North Shore Getaway - Day 1

Beth and I were able to get away last weekend, so we went to our favorite spot - Lake Superior's North Shore. We got on the road at about 1:30pm and encountered fairly heavy traffic all the way up. Some of this was for Grandma's Marathon and some, I'm sure, was just summer cabin goers trying to get out of town for the nice weather.

But the weather wasn't so nice as we went past Duluth and trekked along the shore. A great mist was coming over the lake and the temperature started to drop.

It was cool and misty when we stopped at the Tettegouche to visit our favorite rock beach (and gaze upon the arch). But we hiked down anyway and were greeted by a virtual city of rock cairns (somebody had made 40-50 separate towers of stones and left them there). It was quite a sight. Beth, of course, got right to work making her own rock cairns and I just enjoyed the view.

By the time we reached our cabin along the Cascade River it was downright cold. We were quite happy we had decided to book a cabin that had a fireplace - even in June. After getting a couple of bowls of chili at the local greasy spoon, we settled in for an evening beside the fire and just enjoyed time with each other -- quiet, cozy time with each other!!

Happy Rock on the North Shore

Congratulations, Bayley!!!

Bayley Kinner - Mounds View High School Class of 2009

See Bayley Graduate

Tossing of the Hats!

Happy Easter!

Kids Dying Easter Eggs

Flowers from Grandma Gay

THANK YOU!!!

Bayley's Prom Dress!

Taking Care of Ladybugs

"I took care of the ladybugs," said Emma.

"Oh," said her mom. "How did you take care of them?"

"Last night I found two ladybugs in my bedroom. So I squashed them and threw them in the garbage!"

Dave's Taxi & Entertainment Service

Day 2 of Beth's trip to Illinois and the day started early.

6:30am - Sunny woke David up to be let out.

6:45am - David drove Bayley to school for her speech meet.

7:50am - David drove Braxton to his friend John's house so he could go to baseball tryouts.

9:15 am - David & Emma drive to the hotel where Paul is having his birthday party and pick-up Gretchen.

10:00am - David plays games with the girls. First they play a round of speed-Life which Gretchen wins. Then David and Gretchen play a game of Battleship. Gretchen wins that game, too.

11:30am - David, Gretchen, and Emma take Sunny & Rufus to the dog park. Emma has a great time gathering up tennis balls and throwing them to the dogs. Gretchen was cold!

12:45pm - We left the dog park and stopped at McDonald's to pick up some lunch. Then we went home, met up with Zoe and Braxton, and whiled away the afternoon (during part of which time the girls drew faces on some of Emma's remaining party balloons).

3:30pm - David is back in the car again going to pick Bayley up from her speech meet.

4:00pm - David, Braxton, Zoe, Gretchen, and Emma drive back to the hotel where Paul is having his party and join the party for some cake and to watch Paul open presents.

6:00pm - David is posting pictures and drawings to the blog so Beth can see what we've been up to.

6:30pm - David uses all of his culinary expertise to prepare a meal of fish-sticks and tater-tots for the kids.

7:30pm - David writes this last blog entry for the day.

8:00pm - Time to put Emma to bed and start turning the clocks forward for tomorrow.


+ posted by David

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A Picture for Mommy!

Emma drew this picture for Beth so that she'll know that Emma loves her Mommy!

Pictured from left to right are Emma, David, Braxton, Beth, Zoe, and Bayley.

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Nice Hat, Emma!

Emma's Baby Balloon

Gretchen Surprised

Balloon Faces

Happy Birthday, Paul!

Paul's Birthday Party

Another Day with the Chatty Chatty Princess

Today is Day 3 of Emma's vacation from school, Day 2 of Bayley, Braxton & Zoe's vacation from school, and Day 1 of Beth's trip to Illinois. Bayley, Braxton & Zoe were at Brad's house last night, so David decided to take Emma to the office for half a day.

Emma is always greeted by smiling faces. She is known in these parts as the Chatty Chatty Princess and people in the office go out of their way to make sure they get to see her. She is one precocious and entertaining child!

Today Emma spent the first part of her visit opening up some of the toys she received at her kid birthday party: (i) a Thumbalina Fairy, (ii) a My Little Pony, and (iii) a couple of Littlest Pet Shop toys.

After playing with those toys and visiting a few friends, she worked on some drawings. She did a great job of entertaining herself while David was engaged in a one-hour conference call.

Great patience, Emma!!!

After the conference call, it was time for a meeting of the officers of the Toastmasters club that David is a part of - he is the VP of Education. Emma was excited to go to her "very first meeting." She brought her drawing pad and drew a picture of the event.

+ posted by David

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Car Repair & the Chatty Chatty Princess

Emma (a/k/a/ the Chatty Chatty Princess) had no school today because of parent-teacher conferences. So David stayed home from work to spend the day with her.

So what do a dad and a six-year old girl do when home alone for the day?

You guessed it - car maintenance!

David's car needed new tires, so he took Emma to the local Discount Tire to get replacements. The people were friendly and the service was great.

Here is a drawing from Emma showing the work that was done.



Beth's car also needed some maintenance today. Her car was due for an oil change. So after getting new tires on David's car we traded vehicles with Beth and took the mini-van to the local Insta-Lube.

Service there was performed with a smile.

See?



After the oil change, David took Emma to Super-Target to get some pizza and cheetos for lunch.

What a day!!!


+ posted by David

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