10 Year High School Reunion

We just had another great weekend.  Saturday we started out the day by going to Lowe's in Grand Forks to their Build & Grow Clinic.  The kids go to build Monster Trucks!  They're pretty neat.

After Lowe's, we dropped off a bunch of stuff at a thrift store.  It sure feels good to have all that stuff out of my house!  It's nice to be able to give away the clothes that are too small for the kids and/or the excess of clothes and other household stuff that we don't need.  We stopped and got a few essentials from Walmart and then headed to Binford.  We went thru Thompson, so we were able to see the path where the tornado went West of town.  It's crazy how just the path had mangled trees and flattened buildings, but not even 1/4 mile away, things were just fine.

Saturday afternoon was my class's 10 year high school reunion.  There were a total of 25 of us that graduated and a few others that didn't.  I just realized I had been counting 13 of us that were there, but it was actually 15.  Not too bad of a turn-out for the 10 year!  We met up at the park in Binford, the kids played, we grilled some burgers and hot dogs, and visited.  It was fun to see everyone and kind of funny to see some of the guys as dads.

After the reunion, we headed to my mom's in Jamestown.  We enjoyed visiting for a little while before heading to bed.  Sunday morning we went to church and then celebrated the girls' birthdays with my mom & step-dad, my uncle, and my Grandpa.  It's hard to believe that they are going to be 7 & 5 years old already!

Sunday afternoon, we went to Kathryn.  My Grandma has been battling cancer for the last couple years and just finished up a round of radiation treatment.  Her church in town hosted a benefit for her.  I enjoyed seeing my dad's side of the family.  The last time I seen most of them was for Grandma's 80th birthday which was about 5 years ago.  Hailey was only about 15 months old at the time, so they were able to meet Lexi and Jacob for the first time.

When we were heading home from Kathryn, we were able to watch a rainbow for most of the trip to Fargo.  As we got closer to Fargo, it got brighter and brighter.  There was even a faint 2nd rainbow, too!  Once we got to the North side of town, it pretty much disappered.  This was the only picture we got on my camera and it was just before it disappered.  You can just barely see it right about in the middle of the picture.

When we got home, we were greeted by 5 little 1-inch long frogs by our front step.  They were pretty cute!  Hailey caught one this afternoon while playing outside.

Isn't he cute?!

Here's a few more pictures of some of mom's flowers and my red geraniums.  :)

Mini-Vaca #2

This past weekend, our family headed to Omaha.  We enjoyed getting to see some good friends and visiting a little.  The kids did so well in the van on the way there and back...it's so nice that they travel well!  I think we actually make record time for us by getting to Omaha in 8 hours!  It was so funny listening to the kids be in awe of all the lights of the city.  It was like they were seeing it for the first time even though we lived there for 4 1/2 years.  One of the funniest moments was when we were heading to "our" church Sunday morning.  As we waited at the light after exiting off Dodge, the kids seen the church on the left.  Hailey said she remembered that's what the church looked like, Lexi said she didn't remember it, and Jacob goes, "I remember it!"  Aaron & I had a good laugh about that one being he was 10 months old when we moved back to ND.  :)
It was so good to be back at Trinity that morning!  We still feel like that's our church even though we love and feel totally at home in our church here in Mayville.  It was fun to see all the changes they've been making in the nursery and other Sunday School rooms--new paint, murals on the walls, electronic check-in stations, new registration desk.  The most exciting part was seeing our friend Kurt & Emily leading worship for the elementary school kids!  They looked right at home leading and I'm so happy they have found a spot to serve.  Lexi was quite excited after class to tell me that she knew and sang along with one of the songs.  It was one that we had learned in Sunday School.  "I Am Free"
The main reason for us heading to Omaha was to help Kent & Colleen celebrate their 25th Wedding Anniversary and Vow Renewal.  We consider Kent & Colleen our parents as they were a huge help to us when we lived there.  They loved on us just like we were their kids and our children their grandchildren...how awesome is that?!  K & C have been participating in Rendevous for many years now and they decided to have their vow renewal Rendevous style.  It was really neat seeing the whole set up of everyone that was there.  We had perfect weather for being outside most of the day.

The Wedding Party

The girls with Leenie and the dresses she made for them.

Jacob wearing Papa's hat.

The kids with Leenie & Papa and their pop-guns!

The kids with Tiffany & Leenie.  The kids loved helping Tiffany and playing with her.  Jacob helped wash dishes and all the kids helped find sticks for her to build a fire.

The weekend was great, but was too short!  We would have loved to have seen more of our friends, but just couldn't fit it all in.  Next time, we'll need to make it a longer stay.

After getting home, my plan was to get my house back in order after being neglected for the last few weeks.  This summer has been crazy and the weekdays end up being used to get ready for the next trip that weekend.  My plans for cleaning got side-tracked by Lexi having a high fever and Jacob having a super runny nose and fever.  Thankfully, Lexi's only lasted 1 day and Jacob was much better the next day.  I think the reason being is they decided to share their symptoms with me.  I came down with Jacob's leaky nose and Lexi's fever!  Today is going well so far and I actually feel like I have some energy to do some of the chores around the house.  I'm looking at this cold as God's way of saying that we needed to slow down a little and rest.  It'll be good to get rested up and healthy again so we can be ready to go for the next 3 weeks.  After that, I think things will slow down as we don't have any big travel plans.