Nature's beauty...found right in our backyard!

I don't fancy myself as much of an Audubon Society type, despite being dragged on a birding expedition with my friend Nancy in Belize in search of the ever elusive Jabiru Stork! But you have to be blind not to recognize and appreciate those rare and beautiful birds that happen upon our backyard. I have only ever seen one Indigo Bunting before and it was in a tree way far off in the distance. But you can't miss that brilliant blue bird! And guess what? It has decided to take up residence in my backyard! It has come back nearly every day for almost a week now! I have no idea what it seems to be enjoying but I continue to throw every seed imaginable out there in hopes it likes one of them. With any luck it may mate around here and we will get to see the entire family!

I finally got him on film!

He always eats off the ground

I had an oriole come in a week ago so I put up and oriole feeder for the first time ever!

and now they're here in droves!

that's an orange on top, sugar water in the bottom and grape jelly of all things in the little dishes on top. They love it and empty the jelly out daily!!

Then Mr. Bunting came back again this morning

If I thought it would bring in a drove of indigo buntings I'd put up a bright blue feeder! I don't think it works that way though... if anyone knows how to bring em in please comment! I have no idea what he's eating but he's been back every day and I'm loving it.

Spartan Spring game and fun with former players!

Well we actually had really nice weather for once for the spring game! A little chilly but no complaints since there was NO rain for a change! Tommy was coaching on the White team and we had our friend Alex Haugen as our special guest on the sidelines with Tommy. He had a great day! The Green team won so it looks like steak dinner for them and hot dogs and beans for the losing team. Haha! We had a bunch of the former players over for a BBQ at our house afterwards. Good times!

Drew and Alex pre-game

Alex with Coach Hoke

Alex giving BJ Cunningham some coaching tips

Kirk Cousins' brother and friends! Way to show him spirit!

Alex gets coached up by Coach Hoke!

#67 Joel Foreman meets the recipient of his jersey!

Blair White, Javon Ringer, Jehuu Caulcrick get recognition for being in the NFL

Draymond Green from the basketball team tries out football...he should stick with hoops!

Jehuu bet the boys they couldn't push him 5 yards...

He won

Boys pose with Big 10 trophy and Tommy's Big ten ring

Tommy's bling and mine too!

Bunch of the guys at the house afterwards

Me with my boys Travis Key and Otis Wiley

Yo dawg!

Pond catastrophes and spring cleanup make for an eventful Easter weekend!

Well this was one of our busier weekends in quite some time given that we finally had some decent weather! We woke up Friday morning to half of the water in the pond gone and the fish looking up at us as if to say "Where the heck did our home go?!" We quickly ran a hose and refilled adding salt and stress coat to de-chlorinate the water and called Luke Landscape to come out and take a look. For the life of us we can't figure out what happened. We have since put the big pump back in to run the waterfall and everything seems to be holding just fine. Whew! We were mentally counting the money on how much that repair would have set us back...

I looked to see when we drained the pond last year to do the major cleanout and it was this very weekend! It wasn't quite as warm this weekend however so we decided to pull the winter cover off all of the outdoor furniture, power wash the deck and stain it. That was our major work this weekend and it looks great now! Maybe we can get to the pond in the next week or two but for now all 7 koi/goldfish survived the winter and are happy to be getting fed again and have the waterfalls running. Hopefully within two weeks we will be fully up and running in the Zen garden!

Tommy hard at work staining

don't let these pics fool you...I did plenty of staining too! I just didn't get a pic!

My work finished in the kitchen making Easter dinner and topping it off with a chocolate trifle with a little Easter flair!

Sunny Saturdays at the Dog Park!

Well the sun is finally shining around these parts again despite the fact that it is still BRRRRRRRR cold! It was a high of 30 degrees today when we loaded up the 3 mongrels in Tommy's truck and headed to the Soldan Dog Park in Lansing. But they didn't care one little bit!

they are immediately off and running!

staying close to Dad though...

meeting new friends

Murphy clung to our legs for about half an hour until his "scaredy cat" side subsided

Dewey found some little dogs - he discovered there are actually dogs smaller than him and was very happy about it!

Everybody ran and played with new dog friends for over an hour. Great times - can't wait for next Saturday!

Three exhausted dogs... that spells "Great Day"!

Backyard Spring Cleanup!

Well after a lot of griping that that stupid groundhog Punxatawny Phil was wrong about an early spring, we both concluded that this was the absolute earliest we have ever been able to do a spring cleanup in the backyard! March 19th and we raked up the last of the leaves from fall, removed all of the dog poop that the kids missed on their daily pooper scooper duties over the winter and put bacteria and salt in the pond to start working on all of the string algae that had grown up during the winter.

all 7 fish survived the winter under the ice and wagged their tails with a happy spring greeting for us!

Mango has spring fever too!

Tommy is hard at work bagging the rest of the leaves that we raked

first fire in the firepit for 2011! Burning up some brush that's been there since fall

Hazel chillin in the sunshine

Mango guards the garden gnome 

Stay tuned for progress on getting the pond and waterfall back up and running along with the Zen garden. We are hoping to have the Zen paradise up and running by end of April - just in time for the spring game on April 30th!

Tomorrow is Tommy's day for "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance". He is jonesin to get the bike out on the road!

SPRING BREAK!!

Well we are just home from a much needed and fantastic Caribbean vacation with the kids. We took an 8 day cruise on Royal Caribbean out of Miami to the Eastern Caribbean and loved it! We sailed on Liberty of the Seas and the ship was unbelievable. Absolutely HUGE! We had a Junior suite which was great and the kids were in the balcony cabin next to us. We were able to open the divider between balconies for one giant balcony plus we had our own space which was especially nice for when poor Tommy was seasick as a dog the first 2 days and also I didn't have to live with the slobs next door. Our stops were in St. Thomas (one of our favorite islands), St. Maarten, San Juan Puerto Rico and finally Labadee, Haiti which is a little private island that RCI owns and a slice of paradise.

The ship from the back

the Pirate ship snorkel tour we took in St. Thomas to Turtle cove. It was great!

leaving Miami...

they had a mini golf course on the ship!

the kids at the pool

Tommy by the stage where the band plays at the pool

they had an ice skating rink for open skate and fantastic ice shows later in the week

Tommy and kids at breakfast after he finally started feeling better

on the snorkel tour

Drew was playing sea turtle

beautiful parrotfish

and a rarely spotted reef squid

the sea turtles were abundant

Jen and her FatDaddy

the view of beautiful St. Thomas from our balcony

St. Maarten

Jen got coerced into getting a few braids...these ladies were aggressive!

Drew does his Baywatch impression

downtown St. Maarten with great shopping

We ate here for Mango our little island puppy!

a few pics from inside the ship

the promenade

beautiful Labadee, Haiti

our balconies combined were huge!

the aquapark at Labadee - kids had a blast!

beautiful beach

Drew Baywatch "Take 2"

Drew climbing the huge inflatable iceberg

Jen on some Saturn thingy

pathway to beach

wine and cheese on the balcony

boys are chillin

pool bar and deck

the pool was ice cold but refreshing!

the had an H2O zone for little kids with fountains and splash pools as well which was very cool

Promenade

Jen on the flowrider

Mom's favorite spot... Vintage's wine bar! I discovered this on the 3rd night when I went to a wine tasting

Kids entering a staring contest at dinner

Our head waiter Ben goes the extra mile to satisfy his customers!

Mom and Dad back at Vintages!

Lucille from S. Africa and FennLei from China - our favorite servers in Vintages

Drew got a Shirley Temple every night. Tommy brought his unfinished ST back to the stateroom and added vodka and I renamed the new drink a "Sharon Osbourne"!!

Promenade at night

Tommy and me with Robert, the sommelier at Vintages

my favorite thing to do! ;-)

Co Ho even got into it!

Drinking a Chardonnay and I found a Coppola red wine I'd been looking for years that I'd had at his resort in Belize... Rosso. Give it a try!

Great trip and great time but glad to be back home with the rest of our "family"!

and finally Prom Night on the cruise and a great time to get some nice family and couple pics

He looked pretty damn good despite feeling like crap if you ask me!

He's not really that tall...

the last time the kids will ever be that close and still smiling!