MindWare Picnic 2009

Tuesday night was our company picnic for MindWare at Long Lake Park in New Brighton. Todd & I brought Justin, Brenden, Tyler & Maddie. Since we were watching them overnight for Jeremy & Kim, we asked if we could get them early & bring them to the picnic. We did not bring our camera because we didn't want to try to keep track of it. Our company's owner, Martin, and one of our IT guys, John, took quite a few pictures so I am posting some of them that had us in them. :)

Here Maddie is looking in the tub with the water balloons in it. Brenden is participating in the water balloon toss. He is in the line to the right with a red shirt on & the water balloon up over his head.

Maddie looking in the water balloon tub. There were only a few left in the tub so she would lean over & reach way down. Her feet left the ground several times & she almost went in head first. :)

They had some cool balloon bouquets at the picnic. :)

Justin, Maddie & me waiting in line for ice cream. :)

Tyler (in the corner) & Brenden with his root beer float. :)

Justin making his root beer float. He put chocolate syrup, whipped cream & sprinkles on his. He said, "The girl making the root beer floats said mine was the best one she ever saw!" :)

Here we are enjoying our ice cream treats. Uncle Todd, Tyler, Brenden, Justin, Nana & Maddie. :)

All the kids waiting for the kids' prize drawings. Justin got a Star Wars volcano science kit, Brenden got a shark model & book & Tyler got a Puff the Magic Dragon puzzle.

In the background, Maddie & I are waiting for her name to be drawn. Maddie got a board book with moving pictures. The kids had a really fun time.......I think Todd & I had more fun because we brought the kids.....oh, they had an adult prize drawing, too, and Todd & I got a $100 gift certificate to Fogo De Chao, a Brazillian steakhouse in Minneapolis. Todd was very excited about this! :)

Here Maddie & I are getting the Fogo De Chao gift certificate with our basket of notebooks & post-it notes from Corporate Graphics.

We set up our smallest tent in the living room & Justin, Tyler & Brenden were very excited to sleep in it. :)

Slimed at Studio Go!

The theme for Summer Sunday School was Studio Go! Game Show. Todd was the host for the 2nd hour of sunday school.............Wade Winalot. I was his assistant, Wanda Winalot. :) I forgot to bring our camera to get pictures of Todd hosting. When our friend, Liz, sends us some, I will add them to this post.

Yesterday was the last Sunday & the kids had to answer questions for all of the lessons from the summer. When they got an answer correct, Paul Hanson & I got slimed. We had two or three buckets of slime poured on us, ice cream, whipped cream, chocolate sauce, cherries & sprinkles. Todd took this picures with his cell phone. :)

A Walk Down Memory Lane...............in Fond du Lac, WI

I have kept in contact with Betty McAuly since we left Fond du Lac in 1979. Betty lived two houses down from us & I babysat her 2 year old son, Marty. We visited with Betty & her family today while they were getting ready for a party they were having in the lake pavilion tonight.

Betty brought along this picture of my sister, Angela, our friend, Karen, & me with Marty out in front of her house. It was taken the summer of 1978. :) I took a picture of it today with our camera to post in on the blog so that is why it has today's date stamp on it.

Betty McAuly, Sonja, Marty, now in his thirties with a two year old of his own, Emma. :)

Betty's Family: Mike, Grace, Betty, Emma & Marty.

Fond du Lac is at the southern end of Lake Winnebago and has a working lighthouse. Todd was very excited about this part of our trip. :)

The Fond du Lac lighthouse.

Todd looking thru the telescope on the observation deck at the top of the lighthouse.

A view of the lake from the lighthouse.............I guess I should have gone over by the railing instead of taking it from the middle of the observation deck.........not sure what I was thinking on that one. :)

Todd is up at the top of the lighthouse.

Here you can see him better. :)

Then we went looking for more memories from my past. This is the church my family pastored when we lived in Fond du Lac. The Fond du Lac Church of God. It was white when my dad was the pastor. Sadly it has been sitting empty for several years & when we looked in the window of the door..........it is very torn up inside. There was not much inside to show that it used to be a really nice church................

..............except the sun shining thru the beautiful stained glass windows. There are four of them on one side of the building. Two of them have pieces broken out of them, but two of them are still in good shape. I sure wish I could have one of them. :)

This is the house we lived in at 86 E. Arndt St. When we lived here it was yellow with brown trim and there weren't any fences. Angela & I used to love playing Barbies on the front porch with our friend, Karen.

Behind our house was McKinley Park. Thirty years ago it did not have the fancy sign & all the trees.

The park also did not have the fancy playground, benches or the basketball court. It was just an open field, with some swings and metal monkey bars on gravel...........but we played there all the time & had a lot of fun. :)

Here you go boys............CHEGWIN! Jeremy's boys, especially Brenden, love the name of our old elementary school. We used to walk about four blocks to get to school. Todd & I walked there from the old house. The school has not changed much at all. We looked in the front door windows & it brought back some good memories.

Then Todd & I walked over to the public library. It is in the same place, but it had a lot of remodeling done in 2003 and an addition. I don't really remember what it looked like in the late 70's anyway. But I do remember that the 5 of us kids would walk the 6 or 7 blocks to the library to check out books to read for the next couple of weeks. I remember that I would always pick out my books as fast as I could & then sit & listen to The Diary of Anne Frank on LP on one of the record players in the library, with big headphones, until Leonard told me that we had to get ready to walk home. I would listen to that record every time we went to the library. :)

Back to Fond du Lac, WI

Todd & I are on a trip to Fond du Lac, WI from today thru Sunday. My family lived in Fond du Lac when I was in 5th & 6th grade. I have always wanted to bring Todd here to see where we used to live. We have to go to a memorial service in Brookfield, WI on Saturday, so it seemed like a good opportunity to take a mini-vacation.

We went to Lakeside Park this afternoon. I remember a lot about Fond du Lac, but I had totally forgotten about the big steam engine at the opening of the park. It was donated to the city of Fond du Lac when it was retired in 1955. Right when I saw it, I said, "Oh, yeah, I forgot about the train!" Then I saw the little train tracks next to the engine & told Todd, "......And there used to be a little train that went around on this track. I remember that."........and then.......................

................the little train came around the track! :)

Todd wanted a close up of me, so I tried to climb the fence & run away in the steam engine. :)

No, that is not me trying to run Todd over with the steam engine............

:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

There is a deer farm at the park. There were at least 4 fawns in there. Here are two of them. It was funny, because there was a third fawn close to these two fawns and when I tried to take a picture at a different angle of the three of them, he hid his head in the grass. When I moved over by Todd & took this picture, he put his head back up. Just for fun, I went back to the original spot to see if he would hide again if I tried to take a picture.........and he did! :) Funny! :)

Sonja in the covered bridge at Lakeside Park.

Close up.............Todd likes this one. :)

Todd in the covered bridge.

We decided to go for a ride on the train. It was only $.95 for each of us. Todd is excited to ride the train. :)

Sonja on the train.

Pink lilies in the park.

These lilies were right next to the pink ones. We have never seen lilies with these colors before.

Todd took this picture of me & he likes it a lot. :)

Freedom Celebration 2009

Our nieces & nephews really had a great time carrying flags in the Freedom Celebration. They all mentioned & some point yesterday that they hope they can do it next year. :) Brenden & I were also in a dramatization of an Avalon song called For Freedom. We were part of one of the families welcoming soldiers home at the end of the song. That was very fun, too!

The Flag Carriers (from our family) :)
Back: JD, Nana, Sophia
Front: Nicholas, Tyler, Emily & Brenden

There was a Festival on the Plaza before the Saturday night services & after the Sunday morning services. So we had our picnic supper/lunch there both days. The kids jumped in the bouncy house, pet the animals & got face paintings. Here is a picture of Tyler's firework.

JD had a cross stained glass window. Brenden had an eagle. Sophia had a peace sign. Emily had a firework.

(If you click on the picture you can see them better.)

When we got home we got all their stuff packed up and then they had popsicles outside before they all went home. Tyler, Nicholas, Emily, JD & Brenden.

Nicholas, JD, Brenden, Sophia, Emily & Tyler.

Tyler was lovin' his popsicle............

.................he was sticky from head to toe. :)

Mini-golfing for 8!

Todd & I had 6 kids (2 nieces & 4 nephews) this weekend, from Thursday afternoon to Sunday afternoon, so they could be flag carriers in the Freedom Celebration at our church. We had practice on Thursday night, practice on Saturday morning, one service on Saturday night & two services on Sunday morning. Friday was totally free, so we took the kids mini-golfing & then to my mom's house where we had filled up the pool and they played in the water for awhile before we had dinner there.

Tyler taking his shot. Uncle Todd, Nicholas & Brenden & watching. On a lot of the holes, Tyler would hit it a couple of times & then he would pick up the ball & set it down next to the hole & then hit it in. :) We will teach him when he is a little older that he can't do that. :)

Tyler, Nicholas, Uncle Todd & Sophia............and the bear drinking a soda.......or a shake perhaps........while doing a handstand. :)

Sophia, Brenden, Tyler, Emily, Nicholas & JD with the dinosaur. Sophia, Tyler & Emily wanted to wear some wild ties that are in our dress-up box. :)

Brenden taking a shot while Emily, Sophia, JD, Nicholas, Uncle Todd & Nicholas watch.

Nana helping Tyler take a shot by the Goony Bird. At one hole, I didn't get over soon enough to help Tyler swing & he threw the ball up the green...........and he got a hole-in-one! It was pretty funny! :)

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We had a fun time, but it was a little warm and it took us about 2 1/2 hours to play the 18 hole course!