Boy, it has been a loooonnnnngggg time since I updated this blog. We've been at Illinois Beach since Sept 17th - finally hitting the road after being at Paul Wolff for almost a month. Buffalo Park is not going to reopen this season, possibly not ever to overnight campers as the damage from the flooding this time was the worst they had ever had.
We figured our days as a camp host were numbered since we only worked two days in between floods. We actually "subbed" for the Paul Wolff camp host for the first two weeks in September as he wanted to take some time off. We learned a lot from that experience - we don't want to camp host again - it's much too like the "W" word. Not hard, but scheduled, and we have gotten used to flexibility.
We headed up to Illinois Beach as Jeff still has several Dr. appointments and the state park is much closer to the VA. The podiatry exam showed that his feet have remained stable which is good news. The doctor said he should continue to stay off them for long periods of time and keep his blood sugars in control and who knows? They are a "time bomb" which could go off at any moment, but for now, he's not having to undergo any new treatment.
His eyes are getting better every day. He still has a way to go before he gets prescribed new glasses though, so we need to wait around for that. The next appointment is this Friday, Oct. 5th, so we should know something about when we are leaving the Midwest after that. It could be as early as Saturday!
Illinois Beach has been very nice. The weather has been mostly mild. We've enjoyed relaxing
 Daily nap |
 It's a well-known fact |
One day as a cold front was coming in, the fog started rolling in from the lake
 Fog rolling in |
 Obscuring the beach |
We drove in to Chicago one day last weekend to visit with Adam and had a good time. We went out to one of the casinos on Lake Michigan and played penny slots for a while. Jeff walked out with $130 off a penny slot machine which is good since I lost $30. Afterwards we went to this great Italian restaurant called Punky's not far from Adam's house which serves the best fettuccine Alfredo ever!
We got some news from Amanda. Madeleine's school was having a back to school party which included a dance and Madeleine's "boyfriend" asked her to the party! She got all dressedup
 Beautiful girl |
 Madeleine, Frankie and Maggie |
Amanda caught up with them at the dance
 At the Hop |
We've always talked about how Madeleine has a resemblance to Audrey Hepburn and one of the photos that Amanda took was very similar to one I had seen of Miss Hepburn. Check these out
 Black and White |
 Audrey Hepburn |
Adam and Laura spent the weekend with us. The weather was mild, and we had a nice time sitting out on Saturday
 Comfy Laura |
 Everyone enjoying nature |
It was tough putting them on the train back to Chicago last night. We won't see them until (hopefully) Christmas. I've enjoyed being in the area with them.
Jeff's last TV pilot - Cavemen - is being broadcast Tuesday, October 2nd on ABC at 7 p.m. CST. He's wearing grey pants, blue shirt and a string tie and will be in the barbecue scenes. Hopefully he'll get some airtime. Can't believe that was filmed back in April and is just now being shown.
If all goes well Friday, we should be hitting the road again soon on our way back to Texas. We're looking forward to appearing in the Lone Star Murder Mystery Dinner Theatre at the Gaylord again while we spend the holidays in Texas.
