November In Upper Michigan - Fall Is Over and Winter is Here

                                                        November 1, 2017

So I was sitting in the living room one evening and saw "AGAIN" a mouse run from the living room to the kitchen and into the laundry room. I saw this "rewind happening" in a early spring evening when we came back from Gulf Shores, AL."AGAIN" I didn't have my phone with me. Joe was in the man cave. I yelled at the top of my lungs, "Joe" at least 6 times before he heard me. He blocked off the laundry room. He looked behind the dryer and said the insect sticky pad was gone. I said the mouse probably got caught in it. And why is there no wall behind the dryer. I think this was the first time we had pulled out the dryer. The washer and dryer came with the house, so we didn't realize the wall was open. Joe put out some mouse traps, and because it was late we went to bed.

The next morning Joe pulled out the washer and found the sticky pad.The mouse evidently got caught in it and chewed his way out at least 3 times. Two days later, we caught a mouse in a trap. This mouse was grey, the one I saw was black.

So what's a women to do? She became a caulking crazy women filling every space she could find. I know the fireplace looks terrible. Don't worry, Joe shaved off the excess and then I caulked over it with a more like color. We found 2 holes behind the washer and dryer and filled them.

On November 4th,
 we had our first snow fall of about a 1/4 an inch.

By November 6, the snow was gone and the sun was out again.

One of the last outside winterizing job was to pull out the hose that feed lake water to our front yard.

The first of November I started an Elimination diet. I have eliminated beef, pork, gluten, dairy, coffee, tea, alcohol, night shades ( tomatoes, pepper, and potatoes) processed sugar, chocolate, eggs, corn, and  peanuts. For the last 7 to 8 years I have had acid reflux, and then gastrointestinal issues the last 4 years. (mainly stomach pain during the night). In the spring, I started working with a Functional Integrated Doctor for these issues. She put me on this diet for 4 weeks and then I will reintroduce the foods one at a time for 3 days watching for signs of an allergy, intolerance, or sensitivity from the offending food. If I get symptoms, I need to continue to eliminate the food for 6 months and recheck there after. (Picture above is of chicken, and roasted cabbage, carrots, onions, and turnips).

My doctor also did a in depth blood labs checking for deficiencies of vitamins, mineral, enzymes, and probiotics and more. I have been taking vitamins including C for years, yet I was in the high need for vitamin C, and borderline in others.

I am also in dangerously low of probiotics, even though I had been eating and drinking fermented food and drinks and taking probiotics. My doctor says my immune system is low because my stomach can not absorb the nutrients from the foods I eat and the vitamins that I take. I am taking 100 billion probiotics every night for 6 months, supplements that kill bad gut bacteria (that showed up in the lab test), and gut lining healing supplement for a month. I'll fill you in later on how things go.

When we moved into our place 4 years ago we had been left with 8 giant piles of cut up trees and branches in the woods behind us. The property behind us is not ours, but the wood piles is a great place for all kinds of varmint to live in, like MICE, snakes, skunks, and who knows what else. The people who own the property behind us also own the property behind the woods. The land and a house have been abandon for years. It was left to the adult children. We hired our tree man to chip up all the piles. They just arrived as I watched out our bedroom window.

They put something in that produces a large orange dust storm.

Here is one down tree and roots that has new trees growing up from it.

the woods were so dense in places, you could not see or walk in the woods.

As seen here.

This is the only pile Joe made when he cut branches out of  a tree when we had to get our bus backed into our drive the first year, which made 9 piles.

First pile into chips.

Looks much better.

and keeps getting better,

and better.

There were many cedar trees leaning on the front row of trees that we were afraid would come down on our house at night while asleep.

Like these trees,

and these trees.

These picture shows how bad these trees were leaning facing our bedroom.

What a mess. So glad it's all gone now.

There is a spring in the woods under this large down tree. You can see the crocks under the tree that use to be used by the very first owners who used it as drinking water 68 years ago.

Joe has to clean the screen a couple times a week, that takes the spring water through a tube under the alley and down under ground down our side yard to the gully in front of our house which empties into the lake. The screen gets clogged because of all the debris and muck that has broke down into organic debris. In the winter while we are gone, there is no one to clean the screen, so the spring spills over into the alley and down the drive creating a stream. This stream freezes over into a sheet of ice! When we come home in the March, it is hard to get into the drive because of the ice. By cleaning this mess up, we hope it will help eventually the tube from clogging up. I thought about calling the owner and telling him he needed to cut down the trees that were leaning toward our house, or when any fall on us, beware of being sued. But that takes time and in the meantime if any of them falls on us, death or injury can not be compensated with money. Last winter our neighbor's Mindy and Larry had trees at the very back of the woods come down, pushing tree after tree after tree down just missing their home. There was a total of about 8 trees down one from another. Cedar evergreens have very shallow roots and the roots are entwined together.

We only see these swan is the early spring and late fall. Oh and our old dock that was stacked up on the back side of the shed got sold for one seventh of what I paid for  the new dock. It sold at the going Craig's List rate, so I was happy it is gone.

Our neighbors house is coming along.

On November 9th,
 we got our second snow. A tad more then the first snow fall.

On the November 10, we dropped to a chilling 13 degrees.

It was so cold this morning, there was fog above the lake.

The lake was warmer than the the air.

The  fog started to rise up, as

it warmed up, and the fog lifted.

November 11
 Our 3rd snow fall 2 days later.

Joe started to complain daily about the cold and snow.

I myself enjoy it, if I could only stay inside and the mice would never come back. I have so many things I could catch up on, if we hibernated here for 3 months. The only other problems is my hands couldn't handle it with the cracks I get on my finger tips from the dry heat and low humidity of winter. And of course I would miss my girls and Nana kids.

I guess it's almost time to head down the road again.

Before the snow, we had like 10 days of rain, producing a leak somewhere around the fireplace. We have been dealing with this leak, (when we have long heavy rains) since we bought our place. First the chimney was caulked a couple times, then we re-roofed the cabin section of the house, which has showed it hasn't helped. We called the roofer to come back out to check the roof. It took all spring, summer, and fall, before he finally came. He gave us his opinion and work will have to wait until spring. Meanwhile Joe tarped the chimney.

November 19
Our 4th day of snow. All our snowfalls were of about enough to cover the ground and melted a few days later.

I had to get the laundry room's wall paper off and paneling painted so a laundry tub could be  installed this summer.The paint color is the same as the mud room but it is much darker because of no natural light. I might have to redo the color to something lighter in the spring.

November 24
Five days before we left, we had a warm up to 63 degrees. We went from 13 degrees to 63 degrees in 2 weeks.

I also did some chinking where I found gaping holes under the window in the guest room. I can't tell if it is sealed in the space, so I  sealed it anyway with new chinking.

The under side of the window after I chinked it.The chinking that my contractor used on our one new cabin window and recommended us to buy is different from the original. It is rougher and can not be smoothed out like the chinking between the logs. Good thing I took this picture, because I saw a hole I missed. I fixed it after this picture.

Last picture of our neighbors house going up, it will be finished when we see it next.

November29
We left Boyne City around 1:30, after we finally got our car packed for the road. Joe winterized our place for the first time this year, which entails, turning off the water, open all the facets, drain the piped, put antifreeze in all the traps, put antifreeze in all the toilets. Normally we have someone else do it. This saved us $300.  The first day we only made 3 1/2 hours before the sun started to set, so we stopped at the Red Roof Inn (2 star). Big Mistake- we stayed at this motel 2 years ago when it was newly remodeled. Can't believe how run down it got in two years. Picture above as we cross over into Louisville, KY the next day.
November 30
The 2nd Day Joe drove 9 hours to Franklin, KY, which is on the northern border of TN. We stayed at a 4 star motel, a Quality Inn, which we felt was only a 3 star. 

The 3rd day we encounter 3 slow downs, or complete stops which added to 30 minutes in all. This made our final drive at 9 hours. I took this picture of the field of cotton as we drove into Gulf Shores/Foley out skirts.

The sun was setting as we arrived to our winter home town for the next 3 months.