I don't have much to post, but a few pictures to share. Please excuse my horrible photography, these are off my phone.

Heather has completed driver's training. Now for the next 6 months we need to log 100 hours, 10 of which are at night. Against the advice of the instructors, what a better way to log hours than to take a trip to visit family. So 2 days after receiving her permit, we loaded up and headed to Columbus. 11 1/2 hours down, 88 1/2to go. Now that the weather is cooperating (which it wasn't so much on our trip, by the way) we may have to take a drive to Geneva!! And I believe Ann Arbor is in our very near future as well, to visit with Rachel and Jameson. While we're there, we may as well take in some shopping at Birch Run. She is doing quite well, given that she lacked the cabin driving that Matt and Mike experienced for at least 3 years prior to their legal driving. She continues to excel academically, as well. It is very important to her to do well, so she can pursue her dream of teaching kindergarten. Most of you know her school of choice is Texas Tech. Which has a great education program. And Uncle Luke has told her that Texas is a great place to teach.

The boys are doing very well in their programs at MMI. They do not care too much for Phoenix (it is too BIG and too HOT). But they are nearly 1/3 of the way done. I know Mike is very homesick and they really have no time (or money) to visit. They had just one week off at Christmas, and that is it until Christmas 2010. But we communicate several times a week via cell phone. As soon as his computer is fixed I think we are going to attempt video chat. When he has this capability, I will let you all know!

Here are some pictures of our trip to Patty's. We went mini bowling, and CeCe did a mini fashion show for me, of course when we weren't watching The Brady Bunch. I am still amazed at the amount of snow that fell. (And I'm from Michigan)

Cruefest2

Kelly, Tammie Keim, and Mike Cox. And that is Mike's son Brandon in the green next to him. I had to snap this picture and send to Sara, wish she could have been there with us.



Bring back memories, anyone? I just couldn't resist when I saw this car pulling into the parking lot.



Kelly and I. She hasn't changed one bit. We had the BEST time.




The Zimmer clan. Jake is 15 and Cole is 13. It was the first time that I've met them. It was great to get together with our kids for the day.



Heather and I tailgating! What a fun day we had spent with eachother and great friends.

Well, that's the update for now. The boys leave for Arizona on Wednesday, Sept. 2nd. Keep them in your thoughts/prayers that they have safe travels.

Glasses

Not much to report. But I needed to post something, just to keep up with the rest of you.

Another school year is winding down. Heather is finishing up her freshman year, and Michael has completed his senior year. As you can see from the pictue, she's joined the ranks of the 4-eyed. She's almost the same age Mike was when he got glasses, but by far WAY older than Sara and I were (2nd grade).

One more year down ....

Well, another year bites the dust!!! And you know I don't feel any older than I did ... sure I have to hold stuff a little further away from my eyes to read. And my bones ache after sitting in one spot too long. And I'm a tad forgetful. But, still that's not old!!! We celebrated the day after by going to the Motley Crue concert, now those guys, are old. We took the kids, this is Heather's favorite band. I am so glad we shared this experience. She will have this memory forever. Kinda like the Beach Boys concert that Mom and Dad took us to when we were 12. It was almost 5 hours of pure rock and roll. There were 3 groups that opened up for them, The Last Vegas (out of Chicago), Theory of a Deadman, and Hinder. ALL were fantastic. And the Crue ... well, they were just awesome.

We are all doing pretty well. We both made it through the large cuts that our companies made and have jobs to go to every day. So, I count my blessings every day. We got the financial aid paperwork completed and filed for Matt and Mike. Now we just need to get Michael a job and a car. Say a prayer that he finds something soon. Even McDonald's isn't hiring. It's crazy.

Old Friends ...

Thanks to the world wide web, I have reconnected with an old friend. Come to find out she lives just up the road, so to speak, within 15 miles anyway.

We met for a 2 1/2 hour cup of coffee the week after Christmas. You'd never know that it's been more than 20 years since we actually had a conversation.

Patti says hi to all the Cronley's and had some good memories to share that I'd forgotten.

I think I probably sent all this out in an email, but I wanted to post the picture that she shared with me.

Not too much is happening in the frozen tundra. We get a dusting (or dumping) of snow almost every day. It so reminds me of the olden days, you remember when I was a kid. I wished Rachel and happy 42, yesterday. That means that ours is right around the corner.

Work is good, busy!!! Which I am grateful for. We just downsized globally nearly 100 employees. The 2nd restructuring in 9 months. Just pray for our state, there are so many people without jobs, the unemployment office fielded 6,000,000 calls in the month of December alone.

Hope everyone is healthy, and keeping warm. Boog/Tracey, you are probably loving the freeze, what is it there now ... 70???

Winters Remembered

Here are a few pictures of our gigantic snowfall. This was the morning after the first snowfall, on Dec. 19.


After this snowfall, we had a one day break, and received another 3-6 inches daily until Christmas Day.



Upon returning home from our very fast trip to John/Suzanne's, we had nearly NO snow. But it's snowing (kind of) this morning. Geneva is a wonderful place! I am so happy to have family members so close!! (At least close according to the Cronley definition.) I hope everyone had a safe and happy holiday!!!!

Here is the new house. This was taken a couple weekends ago, when the weather was beautiful and we were trying to get some leaves cleaned up. I absolutely love it!!! It's nice to have us all on one level again. I miss having a master bath, but don't miss the time it took to clean 3 bathrooms, and all those stairs!!!

Also is a picture of the new Jeep in the garage. It's also fantastic!!!

The weather is now what it should be. 20's at night, 30's during the day ... we even got a dusting of snow, just in time for opening day. Hopefully I'll have some good news from Dale and Mike's hunt!

A trip back in time

We made a trip to Battle Creek to the Binder Park Zoo on Saturday. On our way home, we drove through the old circle neighborhood. People probably thought I was nutz taking pictures of their homes, but I wanted to take this trip with all of you. Watkins Ln, looked beautiful. The homes have ALL been kept very well, and I was naming all our old neighbors as we drove around the circle. The Lemaires, the Leightons, Tabors, Pughs, Mohrs, Clarks, it certainly brought back some AWESOME memories of my life. I remembered the blizzard in '78 when we walked out to the corner to meet Dad with groceries. The bronco II only made it so far. We ice skated around the circle, and went sledding down the big hill in the back yard. Who remembers the gigantic snowball we rolled between our house and Clark's?? It was so big the dads had to come and help. How come I can remember these thoughts like they were yesterday, but can't remember what I ate for breakfast most days??? HAHAHA

Canada Trip

Well, we set off on Wednesday morning around 7:15 am. We stopped once for breakfast, and another time for gas (note to self: purchase petro in the USA) just over the border in Canada. We arrived in Toronto at about 1:30 pm, with the WRONG mapquest directions. So, after stopping for directions, and calling the hotel once we got in the city. We arrived at the hotel at 2:50. It was beautiful!!! We drove in on Lakeshore drive, it reminded me of Lakeshore drive in Chicago. Ontario Place is on Lakeshore, so I had to wave as we went past.


After we checked in, we hit the streets. I imagine that downtown Toronto is a lot like Manhattan, with skinnier sidewalks. We didn't have a specific destination, just wanted to check things out. We found the Hockey Hall of Fame, which was our destination for Thursday. It is an old building and the only way to get to it is from the underground tunnels. Did I mention that the entire city is connected underground? Not only by the subway, but there are concourse shopping centers/food courts/banks, etc ...... It reminded me of an airport concourse, except that it's all underground. I imagine it's nice in the winter time!!!

We had lunch at Shopsy's. http://www.shopsys.ca/ I had to try the burger that is a Food Network award winner in the hamburger cook off. It was ground beef mixed with lamb and special spices. I have to say I much prefer an ALL beef burger. Nearly EVERY restaurant downtown had an outside patio, and after 5 pm, they were always full of people. Shopsy's after 5, was biker haven (not the greasy scarey kind)!!!! I'd not seen so many motorcycles parked along a city street except in the movies.

We walked around the city, above and below until almost dinner. We went to the Old Spaghetti Factory for dinner. http://www.oldspaghettifactory.ca/ It was amazing!!! I had the goatcheese agnolotti (?). Then after dinner and a little rest at the hotel, we hit the streets again. We were trying to find the old Maple Leaf Gardens. We walked and walked and decided we would check the map and try again on Thursday. We walked one block over from the mainstream and headed back to Novotel Hotel, saw a few bums along the way and walked faster.


We awoke early on Thursday. Went to go find breakfast.... we found http://www.sunsetgrill.ca/ We had breakfast and headed further north to the Maple Leaf Gardens. We found it, and can you believe we'd turned back the night before only a couple blocks away???? Go figure ...... It is considered a landmark now, and is a very old building, built in 1931. We will find the new Air Canada Center later.

Dale and I ventured down to St. Lawrence Market while Heather took a rest at the hotel ... Mom, this was awesome!!!!! It was all enclosed, and warm, but was pretty cool!!! We also found St. Michael's Cathedral. There were two other churches along this street, appropriately named Church Street. I had to take pictures of all of them. http://www.stmichaelscathedral.com/

Then we headed to the Hockey Hall of Fame. It was very cool, especially with the Wings winning the Stanley cup this season. It was a bit smaller than we expected and we had to wonder where they will put new stuff. You can see it in about 2 hours. The upstairs hall, where they keep the Stanley cup, was full of 16 other major trophy's, of which 1/2 were won by Wings players this season. It seems as if nearly the other 1/2 were won by Alex Ovechkin, from Washington. His story is pretty cool, if you're ever interested. His mother is his agent and negotiated his contract.

After the hall, we had lunch at http://www.bottomlinerestaurant.com/ . It was a bit upscale, but the food was delicious!!!

After some more exploration in the underground, we were just amazed, we headed to the CN Tower, by way of the Air Canada Center. The http://www.cntower.ca/portal/ is the tallest building in the world. We decided the expense was worth a trip part way up to view the city, money well spent!!! The pictures are a little crazy, as the flash left a glare in them. I suppose we could have turned it off, but we didn't. The view was amazing!!!! Following the tower, we walked a little more in search of a take out pizza place!!! Went back to the hotel and crashed.

Friday morning, up at at 'em early again. Checked out of the hotel, and got directions to Niagara Falls. It was pouring rain the whole 131 km drive from the hotel to the falls. Just as we were pulling into the parking lot, the rain stopped. (Thanks, Dad) We saw a Cardinal in the parking lot, and headed down to the walk along the falls. It is pretty much as I remember it.... except there are high rise hotels and a casino, maybe they were there and I just didn't pay attention. We walked along the falls, and got drenched, as it was fairly windy. Got some great photos, and even a video. Waved at New York, and looked at ALL the traffic on the bridge. We did a little shopping at Hard Rock Cafe and looked at all the pictures/guitars, etc.... all of the walls. That was pretty cool, too!

Then we headed for home. Found a nice restaurant in Brantford, ON (birthplace of Wayne Gretzky) to spend the remainder of our Canadian currency. It was delicious!!!!!

We arrived home at 8:30 pm last evening.

All in all a great and glorious 3 days...... the drive was easy, minus construction would have been perfect!!!

Highly recommend for the next Cronley get together!!!!!!!

Click the links for more pictures. The ones labeled "view" are from the CN Tower.

http://s126.photobucket.com/albums/p99/maurapalmer/?action=view¤t=17ccaca4.pbw

http://s126.photobucket.com/albums/p99/maurapalmer/?action=view¤t=a0426893.pbw

Going to Toronto .... eh?

Tomorrow is the day we are hitting the road, in our NEW car. It was time to ditch the gas hog truck! We got a great deal on a 2006 Chevy Impala with 39K miles, and the trade was nearly even. TOO good to pass up, and just in time for the trip. Which means that I'll be in the back seat with Heather, since Mike's limbs just don't fit a back seat anymore.

We plan to head off at 7 am, and I wish I had Aunt Priscilla's log book of our trip (I think I left it with Patty?). It would be fun to compare notes. I am so lucky that X-Rite has purchased a lap top computer for me, so that I can take some work on the road. (truthfully, with the 6 hour drive, and being gone for 3 days, it doesn't bother me a bit)... It will also save on the potential pile of work when I return.

Last week, I was visited by two very special ladies. MOM and Aunt CeCe stopped in at work and had a cup of coffee with me on their way to the cabin. You'll have to get the details from them about where I work. I don't want to spoil their story.

I look forward to fun filled tales of Canada and hope to get something posted over the weekend. If I don't, I'm sure Heather will. She's much better at this than I. I'm sure you'll see a different layout every time you visit :o) .

~ ttfn

Heather's new hair!

So as of yesterday, June 30th, I dyed Heather's hair. This was my first time ever. I helped her pick out the color and we chose Intense Auburn. She really likes it. But Dale wasn't too happy about it. (: When the sun hits it, it looks really red-orange, and when it's not, it looks dark red. (: What do you guys think? :]


~~~posted by Heather

Short Vacation Getaway

In keeping with the Cronley summer vacation tradition, highly scaled down. We are taking a 3 day 2 night trip to Toronto in two weeks.

The kids voted this trip over a Cedar Point trip. Heather was there for her 8th grade field trip. Michael doesn't like the rides, and neither does Dale. And I have to admit, I'm a bit of a sissy when it comes to the big ones.

So, we have decided on the Hockey Hall of Fame. It is about a 6 hour drive (just a little longer than Patty's). I think the rest of the trip will be ad lib. I'd like to venture to Niagara Falls, but don't know if we can squeeze it all in. If it's something we decide to do again, that is definately in the plans. I'm excited to see the underground shopping mall!!! We are staying downtown at Novotel Toronto Centre.

http://www.novotel.com/novotel/fichehotel/gb/nov/0931/fiche_hotel.shtml

I'll be sure to take lots of pictures!

I've caved

Well, I guess I've caved to the world of blogging. I can't guarantee we will have much to post, but I'll do my best.

It's supposedly summer (well almost) here in the Great Lake state.... but it's only 60 degrees today. I actually ran my heater in the van this morning and also at lunch time. We've had so much rain, I can't remember when I've seen our grass so green.

I completed a couple projects over Memorial Day weekend. The back deck is stained, and I got some hostas (free!) planted along the side of the house. I still need to get 2 rose bushes planted that Mike gave me for mother's day. But, I've got to get the railing stained first. Dale replaced some rotted out boards on the corner planter, and I'm waiting for the new wood to dry before I can stain. Ahhhhh the joys of home ownership!!!

Heather is quite the brainiac when it comes to birds. So we've hung a birdfeeder and a suet thingy in the ONLY tree in our yard. I've seen birds there that I've not seen in our yard before. We have a cardinal that visits several times a day, and always makes me smile. It is almost like watching the birds at the cabin. Only without the wonderful variety.

Well .... TTFN!

We have gotten a new camera, so I hope to have some pictures to be able to post soon!!!