Craigslist....

We got such a chuckle out of these posts...I had to share them with you!

These were on CL, the first & second were the posts just as they were on CL.
The last one is someone else that responded to it!
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message chair ijoy $400 chair for frad (grand rapids)
Date: 2009-08-28, 3:02PM EDTReply to: sale-5jd6a-1347195201@craigslist.org

2 years old no rips no tares sat in the storage for most of its life its black and the messages are intense at first i would like to trad it for a weight bench and the weights and or a decent sounding fender,gipson,washburn,or pv with a decint amp like marchall broomdude@yahoo.com or 616-881-8252

$400 ijoy message chair - $300 (grand rapids)
Date: 2009-08-28, 3:11PM EDTReply to: sale-yaxag-1347213682@craigslist.org

color: black
sat in storage unit most of its life
2years old no rips no damages
intense until you get used to it
google ijoy chair for a pic and more details
reclines 180 degrees
call me or email me at broomdude@yahoo.com or call 616-881-8252
p.s jusus is coming back soon so get ready :)


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Re: message chair ijoy $400 chair for frad - $1 (spell check)
Date: 2009-08-28, 5:46PM EDTReply to: sale-qeqms-1347489718@craigslist.org

Dude, get help. Your lack of correct spelling is killing me. Have mom proofread it please.


Ya got to love people!

Fredrick Meijer Gardens....

Trent and I had the privilege of visiting F. Meijers Gardens on Wednesday.We went with the school for a, lets just say, a pre-school field trip.

They did some classroom work making their own sculptures. I was helping a table of six girls...lets just say ours was 'less than beautiful'! What can we say....it was a bag of metal pieces and nuts and bolts!

Here is Trent with their 'sculpture'.....he was helped by 4 other kids.

Here we are in the classroom.

We took the kid tram around to look at the sculptures and gardens. It has been years, maybe 6, since I have been here and they have added a lot! I don't think I had seen the waterfall area..very nice!

This was a sculpture using letter shaped metal to form people. The kids had to find the first letter of their name.

Here is my group....taking a break. Notice I had all girls! They all behaved perfectly! We had a fun day together! Trent was acting as a monkey!

We were on a 'clipboard hide and seek'. We were given a small picture of a larger sculpture and then we had to find it...when we found them all, we could solve the puzzle. Again, these kids were at a disadvantage with me as their leader! If you know me well, I'm directionally challenged. So, needless to say, we did, shall I say, just a wee bit of back tracking! Just in case you are wondering...we did find all the sculptures...we only had to cut through the grass once to get to our sculpture...it's okay, no one saw us!

Here is the waterfall area I spoke of earlier.

They have a wonderful kids area....we unfortunately, were only able to enjoy it for a short while!

Trent enjoying his day!

Catch Up....

Rose of Sharon....

This is my Rose of Sharon Bush...it's just now blooming. I planted this after my mom died..so it's in memory of her. She loved flowers and her name was Sharon....how fitting!

Our 1st Annual Block Party....

A Success! Sunday we had our 1st block party. We invited 13 families that live along North Main. Almost all were able to attend....Yeah!

The kids went swimming

Troy, Trent and Breegan

Jack

enjoying our potluck style food

Men and their grills

30 neighbors attended. We have great neighbors..I will be truly sad if any of them move. We all get along so good. We all help each other. The younger help the older and the middle aged...well, I don't know what they do! We share tools and resources..not all neighborhoods can say this!

A Memorial Service for Grandma B.....

We gathered to have a belated memorial service for G-ma B, she died last fall.

Trent

Cousins

Steve and Joanne

joanne

'The Brothers'

Do you see any similarities? Na...I didn't think so!

Oops..sorry Mike, not the best picture of you!

Doing It BIG!....

On Friday, we had our stump from the recent storm removed. We do it big here in MI. No shovels, axes, ropes, chainsaws.... Nope, we get right down to business and 'Git'r Done!'


They came in and pulled that baby out...it was so fast, I almost didn't get my camera in time.


Up, Up, UP and over the fence. Now we are left with a crater hole. The boys immediately jumped in and started playing Army in their new bunker!

Blueberry Babes....

Before Grandma Elsie flew home we were able to go pick blueberries. We ventured over to a field in Nunica...why you ask? It would have been to easy to head to the field that is 3 miles from my house!

The real reason $$. You guessed it....we will try for miles to save on our berries! They were priced at a measly .40 lb! Much cheaper than the 1.50 at area farms. Anything for a bargain! They did fail to tell us they were Blueberry trees not bushes! We need to be a giraffe to get them!

We did pick about 2 lbs each..a whopping .80! We told the farmer

to 'keep the change'.... kinda felt bad

paying only a dollar. We had lots of laughs and made some fun memories!

Here's Janice and G-ma Elsie sharing a picking moment. We can't take Grandma anywhere...she thought she was a sailor!

A Boys Battle.....

Troy has been busy directing and editing a movie with the neighbor kids. Trent is the one on the deck as the sniper, Troy is filming & Breaden, Breegan & Landin are actors.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5ZXSZFqAiU

A movie only a Dad & Mom could love.....

Hibiscus Hiatus....

My Hibiscus has finally bloomed! This is one of those plants that are a lot of work! A lot of times it's....'more work than it's worth!'

I personally think it has feelings....it must have known! I've been thinking....maybe I should just get rid of it.

I have to bring it in during the cold months, which is anything colder than 50. I can't just store it in the basement...no....it has to be in a draft free place....right in the living room. We have to stumble around it all winter. Then it has the audacity to not bloom all summer. All that work and nothing but a big Japanese Beetle Attractor.

Well, we have a bloom....okay, so maybe one more summer...but if you don't bloom better than this next year....

Hodge Podge...

Here we are enjoying a Sunday Dinner at Oakridge.

Trent, Tyler & G-ma Elsie

Tyler

Troy, Steve,Trent & Tyler

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We had dinner at Dad & Linda's

Trent & Linda play ball in the background

a little game of Euchre going on!

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We went to see a Science show at Maranatha in Muskegon. It was a beautiful night!

Here is the man doing an experiment with a volunteer from the audience.

It was very techy...Linda & I spent a lot of time saying "what is he talking about?"

He put a 1 million volts of electricity through his body. That was impressive!!

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Ladies Breakaway at Maranatha

The speaker was Gloria Gaither a well know singer, songwriter and lyricist

Kelly and Joanne on the beach at Lake Michigan.
This was on our lunch break while at Maranatha.

Liz and Cosy enjoying the swing down on the beach.

Listening to the speaker. There's Linda..third one down..yellow shirt.


Fun Fact...Gloria was born and raised near Battle Creek MI! I never knew! And she really never saw herself as a singer!

Just Getting Ready To....

make a post about last week, when a storm literally blew through Kent City. It hit on Sunday around 6:30pm.

I was arriving home from an Alpine run when it started looking dark in the distance....hmmmm? The winds were blowing sticks an leaves around the van as I proceeded up M-37. As I pulled in the driveway I was asking Steve to go move a large branch off the

road because people couldn't get around it. His response.."I can't, a tree just fell on the garage".

I think the winds were clocked at 70 mph. It was over almost before it began....next time Steve looked at the 'branch in the road'...it was now a tree!!

For the next couple hours, we did a lot of walking around town

seeing the damage....and there was a lot to see! Everyone had limbs and tree's down....and power lines were laying on the ground!

Steve and another neighbor stood at 18 mile road re-directing traffic around town. They were there for about 3 hours. Normally the Fire guys do that but they were busy putting out a house fire.

All is getting back to normal now...power came back on Wed. at 11am. PTL!! It was getting old!

We have a lot of work that needs to be done. Garage repair (fixing overhang, soffit & re-roofing the entire side of the garage), yard

clean up, estimates, insurance dealings...... Steve just tried to turn the hot tub back on....no power....hmmmm? Maybe a larger home owners claim than we had expected?????

(A neighbor's tree)

We are thankful to God for his protection of all of us! It's a great reminder of how powerful of a God we serve. They call these....Acts of God...for good reason!

We have no power..big storm came through Sunday evening. Tree on Garage...pics and post later! At Burger King....

Sights of the Parade...

Grand Haven Coast Guard Festival Parade.....

Here we are waiting for the parade to begin

We arrived at about 10am and had a hard time maneuvering around the city and finding a parking spot. Some people were selling their drive way spots for $10!

The whole town is already 'taken' when you get there...it's very

discouraging! They allow people to 'mark' their spots on Friday am...not allowing for out-of-town guests. We did find a beautiful spot right on a corner....which they can't mark because it is a cross walk. Once the parade begins....people are 4-5 deep and in some spots, even deeper!

They have 160 floats in the parade..so it's pretty long! We got sprinkled on a few times..but nothing serious!

I took a lot of grief over this picture...it's not a great shot..but you can read that it's the coach for the Pittsburgh Penguins. If you didn't know, they beat the Detroit Red Wings in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Dan is from Grand Haven originally.

No parade is complete without the Scottsville Band! If you have ever seen them, you know what I'm talking about!

Bag pipes

A clown

K-9 dog

We had a good time together. We stopped at Red Robin to eat on the way home. We had won a $10 gift certificate at the Gluten Free Food Fair a couple months back..so we decide to use it. They accommodated the GF kids very nicely. It's always very scary taking then out to eat!