I am still in Menomonie, Wisconsin, typing on my new refurbished MacBook. Bob helped me to understand everything, and set me up. I am very excited about having it!

Tomorrow I will leave for Iowa, and Dick's home in Nevada, Iowa.

Badge (Natalie) is a hoot. She loves skirts and dresses that whirl around. She has wonderful hats. And even a Mary Poppins outfit, which she wore, when they went to see Mary Poppins in Minneapolis. Yesterday, Badge got set up outside, under an umbrella, with her lawn chair, clothes drying in the sun, oven top boiling something, babies asleep in their beds. There was Badge, in her chair, reading her books.

We gave her the Atwell dollhouse last night. And now all her animal friends are sleeping together in one of the bedrooms. Casey is going to go through the furniture I brought with me, some of which needs to be glued, and decide which to put away, and which Badge can use now.

Yesterday I went up to a cheese factory and store, and bought some wonderful cheese. The cheese they make is hard Italian cheese, very yummy. They also have a lot of other Wisconsin cheese for sale, as well as some imported. I had a dish of ice cream there which reminded me so much of my mother's homemade ice cream. It was the best I have had since Mom's actually!

Moonbear is the Atwell dog, a husky mix. He is 15 or so. He picks up his bowl and drops it when he wants food. Casey, Badge, and Bob were out, and I was here looking over my manuscript. Moonbear was outside, and scratched at the door to come in. I let him in, and he went first to his water bowl, and drank. Then he went to his food bowl, nothing in it, so he picked it up and dropped it. I got up and got a cup of dog food and put it in. He just looked at me. Then I remembered that I had seen Bob pour something on top of the kibble. So I went to the fridge and looked for what he had used. Seeing nothing definitely saying, for dogs, I reached for the French Dressing, which looked like the bottle Bob had used. I poured a little over his food. Moonbear looked at me, looked at the food, sniffed it and ate it. I did this twice over the next two days. Then, Bob fed him and went to the fridge, and pulled out this bottle, which was definitely now french dressing! "What is that?" I asked. "Moonbear's sauce," was Bob's reply. And sure enough, the bottle showed a dog and said IAM's on it. Bob got a good laugh when I told him what I had done.

Bob took me down to the Applied Arts Building where he teaches. When we were driving back to the house, there was all this stuff on the road, flapping. But it was in lines and squares. I asked Bob about it. The road department, when they are putting down hot tar in the cracks in the street, have a man walking behind, laying down toilet paper over the tar, so drivers don't get it all over their cars! As my dad would say, "Such a business!"

Well, Bob has put my story into PDF, read it twice, Casey is now outside in the shade, reading it again, and then I have to read it. Then Bob is going to put it into a PDF file, and print it for me. He has already put in various pictures.

Bob and Casey have a beautiful house. The builder and first owner used recycled wood flooring, and doors, and window casements. All oak. The floor on the first floor Bob said was thought to be from the Stout Campus' basketball floor. The floors upstairs are all recycled pine floors. The doors are massive, and there are lots and lots of windows all over the house. There are wonderful gardens of flowers all around the house. Along with a large garage, where Bob works on his bikes.

Right now Bob is having Badge walk like a wheelbarrow. Badge is a very busy girl. She has so much fun and is so imaginative. Of course, Casey has had a lot to do with that. Didi is Badge's invisible mouse, and all over the house, there are mousehole, one even with a door. They are black doors, to look like a hole, and are on the baseboards in various places. Yesterday we were having ice cream cones. But not just your everyday cone, oh no. Badge has four empty cones, which look almost real. Casey made them for her out of paper and contact paper. Badge has a basket of silk scarves, which have many uses. For the ice cream, we stuffed a scarf into the cone, and rounded it, so it looked just like an ice cream cone. We even made cotton candy!
This is definitely a fun place to live and visit.

More later.
Mahalo,
Sally