SUMMER...PLEASE DON'T GO!!!

A lake is the landscapes most beautiful and expressive feature. It is earth's eye, looking into which the beholder measures the depth of his own nature.                   Henry David Thoreau

We Minnesotans love our lakes! All 10,000+ of them! We live 30 minutes away from Lake Pepin, a lake through which the great Mississippi River runs. Growing up we had a cabin on the lake and enjoyed a lot of family fun while enjoying the lake. So last year we made a decision to buy a boat... to keep making family memories.  We have grandchildren ages 3 to 18 and boating is something that kids of all ages and all generations can enjoy together.

 One of the fun aspects of this particular lake is that because it is on the Mississippi River which runs from the Northern- most part of Minnesota down to the Gulf of Mexico is that you see many interesting kinds of watercraft that you might not find on a lake not connected to a big waterway such as the Mississippi. Large barges pushed by tugboats are a daily sight on the River as they move cargo up and down the great waterway.

You might also see big paddleboats such as this one cruising down the River, a sight we saw just last week while boating.

In the harbor where we keep our boat there is an old restored Tugboat. We've seen others like this one also cruising the lake.

And on a beautiful summer day you'll see boats of all shapes and sizes pulled up to one of the many beaches along the shore or anchored together out from the beach. We boated to this beach and swam when I was young and now we're back with our grandkids having a blast! We have now had 5 generations enjoying this lake!

This big boat pulled in alongside us on a beach this summer filled with guys having a bachelor party.

Another thing we saw flying over  the lake this summer was a boat-plane. Um, I'm not sure what they are called...

But amazing watercraft are not the ONLY things you see on the lake. Lake Pepin has amazing bluff views that are breath-taking! If you look over the heads of our family boaters here, you will see beautiful bluffs all around.

My husband really got into the "boating thing" when he bought this Captain's hat at the insistence of our grandson, Charlie. 

                                
                                  And of course you need something to pull behind the boat...

We've made a lot of memories on this lake and hope to make many more. But summer has gone by too fast. About this time I'm usually ready for Fall but now that we have a boat I want more time on the water. I'm having a hard time letting go of summer right now...

So all of this is just to say..."You won't be seeing Mums or Fall decor on THIS blog until the boat comes out of the water!" 

Summer....Please don't go!!!

LORIE LINE CONCERT

Lorie Line

If you have never been to a Lorie Line concert, RUN, don't walk,  to  get your tickets for her latest Christmas HOLIDAY EXTRAVAGANZAAAAA!!! Her concerts are amazing! Lorie is a pianist who, with her "Fab Five" musicians puts on an incredibly entertaining show! Even if you've never been "into" piano music before, this is a concert you will absolutely love! From her Master of Ceremonies husband, to her beautiful music, to the ever-changing costumes, it's a non-stop evening of fun and entertainment!


I have made it a tradition every year for 19 years now to purchase tickets for all the women in the family, four generations of us! At first, we thought piano music might not be something the guys would enjoy, but after the first concert, we realized this was MORE than a piano concert! So we finally had the guys come and they enjoyed it as much as we did! Even the children who go to the concert are involved. At the end of each concert, the children are invited onstage to "perform" The Twelve Days Of Christmas. With "Mr Lorie Line" ( Lorie's husband ) dressed as Santa, the children scurry backstage and are helped into costumes and then they "act out" the actions to the song. My 9 year old granddaughter this year said excitedly, " I got to have Lorie Line help me get on my costume!"


Lorie is an amazingly talented woman! I cannot say enough about her and her concerts! You just HAVE TO GO AND SEE FOR YOURSELF! I'm sure you'll also make it a family tradition as well. OUR Lorie Line concert kicks off the Christmas season for us!


 Go to lorieline.com and click onto the 2010 Christmas show photos. You'll also see where the next concerts will be held. They have shows daily through Dec. 23rd!

THANKSGIVING IDEAS

My LAST post was about decorating SIMPLY for Thanksgiving. Today I'll share how I get everyone involved in the preparation and also engaged in activities during the BIG DAY itself. Spreading the work around ALSO simplifies things.

Ahead of time:   Everything is more fun when everyone is involved somehow in the preparations. Some people love to share their favorite special dish for the meal. Now you don't have to do all the cooking.  Family will always look forward to "Aunt Bea's mincemeat pie" for example. I like to get the little children involved by having them make place cards ahead of time. Children can also make table decorations for a special children's table. There are a lot of fun and simple ideas on the internet.

On Thanksgiving Day:    Since the purpose of the day is to Give Thanks, one of the things I have done is to have the little children take a sheet of paper with the title on the top," I'M THANKFUL FOR..."and go around to everyone and have them write down what they are thankful for. Then I take"Thanksgiving kids coloring pages" that I've downloaded from the internet and have the kids color them. A Thanksgiving booklet can be made simply by stapling together the colored Thanksgiving pictures and the list of things everyone is thankful for. This can be read throughout the day by family and friends. It also keeps little ones busy with a project while the food is being prepard. Of course there is always a special prayer of thanks before the meal, remembering what God has done in all of our lives and a song of thanks that the grandchildren like to sing. Here is their favorite:

God, our Father,
God, our Father,
Once again, once again
Thank you for these blessings
Thank you for these blessings
Amen, Amen

But after the meal, the day is not over. Of course there are the typical football games that some enjoy watching and our family is no exception. But those of us not interested in sports on TV ( wierd people that we are ) I've usually planned some activities so we don't get lulled to sleep by the tryptophan in the turkey. So here are some things we have included in our "Day Of Thanks":

1) The kids ALWAYS have to put on a "show" for us. This just goes without saying. So we always plan on the" Kids Show". This takes up a lot of time for the kids because they have to spend time putting it together and then practicing. OUR kids also make PROGRAMS to hand out so making them also fills a lot of time for them! ( The football watching guys have to take time to watch this also so we shoot for commercial times. ) The show itself takes much less time than the practice and making the programs.
2) A walk. We DO need to take a walk to "walk off" the BIG MEAL. Most everyone gets in on this and the fresh air feels great!
3) Visit over pie and coffee. The candles are still lit for the ambience and everyone catches up on each others' lives.  It seems no one is hungry right after eating so we wait until later for this casual ritual.
4) Board Games.We pull out the favorites that require a bit of ACTION. Nothing is worse than a QUIET board game with people "drugged out" on tryptophan.
4) BINGO  This was a favorite for several years. My daughter and I found things around the house that we could use for prizes ( unwrapped note cards, unused candles, etc. but also some funny "booby prize" types.) We gift wrapped them also. So we had a large basket full of small gift wrapped presents as prizes. When someone would win they could pick a prize out of the pile. But after the first prize was opened, the next winner could take a gift from the pile OR someone else' gift ( and then they would give THAT person another wrapped prize). This became quite popular and was continued for several years.( We change up some activities depending on the ages of guests, the number of guests, etc.)
My daughter liked it so much that she and her husband continued the tradition when they moved to China. Their guests were from all over the world and most had not celebrated Thanksgiving, not being from the U.S. but wanted to celebrate with them. They also couldn't find turkeys in China so they settled for a different kind of bird. But the BINGO game went on with prizes and all and everyone LOVED it!

These are just SOME of the things we've done to entertain ourselves throughout our Thanksgiving holidays. Share some of YOURS here!

Below are some photos from Country Living of things you can do for place cards, kids table,  take-home left-overs, and other ideas.

I LOVE these ideas from COUNTRY LIVING because they are natural, simple, and affordable! 

BUSY, BUSY, BUSY!

 I've been a slacker with blogging but I've got some good excuses! I've been busy with Grandkids and family! Just went with granddaughter, Brianna's 4th grade class to The Science Museum in Mpls. I was "group leader " for 6 fourth grade girls. We took some photos! Here they are sitting on a giant hand that shows what blisters and scabs look like under the skin. Yuck!







And then we've been doing a lot of babysitting for grandson, Charlie. Here he is in Grampa's shoes and "momo" in his mouth:

And we've also been going to our granddaughter, Ashley's basketball games. Here she is with Coach Grampa after winning a championship.

So you can see we've been busy!


And what is this Kuert Adoption deal on the widget to the right and above? Glad you asked!

My daughter and son-in-law, Elissa and Jon, have begun the process of adopting a baby from China. Elissa and Jon are currently living in Kunming, China working in various positions. Jon is teaching English helping to prepare young adults to get into college in the States. Elissa works with Eden Ministry, an outreach to young girls who have been forced into prostitution. Read about them by clicking on the "Kuert Adoption" page. It also explains the Chipin Widget! I just LOVE all these new gadgets on the internet!

And Les and I DID take in a  Minnesota Twins Game ( baseball for those of you not familiar ) at the new outdoor stadium. FUN! We sat in a special section that had ACTUAL restaurants, a Kirby Puckett  Buffet, lounge seating.... not just your normal "hotdog at the baseball game" fare. So I had walleye pike fish..Yum! Then at one point during the game my husband went out to get us a couple of candy bars ( you know, peanuts and crackerjacks and baseball treats ) but all he could find were slices of gourmet chocolate cake served with plates and forks. NOT how I remembered baseball... but.. guess I might go more often now. : )

I think I'll be back out hunting for treasures soon! I've got lots of collecting to do! I just counted the number  of "tags" on things I sold at our last occasional sale and there were 310 items sold! Yikes! How am I ever going to find that many things? Wish me luck!

BEING INTENTIONAL

One of the things I try to do is to be INTENTIONAL  in "making things happen" in my life. I'm a big goal setter, planner, and list maker but I've found it also helps to make sure I am INTENTIONAL in making these goals and lists HAPPEN.  For example, my daughter, Elissa, and her husband, Jon, were going to be returning from China and staying with us for a while this summer. Since one of my life- time- goals  is to make memories with my family I knew I would need to do some INTENTIONAL planning to accomplish this while they were home.  They had meetings and speaking engagements they had to participate in so we had a lot of schedules  to work around. I had many items on my list of "Things to do while Elissa and Jon are home". Two of those things were: 1) Take a mini weekend get-away with the family to a nearby destination for some family R&R 2) Make sure we get a family photo of all of us.

 WOO HOO! I accomplished both! So here's the informal photo...

It was summer, it was hot, the guys didn't want to dress up or be matchy-matchy ( They were afraid we would look like we belonged on the "Awkward Family Photo" website ), and we had a very short time frame in which grandson Charlie would sit still so we settled for simple jeans on the bottom and white tops. Whew! Got that done!

For our mini get-away we went to a nearby lake (where my family had a cabin while I was growing up) and stayed at a beautiful condo overlooking the lake. 

We went sailing, fishing, swimming, antiquing, shopping, played board games, dined at  local eateries and enjoyed the gorgeous lakeside views!

But the BEST thing that happened while the kids were home was that Jon, our son-in-law, had the opportunity to baptize our granddaughter, Ashley, in the lakeside Baptism put on by our church. That special event was INTENTIONALLY planned by THEM. 

Many family memories and milestones were made in a short period of time because we planned INTENTIONALLY to make things happen! 

THANKS FOR STOPPING BY!

Relaxing By The Ocean

We're still on vacation. ( smile ) I'm sitting on our balcony overlooking the ocean  and enjoying my morning coffee while "practicing" being in the moment. That's easy to do while being mesmerized by the waves  rolling in. We're having a relaxing time here. Our kids and grandkids left Saturday and we moved to a smaller condo in a different building. The decor here is bright, colorful, fun, and very BEACHY.

I thought the starfish tiebacks on the curtains were a cute idea. The other photo is of a vignette of starfish and red coral.

Yesterday at the beach I was amused by the piles of flip-flops on the deck that everyone leaves behind before going onto the beach. Me....I wear mine onto the sandy beach.

I left some photos of our earlier condo on my other blog. Check it out. It was gorgeous! You'll find it at bloomingboomers.wordpress.com where Sherrie and I blog about living a joy-filled life!

At The Beach

OK, well we're still not ready for inside photos but I did get some outdoor shots. Actually, TONS of outdoor shots but I won't bore you with  them.  Two of the photos here are from our balcony on the 7th floor. The scene below is breathtaking! The weather here has been great and I hear it has been wonderful back home also..... but back home they don't have the OCEAN!

We've been coming to Florida for vacations for 40 years because we like the ocean and beaches. We're not into sightseeing so much, just relaxing and hanging out with family so this has met that need and we never tire of it! Where is YOUR favorite vacation destination?

Thanks for coming along to Florida with us!

SPLASH

We're staying in a condo here on the beach in Panama City at a resort called SPLASH! It is  very family- friendly and kid- oriented with fun colorful ocean photos all around the premises and its own water park! Our condo even has a bunk room for kids with DVDs at the end of each bunk. I would recommend this place without reservation! It's worth saving your money for! Photos here are of lobby and play areas. In my next post I'll share inside photos of our condo. We have to do some picking up first.  :)

Traveling

I got a little behind in my promise to blog three times a week because we couldn't find internet access at first. But now we're up and running!

I captured a few photos of some trees I saw on the way down to Florida. All through the state of Alabama we saw lots of white trees that appeared from a distance to have snow on them. But upon closer inspection I found them to be white flowers. I'm not sure what kind they are. I don't know my trees very well. Here they are and if you recognize what kind they are, let me know with a comment. Thanks!

Have a beautiful spring day!

Oops! I just found out that "Blogger" is having technical problems with posting photos so my photos wouldn't come out here. Hopefully they'll fix the problem soon and I'll have them up for you to see. In the meantime I'll still post this short post so you'll know I'm here!

Playdates and Treasures

Our friends, Max and Patty,  have a granddaughter about the same age as our grandson, Charlie, and the other day Patty called to invite us  on a Playdate. So Grampa Les and I took Charlie to the park  to meet them for his first Playdate with Miriam. It was very difficult getting them both to sit still at the same time for pictures. Charlie was a little shy at first but then warmed up to Miriam and they had a great time as did the Grandparents. It was a beautiful sunny day! Aren't they adorable? What fun!

I also found time to go" treasure hunting" in the afternoon while Charlie and Grampa were napping. I picked up this pretty blue dish ( not old )  for myself as my China is blue and white and I like to pick up odd pieces for serving. I paid a whopping 75 cents and when I turned it over it still had a price tag from a local gift/floral shop for $28.99! WooHoo! What a deal!