Christmas Eve

Sometime during my six-day stretch of work, I managed to bake a small batch of cookies. It just doesn't feel right with Christmas without making spritz cookies using my antique cookie press. I found out though I'm not much of a cookie decorator.
At last, I got everything I needed to complete at work done on this Christmas Eve, racing with time after a UPS drop off. So that's how an elf feels on every Christmas Eve! But within an hour of me getting off work, Joe had our special shrimp and steak dinner ready with a special bottle of wine. 

 It was also worth having whipped up homemade tiramisu yesterday morning as special dessert. Everything tasted so good that we didn't mind doing the dishes. Now it's time to sit and relax and watch "A Christmas Story." Merry Christmas to all!

It's Cold Outside!

It has snowed on and off since last post, but nothing major. Under 6" at a time, mostly an inch or two. Still, the temperatures have stayed cold enough that our massive snow banks are staying impressive. When it's REALLY cold, like today's high temp was 7 degrees, a hearty venison stew dinner with homemade dumplings feels just right.
This month of December is disappearing fast. I managed to rush to print our holiday cards the other day... but ink is still drying! 

Asides from finishing up the greeting cards to be mailed out, I am all done with my holiday gift giving preparation. I am hoping to make some cookies, but today was my last day off before Christmas. I hope to survive the next 6 days of work. Oh Boy. Wish me luck.

Yet Another Snow Storm

I survived another Black Friday weekend at work. When you work in retail, you have no desire to participate in such events. The only purchase we made over this weekend was a brand new snow blower. After 10 plus years of heavy use, it was time to replace ours before it died completely, and definitely before this winter storm started last night.

As they predicted we received another foot and half of snow over night. Simply impressive. (Disclaimer: the picture below was taken this morning, not recycled from the other day)

Thank goodness, I had this Sunday off from work. We had a lazy morning, letting it snow (the storm continued). Except I had picked out a new faucet for our kitchen for my birthday and patiently been waiting for Joe the plumber. Cooped up inside the house on this snowy morning, I couldn't wait anymore. Joe had to install it for me, and I tried my best assisting him. I love my new kitchen faucet to fit our retro (more accurately "just plain old") sink!

And guess what? It's still SNOWING!!

Thanksgiving!?

Happy belated Thanksgiving to you all!
We received LOTS of wet heavy snow on the day before... about 1 1/2 feet in 24 hours, during which we removed snow at least 3 times. All of the snow in the pictures came from one storm. And we are expecting another foot of snow later tomorrow, if you can believe it.

We ended up hosting a Thanksgiving gathering at our house. Since there were only four of us, Mom and brother Mark and us, it was easier to do an unorthodox no-turkey dinner at our place, including popcorn and toast (with homemade grape jelly) after Charlie Brown.

For the main feast, we had venison and salmon tacos with our usual Mexican fixings plus cranberry salsa and wild rice with morel mushrooms. We thought the original pilgrims would be proud of our table filled with our own catches (venison and salmon) and gatherings (grapes and mushrooms). But to be honest, we were most thankful that we never lost power at our house and that Joe's snow blower worked hard to clear our driveway.

Date with a Dead Deer

Joe's deer season lasted 3 days this year... but it was a good thing because he couldn't take time off from work this week. Still, he managed to have a morning off today to go on a little date. Our main destination was a new pastry shop 30 minutes south, but we first went to drop off Joe's deer to get butchered and processed. The temperatures have gone up, warm enough to rain today though it soon changed to light snow.

On such a wet grey morning it was delightful to have coffee and croissants and to visit with our good friend. A nice little recharge before the weekend is here.

Deer Season

It's hard to remember Joe sighted his deer rifle in his Hawaiian shirt the last weekend of October. This November has been pretty cold, temps dipping down to zero as in our normal January or February. A week prior to the opening day of deer season Joe got 20 inches of snow where he hunts, while we received only dusting up on the hill at our house (a rare occasion). 

Joe did have a very good reason to be excited about deer season though. A beautiful 8-pointer showed up regularly on his trail cam, chasing after does. The only problem was that he and all other deer moved around exclusively during the night. 

 The first two days of deer season were uneventful... as expected.

Day 3: this morning Joe shot this respectable 5-point. I wish I had gone along to take a nap again like yesterday... but I had a feeling that Joe might get a buck if I stayed home. Now we are going off to have celebratory drinks.  

First Snow

Almost forgot to post the picture of our first snow of the season. Our official first snow (or snowflakes) came on the 11th. We woke up to 1-2 inches of wet snow next morning, which melted completely the same day. This is our avarage. The first snow just before my birthday is what I expect every year.

Joe took me out to our favorite Cajun restaurant on my birthday to celebrate, with a fruity drink, Gulf shrimp and oyster, Voodoo wings, and bread pudding for dessert. It was a nice short escape/vacation from the chilly wet storm outside, which destroyed our local lakeshore with monster waves.

Fall Colors

It's hard to believe November is just around the corner.... Not ready. But the autumn up here has been spectacular... We've been enjoying fall colors for almost 2 months, in stages. The long lasting fall color show made us lose track of time. 
We took some drives and hikes not far from home, but a bit out of way from our daily commute routes, time to time to enjoy the season from different perspectives.
Last week when we had a tire appointment for our Subaru in town, we strolled around the neighborhood for an hour. We ended up at Park Cemetery where our wedding pictures were taken. Even that was enjoyable.

Last Sunday we took a day trip eastward along the lakeshore to Grand Marais, MI. The summer tourist season is over, so we enjoyed the quiet drive on rural roads. The highlight was rock picking on different beaches. As we walked on the beach with the setting sun after dinner, the fog line moved in like stage curtains. A cool dramatic effect... except no chance of observing the meteor showers predicted for that night.

Grape Jelly!

On Monday evening Joe picked our first batch of grapes. In an hour he selectively picked only fully ripe bunches to fill a grocery bag full. Almost 15 pounds. Then he spent 2 more hours taking the stems off. All the hard work was done. So today, my day off, I had my first jelly making session of the season. Our goal is to stock up on enough grape jelly to last for a year of PBJ sandwich lunch for the two of us. Surely we have enough grapes this year. We will be sharing our jelly with everyone. 

End of Trout Season

We both took the last weekend of trout season off from work, including Monday. Joe got to start his weekend on Friday afternoon. He fished Apple Creek in rain and came home with 2 salmon, about 22". We fully intended to fish the rest of weekend, so I watched a YouTube video to fillet the fish, which took a fraction of space in the freezer.
The weekend forecast didn't look the best. Saturday being the nicest day, we took a small road trip. Of course, we had to fish a little on the road. We didn't catch a big one, but the fall color was beautiful.

Lake of the Clouds... it had been a while. We did some rock picking on the beach, but mostly watched our changing skies with dramatic clouds. We were really hoping for the sky to clear at night to be able to see northern lights. We ended up staying up past midnight at the lakeshore close to home, just as the thin cloud cover moved in. Oh well.

Sunday we went back to Apple Creek. It was rather quiet in the woods. Fish were not very active, though we saw a few underwater. The only good size fish we caught was my brown trout, which probably came upstream to spawn. I let it go after the picture was taken. You can tell the fish is still alive!

On our way home after fishing, we stopped to try a new BBQ smoke house. Everything was very tasty.... we'll have to introduce it to our friends. After this treat though, we worked hard at home, finishing painting the rest of house, at least as high as we could reach. Only because it didn't rain as predicted. Phew.

Monday, the last day of trout season, was stormy all day. Thunder and heavy rain on and off. We needed a pick-me-up, so I made an oven-baked pancake with wild apples for breakfast. We kept checking the hourly weather forecast, hoping to go out fishing one last time later in the day. We did drive to check out the river at 5pm, but the water level was too high to fish or even access at some areas. So ended another season. We must say it was a pretty good season.

Seasonal Table

Talk about the taste of fall.... we received a huge bag of wild apples from Ironwood last week. I had to make an apple pie.

We had apple pie a la mode for breakfast for a few days. Perfect before fishing and even on work days.

Also we got various garden tomatoes from a few different sources. Just enough to make a batch of tomato sauce with venison meatballs.
We are lucky if we could have fresh tomato sauce once a year with our limited growing season up this north... so we savor the taste of late summer in every bite this time of year.

Fall Salmon, Finally!

It's been a whole month of frustration NOT being able to catch the fall salmon. Worse when we could see them under water, yet they swam away from our lure, crawler, and whatever else we offered. Finally, that accumulating anticipation for our annual event is over.
This Saturday morning was very picturesque, every which way we looked. The clouds in the sky, trees, the water.... We couldn't see much in the dark water at first, but I caught a salmon on my first cast. Of course, then, Joe really needed to catch his own.

Joe had to work a bit harder to catch his salmon downstream, quite expertly presenting his lure to the fish. Both salmon were19", bright silver color indicating that they had just come up from the big lake. One male, one female.

Next evening we had sushi rolls with cooked fresh salmon and roe. The best part was that our wait was over. We could relax and enjoy the taste of fall. Happy Fall to all!

Before & After: Minor Siding Repair

One urgent fix we needed before winter was the few rows of siding meeting the porch roof. Neither of us were experienced enough for this project... so our most trusted contractor P&J from Ironwood came to rescue us. Thank you!!!
And our grapes started to turn colors. It looks like we are going to have lots of work making jelly in a few weeks!

Pork Banh Mi

We are still chasing the fall salmon.... The first one is always the hardest to catch.
Good thing we had a dinner plan this past weekend. Joe wanted to try a Banh Mi sandwich recipe with grilled pork tenderloin. It was so good!

Fall Is Here

At the end of short summer, Time especially flies by. Mostly due to chasing hard after any sign of fall salmon first, then trying to catch one. This Saturday Joe spotted a bunch of large salmon in the stream. So far, fish vs. Joe, the fish are winning. Joe is becoming like a grizzly bear after salmon. 

Another reason that we need more summer is because we aren't done slopping paints on our old house. For a starter... I am loving my red storm door, though it needs at least a couple more coatings of paint.