For our anniversay, we took a couple days off our retirement activities and spent some time at Pentwater and nearby Ludington, where we enjoyed eating at a local hotspot called The Old Hamlin, where we also had homemade ice cream.

Near Luddington, we visited the Historic White Pine Village, spending the day in the past but were treated to a free anniversary present -- ice cream!

This Summer, Lee had an opportunity to ride in a real Ford Model A automobile. Good thing it was a nice day!

A favorite memory is enjoying Labor Day in New Buffalo with Diane Oster's family. Di is Dot's niece from sister Jan. From the balcony at sunset, you can see the Chicago skyline (if you look very carefully in the photo above).

This year, we had three floods: The first was in February (above) and didn't get very far into the yard. The second in March went about half-way to the pond, which is not shown above. We did have a very wet Spring, but an equally dry Summer kept mosquitoes at bay until late August, when rains began again.

The third flood was in April, and was the worst this year. It licked at the edges of the pond, but didn't go in.

One of the highlights of our Summer was going to Grand Haven and seeing the Scottville Clown Band. Talk about trying to herd cats! While it did look chaotic and disorganized, looks are indeed deceiving, as their music was fabulous and fun, both on the parade route and in the concert tent.

We couldn't believe our luck on this trip: cars were lined up for 2 or 3 miles, trying to get into town. We had planned on parking at one of the specified lots, but we went by it before we noticed it. So we continued on into town. We got the last spot in a private lot that was a block from the parade route, and a half a block from the concert tent! Then the icing on the cake: we parked ourselved under a tree along the parade route. Everywhere we looked, people had claimed all the available spots, but somehow left this spot for us -- and it was a very hot day!

The band paid a beautiful tribute to all the branches of our armed forces by playing each of their theme songs, as well as to our national flag. It was quite a patriotic moment.