Christmas at Home 2007

We had our own little Christmas at home on Friday night. We opened our presents to each other & had some eggnog. We like to just have a little Christmas celebration ourselves before the busyness of Christmas with our families. We drove up to Duluth today to spend the weekend, Christmas Eve & Christmas Day with Todd's family. We wish you all a blessed Christmas with family & friends.

Sonja's Birthday ~~ 12/9/07

Todd sent these beautiful flowers to my office for my birthday. He sent them a couple of days early because he wants to make a "show" for my co-workers to see. My boss, Martin, was impressed. I said, "Yeah, he's good!" Martin said, "He's setting a pretty high standard that the rest of us are not living up to." :)

We went to the Lake Elmo Inn for my birthday dinner because we had a gift certificate. (Thanks Matt & Lisa!!)

The outside of the inn was all decked out with lights for Christmas. The inside was decorated with lots of snow globes, a beautiful Christmas tree and lots of other decorations. Through out the restaurant, there were several display cases containing a collection of hundreds of interesting salt & pepper shakers.

We had a wonderful meal and topped it off with a slice of strawberry cheesecake on a Happy Birthday plate. We highly recommend this restaurant for a romantic evening. ;)

The Christmas Window

Todd & I were in a new Christmas production at our church this year called The Christmas Window. It was about a boy named Tyler who learns about imagination & faith from a special friend (an angel?) & his grandmother by looking thru the Christmas Window. As you can see by the picture, I had my own coffee shop. The directors surprised me with my name on the shop because of my faithfulness in attending practices (& church services) very soon after back surgery.



Todd in his waiter costume with Mrs. Potts (our friend, Pat Ahonen) & Lumiere
(our friend, Matt Anderson) from the Be Our Guest scene.











Todd & I wore these fancy Victorian costumes for the Christmas Waltz scene. Isn't Todd handsome in his tux? This also made a great picture for our Christmas card. :)

Oh, Todd said I'd better include that he thought I was very beautiful in my fancy dress. :)












In the Biblical scenes, Todd was (in his words) one of the three wise guys..........here he is with his wise counterparts. (Rick Yapp & Barry Helgeson)

Thanksgiving 2007

Thanksgiving dinner #2 at Jeremy & Kim's house in Chaska, MN on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving #1 was at Todd's mom's house in Duluth on Thanksgiving day. Mmmmmmmmm..........







The kid's table in the kitchen. L-R J.D., Justin, Brenden, Nicholas & Evan.
Mom Lane and her 6 crazy grandkids. L-R Evan (4) (chewing his fingernails.......not picking his nose), Tiffany (17) Justin (2 days away from being 8) Mom, Tyler (1), Nicholas (6), J.D. (10) & Brenden (5).

I'm back........

I haven't been able to post for awhile because I had back surgery on 10/24 for a herniated disc. So I will try to catch up a little on some things we have done.

We went to watch our nephew, J.D., play football a few times this fall. He is #42 in the middle of the picture.

It was really fun and he is a good player. :)

We also went to watch one of Justin's basketball scrimmages. He made quite a few baskets that day & was fun to watch. :)

On Oct. 20th, we went to Sever's Corn Maze in Shakopee with Todd's mom & stepdad, his sister, Jamie, & our nieces, Emily & Sophia. I had never gone there before........it was really fun. :)

Todd & I at Sever's Corn Maze.

The day after my surgery, some of my favorite guys came to visit me in the hospital......besides my favorite guy, Todd, of course. Evan came with my sister, Angela, with a plant & balloon he picked out himself....

.....and J.D., Tyler, Justin & Brenden came with my sister-in-law, Kim. They brought me a raspberry shake from Culver's. Mmmmmmmmm!!! :)






Dr. Crowe said the surgery went very well and I have been recovering nicely. Thank you, everyone, for your prayers. I am very grateful for them. :)

Sunday, Sept. 16, 2007

On Sunday, we met Todd's mom & step-dad in North Branch for lunch to celebrate her birthday (9/17) and their anniversary (9/18). We had a good lunch at Perkins and did a little shopping at the Tanger Outlet Mall before we headed back home and they went back to Duluth. :)

Quadruple Birthday Party!!

We had a birthday party on Saturday for one niece and three nephews. Nicholas (6 on Sept. 18th), Brenden (5 on Aug. 19th), Tiffany (17 on Sept. 20th) and Tyler (1 on Sept. 3rd).

Tyler having fun with the balloons.

The sports themed pinata.....

......was a big hit! :)

There was LOTS of candy for everyone! Justin, JD, Brenden, Evan & Nicholas.

Brenden picked out the "Golf" birthday cake. Everybody had their own number candles on the cake.

Tyler found the cake very interesting.
(Evan, Sonja, Tyler, Brenden & Nicholas)

Mmmmmmmm...........the green frosting is good! :)

Tyler enjoying his cake. :)

The Depot Train Museum -- Duluth, MN

We had Evan this weekend when we went up to Duluth to see Todd's Grandma Vi, so we decided to take him to The Depot to look at all of the trains.

The trains were VERY BIG. :)

Uncle Todd & Evan in a caboose.

(Aunt) Nana & Evan in an engine.

Evan loved watching the big model trains they had set up in The Depot. He would wait for a train to come by and then run over to the set of stairs on the other end to see it again. Then he would see one coming the other way and run back to these stairs to watch it coming again. He must have had a good time, 'cause he slept all the way home from Duluth. We wore him out real good. :)

Our 1st Anniversary~~May 6, 2007

This one got out of order because I was having a lot of trouble editing & posting it and had to delete it and start over. :)


We went back to the Grand Superior Lodge just north of Two Harbors, MN for our 1st Anniversary. We stayed just a couple of nights in the same Honeymoon Suite that we were in for our honeymoon. We brought our cake top that was frozen in our freezer for a year. I think I unwrapped it from it's plastic wrap & tin foil for about 10 minutes. It was still very tasty & moist. Karen Halberg sure makes a good cake! We also brought some sparkling apple cider and our wedding glasses.

And of course, we brought presents. :)

It was a beautiful day when when we arrived. We were able to eat our cake & drink our sparkling cider on the balcony and enjoy the view of the lake. :)

Todd had been talking about wanting to go to Tom's Logging Camp because he remembered having a lot of fun there as a kid. It was a cool cloudy day and while we were there it started raining, too. But it wasn't very busy so that was nice.

Does Todd make a good lumberjack?

THERE'S A LEGEND WE'VE BEEN TOLD

OF INDIAN MAIDS & BUCKS QUITE BOLD

TO HOLD AN ANTLER O'ER HER HEAD

AND STEAL A KISS, IT HAS BEEN SAID

WILL MAKE ONE'S ARDOR TRULY WARM

A LOVE TO WEATHER ANY STORM.

SO HONEYMOONERS DO NOT DALLY

BE SURE TO KISS IN ANTLER ALLEY!

Todd wanted to make sure he got his picture with the two white horses out front. :)

Sonja with the horse & wagon in front of the store.

Of course the next day (the day we left) dawned bright and beautiful once again. We think we have started a tradition. ;) We did have a wonderful time on our 1st anniversary get-a-way.

Higher Ground 2007

A couple of weekends ago, I took our niece, Tiffany, and nephews, Evan & Nicholas camping at the Higher Ground Music festival in Winsted, MN. Friday was a beautiful day and the most perfect day we could ask for to be camping and listening to concerts. :)

This year we borrowed Angela & Eric's new screen tent so we had some shade and a virtually bug free place to eat. :)

Evan & Nicholas carrying their chairs to the concert area.

Tiffany, Nicholas & Evan waiting for the Go Fish concert to start. Nicholas was so excited to see Go Fish. He kept asking all day when it would be time for Go Fish........I think he was afraid we would miss it if he didn't keep checking. :)

Nicholas & Tiffany enjoying the Go Fish concert. :)

Nicholas, Evan & me.

Nicholas & Evan with Go Fish (Jason, Jamie & Andy). We waited in line so the boys could get their posters signed. While we were waiting, Nicholas asked, "Do you think I will get to hug them?" :) He didn't hug them because they were behind a table but he did get to talk to them a little bit.

Saturday morning it started raining at 7:30 am and rained all day. I was very, very thankful for the screen tent. It allowed us to still be able to cook breakfast. The people on our right went to McDonalds in town because they couldn't cook their food. The family on our left just packed up and left. Here the boys are eating their french toast. :)

We listened to the concerts while playing games in the tent. Here we were playing HuskerDu? and we also played Dora Candyland, Oh Rats! and Sum Swamp. We also had to keep mopping up little puddles that came in thru the seams of the tent because it was raining constantly at a pretty good rate.

The adult ponchos were a little big on the boys, but they thought they were fun. We did finally give up and start packing up after we at supper. I was tired of carrying the boys over the mud to go to the port-a-potties and I didn't want them to wake up in the middle of the night in puddles of water. I had just changed them into dry clothes and Evan had to go to the bathroom. I said, "You have got to be kidding. I just got you dry." So instead of walking there, I loaded them up in the truck and we drove to the port-a-potties. One lady found this amusing. I told here I was tired of fighting with the mud. :) We were finally packed up and ready to leave at about 9:40 pm. We only missed one concert because we didn't want to wait around in the truck for the Mark Schultz concert to start at 10:00 pm. It started to lightning while we were leaving so we were glad that we were going home. Evan said, "I am a little sad because I wanted to stay." Over all, we had a very good time. :)

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P.S. I have decided that I do not like packing up the tent in the rain.......very soggy! :)