. I really feel a deep and close connection to her, as if we actually were related. Anyway, I think of her as the sister I always wanted - maybe if my brother Mike had been born a girl. Mike is just one or two days older than Annie.

We saw great sights in Michigan, and yes there are lots of photos - I took about 600 while I was in Michigan, and so it going to take a while for me to sort through them. From Michigan we went to Philadelphia so that Kevin could attend a World Ostomy Convention, which I think was very helpful for him. I did make a day trip to northern NJ to visit one of my members from the Del Shannon fan club. She had saved letters I had written to her when I was 15 plus bulletins that I published for the fan club. We had never met in person, but she found me on a Del Shannon web site and contacted me a few years ago - 50 years after we had been pen pals. It was very interesting meeting her, but that is another story altogether.

After Philadelphia, we went straight back to Los Angeles (plenty of non-stop flights for that!) last Sunday, and the vacation ended immediately because I had a ton of things to do in California regarding the house we just bought in Cathedral City that we are renovating and an interview I had for a new furniture design project. Therefore I have had very little spare time or time to fully write about my trip to Michigan. I finally got around to sending Annie a thank you email, and I just got around to writing and mailing her a thank you note a couple of days ago - so sorry for the delay!

We're in Cathedral City right now (Kevin plus sister and BIL), and so I am having to use my laptop, which is a bit awkward for me, but not as bad as a phone or even a tablet. I don't have the photos with me, and I won't have access to them until middle of next week.

The trip to Traverse City was especially nice, and I wish I had taken Elery's advice and had dinner there, as it is an extremely charming little city. We especially liked climbing the small lighthouse at the end of the peninsula, and we got good photos there, as well as in town. I took an accidental selfie while photographing a store window that I liked.

St. Ignace was very interesting as well, and we enjoyed our day on Mackinac Island. I'll write more about that later - we took some great photos there. From St. Ignace we went to Sault Ste. Marie, and that town was also extremely charming and picturesque. I think we took most of our photos at the locks, and we should have photographed the town more. It's extremely old - I think it was founded in 1672. We did not cross the bridge to the Canadian side because Kevin did not bring his passport. I always have mine with me, and so I could have gone.

Annie fed us very well - mostly with food that she had grown or raised, and we also got fresh cherries from a roadside stand, as she mentioned. All of the meals were special, and every morning Annie made me a scrambled egg, using her own eggs, of course, which were extremely tasty. I ate them plain with no salt or pepper (except for an occasional addition of some hot sauce), and I found that they did not need salt or any other flavorings. Definitely the best eggs I have had since my childhood when I collected eggs on my parents' farm.

Next week you can expect a barrage of photos and more stories. I am so glad we did not overstay our welcome with Annie - we were there nine days, I think, but that includes the two days we went to St. Ignace. All in all, it was a great trip, and I would love to go back some day, especially now that I know more of what to expect. And we would not be following GPS through seasonal roads requiring four wheel drive.

Yes, Annie is a great hostess. I'm more of a Vegetable Growing forum person and a sometimes visitor to the harvest forum. The cooking forum gets some visits now and then. So visiting Annie's farm and garden was great for me, perhaps...dare I say it on this forum...more exciting than eating. It was fun to see her laying hens, several colorful breeds of older hens, and the new chicks destined for chicken dinners or the freezer in 7 weeks. On our tour, Annie turned off the driveway and took off on a grassy path to a high point where we could see the beef cattle out in the pasture, too. Her large farm garden was of special interest to me. An old time Wolf River apple tree brought back memories of the first place I lived after getting married. Her varied selection of bean varieties was interesting, too. The harvest she sent me home with was all used and tasted great...maybe not cooking forum great, but great for me, the simple prep, fresh veggie lover.

Meeting Lars and Kevin was fun and hearing their perspective of Michigan places I know well was interesting. I'm glad to hear the rest of their trip went well, too.

It was fun meeting naturegirl also, but everyone was disappointed that lpink was unable to visit as well. I had hoped to meet Dedtired in Philadelphia, but she was out of town, as was another friend in Philadelphia that I went to Rice with and was one of my best friends there.

While in Philadelphia, I took the train to Newark, and that was not the best experience. It would have been better if I had bought the Amtrak tickets in advance, but Amtrak was not very helpful. The round trip ended up costing me $222.00, and I could have rented a car for the day for less than that, but I would have had to deal with traffic. I definitely got educated about Amtrak. Newark was somewhat scary, and I had to show my Amtrak ticket to be able to sit down in the waiting room while I was waiting for my friend to pick me up. I won't be going back to Newark.

Thank you, Lars, I'd love to be the sister you always wanted!

Jasdip, come any time. Stop and pick up FOAS, will you? And anyone else who wants to come along, better rent a van! (grin)

Naturegirl, my poor garden has been sadly neglected this summer, I've spent so much time goofing off and playing with visiting grandkids, but I think it was worth it. The tomatoes are just starting to ripen, and I've plucked off 100+ tomato hornworms, the plants are down to stalks. (sigh) Good thing you came then, I'd have you out searching for tomato worms!

I did try to start a new thread, but I can no longer find the cooking forum to create a new post. (sigh) I just wanted to show off the lovely gifts that Lars and Kevin brought when they visited. I resurrected my old Canon Elph, as I have received my new camera but haven't figured out how to use it yet. It's quite a lot different than my old one, so it could take a while, please bear with me if the pictures are not wonderful.

Kevin had a friend make this lovely dish. She apparently uses real leaves, which burn off in the kiln, and they leave the imprint of whatever botanical she chose. The back is signed, but that picture did not come out well. She does lovely work and I greatly enjoy seeing that little leaf on my table.

Lars brought some of his "famous" hot sauce, which he and Elery used for every meal, I think. He made nice labels, and promised me the recipe, if I can grow chocolate habaneros next year:

Good thing, the bottle is nearly gone, although I've not made Elery share at all:

It was a lovely visit and I was sad to see them leave. I haven't used the little dish for anything specific yet, it just sits on the table and I smile when I see it, thinking of good friends, even when they are far away.

Lars, I'm sorry your trip to Newark didn't go as well as you hoped, but hopefully you had a nice visit with your friend there. I do take Amtrak when I go to Chicago, and it seems to work OK, but I always buy tickets in advance or they are sold out. They aren't nearly as inexpensive as they used to be either, so I'm not surprised about the cost, although I find it cheaper to take Amtrak to Chicago than it is to pay to park, which is outrageously expensive (IMO).

Annie

Sounds like a very happy and memorable gathering.

I have been to Michigan many times. Many interesting things to learn and to see there.

One time on a business trip to a big monthly regular project meeting there. No one showed up. I learned that on deer hunting season opening day, it's a holiday in Michigan.

Another trip there for the regular meeting, I was stuck there for four days and there nights due to snow.

dcarch

Sounds like a fun visit!

Sometimes it takes me all day to get nothing done.

So, I'm amazed you managed to cover so much ground in such a short amount of
time; wonderful that you got to see Mackinac Island and Traverse City,
both so full of charm.

Looking forward to too many photos of the meeting and summer vacation☺

Sol

Dolce far niente is one of my mottoes, but I can't get my sister and BIL to appreciate it. I felt like we had a very relaxed trip, and the farm was very peaceful, which was good for Kevin. His work is very demanding, but I am now in the middle of a renovation (two bathrooms plus a pool), and this is taking more of my time that I had expected. I bought a laptop so that I could revise drawings for the project, but then I had to buy TurboCad for the drafting, and it is not at all easy to get used to. I joined a TurboCad forum, where I hope to get help.

The roads in Michigan were not at all crowded, and we could put the jeep on cruise control on the expressways. It was a vast difference from California!

To get to Philadelphia from Grand Rapids, we had to change planes in Detroit, and on the drive to Grand Rapids, I got a text message saying that our flight to Detroit was being delayed by 45 to 60 minutes. Since we only had a 30 minute layover in Detroit, I was afraid of missing our connection, but as it turned out, since we got to the airport in Grand Rapids two hours and 15 minutes early, we were able to just make an earlier flight. However, our flight to Philadelphia was also delays one hour, and so it really did not make any difference. I noticed that there was another flight to Philadelphia two hours later, and so we could have gotten on that one if necessary.

We really try to get non-stop flights for this reason, but when we don't, I make a point to get to the airport extra early.

I'm anxious to get back to L.A. now, as I believe the pool here is going to be drained today, and tomorrow it is supposed to be 117°, which would be a new record. The water in the pool is 87° this time of year, and so that has been pleasant. It looks like I won't be able to leave until Thursday evening, but Thursday is not supposed to be as hot as Wednesday.

So sorry I had to miss the get together! I had reservations and a planned trip North but then dad had to have some emergency heart surgery and I didn't want to leave him alone when he had just gotten home from the hospital. So we had to put our trip on hold for a couple of weeks. Dad's OK now, but at his age, he has to try and take it a little easy.