A Grand Old Time

My time on the island is sadly winding down. Just a few days left and I will be back in the real world where I can enjoy the luxury of cars and daily trips to Target. It's bittersweet to know that I will be leaving the island again soon. When I first arrived here, I knew two months was not going to be long enough, but now that the time is approaching, I know my old routine at home is waiting for me, and I am content with going back.

I have been able to enjoy many visits from friends and family this time around on the island, like I did the last trip. Lots of biking and exploring and shopping were the things to do. Each visit was spectacular and when each set of people left, it made me long to go home with them. However, I know my time up here is short and I will miss it as soon as I leave.

Last night several of my coworkers and I went up to the Cupola Bar at the Grand Hotel for our annual employee outing. So fun! We all got dressed up and met at the store, where we had wine, cheese, and grapes. Then we walked up to the Grand Hotel to the Cupola Bar. It is absolutely gorgeous up there. You can watch the sunset near the bridge and see the lights in the city and on the bridge. We all sat and talked and had a wonderful time. Then we made our way downstairs to the ballroom where the jazz band was playing and we danced and laughed again. Such a wonderful, fancy night.

Main Street

Nephews Crew 2012

Now all that's left is working, packing, and going to see all the places and things I want to see for the last time this trip. It has been a great couple of months and I am so blessed and thankful to have been able to come and work up here again this season.

Happy 4th of July. And Welcome Back, Anna Stornant!

I got to spend a nice time out tonight with my old roommate, Anna! It was sooo good to see her back on Mackinac. After the fireworks for the 4th tonight, we all went out to the Pony and of course Anna entertained us with her dancing, laughing, and spectacular air-flute playing! I miss that girl. She's a good one. She challenged me to write this tonight. So here I am, 2:20am, writing a post instead of sleeping because of Anna, haha.

The 4th of July was a good one. The store was busy today, and tonight I went up and watched the fireworks over the lake with Mandy and Cameron. The fireworks were awesome this year! Really impressed.

On another note, I feel bad for our air conditioner. It's hot in our apartment and our air conditioner runs constantly. Hardest working machine I've seen lately. Thank you air conditioner. You keep our kitchen and living room cool, but the bedrooms? Not so much.

Lemonade for Sale

Greetings from another beautiful day on Mackinac! The rain decided to take a break for today leaving us with a big clear blue sky and a warm breeze blowing.

 I went out for a little bike ride today and found myself up in the Village. While riding through and looking at all the houses, two little boys had set up a makeshift lemonade stand and were asking people as they rode or walked by if they would like some.  Well, since it was the cutest thing I have ever seen, I couldn't pass them up. So I got off my bike and walked up to their stand. One boy asked me if I wanted just lemonade or half and half: half iced tea and half lemonade.  I chose the half and half, and the one boy says "Everyone has been saying it's really good!" He reached for a cup and started to pour. All of a sudden, he got a weird look on his face and staring into the cup said, "There's a hair in here." But continued to pour my drink. I couldn't help but laugh inside, the poor boy didn't know what to do. I could tell he was struggling with whether to serve it to me or not. Not wanting to make him feel any more embarrassed, I told him it was okay, that I didn't mind there being a hair in my lemonade, and asked how much I owed them. "50 cents," said the older boy. I handed him 2 dollars, one for each of the boys. There faces lit up, "Thanks! Do you want any coins back?" I smiled again and said no. They were so excited.  "Look how much money we've made!" The older boy said, and he held up his zip-loc baggie of quarters and dollar bills. I thanked the boys for the delicious drink and as I got on my bike to peddle away, the littler boys says to me "Sorry again about the hair!" :D

Island Time...

I feel like one day blends right into the next here on the island. I'm never quite sure what the date is here or even what day of the week it is. Today was day 8 of 11 straight days of work and I'm going strong! I finally feel like I'm all settled back in remembering how to do everything at the store and actually knowing what merchandise we have so I can help customers find what they are looking for. 


The days have been going by fast. I can't believe that I've already been here almost a week and a half. I've been working lots, but I've also been playing lots. Mandy and I have been going on adventures or hanging out pretty much every night. We found a new biking trail that we love, so we've gone on 2 and 3 hour bike rides the last few nights. The second night, we took trail map with us (you'd think after all the times we've been out riding we wouldn't need to act like tourists anymore) to try to find Eagle Point Cave. But even with the maps help, we couldn't find it. Instead we found ourselves walking our bikes along yet another foot path with rocks and roots sticking up all over the path. It brought back flashbacks of my journey through the woods on a foot path two years ago when I began to think I was like Tom Hanks on Castaway. At least this time I didn't mind getting a little lost since I had good company. Perhaps we should have turned around right in the beginning of our ride/walk as we were trying to maneuver our bikes over the rocks and roots of trees, and Mandy yelled that there was a snake! I thought she was kidding at first to be mean, but sure enough I looked down right at her bike tire and saw that she had almost run over a large coiled up snake. We both screamed a little, and ran our bikes away fast. I hate snakes! Hate them. They make me sick. Needless to say, we were VERY careful about watching the path from that point on and careful about what we were running over. We never did find the cave...


Now to relax a little bit and listen to the rain outside my window. :)

Watching the sun set and the bridge at night

I've never seen such beautiful skies

One of my favorite sights

Welcome Back!

I'm back! I'm back! I'm back!

That's me being excited. I'm back on Mackinac Island for the next two months, so I figured it was high time to write in my island blog again.

I got back up here last Saturday, and after spending two glorious days on the island with my mom and sister, I started work again at Nephew's. I'm on day 4 and loving it! It is so good to be back. It took a day or two to get readjusted and remember everything that I'm supposed to be doing, but I really enjoy the new crew and being back in the store. I'm back in the same apartment as before, in my old room, with one of my old roommates. It's a good time. I love being here.

My family and I of course visited the Seabiscuit as one of our first meals back on the island. John, the owner, was so glad to see me back he brought out two free desserts with the "Seabiscuit" and "Welcome Back" written in chocolate on the plate underneath. So SWEET! And delicious! It was an awesome welcome.

Haven't gotten to do much exploring yet. Mandy and I went on a 3 hour bike ride tonight and found a new trail that we both liked a lot. We'll probably go out again tomorrow so I'm super pumped about that. I need to start running here again, too. Laura, Andrea, and I ran a 5k the weekend before I moved up here, so I'd like to build on that and hopefully get back to running around the island.

Ah! I just can't believe I'm back up here again! I get to wake up to the water every day. I'm so incredibly happy. I know it's only for 2 months, and then it will be back to working at the school, but I'm going to enjoy every minute of the time I've got.

Visitors are always welcome!

Reunited and it feels so good!

Showing some love from the Seabiscuit

Flowers at Marquette Park

I live on an island, and I love it.