Beginning of Autumn, Definitely

Fishing hasn't gotten much better yet, but fall salmon must be coming up the streams very soon. We actually had 90 degree weather over the Labor Day weekend and enjoyed sitting outside with margaritas, listening to Jimmy Buffet.  

We waited for much cooler weather this week to have homemade pizzas. All I did was to mix pizza dough.  My own pizza king Joe did the rest.

We finally booked a trip to Japan for mid-October. Some things have changed, and we are traveling on our own from Tokyo to Yokohama, and to my hometown this time. It's going to be an adventure.  For a starter, Joe got a new suitcase. 

Corn, Fair, and Art

Fortunately it's been a comfortable summer for us, while lots of other parts of the world suffer from the extreme heat and weather. The summer is coming to an end quickly up this north. We've been enjoying fresh Wisconsin corn for a few weeks. The State Fair happened this past week already! Time... where does it go?? 

I may not be keeping up with my blog posts this summer, but we have managed to have some fun. Asides from our usual fishing and beach going, we got to enjoy a little more art appreciation. We got to experience the Beyond Van Gogh exhibit in Green Bay last month. Also just last week when we traveled to Detroit (8+ hours away) to pick up my new Japanese passport, we went to a couple of museums (art and industrial). 

We live in a place full of beautiful natural inspirations, but sometimes forget what we are missing. It is nice, or even necessary, for us to go to bigger cities every so often to be stimulated mentally. Being in touch with art actually made me start a new painting! But it is always good to come home, where we only need to drive 15 minutes to get to the lakeshore. 

June No More!?

Honestly we aren't sure where the month of June went. We started our yakiniku season, but then the weather got chilly. Still, the greens grew tall and thick out in the woods, and the mosquitoes have been awful. 

We normally go fishing earlier in the day, and then get down to the lake to cool off. Usually it's 10 degrees cooler than at home.

We enjoy picnic whenever we can, even when it's 55 degrees! 

And the 4th of July is almost here.... we are watching the fireworks, but mostly business as usual. We do have a little getaway planned for this coming weekend to look forward to.  Happy 4th of July, everyone!!

Memorial Day Weekend

This weekend we had such a gorgeous summer-like weather... hard to remember the first couple of days of May with over 2 feet of snow! Apple trees on the back hill blossomed out literally in a day. All spring/summer flowers are happening at once.

Saturday evening we hosted a low-key birthday party for a friend. We didn't even take pictures of the food, but managed to snap an evidence of the good time we had.

We did go fishing both Saturday and Sunday, to find all sorts of pollens in the air as well as mosquitoes. We can't have summer without the bugs. Saturday morning there were so many fish jumping for flies and showing no interest at all in any of our lures. Next day though Kayo caught a 28" female steelhead that was on her way downstream after spawning. She weighed 6.5 lbs! To be fair, once again my line (due to my poor knot tying skills) came detached as I was trying to raise the fish on the bank. So Joe did his best grizzly bear routine to save OUR fish. 

We really couldn't ask for a better weather on the Memorial Day weekend. We fished Apple Creek in honor of Joe's dad and got to enjoy some beautiful summer moments... to kick off our summer months.

Anniversary Weekend

No matter how long, or forever it seems at times, winter persists... spring always happens to some degree around our wedding anniversary. Joe managed to squeeze a couple of days off from work, so we started our weekend on Thursday. Since we were opting for a mini getaway to relax not too far from home, we first enjoyed a pasty picnic on our beach. Hard to believe only a few days ago we were shoveling 3 feet of snow!

Then we drove to Munising (45 minutes east) for an overnight trip. We stayed at the same wonderful place as last year, except this year we made sure their amazing restaurant/bar was open. Lots of businesses up our way close at the end of April for their last chance to relax/recharge before another crazy summer tourist season starts. 

Mmmm.... we tried and enjoyed quite a few exciting dishes over some well crafted cocktails. Very relaxing and enjoyable.

Next day we drove 3 and a half hours the other direction to Ironwood. We went to check out a few waterfalls, which were roaring as expected, and had a nice visit with P&J. 

Sunday as we got close to home... ah, sadly all fun vacations must come to an end... unexpectedly we spotted a moose on the opposite side of the highway. We turned around to take a closer look. He was close enough to the road, you needed to stay in your car. So our weekend adventure ended with a wild note for sure! 

White May

It snowed and snowed for the first two days of May.... Wet heavy snow. All this snow, we really don't know the exact total accumulation but  close to 3 feet, fell onto the bare ground. 

This is why we never put away winter gears. 

Trout Season Day 1

Yesterday we ventured to get to our beloved Apple Creek for the first time this year. We were quite pleased that Joe's truck actually got us where we wanted without getting stuck and also that our trail to the stream was clear of snow. More importantly the threatening rain system waited. Our first day of trout season was a success even if we saw no fish.

So when I missed a couple of decent sized fish, we really got excited. I caught this brown and let it go. The season has just started. Unfortunately it rained later yesterday and switched to heavy wet snow this morning. AND they are predicting 28 inches of snow for the next two days! We are just so glad that we could go out fishing yesterday.

New Grill and Earth Day

Joe recently upgraded his gas grill, with a newer generation of his 10 plus-year-old one. He was having a challenging time grilling in the cold... more so than usual. He found his tired and old but trusty grill had a hole in it. It was time to replace. Notice in the picture the garage door is shut because it wasn't warm enough outside. Cold weather doesn't stop us from grilling though. Especially with the new grill, we had to try cooking BBQ ribs. Joe loves his new grill!

Last Saturday, Earth Day, we started off to the beach with our coffee to be outdoors before the dry weather was changing to rain and snow as forecasted. The morning sun was nice and warm, and we got to enjoy a pleasant couple of hours walking and picking rocks. 

And now we have two more days till trout season. We're more than likely to be sleeping in on the opening day, since it's supposed to rain, snow, and who knows what else. The weather guys were right about the snow we got last night. Needless to say, we are planning to check out the streams tonight. Just to see.

Spring!? and Fishing Fever

April came with another snow storm... but 10 days later we are pleasantly surprised how much snow has melted, with the temperatures reaching 70 degrees. 

Joe had his full beard since deer season in November and just went back to his normal look. Only appropriate to bring in Spring. "Before" and...

"After."

On Easter Sunday we went to check out the beach and were delighted to see the sandy lakeshore instead of ice. The first rock picking and rock skipping of the season!

Officially two and a half weeks till the opening day of trout season. There's plenty of snow in wooded areas. We shall see if we can walk into Apple Creek to fish AND how high the river water levels will be....

Our March Madness

Not exactly sure where our March has gone.... Vaguely remember we tried our best thinking of spring on March 3rd, Girls' Day in Japan. Except it seemed that we received 1-2 feet of snow every week since mid-February... and continued. 

Though the days were getting longer, and the sunshine warmer, we fully expected our March to be far from spring-like. Still, we enjoyed soaking in as much sun as we could out on the trails.

We also shared a cold and lost a small part of the month, I suppose, after resisting against all those bugs all season. Last weekend's winter storm was perfect for us to stay home and recover. When the sun finally came out on Sunday, we celebrated belated St. Patrick's Day with venison stew.

The below picture shows our snow bank exactly a week ago. Snow is melting, but has long ways to go.

And it had been a long while since we made gyoza dumplings. Joe's birthday was coming up, so I made them on my day off. I prefer our homemade dumpling skins (I need Joe's help with them) better than store-bought ones, but they were still very tasty and made me wonder why I waited so long.

Unfortunately I had to work all this Joe's birthday weekend, but we'll make up for it next week. Happy Birthday, Joe!

Valentine's Day to Winter Storm Olive

Just before Valentine's Day we finally got to try one restaurant in town we had wanted to. They offer a four-course menu that changes weekly. And it's part of a wine bar. We even had to dress up to meet the "casual elegant" dress code. Well, it's the UP. Thank goodness, plaid shirts are allowed. To say the least, the whole experience was amazing. Not often can a meal blow your mind. Even better we were able to share the evening with P & J from Ironwood.

For our actual Valentine's Day, we ended up cooking a gourmet meal at home. We tried a new venison recipe: Grilled Venison Backstrap, served with Cauliflower Puree and Balsamic Reduction. Joe had never cooked his venison like this before and was blown away. 

Overall, this February has been milder than usual. In fact a sled dog race event was canceled due to the lack of snow and the icy conditions after some rain. Even so, we still had plenty of snow to snowshoe in the woods this past weekend. It was so nice to play in the sun!! And now we are getting 20 inches of fresh snow from the Winter Storm Olive. We are very fortunate just to deal with lots of fluffy snow, the element that we know well. Our garden gnome is deep under the snow... and it's not quite done snowing yet. 

Frozen!!

It's been cold for a week or so... not much snow, but subzero temperatures. We have probably seen more sunshine this week than all of January leading up to this super cold weather. The trees in the pastel morning light from our kitchen window sure looked inviting and warm... but it was only -9 °F.

Naturally our potted basil plants on the window sill is not too happy about winter, either. And even more traumatized every time I snip off some leaves for cooking. Today we had a pizza night to eat up leftovers, which turned out to be quite a nice spread. 

"Corona" Party

Exactly a year ago we both came down with Covid. To remind ourselves to stay healthy, I wanted to have a "Corona" themed dinner today. Naturally the menu was Mexican. I cooked Birria tacos with Joe's venison roast, which turned out fantastic. Sorry we didn't share it with friends.

Like last January we had to get snow off the roofs, especially when the weather was switching to rain. This was Joe's second time to shovel our roofs this season. 

The manual labor of moving snow in the cold does make our beer taste better. We hope everyone is staying healthy in this new year!