Another blogger slacking week. I hate it when I get behind on these.
Monday- have no idea at this point what happened on Monday. Oh, yes, I do...I took Kevin to Kumon. He took two tests and passed the level that he started on, so he got to move up a level. Yay! Way to go! Good job Kevin. Math is getting easier for him, but he still needs lots of practice. Kumon has him doing a math packet every day. Repetition is key they say. Whatever works!
Tuesday - I did a practice photo shoot in my new in home studio. My friend from work brought his niece and his 3 kids over. They were a fun group of kids. I did individual photographs and group photographs. I started with the youngest and worked my way up to the oldest. That strategy worked pretty well. While I was photographing one kid, I had the parents getting the next one ready. It went really smooth. The started to get pretty silly and bored with it at the end, but all in all, they did great.
Wednesday and Thursday- I worked on editing photos
Friday - I had Friday off from work. Sam didn't have daycare, and Kevin didn't have summer school. I picked up an unmotorized Go-Cart that some guy's kids made in boyscouts. They no longer had use for it, so he posted it on Freecycle & I snatched it up. I brought it home (it was a lot larger than I had thought) and Sam had some fun in it for a while. Our driveway doesn't slope enough to get it going real fast, so his interest didn't last long. It needs a couple of new nails in it. It needs sanded and a new paint job. I think I can handle that.
Sam & I went to Goodwill on Friday as well. Sam bought a couple of new shirts. He picked them out all by himself. One is just a plain white t-shirt and the other is a button down, short sleeve blue shirt, with white Hawaiian flower print on it. It's actually quite a nice shirt and looks pretty good on him.
Friday afternoon, I ended up with a stomach ache, so I ended up eating Tums and taking a nap. After the Goodwill trip, I wasn't productive at all.
Friday evening Ken & Kevin went over & convinced the neighbor guy to light off some of the fireworks that he'd bought over in Wisconsin. Ken had some bottle rockets and others that he ran over to light off as well. No sooner had the neighbor guy lit off a firework, a cop showed up. Told us the fireworks we had were illegal in MN, and he confiscated them. Then he told us that if he came back we could be fined $1000 and sent to jail for 90 days. Buzzkiller. Apparently, he doesn't know that we have a fire fighter and a doctor on the block. That should be good right? Ok, illegal is illegal....fine...stupid people who light them off when they're drunk and hurt other people always ruin it for the ones who are safe. Things must have been slow at the police department. We figured they'd gone out to all the neighborhoods as there were about 5 pockets of fireworks being shot in the air and suddenly all activity ceased.
Saturday - We packed up the van and headed to Ken's sister's house about an hour away. She lives on a lake, so she had a family beach party. Ken got to waterski. He only waterskis about once a year, so he stayed up as long as he could. He was pretty sore today too. He was done when he did a face plant in the water. It looked like it hurt and I did not get a photo of his ever so gracious face plant, but I did get some really good ones of him on the water. (I'll post later) He wasn't hurt, thank Goodness, but he was done skiing. His siblings all took their turns waterskiing too. They are all pretty good at it. They've been doing it since they were kids. I have only ever gotten up on waterskis once in my life. That once was good enough. Water is not soft when you hit it at 40mph.
After all the water activity his sister had dinner done for us. She made a BBQ beef brisket. It was so delicious. She made some without BBQ for the kids and Kevin sure ate up a bunch of that.
We got home from Ken's sister's house around 8:30 pm, so we headed over to the neighbors. Kevin & Ken wanted to know if he was going to light off the rest of the fireworks. No go there, the neighbor's wife said absolutely not. The neighbor told us if we wanted to light them off we could, but he wasn't going to. I figured it was a bad idea too. We certainly didn't need anyone getting arrested on the 4th of July over fireworks of all things.
Kevin & I made some popcorn and headed over to a field nearby to watch fireworks so that we wouldn't have to fight the big crowd at the City Park. We got to see about 4 different firework shows from around the area. That was pretty neat. When it was over we were home in 5 minutes. No crowds at all.
We got home and Ken was in the neighbor's driveway with a bunch of other people. They had lit off the legal fireworks. No one wanted to chance the cops coming by again after Friday night.
We finished the night hanging out with the neighbors until it was really late.
Today we laid around. I went outside for a while to get some sunshine and worked on sanding the rust off of an old tricycle I bought at a garage sale for $2 I still have some work to do on it, and then I have to re-paint it. Apparently I think I don't have enough projects. Oh well, it's a fun project and gets me outside with something to do.
This evening I made hamburgers on the grill. Oh they were yummy.
This coming up week, I have a wedding to attend on Wed. We have a wedding on Friday, and then are going to a friend's cabin for Saturday & Sunday. So it will prove to be another busy week. I still have photo editing to do and work on the tricycle now that I've got that project started.
Showing posts with label 4th of July. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 4th of July. Show all posts
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Vacation Summary
http://www.flickr.com/photos/81125618@N00/
Here is the link to my Flickr photo's from Gracie's 100th and then the rest of our vacation. And then the link to our 4th of July celebration on picasa.
At the end of June we traveled to Wyoming for the 3 day celebration of my grandmother's 100th birthday. We also took our family vacation in south west Wyoming.
Here is the summary of our trip:
Day 1-3 Driving, driving, and more driving! We like to take a slower pace driving out since it's the beginning of vacation and we want to take time to be tourists. Stops included, Blue Earth MN, Wall Drug, SD, Buffalo, WY. We hit our final destination of Meeteetse in the late afternoon Friday & got ready for the birthday dinner. We got bussed out to the dinner location. The view was spectacular, and the dinner was really good. Later in the evening we watched the Birthday Fireworks show, went to Cowboy Bar ,and then sat around the camp fire at the Oasis with some of the relatives.
Day 4- Birthday Open House: We did the meet & greet with the birthday girl. We toured the museum and visited the Gracie exhibit. Later in the evening we went and listened to the people performing for open mic night. After it got dark we had to shut the microphone off and then we sat around the campfire and some people continued to play guitar through the night.
Day 5 - We attended a very special church service dedicated to the birthday girl. After church was over, we watched the rebellious young 100 year old get her annual Harley ride. She hopped on the back of her friend's Harley, smiled, and away they went! They had a good ride and everyone cheered them on. Then we had a big BBQ and finished up visiting with family. Near sundown I took my nephew's new wife up Wood River Road for a wild life drive. Later in the evening we joined the birthday girl and other folks at the Cowboy Bar for a night cap.
Day 6 - Our last day in Meeteetse. We visited the whole day with the grandma's. The kids enjoyed playing with their cousin Alice. Later that evening we went to dinner at the Cowboy Bar/Outlaw Cafe for our annual order of BBQ ribs. Yummy, the best ever. Gracie, Helen, Spuddie, and Phil accompanied us. I had to practically wrestle my mother and threaten the waiter just to have dinner be our treat.
Day 7 - We departed the grandma's and headed south of Jackson Hole, Wy. We made a stop at Shoshone for the best ever Malt. I had a chocolate & huckleberry malt and Ken had a mint and chocolate malt. Heaven in a glass! We toured Atlantic City and South Pass City. In South Pass City, Ken ran over a log and we ended up getting our van checked out in the South Pass City garage. We were sure glad to see that 1 out of the "about 7" population was a mechanic. He gave the van a check and informed us no damage was done, we were good to go. So onward to our cabin in the Wind River Mountains.
Day 8 - Toured the Mountain Man Museum in Pinedale, Wy. Toured the dam at Freemont Lake, and went fishing. Ken caught a nice sized lake trout.
Day 9 - We went hiking in the mountains. I ended up out hiking all the guys. The trail was pretty steep and the boys got tired out. Ken ended up having a stomach ache. Hiking back up hill was a bit challenging. We started to get eaten up by mosquitoes and went through plenty of water. So I was a bit glad we didn't make it all the way down the path.
Day 10 - Horseback riding! We had so much fun doing this. This was the first time the kids have been on a horse by themselves. They did really good too. Sam was pretty nervous beforehand, but once he met his horse, he felt better about it. He ended up really loving it. Kevin was a natural. He had so much fun. He even had fun flirting with the blond trail guide. I hadn't been on a horse in over 20 years. It felt good being back on one. Ken did good too. He rode horses a few times as a teenager, and hadn't been on one since.
After the horse ride, we went on the ski lift to the top of the hill. We had a 360 view of the area. It was pretty breath taking. The ski lift operator took his mountain bike up with him and rode down the hill. CRAZY!!! He made it down alive and then went back up for more with the group of people that went up the ski lift after us.
Day 11 - Boo Hoo! Vacation is over. :( We packed up and headed home. We decided to drive straight through home. Ken drove the first 11 hours and I drove the last 8 1/2. We stopped in Hot Springs, SD for a picnic and stretching of the legs. So we walked around the area a little bit.
We made it home safe and sound and weary travelers. Sunday we just spent the day catching up on much needed sleep and unpacking.
It was nice having a 4 day work week, but it was hard to get back into the groove after such a nice long vacation.
For the 4th of July, we went the Air Guard Museum at Fort Snelling. Then we went to the actual fort at Fort Snelling and celebrated our 4th there. It was a good time. In the evening we sat in our cul-de-sac and watched our neighbor set off fireworks he had purchased in WI. It was a pretty good show. Today (July 5) we went back to the Air Guard Museum so that Kevin could sit in the cockpits of the planes since they were closed up the day before. He was in military aircraft heaven. He got to sit in the cockpit of an F4 Phantom, a Hercules, the Mustang, and a Huey. He had a really big smile on his face. He also got to talk to a man who had served in both WW2 and Vietnam. He had piloted 11 different aircraft in his military career. Kevin was quite impressed talking to him and he enjoyed talking to a youngster with so much enthusiasm for the air craft. Sam was bored the whole time, but came along because he's such a good sport.
 |
| 4th of July, 2008 |
Here is the link to my Flickr photo's from Gracie's 100th and then the rest of our vacation. And then the link to our 4th of July celebration on picasa.
At the end of June we traveled to Wyoming for the 3 day celebration of my grandmother's 100th birthday. We also took our family vacation in south west Wyoming.
Here is the summary of our trip:
Day 1-3 Driving, driving, and more driving! We like to take a slower pace driving out since it's the beginning of vacation and we want to take time to be tourists. Stops included, Blue Earth MN, Wall Drug, SD, Buffalo, WY. We hit our final destination of Meeteetse in the late afternoon Friday & got ready for the birthday dinner. We got bussed out to the dinner location. The view was spectacular, and the dinner was really good. Later in the evening we watched the Birthday Fireworks show, went to Cowboy Bar ,and then sat around the camp fire at the Oasis with some of the relatives.
Day 4- Birthday Open House: We did the meet & greet with the birthday girl. We toured the museum and visited the Gracie exhibit. Later in the evening we went and listened to the people performing for open mic night. After it got dark we had to shut the microphone off and then we sat around the campfire and some people continued to play guitar through the night.
Day 5 - We attended a very special church service dedicated to the birthday girl. After church was over, we watched the rebellious young 100 year old get her annual Harley ride. She hopped on the back of her friend's Harley, smiled, and away they went! They had a good ride and everyone cheered them on. Then we had a big BBQ and finished up visiting with family. Near sundown I took my nephew's new wife up Wood River Road for a wild life drive. Later in the evening we joined the birthday girl and other folks at the Cowboy Bar for a night cap.
Day 6 - Our last day in Meeteetse. We visited the whole day with the grandma's. The kids enjoyed playing with their cousin Alice. Later that evening we went to dinner at the Cowboy Bar/Outlaw Cafe for our annual order of BBQ ribs. Yummy, the best ever. Gracie, Helen, Spuddie, and Phil accompanied us. I had to practically wrestle my mother and threaten the waiter just to have dinner be our treat.
Day 7 - We departed the grandma's and headed south of Jackson Hole, Wy. We made a stop at Shoshone for the best ever Malt. I had a chocolate & huckleberry malt and Ken had a mint and chocolate malt. Heaven in a glass! We toured Atlantic City and South Pass City. In South Pass City, Ken ran over a log and we ended up getting our van checked out in the South Pass City garage. We were sure glad to see that 1 out of the "about 7" population was a mechanic. He gave the van a check and informed us no damage was done, we were good to go. So onward to our cabin in the Wind River Mountains.
Day 8 - Toured the Mountain Man Museum in Pinedale, Wy. Toured the dam at Freemont Lake, and went fishing. Ken caught a nice sized lake trout.
Day 9 - We went hiking in the mountains. I ended up out hiking all the guys. The trail was pretty steep and the boys got tired out. Ken ended up having a stomach ache. Hiking back up hill was a bit challenging. We started to get eaten up by mosquitoes and went through plenty of water. So I was a bit glad we didn't make it all the way down the path.
Day 10 - Horseback riding! We had so much fun doing this. This was the first time the kids have been on a horse by themselves. They did really good too. Sam was pretty nervous beforehand, but once he met his horse, he felt better about it. He ended up really loving it. Kevin was a natural. He had so much fun. He even had fun flirting with the blond trail guide. I hadn't been on a horse in over 20 years. It felt good being back on one. Ken did good too. He rode horses a few times as a teenager, and hadn't been on one since.
After the horse ride, we went on the ski lift to the top of the hill. We had a 360 view of the area. It was pretty breath taking. The ski lift operator took his mountain bike up with him and rode down the hill. CRAZY!!! He made it down alive and then went back up for more with the group of people that went up the ski lift after us.
Day 11 - Boo Hoo! Vacation is over. :( We packed up and headed home. We decided to drive straight through home. Ken drove the first 11 hours and I drove the last 8 1/2. We stopped in Hot Springs, SD for a picnic and stretching of the legs. So we walked around the area a little bit.
We made it home safe and sound and weary travelers. Sunday we just spent the day catching up on much needed sleep and unpacking.
It was nice having a 4 day work week, but it was hard to get back into the groove after such a nice long vacation.
For the 4th of July, we went the Air Guard Museum at Fort Snelling. Then we went to the actual fort at Fort Snelling and celebrated our 4th there. It was a good time. In the evening we sat in our cul-de-sac and watched our neighbor set off fireworks he had purchased in WI. It was a pretty good show. Today (July 5) we went back to the Air Guard Museum so that Kevin could sit in the cockpits of the planes since they were closed up the day before. He was in military aircraft heaven. He got to sit in the cockpit of an F4 Phantom, a Hercules, the Mustang, and a Huey. He had a really big smile on his face. He also got to talk to a man who had served in both WW2 and Vietnam. He had piloted 11 different aircraft in his military career. Kevin was quite impressed talking to him and he enjoyed talking to a youngster with so much enthusiasm for the air craft. Sam was bored the whole time, but came along because he's such a good sport.
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