I was out pushing snow today...

I pulled out the tape measure... The snow in the yard is fifteen inches deep. I held it up to the bird feeder for reference...

While looking through my phone, I found a couple more pictures.  Here's the not-so-little chickens...

And here's a picture of Mike and Jan's backyard.  There's a deer in there somewhere...

I'll have to find the little camera for my of the pictures from our last trip.

We had a test at the Aikido club last night.  Here's prob'ly my favorite picture...

I see one hand and one foot on the mat. Your guess is as good as mine as to which-is-which for the other two.

I took a couple pictures today, and found a few more on my phone I hadn't posted yet.  Click HERE to see them.

The new septic tank arrived today...

They'll be putting in the ground tomorrow.

We're home.  We left at quarter to nine and pulled into the driveway at quarter to seven.  It takes twelve hours to drive to Detroit, and ten to drive home.  I think I finally figured out why...  The Earth rotates to the east.  As we drive across the UP to the east, Detroit is moving away from us to the east, and we have to catch up to it.  On the way home, when we drive west across the UP, Mercer is moving to the east towards.

Looks like peak color up here.  I'll get some pictures to post tomorrow.

Let Kelly take your daughter home for the evening and you know she's going to get brainwashed...

With a freezer full of chicken, we decided we needed to go fishing.  A couple of Kelly's co-workers are big fishers...  They go out nearly every weekend.  We tagged along with them for the day, which started at 4am so we could get up to the gas station to buy one-day licenses and get out to the Harbor by 6:30.  Even with DNR computer trouble, we made it on time.  Kelly pulled in the big fish of the day.  Here's a picture of Captain Hulio weighing it...

It was a 14.5 pound Lake Trout.  We threw that one back.  In seven hours, we caught fourteen keepers and two throwbacks.  Jim, Hulio's deckhand for the day, took two, and we get the rest...

Seven Coho Salmon, three Lake Trout, and two Steelheads.  The salmon were smaller, so we put both sides of a fish in a bag.  Those are the redder fillets on the right. The Lakers and Steelhead were bigger, so we split them into two bags each.  The Lakers are in back on the left, and the Steelhead are up front.  There's only three Steelhead bags because we grilled one fillet for dinner...

The kiddies sang Happy Birthday on the phone for me...

Winter isn't over, yet. We've gotten half-a-foot so far...

Click HERE to see a couple more pictures.

I was going through my phone before updating it and found a cute video of the kiddies from Christmas.  Sorry it's late...

We went skiing today.  Here's a picture of Kelly and the dogs in the pine stand the trails go through...

My new skijor harness has an emergency ripcord.  It's a quick release in case I fall down or am going downhill and don't want to run the dog over.  It's held together with velcro, so I can re-attach it when I call the dog back.  Here's a short video of it in action...

This is what they gave me to wear while I sleep so that I don't rub my eyes...

I still have sticky tape residue on my face from last night.  I'm not doing that again.

Kelly went out to take care of the chickens this morning and returned with a little "fart egg".  Yes, that's what they really are called.  It prob'ly doesn't have a yolk in it...

Later, we went skiing.  I was given a skijor harness for ME this year...

It was about 15° outside today, so we were well bundled-up.  Here's a picture of just the harness...

The red handle is the quick-release.  If I fall down, or am going down a hill, I can pull the quick-release and Kody can go off without me.  It's held together with two eight-inch long pieces of Velcro.  Just past the quick-release is a sixteen-inch shock-absorbing rubber-tube sewn into the lead.  It's MUCH better than just holding on to a long leash as I had been doing...  Since my hands are free, I can use my poles and ski normally.