Our Final Days in Holland

I've said it before and I'll say it again, the summer always goes by way too fast. And this one especially has flown by, probably because the end of this summer means the end of our time here in Holland for now. It's crazy to think we pick up the moving truck tomorrow (Thursday, September 3rd). But we've made the most of our last couple weeks here. 

Last week our good friend Pauley had to have some knee surgery, which is never a fun thing to go through, and especially no fun to go through by yourself. But luckily it got scheduled while we were still around, so we were able to help him out. We took him to/from surgery and made sure he was able to get around alright the following couple of days. 

Pauley received the "Star Patient Award"

Both before and after surgery, he was a non-stop parade of entertaining banter. He wanted to make sure everyone was having a good time or at least laughed once. And as part of that he also wanted everyone to know how much he appreciated their help. We got to enjoy the slightly drugged up version of our friend post surgery. His shining moment was when his nurse who he had been joking around most of the day was taking off for the day he stated aloud, "You're just like all the other women in my life, leaving me when I need you most". It was both awkward and hilarious all at once. A perfect Pauley moment. Needless to say I don't think anyone could stop laughing for several minutes. 

Pauley's recovery is going well. Like I said earlier, we were able to stop in and hangout the next couple days after the surgery. He really didn't need us around, but it was still good to hangout anyway. We made sure he got to eat more than just frozen meals. There was a lot of youtube watching. We played some Pandemic. We also made sure he could make it to his first PT appointment. Katie wanted to scope it all out to make sure they were doing good work on him. 

Pauley has more than once claimed that he owes us. And normally we would refuse any kind of repayment because honestly we really are just glad we were able to use our time off to help out a good friend. But that doesn't stop him from trying. And he knows we won't turn down tacos. So on the way home from PT we stopped at Donkeys in GR and gave in to the delicious "repayment". 

After all that came the weekend, wherein by dad came up for his annual visit/to celebrate my birthday. Some of you may remember that my birthday is not really a recent event, but that's just how we roll in my family. Birthday celebrations can happen at any time throughout the year. 

Our tradition is to pack the weekend with golf and good food. We usually get in two rounds of 18, one on Saturday and one on Sunday, and then squeeze in a round of mini-golf Sunday evening, especially if there is a need for a tie-breaker in case we each win one of the two rounds of normal golf. 

This year the first course we played was Diamond Springs. Katie's dad also joined us for that round. The most positive thing we can say about the day is that the course was quite lovely. Both my dad and I compared it to the TPC course in the QC where they play the John Deere Classic, except it was 1/3 the price. Everyone agreed the course was worth going back too, which is somewhat surprising considering how terrible we all did. The course is pretty tough, but on top of that none of us could string together two good shots in row. Those two things combined makes for a long day. Add in some rainy weather and it makes you wonder why we ever picked up the sport. But at least the rain kept the course pretty empty. So I guess that's another positive for the day too. Someday we'll have to return when we're shooting better. My dad technically won that round between us, but I'm sure it didn't feel like much of a win. 

The next day went much better for both my dad and myself. We played Kaufman Golf Course in Grand Rapids based on the recommendation of Katie's dad. The course was again quite nice. Not quite as fancy as Diamond Springs, but it was much more forgiving. We both shot 47's on the front nine, which was impressive considering neither of us got any better then a bogey. That basically means we were playing very consistent decent golf, which is very rare for us. The back nine was a little bit rougher, but I still managed to get a 51, still with no pars but no worse than one 7. My dad started out strong with two pars but then fell apart on the last few holes when his back started bothering him. Walking 18 holes of golf two days in a row, one of which was terribly hot and muggy, it'll wear on you. But he still had a shining moment on the last hole when he sank a 40 put putted from across the green and downhill. But even with that I still won that round.

After a little bit a rest and some dinner we got out one last time, this time with Katie, and played 18 holes of mini-golf at Holland's very own Sundae Sundae Golf Golf. It was a close game at first, but I managed to pull away with two hole-in-ones, making me for the first time ever the overall winner of the weekend. Katie also did very well and was quite proud of her performance. 

Post mini-golf picture at Sundae Sundae Golf Golf

It was a wonderful weekend. It's always nice when my dad can come to visit. We filled the non-golfing time with sharing stories of what's been going on throughout the summer, watching some movies, and of course eating delicious food. I'm not sure where we'll be doing this tradition next year, but I sure hope we still try to make it happen. 

The last thing I'll mention about our final days in the area is Katie's sister's birthday blind date. Katie and I decided we needed to start treating others to our "blind dates", so her birthday was a perfect opportunity to do just that. We picked her up at her house, blindfolded her and took her first to Marie Catrib's for dinner and then onto a paint event thing where with some instruction we painted our own version of a painting. Katie's sister got to eat and paint "mostly" un-blindfolded. Good times were had.

Unknowingly hanging out at Marie Catrib's

The surprise activity for the evening: Making a painting!

Our masterpieces. 

And that's that. Tomorrow (Thursday) we move, so we've been filling most of the rest of our time with packing/other moving details. It's quite exhausting, but we have had some nice opportunities to take small breaks still here or there, like to eat brunch with some good friends of ours and stop by Katie's former coworker's start of retirement celebration/open house. And speaking of packing, I should probably get back to doing just that.

Cheers