Ugly Sweater Run

So, my second ever 5k was another fun run. This one was interesting. You have to get the ugliest Christmas sweater you can find, then you run 3.2 miles in it. Even though it's Michigan and it's cold in the winter, it's still extremely hot running in the sweater. The temperature was about 30-40 degrees, but it didn't feel like it at the end.













The run was fun, there were a lot of different ugly sweaters, there were people dressed like Christmas Trees, as Ralphie from a Christmas Story, and of course, Buddy the Elf.

Part of the race packet included a knit cap, and a fake mustache (they were temporary tattoos). When the run was done all the runners, over the age of 21,  got two free beers. Of course after drinking our beers and taking numerous pictures with the Sam Adams Cardboard cut out, we had to take our new friend Sam with us to lunch. The waiter was great, he let us take his picture with it....

The best part was the beer drinking at the end and celebrating our run together. I made new friends and had a lot of fun! Can't wait for another race soon! I am going to start working towards a 10k next!

ArtPrize: 2013

Grand Rapids has this wonderful thing. ArtPrize. It's an open air art contest that is spread out throughout the city. The public is able to wander the streets and view different genres of art and vote on it for the artist to win a grand prize of 200,000 USD. Not to shabby. The contest lasts about two weeks and also has juried selections from art critics and those win cash prizes as well.

This is the fifth year of ArtPrize and it continues to grow and our city receives visitors from all around the world with their art.  My favorite part about ArtPrize is the diversity in the art. There are so many different genres, done in many different mediums, here are a few of my personal favorites.

Disclaimer: I am not any kind of art critic, I have no real understanding of art, these are my personal favorites for various reasons.



Some of my favorite choices this year include, a finger painting from DeVos center. This man paints as therapy for his epilepsy.  It is impossible to tell it was done with his fingers and it's an amazing piece of art with all the colors.  The title is "The Dance" and the artist is William LaGronde Jr.

Another favorite is "The Dog Show" by Michelle Anscombe. She painted it with Acrylics. It has a ton of show dogs in the painting and it's amazing 18.5 Feet of dogs.  Sadly this was in a place where few people saw it, on the Boardwalk Condominiums, they have 47 exhibits and it's in a far off place.








My personal favorite is "Griffin" by Robin Protz. She has entered ArtPrize 3 times. Last year when she entered she was disqualified because of a rule that the entry must be made within the last three years. She made a Dragon and the Dragon was actually made several years before, anyway the rule is now abolished, but the rules say artists can not enter an entry twice. This year is completely new. The last two years her pieces were made of metal, this year she used bamboo.




Next up there is Ann Loveless, she did a sewn piece of sleeping bear sand dunes. It is at the Gerald R. Ford Museum. It looks like a painting until you walk up close to it. I was mesmerized. I was told by several people that the stitching was not that impressive because it kind of like appliqué instead of stitching, but personally I was really impressed. It looks just like a painting until you get up close. I loved the little leaves sewn on for the trees and I loved the fact that it's a truly Michigan landmark.

"Mother Nature Dancing" is another piece that I love. It appears to be drift wood. The artist of this piece has been in the top ten art prize before. He created a work called "Ocean Exodus".  I really didn't care much for it, but now that I see the detail in this piece, I wonder if I didn't look hard enough at the other one, I wonder about all the things I might have missed.  This piece is amazing. As far as I could tell, (This is my interpretation, not the artist's) it looks as if there are two dancing Nymphs and several animals all over the piece. Even the back of it has animals, some of them are tucked away, half hidden, camouflaged by the wood. Every time I look at it I see something different.










There are so many pieces to see I couldn't possibly list them all. There are too many venues to visit. The best venues are usually the ones with less people on the outside of town. It's important to have some quiet. The examine the pieces, to communicate with it and really absorb the meaning. If it makes you cry, or unexplainably happy, or just plain confused. Sometimes when I don't understand the piece and I use the artists statement as a translator, but typically it isn't necessary. Art is interpretation,  the artist has placed it in front of you for a reason. Those reasons vary, but the bottom line is anything in the competition is for the public to look upon and make decisions. Art is to inspire.

Another disclaimer: I began writing this blog before the top ten was announced. I'm really conflicted as I've never liked so many pieces and actually had them make it in the top ten. I'm not sure what to do now. I guess I have to think about it.

Remodeling a Summer Cottage: Part One

Before the remodel 

A major part of my summer was the remodeling of my parent's cabin. When I was a child my father bought a small cabin from his sister. The cabin has been in our family since it was built in 1949. My father's Uncle built it by himself. He did not install electricity or plumbing at the time of building it.  Electricity was added later, but it has still never had plumbing. It has an outhouse.  It's foundation is cement that was poured into stove pipes than the house was built around them because the land he purchased is on a hill.

As a child my father would take us to the cabin for days at a time. We had a giant lake to swim in, a patio, and lots of places to walk and explore. We would pick berries, in the spring we had cherries, in June we had black berries, in July we had Dew Berries (That's what we called them, but I think they have a different name), and in August the Gooseberries were ripe. It was fun, it was a cycle. When I was fourteen we installed a raft. The raft was a lot of fun. We would take the boat into the swamp and look at all the bull frogs, lilly pads, and flowers. It's a place that means a lot to me.


Then there are the sounds. There is loons. They make the most soothing sounds.  They are an endangered bird and there aren't a lot of them this far south in Michigan, but our lake has two of them that return every year.

The first place we started on our remodel was on the roof, we started from the top down and the roof needed to be replaced. This was not a DYI project, so we hired Sam. He is a friend of my family. After talking to him about some of our plans, it became clear we needed to hire him. He saw our vision. We discussed the importance of starting on the roof and working around the rest of the house. This is only a summer cabin, but we wanted to make it as welcoming and protected from the elements as possible.

When the day came to do the roof Randy and I decided to work on the patio. Randy and I worked on the landscaping as much as we could. We built two retention walls on the patios. One near an old pump that my Great Uncle put in when he built the place. There were still railroad ties in the side of the hill. We had to dig them out because of all the erosion, so building brick retaining walls seemed like a great idea.  We had to do the job in two parts. The first part was the top patio, which took my husband about an hour to dig it out. As he was digging I had to the move the 22.5 lb.  blocks over the small hills and valleys from the truck to the patio. I could only handle four at a time in the wheel barrow and there were 100 of them. Needless to say, my arms were angry the next day and after all the digging Randy's body wasn't real happy either. I'm sure it was good for us.

The first retaining wall took us an entire day and used about 80 bricks. We liked it so well, and we had already decided to do something with the second patio, so it was only natural that the following week we built the second retaining wall down by the pump.  I planted some plants by the patio. I wanted perennials and they had to shade plants because of all the trees. The entire area is covered in moss, the grass is patchy at best, but there are a lot of plants, it being so close to the lake. I chose Hostas, Philox, and some lilies. There are a lot of Tiger lilies all over the hill near the second retaining wall.

This was just the first part of the remodeling project. After this we decided to work on the siding and making the inside look like a log cabin. Those projects took us about a month and I will write about them in a separate blog. It's a very special place to me and has been since I was a child. It's renewal is very important to me and all the time we took to do this project was well spent and will hopefully benefit us for years to come.

The Downtown Farmer's Market

There is nothing as wonderful as being able to peruse fruits and vegetables in an open air farmer's market. It's one of the things I love about spring and summer, being able to buy seasonal produce and plants from stands. It seems so much friendlier to talk to the vendors and purchase things directly from them.  Randy and I decided to go May 4th, as it was the first day of opening of the new market.

Celery Root

The market was bright and full of people. The booths all had similar stuff, honey, bread, vegetables, and even one rare beef jerky booth, which Randy wanted most of all. My favorite part of the farmer's market is the vegetables that I don't understand, like this celery root. I have no idea what a person would do with this thing. We ended up slicing it, steaming it, and mashing it with potatoes. It was delicious.

We bought potatoes (of course, they are my favorite starch and a staple in our house), the celery root, onions, potato bread, maple syrup, and Randy sampled a little be of the beef jerky. My favorite thing that we bought was the honey comb. I've never had honey comb before. It was a sweet treat.

Daffodils for sale 

Break dancers under the bridge 

There were also people break dancing and there was some other dances with hula hoops and music. It was a really busy place. I'm grateful to my husband for taking me out in the sunshine. It's nice to see such wonderful weather in Michigan, and we never take advantage of it as it's usually too hot, too cold, or there is some sort of precipitation.

This was where we went:

http://downtownmarketgr.com/