We got to the campsite by about 6:00 on Friday evening. We got our camp setup and cooked dinner. The three patrols rotated cooking and cleaning duty. Kieran’s patrol had cooking duty for Friday dinner. They did a good job on the soft tacos. The evening was cut short by rain. The guys were ready to stop fighting the weather and retired to their tents early.

Kieran, Kyle, Jason, and Matthew paused for a picture

Saturday we got up at 7:00 am. French toast and scrambled eggs were prepared for breakfast. After the cleanup there was some scout skill sessions that helped our newer guys learn some of what they need to advance to higher ranks.

One of the Scout Skills stations was fire starting

Kieran and Christian are really getting into their fire starting

We had intended to roast hotdogs for our lunchtime chili dogs over the fire. However, it was raining again so we resorted to the camp stoves for lunch. We did get a fire going later and had some really good pork chops grilled over the fire for dinner.

Our tents were all lined up along the tree line. Gear and grub areas down there at the end.

Kieran and Jason are in the background going over anime art techniques while pork chops cook over the fire for dinner.

Here are the Scoutmasters waiting for those chops to be done

This drain was a popular place for this gang to hang out

We had a nice time around the campfire Saturday night. Lots of conversation and the cracker-barrel. Since Friday’s cracker-barrel was rained out we doubled it up on Saturday. We had crackers and a cheeseball plus s’mores.

Unfortunately, the rain came back during the night while we were sleeping. It didn’t let up at all Sunday morning. We prepared breakfast. We had perogi, beef sticks, and fruit cups. The group that was using the pavillion was nice enough to let us cook and eat breakfast under it. That made it much easier with the rain. After breakfast was cleaned up it was time to break camp. We had to put everything away wet. So the tents and other Troop gear went home with the various leaders to get setup and dried out over the next couple of days.

Everybody said they had a good time on this campout. I know Kieran and I did!

Owen appears to be very happy about the dinner Mom made for Easter

Here’s the centerpiece Linda created for the dining room.

Candles, flowers, and eggs - the colored and the peanut butter kind

It’s not often that all of us guys put on something that isn’t a t-shirt.  So when it happens there must be a picture.

Family photo from Easter 2011

Thanks to this picture I finally replaced the old banner image for this site.  This one is much better.  Hope you had a nice Easter.

We surrounded our one night in Ludington with nights in Reed City. So we headed up to Reed City on Friday night. We had dinner at home and then hit the road. We thought maybe Declan and Owen would sleep in the car if we got a later start. That didn’t work all that well, but it was worth a try. Saturday we got ourselves over to Wrights Bake Shop for breakfast. We got enough to take with us for the next day too. It’s always great to visit Wrights!

We made the hour drive to Ludington and got there around lunch time.  What to do for lunch?!  Linda got a brilliant idea.  She suggested we got to Bortell’s.  If you ever go to Ludington during the Summer you must eat at Bortells.  We were introduced to it by the proprietors of Bed and Breakfast at Ludington where we used to stay.  It’s a little way out of town, but quite popular.  They do seafood.  You pick what you want from their display case, then they take it out and fry it up right in front of you.  Oh it is good!

Bortells is on South Lakeshore Drive along Lake Michigan outside Ludington. There isn't much parking in the lot.

Because Bortells is so popular, there are usually cars parked along the road.

There is no inside seating at Bortells. If you want to sit down and eat, there are picnic tables outside.

We got two orders of whitefish, an order of shrimp, an order of fried mushrooms, and an order of fries. Yum!

Something's fishy

Since there are five of us these days, our favorite B&B isn’t as good an option any more.  So we opted to rent a cottage for the night.  The Lakeview Cottages owners were nice enough to rent to us for a single night at the last minute.  It was the end of the season so they helped us out.  Our cottage (#3) was nice.  It doesn’t look like much from the outside, but inside it’s good.  The kids weren’t sure about the lack of TV, but that’s just fine for Linda and I.  It does have Wifi which works for the two of us.

Our cottage was actually the back portion of this corner building.

Here are the boys outside our cottage door.

After we got our stuff unloaded we walked a couple of blocks down to Stearns Park.  That’s the city’s lakefront park.  The wind was pretty strong, and it had been for a while.  It had blown lots of sand off the beach across the parking lot into the grassy part of the park.  It was also causing big waves that were crashing up over the north breakwater.  We thought it was crazy that there were actually people out on the breakwater while those waves were present.  Our common sense was right.  On Monday, after we’d returned home, a tourist was out on the breakwater and a big wave swept him right off into the lake and he drowned.  You should never underestimate the power of the lake!

The waves are crashing over the breakwater and common sense is apparently absent.

I thought the sky was amazing.

Just a small sample of the sand blown off the beach. The city spent the next week putting it back.

After we walked the length of the park we were at Ludington Avenue.  So we headed up the street and checked out some of the shops.  It didn’t take long for the kids to get bored with that.  We had dinner at the Jamesport Brewing Company.  A walk in the dark back to our cottage was fun.  When the kids weren’t being raucous we could hear Lake Michigan a couple of blocks away.

Sunday was Big Sable Point day.  We had the Wrights goodies that we brought with us for breakfast, picked up some lunch at Subway, and then drove out to Ludington State Park.  We parked at the Lake Michigan beach and started our walk to the Big Sable Point Lighthouse.  To get to the light you either have to walk along the beach or a state park road.  You cannot drive out to it.  The walk along the beach is much more fun so we do that.  On the way out there was much “I cannot walk one more step” heard from the children.  It got better once we walked far enough for the top of the lighthouse to come into view.

Kieran and Mom had lots to talk about on the way to the lighthouse. You can just see the top of it over the grass.

A little further down the beach, now it looks like a lighthouse.

Now the color bands are more visible. The kids were getting more excited at this point.

The fog signal is visible on the left now.

Keepers quarters starting to rise out of the grass.

This view gives quite a different perspective. I didn't realize somebody was looking down at me until after I took the picture.

We paid the keepers and climbed those stairs to the top of the tower.

Hold on to your hats! It's windy up at the top of the lighthouse.

Looking toward the lake from the top of the lighthouse. The replica fog signal structure doesn't actually have a fog signal in it.

This is the view behind the lighthouse from up top.

Looking down at the Keepers Quarters from the top of the lighthouse.

This is the view back in the direction we came from.

Looking down the beach we walk to get to the lighthouse.

We sat down for lunch in the shadow of the tower, but the shadow moved.

From the shadow of the tower the sun cast a bright glow from behind the top of the tower.

There's no bathroom in the Keeper's Quarters, but there is a very fancy outhouse.

This huge tree stump is between the lighthouse and the outhouse

As we started to walk back from Big Sable Lighthouse I spotted this out on the lake.

On the way back from the lighthouse everybody eventually removed their shoes and walked close along the water.

Just can't resist the sand.

One of us was holding this kite for our walk out and back to the lighthouse. There's no better place to fly a kite.

It was a beautiful day to walk along the water.  The sun was shining and it wasn’t too hot or cold.

We made it back to Reed City for dinner with Grandma and Grandpa who came up that day.  After a nice evening with them the kids slept well.  The fresh air and walking helps with that.  Monday it was time to head home.  It was a short vacation, but a great end to the Summer.

We made sure to get a picture with Grandpa before the week was over. Amazing that everybody smiled!

Owen and Declan spent a lot of time doing dances like this. They were having fun!

We didn’t go on the trip with any plans as to what we would do while we were there. That’s pretty typical for us. Trying to stick to a schedule just seems like work. Where’s the vacation in that?

Grandpa’s house is a short walk away from a place called the Custard Cabin. It’s pretty good stuff. Since the weather was extremely hot while we were there we thought it would be great to walk up there in the evening when it started to cool off.

There's a big valley followed by a big hill in the road out of the neighborhood.

Walk up the big hill, turn left, and just a short way up the main road is that big cone calling you toward it.

They have a table just the right size for Declan and Owen out on the porch.

Kieran sat with us at the porch counter.

One day we stopped at a road side stand selling peaches. The peaches were very good, but the reason I mention it is that the woman running the stand asked us “Have you been to the tree house?” Huh? What tree house? She told us there was a local minister that was building a huge tree house because God told him to. She said it’s open for people to climb though for no charge. When we got back to Grandpa’s house we looked it up on the Internet. It looked really impressive so we decided to check it out the next day. It’s called The Minister’s Tree House. Here are some pictures.

There's a chapel inside where they hold church services some Sundays.

This is the main stairway that spirals all the way up to the top. That's 10 levels up. Other stairs are located on various levels.

Most of the structure has walkways around the various levels like this one.

Declan and I were not all the way to the top, but we were looking down at Owen and his Mom.

If you look real close you can see Linda, Kieran, Declan, and Owen looking out from the top floor window.

Add a little zoom and you can see them all looking down at me.

I tried to capture the whole thing, but it's hard to see it through the trees from this side.

When you go around to the front (or is it the back) you can stand back and really get blown away by the size of this tree house.

If you get the chance to visit Crossville, it’s worth a stop at the tree house. You’ll be impressed.

They recently opened a brand new public library in Crossville. We like libraries so, of course, we had to check it out. It’s a really nice place.

The new Crossville Public Library

You can sit out on that balcony and read in a rocking chair. At least if it’s cooler than it was when we were there. The children’s department has a round area where they’ve setup former carousel animals and carts and things that the kids thought was great.

Declan on the carousel pig

Owen on the carousel horse

Cumberland Mountain State Park isn’t too far from Grandpa’s house so we decided to go hiking one day.

This is the lake created by the bridge/dam in the park.

This is the bridge/dam that creates the lake.

Setting out on our hike.

The boys stopping at the stream on the trail.

There's a cable bridge at the far end of the trail that we hiked. The twins were a little freaked out by this.

There were several of these large overhanging rock formations along the trail. The Tennessee rocks are just amazing.

We have cousins that live closer to Nashville and we decided that we needed to get over to visit them on this trip. We spent the day with them and their new baby. It’s the third girl for them.

Linda got her baby fix with Makenzie

Kieran wanted to hold Makenzie as much as possible

Had to get a shot of the proud parents with the new little one

We had a lot of fun on our trip. The drive there and back got a little long at times, but everybody survived. Grandpa was happy to have us and it sure was nice getting to see him for an extended time. Hopefully t won’t be so long before the next trip!

Original Recipe Throwback on the left. Current day recipe on the right.

The label on the throwback bottle is certainly more interesting than the new one.  The main difference between the two drinks is how they’re sweetened.  The current day recipe uses high fructose corn syrup, the ubiquitous, highly processed goo that seems to be everywhere today.  The throwback recipe uses sugar.  Imagine that!

All three boys took part in the test along with me.  Everybody got a couple of ounces of each of the drinks placed in front of them.  I probably shouldn’t have told them which was which, but they knew.  In the picture the throwback is in the red cup.  The modern formula is in whatever the other cup is.

Owen, Declan, and Kieran are ready for the taste test

Everybody drank the throwback first.  The feeling among the boys was that the throwback was sweeter.  It was their unanimous choice.  I really couldn’t tell the difference between the two.  After the first couple of drinks I just sensed no difference.  After another try of each I finally noticed a subtle difference.  For me, as soon as I swallowed the current formula the flavor was pretty much done.  With the throwback formula it seemed that the flavor stayed with me longer.  The sugar must do a better job of coating the tongue.  That’s my theory.

Can you tell which Mountain Dew is which?

So  there you have it.  The four of us all felt that Mountain Dew Throwback is better than the modern formula.  However, I still prefer Diet Mountain Dew to both of them.

We met at St. John’s at 5:30 Friday and loaded everything up.  Then we headed out to Camp Munhacke.

These new scouts hadn’t done much tent setup before so it took a while to get them up properly.  However, everything did get setup before there was any rain.  After things were setup we needed to focus on dinner.  We made spaghetti.  We had propane stoves on the picnic table under the easy-up canopy.  It came out quite good with plenty for everyone.  There was even some for the raccoon that fished it out of the trash while we were cleaning up.

Kieran, Zack, and Matthew were in a tent together.  They were probably the last ones to fall asleep.  At least they were the last voices I heard before I fell asleep.

Saturday morning dawned bright and early.  We were up at 7am.  Pancakes and sausage were cooked up for breakfast.  Everybody helped and it didn’t go too bad.

Pancakes and sausage for breakfast Saturday morning

After filling up on breakfast and cleaning up it was time for our five mile hike on the Bill Baker Trail.  There is some history to this particular hike.  When last year’s new scouts went out on this hike it became known as the “Death March” because the trail was washed out at one point.  That led to a huge detour through the wilderness and everybody was completely exhausted by the time they got back to camp.  This year the hike went quite well for most of the way.  Then we hit the same place that it was washed out last year, and it was washed out again.  Oh dear.  Casey remembered that it was the exact same place that they encountered trouble last year.  Mr. Blossom and I thought about the situation briefly and decided that our best course of action would be to double back to the road that we crossed most recently and take it back to camp.  It wasn’t quite as adventurous as last year, but given our circumstances it seemed like the best thing to do.

All the hiking scouts as we approach the end of our trek

Once we made it back to camp it was time for lunch.  We fixed Hobo meals on the camp fire.  Hamburger, diced vegetables, butter, and seasonings wrapped in foil and cooked on the grates over the camp fire.  They were easy and delicious!

Matthew used aluminum foil to clean the grates before they went on the fire

The scouts are working on the hobo meal ingredients

Colin, Kieran, and Matthew keep an eye on the hobo meals

Casey and Christian spent some time after lunch working through T-2-1 requirements with the guys.  They made some good progress.  In fact, everybody should be ready to earn Tenderfoot rank very soon.

Mr. Coleman is reviewing Kieran's achievements with him

Manchester Troop 426 stopped over to invite us over for skits and songs in the evening.  So all the guys got together and decided what skits and songs to perform.  Then they practiced them.

Casey taught everyone the bubble gum song for skit time

Christian brought some helicopter-launched-with-rubber-band contraptions that quickly became a hit with all the scouts.  In between other things they would shoot them way up into the air and as they helicoptered back down they’d battle for position to be the one who caught it.

Christian brought these helicopter sort of toys that were a hit with everyone

Casey and Christian showing the new scouts how to do lashings

Dinner was corned beef and vegetables.  It was all boiled on the stoves.  It turned out great and was a pretty easy camp meal.

The boys and leaders taking a break around the campfire while dinner cooks

It started to rain during dinner and continued to rain throughout the evening.  That made dinner cleanup a little more challenging than usual and it took a long time.  Finally it was done and everybody headed over the Troop 426′s campsite to join them for skits and songs.  It was a lot of fun.  They had a pavilion in their campsite so we were able to stay dry during the show even though the rain was pretty heavy.

After the show we headed back to our camp and retired to our tents because the rain prevented much of anything else.  Everybody managed to stay dry throughout the night.  The scouts didn’t know it but we had some pretty severe weather passing over us.  There were tornado warnings issued for some parts of the county, but not where we were.  Dundee was hit by a major tornado during the storm, but that’s quite a bit south of where we were.  Having our tents setup in the tree line as we did provided us with some shelter from the worst of the weather.  The moms and dads back at home were having a worse time worrying about us than we were having being out in the weather.  Mr. Coleman was keeping track of the weather via NOAA weather radio as were the folks in the camp office.  So we knew what was happening.

Sunday morning we woke up to much better weather.  It’s always nice to be able to pack up in dry conditions.  Of course the tents were wet, but the sun was out so we pulled them out into the center of the campsite to dry off for a little while before packing them up.  Breakfast was cereal because we needed to be heading back to the church early.  We weren’t quite as early as we planned, but we were hitting the road for home around 12:15.

This was a great camping experience for the new guys.  Casey and Christian did a great job showing them how its done as well as helping them get a large number of T-2-1 requirements signed off.  They’re well on their way to their next Court of Honor!

Over the last week we’ve experimented with how to layout the soaker hose for maximum water coverage.  I’m still not sure we have it right, but we keep working on it.

You know what the best part of the garden is?  Hearing Linda squee when she sees a new plant emerging from the dirt or a blossom appearing.  That makes the whole project worth it.

The plants and seeds are in and the soaker hose is working

Squash, Cucumber, Carrots, Tomatos are taking root in this bed

Raspberries, eggplant, squash, basil, and sunflowers are growing here

Saturday while Linda spent eight hours working at the library, I spent about three or four with my hands covered in mud sealing up the gaps beneath the garden beds.  That’s mostly done.  I had to quit when one of my nails tore rather badly.  I guess they were getting soft after being wet for so long.

Monday was a day full of dirt.  Specifically new dirt.  Kieran and I headed off to Lowes and loaded up a cart with 25 bags of top soil.  That was only part of what we needed, but I didn’t think the cart would hold any more.  When we got it to the van I decided I should probably check the vehicle’s maximum hauling capacity.  Turns out it’s 1200 pounds.  So with 1000 pounds of top soil plus the two of us we were there.  In the end it took five trip to Lowes to get everthing.  Kieran and I moved just over two tons of material back to our place.  We had quite a thunderstorm during the second trip so that delayed us for a while.

While Kieran and I were hauling material home, Linda was putting some of it into the first garden bed.  Unfortunately, it started to rain again in the evening so the bed wasn’t completed.

That first bed was finally completed today.  Linda even transplanted most of what she wanted in that bed into it.  It’s not quite all there yet, but at least there are plants in the garden!

Sorry the picture is dark, but I was losing daylight fast.