"Yesterday's Dream": April 2023

Because I would already be traveling across the country to the Peterson wedding, I coordinated some routine medical appointments. I really like my primary care physician at Cleveland Clinic, so even though I am not in Cleveland that often, it works. My doctor has been very helpful in squeezing me in given my travels. He squeezed me in for a physical April 18th. Perfect, the wedding was April 14th. But then I was notified I was overdue for a colonoscopy! Turned out they could get me in April 10th. I realized why they had an opening April 10th. That was the day after Easter and you can’t eat the day before a colonoscopy. Not great, but overall a good plan. Plus, might save me from myself as far as eating! Okay…. so I just came to Cleveland a week earlier than planned.

After returning to Cleveland after my Loudonville, visit I enjoyed Julie’s culinary expertise. Not only hers, but also the treats she gets from the Slovenian bakery. In particular the poppy seed pastries!

Because I couldn’t eat anything, I decided I didn’t need to sit at the Easter dinner table. So I went for a hike through the south Chagrin Metropark. My mom and dad took us to the parks many times as we were growing up. I wondered if it would be as fun as I remembered. Turned out it was even better than I remembered. A highlight of the park is Henry Church’s Squaw Rock rock carving. It dates back to the 1830’s.

There is no explanation about why Henry included the serpent, arrows etc., in the carving.

Here are some other pictures of the park.

Monday I completed my colonoscopy and all was good. Not fun to do but nice to know I'm good for ten years! It was nice to get it taken care of before going to the wedding in Hershey, PA. It's about a 5 hour drive. I went a day early so I could check out the basement renovation Randy and Cindy were doing in Erica's house. I was okay with sleeping on a mattress in the basement. There was a bathroom in the basement and Randy and Cindy's bedroom was also in the basement, finished on a previous trip. I was invited to spend the night along with the entire Peterson family. What else would I need?

The basement project is moving along very nicely.

A large new window was installed for emergency egress from the basement living area.

My bed to the right

The ceilings and walls were dry walled.
The bathroom and 2 bedrooms are further back from the stairs.

The basement suite is actually quite large. There will be a full kitchen, a bathroom, 2 bedrooms and a play area.

Erica has a good sense of humor. Here are a couple of her wall hangings.

Wednesday night went well. I had my ear plugs in and never heard Nick Andrews and his mom arrive at midnight. Thursday the action picked up. We all were involved in getting the Grandview Winery VRBO supplied for all the guests that would be coming. This was a big wedding and the VRBO was the gathering place and staging area. I had an easy job. I delivered Chewie, Erica's dog, to his out of the way weekend home.

The Grandview Winery VRBO is very nice. It has been around since the 1800s and was renovated to accommodate guests in the recent past. It had the old style high ceilings, fireplaces, heavy beamed ceilings, etc. Here are some pictures.

The dining room table was huge.

My sleeping quarters

There were three floors to the house with a beautiful full bathroom on each floor. You can see how tall each floor was by looking at Cindy at the bottom of the stairs. The stairs still angled to the left of her for a few more feet.

2nd floor bathroom

3rd floor master bedroom

The grounds were extensive and the house sits on a hill so the view is wonderful.

There is a pond and fountain a short walk from the house.

In addition to the house, there is a Carriage House that has been renovated into another living space. It is a great place to hang out in addition to sleeping.

Carriage house sitting area

And to top it off, there was a game room. All the games were free. The kids and adults enjoyed the games.

Pac Man

There is a Pac Man game as well as others.

There were upwards of 30 people coming and going, eating, socializing, etc., Thursday afternoon and Friday morning. The bride and bridesmaids were getting ready at the Grandview VRBO Friday morning/afternoon. If I remember correctly there were 7 bridesmaids, plus the two moms. The dining room became the staging area. A professional hair dresser showed up and prepared each woman. Then they moved on to the professional makeup artist. The men in the wedding were getting ready elsewhere. Those of us not in the wedding wisely moved outside and enjoyed the Adirondack chairs and great weather. When all was said and done everyone looked like movie stars! Well not us, but the women.

The wedding went very well. No picture taking was aloud so no pictures. The reception was in a very pretty location with lots of good food, music and dancing until 10 PM. (Required closing time) The young people moved to a party room at one of the hotels. I and my companions retired to the Grandview Estate. All in all it was a great three days.

Tom and Erica

Tom Erica's daughter, Eve and Erica

There was a photographer at the wedding taking group pictures throughout the night. I was handed a leafy branch. Not sure the purpose, I just played along!

Given that my niece's family, the Fuchs, lived only an hour away from where I was staying I squeezed in a weekend visit with them.

Mary, Steve and Chris

When I arrived I found a box of doughnuts, pumpkin cake, good wine and other goodies. More eating! It was very good. I enjoyed relaxing and catching up after the very busy three prior days. Mary and Chris told me they live in the mushroom raising capitol of the country. Who knew. They took me to a very nice outdoor restaurant where we ordered of course, mushroom soup and sandwiches. Very fun.

Then we went to a local reservoir for a short hike. Brian and Jillian joined us. The weather was great.

Jillian had picked out some excellent steaks for supper. Chris did an excellent job cooking them and Mary provided all the accompanying items.

Mary, Brian, Chris and Jacquelin

I appreciated getting a chance to become reacquainted with Brian and Jillian. They have always been delightful and have grown into enjoyable teenagers. Among other things, Jillian is quite the gymnast and Brian is quite the all around athlete. I could hardly recognize both of them because they have grown so quickly! Or maybe I'm just getting Older! Jillian showed me how to connect to the Bluetooth option on my rental car. I could use her around a lot more!

Mary, Brian, Chris and Jacquelin

I stayed Sunday night at the Fuch's and headed back to Cleveland early Monday. They were going to school, work etc., so that worked out well. It was about a seven hour drive including rest breaks.

The weather had been wonderful for my entire trip, especially the entire time in Pennsylvania. As I was heading back to my sister's house in Euclid, it was cloudy and a little rainy. I had no complaints given the great weather so far. As I got into the Euclid city limits it started snowing! Actually it was kind of fun. I don't see that in Encinitas, CA.

I had my physical scheduled Tuesday afternoon. It went well I was was deemed "Healthy". I thought I was, but it's nice to get confirmation. I wasn't flying home until Saturday so I had 3 days to spend with Julie and Jim without an "agenda". It was very relaxing and we had time to catch up on lots of stuff.

Also, I told them I would be happy to take care of any projects. They said the molding on the front door had fallen off and it would be nice if I could fix that. Sure. When I looked at the door I realized some of the paint was starting to peel. Not too badly, but might as well repaint the door. It turned out great.

I took off the black squares in the center of the door panels and taped the molding because it was glued on.

It turned out great

Julie and Jim liked it.

There were a couple other little projects. Fun because they were so easy. The over the range lightbulbs in the microwave had burned out. It turned out one had just kind of disintegrated. We were able to find some replacement bulbs in Euclid close by.

Old fan out

I also noticed the bathroom vent fan sounded like the bearings were going. Fortunately, Home Depot had a replacement fan.

Old and new fan

Julie with our Peking Duck

One of the lightbulbs in the dining room light had burned out. It's easier for me to replace it so I took the old bulb out and Julie had a replacement. She decided the other three bulbs would probably burn out so we should get some more. Fortunately, she remembered she got them at Mars Electrict in Cleveland. It just happens to be very close to the Asian grocery store where we have purchased Peking ducks. They are delicious. The last time I was in Cleveland I stopped to get one and they had none. Very disappointing. This time I called and was assured that they would have one for us. It was delicious.

An interesting project was gluing a piece of door molding back where it belonged. Julie found it on the floor and had no idea how it came off.

Closet door repaired

Strange but very easy to fix.

Jim and scooter at the beginning
of the trail down to Lake Erie

Fortunately, the weather took a turn to better. Jim, Julie and I went for some walks along Lake Erie. The new walking trail at the end of their street is wonderful and handicap accessible so Jim can ride his scooter. We need to go out to Lakeshore Blvd. to get to the handicap ramp but this spot at the end of the street is beautiful.

Coots

We saw some Coots and Mergansers. Very fun. They were almost close enough to get a "good" picture.

Merganser

End of the Lake Erie Euclid trail

When we went to Mars Electric to get the light bulbs, they had to order them. I decided to go pick them up the next day and stop at the 55th Street Marina where we kept our boats for many years. Very fun memories. Some geese were nesting so I went around them. They weren't too skittish once they saw I was going around them. Unfortunately, I came across one nest that was abandoned. I was surprised at how big the eggs were.