Another WZZM 13 video

Here's another video that was seen on WZZM 13 in the Grand Rapids area. I'm actually going to try embedding it into my blog on my own!!!! Peggy is sitting next to me in case I need help (and I did).

WZZM Interviews Beacon Hill's Chef

I'm out in Seattle visiting my daughter, who found this video about our chef and she's teaching me how to embed it in my blog. Better enjoy it when you read my blog today, because I may not remember how to do this when I return to Grand Rapids.

Meeting our Neighbors at Beacon Hill

Shortly after we moved into Beacon Hill at Eastgate, Dave and Judy Carpenter moved into the apartment next door to us. I recently sat down with them to get acquainted and learned that they have two kids who must have gone to East Grand Schools at the time that our kids were there. While they have lived in the Grand Rapids area since 1965, they actually met in kindergarten in the Upper Peninsula town of Iron Mountain. When I asked Judy if Dave used to pull her pigtails, Dave said Judy chased him. I didn’t ask if she kept chasing him through the years, but evidently she caught him!
Dave started out as an attorney in the trust department of a bank and soon established a law office with a partner. Together they had a general law practice, and Dave says he did a lot of estate planning.
Judy told me that she worked as a nurse at Blodgett Hospital. Having experienced the loss of a baby before its birth, she wanted to help others through that loss. So, she founded the Resolve Through Sharing program which still exists at Blodgett Hospital. Judy is also a Master Gardener. It was perhaps Judy’s interest in gardening that led the two of them to volunteer at Meijer Gardens where Dave learned to love sculpture as well as the gardens.
Dave and Judy say they played bridge “long ago” and are hoping to take up the game again with a group of casual, forgiving bridge players. While they looked at many Retirement Communities, they chose Beacon Hill because they felt it was the most welcoming. Now that they are here, it feels like family to them.

Meeting our Neighbors at Beacon Hill

When I sat down to dinner with George Anne and Dick recently, she told me that they had moved to Beacon Hill from Greensboro, North Carolina. Since they lived so far away they were not able to attend any of the seminars and social gatherings that were held during the time that this community was being built. They had decided to move here because they have a daughter in the area. I happened to meet their daughter at one of the Beacon Hill seminars. She told her mother about my blog. George Anne said that reading this Blog helped her feel connected to Beacon Hill.

Dick retired after a 35 year career as an engineer with Dow Corning. That job took him all over the world and I imagine he has lots of stories to share. Incidentally, he is looking for a partner to play the golf simulator here at Beacon Hill. George Anne is a seamstress who used to make all of her own clothes. She came by this skill naturally as her grandfather was a tailor. She and Dick are looking forward to having the Beacon Hill bus take them to cultural events in this city.

George Anne and Dick will spend May through September at their cottage on Bass Lake near Traverse City where Dick will be on the water most of the time, fishing. I imagine that is when George Anne will enjoy reading and being Up North.

Settling into Beacon Hill at Eastgate

We've been living at Beacon Hill at Eastgate for just over a week now, and both of us are liking it! Our spacious apartment is fairly well settled and even decorated for Christmas. The tiny tree that used to sit on top of the old Magnovox TV looks rather small standing on the floor by the door to the balcony, but it is a bright spot in that corner.
I'm posting a photo of the two of us, taken in the dining room on Thanksgiving day. We've been able to meet many of the new residents at dinner as everyone seems happy to sit with folks they don't know. One of the first couples that we met were George Anne and Dick Awe. They are from North Carolina and have a daughter who lives here. I met the daughter at a Beacon Hill seminar and shared with her this blog address. George Anne told me that she had enjoyed reading the blog from her home in N.C. and that it helped her feel connected to the progress on the construction of Beacon Hill as well as the progress that I was making in getting ready to move.
If you are reading this blog, I'd love to know what you think of it.