Last Days At Magnus RV Park, Petoskey, MI.

I know it has been weeks since I last blogged, but once we moved into our new home, things got very hectic. This blog is a wrap up of our last days at Magnus RV Park before we moved to Boyne City. I got my new bike and the last month in Petoskey we enjoyed riding our bikes on the bike trail that was located right out our front door at Magnus RV Park.

Mallery was not real keen on the rides at first, so we had to take short rides until she got use to them.

She didn't like it when we left her behind, but didn't like the ride much either. Such a predicament for such a little 70 year old pooch!

This summer we joined a CSA or farm share for fresh organic vegetables, from a first year farmer who graduated from MSU. We bought a 1/2 share which was $17 a week. Every week we got different produce.

I made this Kale, Potato and Sausage soup with our produce one week, which I have made several times since, because it was so good.

One day we drove to Charlevoix to see Michigan Beach Park.

At this beach you can actually get into the water and swim without fear of sharks, unlike beaches on the ocean.

 At the end of the beach is the Charlevoix South Pier Light Tower.

There was a wedding party hanging out on the pier, probably waiting for pictures.

Next to the pier is the Round Lake Channel. This channel leads into Round Lake which leads into Lake Charlevoix. The channel was very busy this day with boaters going out onto Lake Michigan.

Michigan Beach Park views from the pier.

Next we drove south of the town of Charlevoix to an antique second hand furniture store. On the way we stopped at the "World's Largest Cherry Pie".

We found this information telling us more about it.

It took 12,750 lbs of cherry filling to fill the pie, and a helicopter delivered the egg wash and sugar for the top!

It was the first largest cherry pie in the USA at the time.

On another day, on one of our many bike rides, I dug out Mallery's sun glasses that we had not used for a while. During the ride she left her glasses on.

But once the ride was over, she shook her head , and her sun glasses would fly up on her head. I swear she had a smile and thought, "Now I look cool"!

And I would have to agree, she looked like a "cool little pooch"!

Mallery had a rough summer. She seemed to get very winded during very short walks, and she was eating fine but becoming very boney. Her back bone was all of a sudden very prominent.

One day we had to take her to a vet because she developed diarrhea. The veterinary took x-rays to check her stomach to make sure there was nothing going on. She said she thought Mallery had a tumor in or pushing up against her collapsing treachea.

Here is a picture of the x-ray. You can see her trachea ( long black tube under her spine). In the middle you can see where it narrows. The veterinary wanted us to take her to MSU in Lansing, MI. to see a specialist. We made an appointment for when we left the state.

Here is a recipe that I made with eggplant from our CSA newsletter. This one was not so good. Eggplant if not done right can be bitter. This one was bitter. I cooked some other eggplant another way and it was really yummy. Joe isn't as adventurous and didn't try any of the eggplant recipes.

This recipes is Ratatouille that I got in our newsletter with our weekly produce. It has onion, garlic, eggplant, green, red, and yellow bell pepper, zucchini squash, and yellow squash and basil.We got all the ingredients in our share that week except for the garlic. You can put this over rice or noodles. I put it over quinoa instead. I really like this recipe.

Near the end of August the salmon run was beginning at the Bear River inlet from Little Traverse Bay in Petoskey.

I felt sorry for these fish, because they were gasping for air while lying on the ground. I love to eat fish, as Joe and I have really enjoyed the salmon and whitefish we had been buying there this summer, but I which there was a more human way of killing fish.

One day we took a drive around Lake Charlevoix  after shopping in Charlevoix. We took the long way home so we could drive past our new future home. This restaurant is on Lake Charlevoix where boaters come to eat. Next to it is the ferry that crosses over the south arm of the lake.

The south arm of Lake Charlevoix is very narrow.

The ferry is on a pulley system, and only takes 4 cars at a time. It takes just a minute to cross. It closes on Thanksgiving Day for the winter.

If you don't want to pay for the ferry which is $2.50, it will take you an extra 20 minutes to drive around the south arm. You can also buy a book of ferry trips for $50 which ends up costing $1.75 a ride, which is what we did. The book never expires.

These last pictures are sunset pictures Joe took while we were at Magnus RV Park.

This roll cloud was very strange that Joe took one evening.

Unfortunately our home on Lake Charlevoix faces northeast, so we will not get sunsets. Even if we faced west, we would never get sunsets like these on Little Traverse Bay. The bay is like an ocean with never ending water, unlike most lakes.

The summer went very fast, with house hunting, furniture shopping, biking, and cleaning, storing and cooking different vegetables dishes, and medical and dental appointments.

I also had to go to the emergency one morning for a urinary catheterization. This is the second time I have had to have this procedure done this year. The first time was in March. The problem seems to happen when I take my hormones, which helps me sleep, lessens joint and muscle pain, helps with energy, and helps in many other ways to long to mention. It happened both times, after sleeping all night, and my bladder is so full, but I can not urinate. It is very uncomfortable when you want to pee and you can not, and the longer it goes, it becomes extremely painful. After this second time, I went to a gynecologist and she thought the it was caused by the uterine fibroid that I was diagnosed with 4 years ago. She thought it was blocking the urethra when the fibroid grew with the increasing hormones. I then had a MRI and went to a radiologist to see about having an Uterine Fibroid Embolization. After he viewed my MRI, he decided I needed to see a urologist first because he was unsure that the fibroid was causing the retention. He said the fibroid was too far up and back in my uterus, and he was unsure of how it could cause blockage on my urethra.Because we ran out of time, I am now taking very low does of hormones (which is causing me sleepless nights, to be grouchy, and hurting  all over). When we get to Gulf Shores, I will continue the search for answers to this problem.

We are currently in Lansing, MI. and Mallery had her appointment at MSU with a specialist. It was a very hard day when they took her for a full day to do blood work and two kinds of x-rays. She does not do well when she is separated from the pack. As they took her away she was licking her lips, which she does when she is anxious. We had to leave her at the clinic from 11:30 to 5:00. They promised me someone would be with her at all times. When she gets stressed and anxious she has problems breathing. I was stressed all day thinking she would die just being separated from us so long and in a strange place. Even though they told me someone would be with her, I imagined that they would not notice her, in her panic attack, gasping for air. When we got back to the clinic at 5:00, we were brought to a waiting room and told the Dr's would be in to talk to us. We both knew this was not good, when they said Dr's. We only had seen one Dr during our initial visit that morning. Unfortunately the tumor was confirmed and is very large. They want to do a scope to do a biopsy, but because of her present collapsing trachea problem, we were told she would not do well during anesthesia. Next week another Dr. who is out of town will be back. They told us he would put a stent into her trachea immediately following the biopsy. If the mass is soft, the stent would probably go in well, but if the mass was hard, they would probably not be able to get it in, and her chance of dieing on the table are great. If we don't do it, the mass will probably continue to grow and she will go into respiratory arrest. It is hard to think about doing this procedure when she is eating, drinking and doing generally well. She has had a couple of times in the last month where her legs gave out. The first time was after we clipped her nails. When I set her on the ground, she collapsed. She hates her nails done, and it stressed her too much. The other time was when we woke her up to go out to pee before bed. I picked her up and set her on the floor and her legs gave out. Both times she recovered within seconds, but this was a very unusual event for her. My bill for MSU the other day was $570 and it will be more after the radiologist and labs add to it. They told me to plan on $800 to $900 total. Who knows how much the surgery would cost. At this moment Joe and I are leaning on not doing the surgery because it scares us to put her though this and she might not make it. They also told us she would probably need more surgery to try to remove some of the mass or have chemotherapy. They told us all these treatments or surgery are not curative. In other words, this is a battle that will eventually come to an end, just hopefully a little later. It is just too much to put her through all this. I am looking to try to change her diet to grain free which will stop feeding the cancer. Grains turn into sugar and sugar feeds cancer. Please keep our little Mallery in your prays. I am calling the Great Healer Jesus Christ to watch over her and to heal her, if she does in deed have more time on this earth with us.