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| Arielle's 24th B-Day (and yes there are 24 candles) |
Michigan has amazing beauty in the spring and summer as the plants gain their leaves and flowers. There are more critters here than I have ever seen in Washington. So far we have seen a river rat, geese, ducks, three types of squirrels, chipmunks, bunnies, skunks, raccoons, herons, blue jays, cardinals, woodchucks, snakes, spiders, caterpillars, possums, fire flies, deer, turkey, and many other animals which I can't think of right now.
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| So this squirrel lives around our apartments and gets really close since other neighbors feed him. He almost ran inside the apartment when I took this photo since I wanted a photo not taken through the screen. I had to close the screen door really quick. |
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| This is one of the chipmunks that have a burrow about five feet from our back door. We had one or two last year and now they have four babies. Interesting fact, they only live about 3 years. |
We think the variety of plants is due to the fact that it rains in Michigan a lot and it leads to good hiding places for animals large and small. We have been hiking and I have been biking which is where some of these pictures below are from.
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| A hiking trail that is about a 1/4 mile from our apartment. I took this while on a bike ride. |
The weather here is also very different but you get used to it over time. Ann Arbor has similar temperatures to Spokane but we are delayed by about a month. For example, spring break here is still very cold compared to Spokane. Michigan also has high humidity (as I am writing it is 72% but it ranges between 58-81%) which makes it hot and sticky. The humidity makes no difference if you have AC but we don't so you get used to being sticky all day. Arielle is lucky and gets to go to work but we also go to Starbucks on really hot days to escape the heat and humidity. Also from April to October we have the tornado season. Last summer we didn't get any tornado alerts since we had a lack of rain and storms. So far we have had one tornado siren which was interesting but the wall clouds dissipated and no tornado touched down. Basically if you are outside you have to run to a building and if you are inside you head to the basements. This last storm missed us in Ann Arbor but I heard there was hail 1" in diameter. It rains a lot in Michigan and when it rains here it rains really hard with loud thunderstorms.
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| It is hard to tell but it is raining harder than it looks. |
As for the day-to-day Arielle has been working for the kinesiology lab and I have been working for Park and Restroom Structures as usual. Arielle really likes her research and enjoys helping with the babies. She has been working on collecting data (putting babies on treadmills) and analyzing the results. As many of you know Arielle loves to read and has already finished three books (Casual Vacancy, The Hobbit, an Sense and Sensibility). I am reading finance books and studying economics for enjoyment. So far we are off to a great summer and have made some fun plans for the remainder of the summer including a trip to Seattle for Arielle's cousin's wedding as well as some outdoor events here. Look for another post towards the end of the summer.
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| A hike at Nichols Arboretum |
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| A hike at Olson Park |
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| These are caterpillars were hatching in the webs. |
