Zzzzzzzzzzzzz

Another sunny beautiful November weekend. That we spent sleeping or watch go by from a cozy corner on the couch.

Kristian just came out of a crazy work frenzy. Pretty much working e.v.e.r.y. single day for a month. And by the end of that, there is not really much energy left. I have not been any close to being that busy, but I have hardly been using my office chair for several weeks besides eating my lunch as fast as I could. Ulrik and Teresa have ended the first quarter of high school being buried in homework, while Luca has been overnight camping with school. So it is really not a very energetic Frikke Family these days.

But we did get a few things done Saturday. We went here:

Our church supports "operation christmas child", a christian organization that brings out shoeboxes with Christmas presents for kids in poor countries. You chose either boy or girl as well as the age group, and then fill the box with toys, toiletries and school supplies. It is the third year that we are involved, but somehow it always ends up being crazy chaotic finding the stuff to go in the box. This year we went to Walmart. And like every other time we go to Walmart we just cannot control ourselves and ended up with pants for Ulrik, shoes for Luca, Christmas bling (including an incredibly ugly ornament for you, Christine) etc etc on top of the box filling toys. Oh, and 4 pairs of slippers to directly to a charity event collecting slippers for Hope Clinic - a local initiative providing health care to those who have no insurance (or slippers apparently ;-)  And we got to further support a good cause by buying brazilian brigadieros. My all time favorite truffles. Not bad at all.

We promised the kids that we were going to decorate for Christmas early this year, as we are going to California December 21'st. But that will have to wait until next weekend. The ornaments are standing by to replace our fall deco though:

And Saturday a souvenir arrived at the door. While in Universal Studio my sister was certain that we could not live without a crazy ugly bath towel sporting Luca, Christine, and I as Shrek characters. Guess what - of course we cannot. Just look at this beauty:

"beautiful island"

Despite Kristian and I both having work to do this weekend, we had planned a little outing Saturday just to get away for a bit. Eastern Market is one of our Detroit favorites and also our 2016 summer bucket list included a visit to the island in the middle of the Detroit River: Belle Isle.

So off we went.

Detroit Skyline

getting closer

now we are almost there

Oops. One wrong turn and this is what the center of Detroit can also look like

As always Eastern Market was a pleasure, and this time we even found the apples we have been hunting for since we tried them last year. I have never seen pinata apples before, nor have I ever heard of them, but they are the best apples we have ever tried:

We stayed for lunch at the food trucks. Luca had french fries (what else..... sigh) and Kristian and I got our lunch from a pasta/italian sandwich truck. The weather was perfect with blue sky, sunshine, and almost warm enough to wear only T-shirt. Nice!

After shopping fruits and veggies for next week, and after telling Luca that we were not going to buy the monstrous Hubbard squash for his teacher Mrs Hubbard:

 we continued to Belle Isle. It is an island turned into a park in the middle of Detroit River, smack in between Windsor and Detroit (see map here). The first thing you see after crossing the bridge is a giant US flag. I guess they want to make sure that people know they  have not accidentally crossed the order to Canada..... LOL.

It was truly living up to it's name of being a beautiful island on a beautiful sunny day.

Luca was however somewhat disappointed as he spotted a playground he really wanted to test. Well, the rain had caused it to sit in a pond........

No matter what is was unexpectedly nice outside today, and it felt really good to be outdoors. I wonder how long that will last!