Away From Home

On the Way Home

November 23, 2025 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Here is the last post about our trip to America. This feels like it’s been a long project! Now I need to check out all the cameras and phones to see what pictures I have from here at home to post so you can see what has been happening since then!

We left Ohio the last Tuesday in August, more than ready to get home. It was a beautiful, sunny late summer day, and Grandpa wanted to take us across the Ohio River on Anderson Ferry, instead of going the normal way over the bridge. So we had the fun of a 5-minute ferry ride!

Our flight from Cincinnati to Houston went without a hitch. I let Little Miss, who was sitting beside me, use my phone to take pictures of the rivers she saw underneath us.

We landed in Houston and found our gate, got our boarding passes (because the children fly home with New Zealand passports, their boarding passes couldn’t be printed in Cincinnati), and got on the plane right on time. The pilot announced that we were ready for takeoff and should get in early. Then, a minute or two later, he came on again to say that the crew who were going to push us out of the gate noticed that two navigation lights were off on the plane. It took three hours to get them fixed and create a new flight plan–three hours of sitting in the plane on the tarmac. When we finally took off, Miss Joy was sound asleep and Little Miss was so tired and dehydrated that when our meal was served she got sick. That was a long, miserable flight. We were very happy to see New Zealand in the morning as we neared Auckland!

I had again allowed the children to use my phone, and Little Miss took the picture above, as well as this one of a very bored, sleep-deprived Mr. Imagination, and the next one as we were coming in for landing.

Because we were three hours late leaving Houston, we missed our flight to Christchurch. We were rebooked on another flight a few hours later, which went smoothly until we were about 15 minutes away from landing. Then, we ran into a nor-wester, an extremely strong wind that sweeps over the mountains and across Canterbury. We’ve experienced many of them on the ground, but it was a whole new experience to be in one in the air. The men and boys on the flight whooped and cheered as if they were on a roller coaster–I gripped the arms of my seat and hung on for dear life! What a relief to land safely. If you look at this picture, you can see the change in the clouds over the main divide. We live somewhere under those smooth clouds in the distance.

After we landed, our friends picked us up, took us to their house to get our vehicle, and fed us lunch before we headed for home. Notice the snow on the mountains? It’s a bit of a shock to leave summer in Ohio and arrive in winter in New Zealand! It rained for about half of our trip home, so we were a bit concerned about the 100+ books in our luggage, since we had it all in the back of a ute with a leaky canopy. Not much got wet, though, and the little that did was clothing that we could wash and it was fine. We were very happy to be at home!

Pennsylvania and Last Days in Ohio

November 16, 2025 by NZ Filbruns 1 Comment

When we left Michigan near the end of August, we went to Pennsylvania for a few days for Kingdom Fellowship Weekend, a gathering of 1-2,000 Anabaptists for teaching and fellowship. To say the least, it was a bit overwhelming! When a large gathering here is a hundred people, to be in the midst of that many people we didn’t know was challenging. We had some relatives there, though, and it was great to catch up with them, and we met up with several people we knew way back, before moving to New Zealand. That was good!

We spent about 12 hours on the road the day we traveled from Michigan to Pennsylvania. That was a long day! Most of it was quite boring, driving on the turnpike. We did spot a few interesting things, such as a few bald eagles. And, somewhere in southern Michigan, we saw this enormous beam being transported. The children were pretty impressed.

This woodpecker was outside our room at the camp. Because we had just been with my mom, who is quite a naturalist, we were all especially attuned to things like this.

Before breakfast on our first day there, I took the children exploring around the campground. They loved this bridge and tiny amphitheater! They spent some time running around the benches.

Another favorite place at the camp was the playground, where the girls made a lot of sand turtles one day and then wanted me to take a picture of them.

We had another long day of driving the day the camp ended, when we went back to western Ohio to Gayle’s dad’s house to prepare to fly home. This was the sunset that evening, somewhere between Columbus and Preble County.

These next three pictures were actually probably taken before we went to Michigan, the day that we sorted and did our preliminary packing. My sister-in-law was sorting through closets, and found a lot of dresses she and her sisters used to wear. She had fun dressing our girls up like herself! The quilt was hand-made by a great- or great-great grandmother, some hundred years ago or more.

When we got back to Grandpa’s house, the children were excited to find more kittens. This one was especially exciting because it looked “just like” the cat in a book we read at Grandma’s house in Michigan, The Almost All-White Rabbity Cat by Meindert de Jong (an author whose books are out of print but I want all of them!).

The children also had great fun hunting insects with a net. They got this grasshopper and butterfly, and wanted them recorded.

The very best find, however, was the snakeskin Mr. Imagination found at his aunt’s house. He was delighted!

More Michigan Pictures

November 9, 2025 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

We enjoyed two weeks in Michigan, staying at my mom’s little house, just down the hill from the house in which I grew up. We helped her with a few little jobs. Gayle and Mr. Imagination cut down a few dead trees and cut them up for firewood for my sister who lives in the big house.

Miss Joy loved cuddling Johnny Cat, who hangs out at Grandma’s house most of the time, while she watched the tree-cutting operation.

I enjoyed seeing deer come close to the house a few mornings while I had my Bible time.

It’s hard to reconcile the way the land is now with the way I remember it. When I lived there, all this land was grazed by our herd of milk cows, but now it’s all overgrown! I had a hard time recognizing familiar spots.

We visited my dad’s grave on the way home from church one of the Sundays.

We enjoyed picking blueberries. We went just with Grandma once, then again several days later with many from the extended family. My sister and I went back another time, just the two of us, to get a few more. What fun!

We made a delicious fruit salad with the blueberries, strawberries and raspberries from Grandma’s garden, and some peaches that we bought. Yum!

One day, Grandma and I went shopping with the two girls. On the way home, we stopped at an overlook at the edge of the Pere Marquette River beside Ludington. What a view of the wetlands!

The children enjoyed Grandma’s marble roller.

On the day we went to the Otto Nature Preserve, we stopped in Silver Lake to get ice cream from the place where my niece works. The shop wasn’t open when we got there, but she was working and opened the window to sell us each a cone. I recommend The Other Place if you are in Silver Lake!

The children enjoyed putting together Grandma’s puzzles; Miss Joy wanted a picture of this floor puzzle after it was completed.

They enjoyed playing her games, too!

Mr. Imagination loved mowing Grandma’s lawn–and was especially delighted to find a couple of small snakes!

I had fun trying to get pictures of a few butterflies.

One morning, we noticed a huge flock of vultures wheeling overhead. Off to the east a short distance we could see another similar-sized flock, and there were many more perched on the power tower on the hill just to the north. I counted the ones in this flock and estimated that we could see around 60 vultures all at once!

Mr. Imagination had fun exploring the creek (changing clothes and showering afterward because of ticks and poison ivy!), and brought this frog up to show us one time.

Little Miss found this walking stick in Grandma’s garage.

Because Grandma loves nature, the children brought her anything interesting that they found. She put this caterpillar in a cage to see what it would turn into. Within a few days it was pupating.

Miss Joy asked me to french-braid her hair one day, then wanted a picture of it so she could see it.

Gales Pond and Otto Nature Preserve

October 22, 2025 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

While we were in Michigan, we went with my mom to two of her favorite places. The first was Gales Pond County Park–a must-see when we are with her. It’s been a favorite place to take a walk all my life.

There were dragonflies all over as we walked across the boardwalk. They were sunning themselves in the last rays of the evening.

The children enjoyed seeing the results of a sapsucker’s visit!

It was a calm, beautiful evening.

A must-do at the dam is playing Pooh-sticks! First, sticks, or cattail fluff, or grass, or whatever comes to hand, gets dropped over the edge above. Then, everyone runs across the road to see the objects come through under the bridge, below.

I had never been to Otto Nature Preserve before. It’s out near the Lake, and must be fairly new. This is where most of the mushroom pictures in my last post were taken.

And when a child has the camera, you get pictures of caterpillars and slugs and a line-up of pretty leaves, too!

These are Indian Pipe. I had never seen them before, but they were common that day in the preserve. Despite their lack of chlorophyll, they are plants, not fungi.

The two older children got bored with our slow pace, so we sent them ahead to search for a geocache for which I knew the approximate location. They didn’t find it, though, until we arrived with the phone to find the exact place.

Miss Joy explored someone’s hut.

She also tried to fit inside a tree.

Back to Gales Pond! This was the evening we went out searching for several geocaches.

Mushrooms!

October 19, 2025 by NZ Filbruns 2 Comments

My mom loves investigating mushrooms. It was rather funny to see her telling people about or showing them mushrooms a couple of times, and seeing their eyes glazing over. My children’s eyes did not glaze over! They were most enthusiastic partners in the Great Mushroom Investigation at two county parks that we visited. I allowed my girls to borrow my camera, and ended up with at least a hundred pictures of fungi, most of which I didn’t keep. I’ll post our other pictures from those parks in separate posts; this one will just be mushroom pictures, so if you are the kind of person whose eyes glaze over, just skip this post.

Isn’t our Creator’s imagination amazing! What a variety of shapes, sizes and colors, just in two small county parks in Western Michigan. (Before you mention it, Mom, I know that one picture likely shows slime mold rather than a mushroom. I just thought this was the most logical place to put that picture.) Now, I’m hoping that we can find a white-spotted red toadstool while Mom is here in the summer, because she’s never seen one in person. I’m afraid that will be the wrong time of year for them, though.

Silver Lake

October 12, 2025 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

We arrived in Michigan the first week of August, during a heat wave. For the first few days, we rested and caught up with a few people, and went to church with my mom. Then, on Monday, we were ready to do something else. The heat wave had broken, and it was somewhat overcast that day, so we decided it was a good time to go to Silver Lake and show the children the sand dunes. We took two of my nephews along, and the children had great fun!

First glimpse of the dunes across Silver Lake. I’ve always loved this view!

Starting up to the top! This is a very steep climb, but the sand feels very nice between your toes. I had forgotten how fine and soft it is–such a contrast to our coarse sand here in New Zealand. When we came back down later, Gayle and I were about halfway down when the children reached the bottom. They turned around and raced back up so they could run down again! I took a video of that as they came towards me, but since it includes my nephews I can’t post it here.

At the top of the dunes. I always feel like I’m in the Sahara Desert when I get up there!

All the children had great fun jumping from the top of the ridge of sand and rolling down to the valley. We had great fun watching them!

After we played on the dunes for awhile, we went around to Little Sable Point lighthouse. I didn’t get a picture of the outside of it this time, but took these pictures from the top. If you go to this post from several years ago you can see the outside.

That was a fun afternoon!

Family!

October 8, 2025 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

While we were in Michigan, we enjoyed spending time with almost my whole family. My children thoroughly enjoyed getting to know their cousins. In this picture, they were having an apple fight. The tree at the top of the hill was dropping thousands of small, green apples, so the children were pelting Mr. Imagination with them as he returned fire. They all loved it–we heard no complaints about getting hurt!

We often sat at my mom’s picnic table under the tree in front of her house to visit, so the children could play outside nearby while we talked. My little monkey loved the rock pile and the tree!

The girl cousins spent all of one hot afternoon playing with Grandma’s legos. They were building a candy store. The second picture shows some of the “cakes” they constructed and sold to each other and to us.

Another day we spent a couple of hours at Lake Michigan (aka The Lake). Unfortunately, the water near shore was saturated with algae. The children played in it for awhile anyway, but it looked nasty. They ended up having more fun playing in the sand.

Another evening at Grandma’s house! She wasn’t too happy about the barn kittens finding her house, but as close as she is to the barn, it was inevitable. The children loved it!

Lots of games were played on the concrete pad just up the hill. I never got a picture of the basketball hoop Mr. Imagination set up at one side, though.

We also went blueberry picking as a group one day. Miss Joy wanted me to take a picture of her under a bush.

They loved playing in my brother’s pond, too. This happened at least three times, but I only got pictures once.

Travel from Ohio to Michigan

October 5, 2025 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

After spending two weeks in Ohio, we traveled to Michigan to spend time with my mother. On the way, we met up with an author I have gotten to know online. We spent three delightful hours with Chautona Havig and her daughter in a park.

Mr. Imagination was quite bored, so I handed him the camera when we saw a black squirrel, and he practiced photography.

We drove past a large wind farm along the western side of Ohio.

After spending the night with my sister and her family, we drove north through Amish country.

The children were intrigued by the fields of seed corn.

I was startled at the sight of Amish houses with solar panels mounted on the roofs!

This was at an intersection in Middlebury.

We came up behind this truck as we drove north through Michigan.

We made a detour to visit an ice cream shop that a former employee of ours started recently, in Caledonia, Michigan. He makes small batches of specialty ice cream. It is delicious!

If you are near Grand Rapids, I highly recommend Oliver Gramm ice cream, in downtown Caledonia!
And no, this is not a sponsored post.

Out and About in Ohio

September 28, 2025 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

On a few days while we were in Ohio, we drove around visiting various people. On one of those days we stopped at the cemetery where Gayle’s mother is buried and visited the spot. After taking a serious picture, the children got goofy!

We stopped to have a look at this old house and barn, built by one of Gayle’s great-great-something great-grandparents. Can you see the date at the lower right corner of the house? The date on the barn is 1901.

I took this next picture because of the juxtaposition of the old wooden shingles on the shed, with the modern building just beyond.

This is another family house; it is the one Gayle’s mother grew up in. It was brick then, but has been updated more recently. One of his cousins lives in it with his family.

We also visited our nephew’s farm. He raises meat chickens in these structures, and moves them every day.

He also moves his cattle and sheep daily.

Miss Joy was delighted to find a cat she could love on. She badly missed her cats.

Of course, we went swimming again. Miss Joy is quite the fish; she can swim well with a life jacket on.

We visited another nephew, and toured the house he has restored for his young family.

Columbus Zoo

September 21, 2025 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

While we were in Ohio, we took a day to go to the Columbus Zoo. My brother, who lives in Ohio, and his family have a year pass, so we went together. There are no elephants in New Zealand, so the children badly wanted to see one.

While we waited for my brother’s family to arrive, we took a few pictures. They were setting up for the Lantern Festival, so there were cloth sculptures like this all over the zoo (picture below of one of them).

Our first stop was the sea lion exhibit–and the first thing we saw there was this diver cleaning the cage!

The sea lions swim around, over and under a glass tunnel that we walked through. We enjoyed watching them.

There was a glass underwater viewing area for the polar bears, too.

Reindeer

Wolverine

Hyenas

Finally, the elephants! This one was playing with a stick, putting it in her mouth and crunching it. A young one was throwing sand all over itself. The big male was in an enclosure by itself, and we watched it eating hay from a large net bag, very carefully pulling some out and putting it into its mouth.