Long time no update...

 I know it has been forever since I posted an update so this will be a long one!!

We had a really nice dinner with my aunt and uncle last time we were in St. Cloud.  It was kind of funny to have them making us dinner in our house!!  It was really special to have an evening to spend with them.  They left us a wonderful basket of goodies as  a thank you for the use of our house.  We were just glad that it worked out for them to stay and have a place to relax while they were in Minnesota.

We had a great dinner and visit with Mary and Jerry on Tuesday evening.  Jerry made a turkey so that Bill could have the carcass as he loves to make soup!  We took Minnow along when we met Bill’s mom and his brother for supper in Princeton on Wednesday night.  We had not seen Lorraine (Bill's Mom) since we moved up north so it was great to catch up with her and Lanny (Bill’s brother) on family news.   

We headed back up north on Thursday night and Mom and Dad came up on Friday afternoon.  I had not gotten to spend any extended one-on-one time with Mom and Dad in a long time and it was great to be able to do that over the weekend.  We went into Blackduck to a fabric shop.   Mom is going to make the banner for the Marriage Encounter Conference next summer and we had fun picking out the fabric for that.  I also found a quilt kit with fall leaves and colors that I loved so I bought it to make this winter.  I am looking forward to working on it with Mom.   Bill and Dad went fishing on Saturday afternoon so Mom and I got to spend a couple of hours just talking and reconnecting.  I have missed doing that and it was great to spend time with Mom.  

We were back in St. Cloud for a couple of days last week and had a bunch of people from our church over on Wednesday evening for dinner.  A friend of ours from church was part of the band (The Receders) that was playing at Lake George that evening so we had a Preceders party at our house!  It was great fun to see everyone and catch up a little.

We headed back up north on Friday and got to take Minnow back with us.  Since I had Friday off work, we decided to meander our way up north and we did that really well!  We picked up Minnow at 9 AM and arrived at the cabin at 5 PM!!  Needless to say, we stopped at a lot of garage sales, second hand shops, etc. on the way.  On Saturday morning, we stopped over at the resort and saw the first bear that was brought in (as bear hunting season opened on Sept 1).   Minnow was not too excited about touching the bear!

Haley (youngest daughter) and her friend, Katha (from Germany) came up on Saturday.  Katha had explained that they make "bread on a stick" rather than roast marshmallows so we gave that a try and it was very good.  Here are some pics of this.  Here is a link to a site with the recipe (http://www.paddlinglight.com/articles/tutorial/how-to-cook-bannock-on-a-stick-campfire-bread/).  We didn't have dried milk and we were not carrying the mix into a camp site so we just added enough milk to make it doughy.

After church on Sunday (where Bill sang again!), we headed over to a friennd's place to ride horses.  Katha had never ridden before and everyone had a blast!  After everyone rode the horses, the kids got to paint the horses.  Haley and Katha had a blast painting Big Bill with USA/Germany messages and hand prints.  

In late afternoon on Sunday, we tried our hand at fishing.  We did not have much luck at the dock at the resort so we dropped Bill off at the cabin and went over to the nearby bridge.  Katha managed to catch a northern and Haley caught a perch so they were both happy with that success!!

In the evening, we made bread on a stick (again!) and smores!  On Monday morning, we did a quick walk through the Lost Forty before Haley and Katha had to head back (as Haley had to work on Monday afternoon).  Bill, Minnow, and I headed for Princeton where we had a fish fry with his family.  We had not seen many of them for quite a while so it was great to see everyone and eat some good food!

We are now back in St. Cloud for a couple of days.  While Bill's birthday is on Thursday, we are celebrating tomorrow night with the kids (as that works best for their schedules).   As things are going well at the resort and with K's radiation, we are starting to transition back to life in St. Cloud.  I will be going back to full time work on October 1st (rather than November 1st) as the resort schedule is fairly light in October and K is able to do more things as time goes on.

Janet & Ashlee Visit and Bill's Singing Debut!!

It was a great week with the kids from Rochester.  The smaller group size and age spread made it less hectic and the evening devotions around the campfire were very moving.  This group had some kids that loved to bake and on various days, they made banana bread, banana muffins, monster cookies, peanut butter cookies, and peach cobbler.  It was heartbreaking to hear some of the kids talk about not having any food in their homes to cook/bake with but it was great that they had the opportunity while they were at camp.  And we did not mind sampling their treats either...they were very good!

Our friend, Janet, and her daughter, Ashlee, came up Friday to celebrate Janet's birthday and hang out with us for the weekend.  We had a great time together!!  Ashlee had never fished before but she brought along her fishing pole and K got her all set up while we got things unpacked at the cabin.  Ashlee fished from the dock and she caught a bunch of perch and even a couple of northerns!  She was so excited and even was able to put on her own minnows by Saturday afternoon.  Bill came down to fish also but Ashlee had the hot spot and caught more fish and bigger fish than he did!  Needless to say, she enjoyed this immensely!  Here is one of the bigger perch and some of the fish caught (by Ashlee and Bill!) on Saturday.

We also went to the Lost Forty on Saturday morning as everyone who visits us gets to experience this part of the area!  We always love to take this walk and see the huge red and white pines.

On Saturday evening, we went over to have Ashlee see horses.  Our friend was not around so we didn't get to ride but Bill did get to see his favorite horse, Big Bill, again.  Supposedly there is a picture of Bill on Big Bill that I am still trying to get for posting!  We all enjoyed seeing and petting the horses.  After we got back, we had a campfire and smores.  I had never made smores with the giant thick chocolate bars but I have to tell you that although it does not melt as much, it is pretty darn good to have that much more chocolate in the smore!  We enjoyed hanging out and visiting while we had the smores and watched the fire.

There have been lots of butterflies flying around and while we were hanging out at the cabin, we saw this butterfly on the hummingbird feeder.  I was amazed it stayed long enough and let me get close enough to get a decent picture.

Janet and Ashlee got to see and hear Bill's singing debut at church today!!  He sang "Blessed be Your name" at our church up here this morning and did a great job!  While he has played guitar and bass many times, he had never sung before in public so he was pretty darn nervous.  However, he did a wonderful job and is already signed up to do another song next week and maybe lead all the singing for a service in a few weeks.   He has been talking about doing this for several years and  I am glad and proud that he took this opportunity to step outside his comfort zone and give this a try.

It was a really nice day today, so we spent this afternoon driving around and looking for places for Bill to take pictures of butterflies and me to read books!  He found a couple of spots and we stopped in and checked out Little American Falls (up by Effie) again and were surprised that the falls were quite a bit lower (since the lakes are still really high).

We are headed back to St. Cloud tomorrow to say good bye to my aunt and uncle as they are heading back to Kentucky on Tuesday and we have an all day strategic planning meeting for church on Tuesday.  It is a slow week at the resort and K is able to do so much more that so we may hang around a couple of days so that we get to spend some time with our family and friends.

My hard times are a comin'

I have come to realize that while K struggled to let go of her work and tasks and let me take them on, I am now struggling to let go of them and give them back!!  I am a "doer" and I have discovered that it is difficult for me to stop "doing" for K and ler her to take back the things that she is able to do.  For those of you who know me well, this is probably not a surprise!   However, since I have never been in this sort of situation before, this is a growth challenge for me and it will be an interesting next couple of weeks.  I told K that she will need to be direct about what she wants to do and make it clear that I need to back off and let her do the work/tasks.  I have also asked her to be patient as I adjust to this new role.  Wow...God provides some very interesting growth experiences on this path!

Just my random thoughts for today.  Off to the resort to make a spaghetti supper for the youth camp group!

Youth Camp and New Life Plans

Thanks to my sister, Susan, for sending the blonde brownie recipe as I needed to make bars for a memorial service on Saturday.  It is always interesting to bake in a stove that does not have a temperature setting!  As you can see in the pic below, Bill continues to love to cook with cast iron!!

The memorial service was for a guy from our church up here that died of cancer.  It was a very nice service and the potluck afterwards brought back memories.  I had not seen a jello salad with carrots for quite some time and had some calico beans that were out of this world.  I am working on getting that recipe and will try to remember to share it.

On Saturday afternoon, we headed into Bemidji to do some shopping and stop at the Beltrami County Fair.  I simply love the people watching at county fairs!  Bill and I were both impressed that you would win Redneck Bingo easier at the Benton County Fair than at this one!  And, yes, I guess that does make us sound like snobs, doesn't it?  Of course, we did have to partake in some fair food.  I particularly enjoyed the Chocolate Dipped Cheesecake on a Stick and Bill enjoyed the Onion Rings.  We listened to a family group (Mom, Did, 3 girls, 2 boys) do some gospel and bluegrass music.  It was amazing the number of instruments that they could play between all of the family members!! 

We also checked out the horse barn since Bill helped with the horse rides last week with the kids camp and fell in love with Big Bill (and not even because of his name!).   Big Bill is a big old friendly Belgian horse that Bill got to lead around for the kid camps.  We saw some monstrous Percheron horses at the fair that barely fit in the stalls.  Simply amazing animals.

There was a glorious full moon on the way home but unfortunately my camera batteries were dead and then I forgot to take it along to the resort yesterday. I am hoping to get a good picture tonight while we are over at the resort. 

The current group is from Rochester and has recruited Bill to help sing songs around the campfire.  The group is only 15 kids and 5 adults so it is much less hectic than last week's group.  These kids are also older...junior and senior high I would guess.  We had a great devotion and sharing time last night with K telling her story and how God has helped her through this whole ordeal with cancer.  We talked about being able to ask and accept help from God and others and how really difficult this can be as we like to think that we can do things on our own!  K has experienced leg pain with the past 2 chemos and is very thankful that there is only one more to get through.  She starts radiation on Monday, August 29, and has to drive 55 miles one way for a 15 minute treatment and she will need to make this trip every day for 5 weeks.  Please continue to keep her and D in your prayers as they start the final leg of this treatment journey.

We have been busy checking out options for catering training for Bill.  Yes, it is time to stop being a telephone man and follow his heart! :-)  Since he really already knows how to cook pretty darn good for large (and small) groups, we are considering an on line option.  We would appreciate any input from those who have done on line courses.  We know that you only get out of it what you put into it (like any class) and that you need to be dedicated to moving forward in the courses.  Any other words of wisdom or experience to share?  He will also be looking for anyone in catering who could use an assistnace to get some direct experience (when we get back to St. Cloud) so please let us know if anyone has suggestions or ideas.   Keep us in your prayers as we work on this transition in our lives! 

Kid's Camp update

Wow...it was a busy week with about 38 kids (including junior counselors) and 10 counselors at the resort from Sunday to today from a church in the twin cities.  We had kids and counselors packed into all 7 cabins and were bursting at the seams...but what a great experience!

The activities for the week included:

• Fishing...lots and lots of fishing on boats and off the dock.  A local company donates a fishing rod for each kid and many of them have never fished before.  Only the grace of God manages to keep the flying hooks away from everyone!
• Tubing.  They got to take turns tubing behind a boat.
• Horse back riding and painting.  There is a local horse farm that specializes in horses that work well with kids.  The kids take turns riding the horses and then they get to paint the horses!
• Swimming. We went to a nearby lake with a beach and had a blast swimming, skipping rocks, and making sand castles.
• Archery.  The local DNR provides bows, arrows, and targets and the kids get to try their hand at archery.  Again, only God's grace and careful supervision keep this activity safe!  There is a lot of yelling "All bows on the ground" so that no one gets hurts while they pick up their arrows from the targets.
• Nature walk.  The kids go to the Lost Forty and get to experience the majesty of virgin timber.
• Crafts.  Making and decorating pigs (from rocks), journals, bracelets.

What a great way to allow these kids to experience God's majasty in nature!  About half of the group had been up camping last year so they were helpful with the kids that were new this year.  The theme for this year was "Jesus to the rescue" and they had daily word themes and lessons.  We did marshmallows and/or smores around a campfire each night along with daily lessons and devotions. 

The resort provided breakfast on Monday morning (eggs, sausage, and pancakes), a spaghetti dinner on Tuesday night, and a fish fry on Wednesday night (and they just caught enough fish to feed everyone!!).  Needless to say, Bill was in his glory cooking for a large group and the food was good!!

The group left this morning so we get to do all of the clean up and get ready for another group to come in on Sunday.  This group is about half the size of the first group but it is still a lot of cleaning and organizing!

K is on her second to last chemo treatment today and is excited that the end of this treatment is in sight!  She has appointments today to get things organized for the 5 weeks of radiation which will start around September 1st (have to wait until 2 weeks after chemo finishes).   The camps are tough as there is so much to do and so many people but she is holding up well.

Off to clean up and get ready to do the next camp!!

Bouncing between St. Cloud and Up North

No luck going fishing on Monday morning for Matt and Diana but they did run over and visit the Lost Forty and a friend who lives nearby.  What are the chances that one of their friends end up about 10 miles away from our cabin...weird!  Bill and I went over to the resort and tried to pick raspberries.  Unfortunately, it appeared birds and bears had gotten there ahead of us so we didn't get very many...bummer for us...good for the birds and bears!  Since we had a late breakfast, we had a late lunch fish fry...Yum, Yum!!  Matt and Diana headed back to St. Cloud by late afternoon.  It was great to have time to hang out with them!

So, last weekend I figured out that I had totally messed up our schedule as I thought the inner city kid camps started this week and ran for 2 weeks.  Well, turns out they start next week and run for 2 weeks.  Since Bill was planning to come back to St. Cloud the week of August 15 to do some printing, we suddenly had to re-arrange our schedule.  Bill was going to head back without me but since I was pretty much caught up at the resort, I thought I would head along down and enjoy a visit with Minnow (grand daughter, AKA Ja'Leyah).  Unfortunately, it turned out that she is still in Chicago with her dad due to the storms that delayed flights...bummer!

We headed for St. Cloud on Tuesday in the late afternoon and stopped at Bites in Pine River (http://bitesgrill.com/).  I had the TBA sandwich (Turkey, Bacon, and Avocado on multigrain bread) and Bill had the Italian Meat Loaf sandwich (open faced with marinara and mozzarella).  Both were excellent and we would definitely recommend this restaurant.  Very nice atmosphere although it was a little loud when we walked in as there was a very large group of older people who all talked very loud.  Things quieted down once that group left and we really enjoyed the experience. 

You know, as much as I blog about food, maybe Bill and I should just become food critics...visit different restaurants and do write ups!!

Anyway, Bill did his giclee printing and I worked from home on Wednesday.  I ran some errands in the afternoon including delivering a small "congratulations, you're a grandma" jewelry gift to my sister, Mary.  She has been requesting grandchildren for Christmas for several years so she is pretty excited that her son and daughter in law have announced that they are pregnant.  Congratulations, Lane and Nikki!!

We met some friends, Mike and Char, and went with them to the Summertime By George event(http://summertimebygeorge.com/).  I know that I have plugged this several times but here goes again as it is really cool that something like this is going on in St. Cloud.  The music by Willie West was excellent!!  He is an older blues and soul singer from New Orleans who has played with many famous artists and he did an awesome job!  In addition, the food was great.  I recommend trying the chicken kabobs from a wonderful couple from Ghana and Bill had an awesome burger melt at a stand from Cold Spring.  Obviously, we are not very good at noticing the names of the vendors!!  Besides food, there are also other vendors and Bill got cucumbers to make refrigerator pickles and I got a couple of pairs of earrings to match some cool fused glass necklaces that Chelsey had given to me!  There is something for everyone...splash pad for the kids, wine/beer garden for those who want a cool beverage, etc.  As always, I ran into plenty of friends and family and enjoyed visiting with everyone.

On Thursday, my aunt and uncle (Jan and Damian) arrived from Kentucky in the afternoon.  It was great to see them and to be able to give them a tour of the house and help them to get settled in.  They are not sure how long they are staying but Damian did seem pretty sure that they would be gone before we are scheduled to come back in October!!  :-)

We stopped at the Bridge Tavern in Crosby on our way back up (http://www.bridgetavernmn.com/) as the place always seems to be busy.  I have to say that I was not impressed with the atmosphere or the food.  It is a older bar which needs some upkeep and the food was okay but not excellent.  We will cross that one off of our list of restaurants to try.  Appeared to be a busy biker bar if that is what you are into!

So here we are back up north and we don't plan to have another trip to St. Cloud until the week of August 29th.  We are busy getting ready for the kids next week.  Bill, D, and K put up the tents in the morning.  I made up beds in 4 cabins this afternoon, will clean and make up beds in 2 tomorrow and do the last one on Sunday (as the kids arrive on Sunday afternoon).  We helped serve one breakfast to the first group last year and are looking forward to more interaction this year. 

This afternoon, Bill managed to resurrect the deep fryer that was pulled out of storage after about 30 years!  He is a truly incredible man of many talents and this is just one more thing to add to his list of accomplishments.  Tomorrow, we are planning to have deep fried zucchini and sliders on the flat top (which he also got going and cleaned up earlier).

Life is good!!

Wood Carving, Friends, and Family

On Saturday morning, we headed over to Blackduck to the 28th Annual Woodcarvers Festival.  We met my friend, Pam, there and enjoyed both the woodcarving part and the arts and crafts part of the festival.  Pam has been carving for about 17 years and we are lucky enough to have 2 of her carvings in our cabin (an eagle and a fish) as she is truly a talented carver!  Of course, we had to start out with fry bread because it is a great morning snack!  Bill is excited that we could make our own if we can get the deep fryer going at the resort.  If so, I will need to find lots of neighbors to share with as I could eat a lot of fry bread and that would make my clothes shrink!!

Pam bought a couple of pieces of wood for carving and Bill bought a knife blank (where he will have to carve the handle for the knife) and a book on how to carve a woodspirit in a hiking stick.  He wants to give that a try!  Now I just need to get Pam and my brother-in-law, John, up here yet this fall for a carving weekend to get him started!  Any other carving friends out there that would like to participate?  :-)  Bill also listened to a presentation on preparing wood for carving and found out the basswood that he has won't be any good as basswood must be cut down in the winter and cut up before the sap flows...who know that wood could be so picky? 

We went over to the resort so that we could visit with K and D and Bill could start grilling the ribs for dinner.  While we were there, a couple pulled in and asked if they had a room for the night.  It turns out the couple is from Italy and so it was very interesting to talk to them and get their story.  The wife loves the Mississippi river and so last year they flew into New Orleans and followed the river up to Memphis.  This year they flew into Chicago and are coming to the source of the Mississippi (in Itasca State Park) and following it down to Memphis.  They are retired and planning to take 3 weeks for the trip.  We had good discussion around loons (there was a family of them in the bay), wild rice, ice fishing, and other Northern Minnesota topics. What a wonderful sense of adventure to just rent a car and drive and see where they end up each night!

Matt and Diana (son and girlfriend) arrived about 8 PM on Saturday night and we had a wonderful supper of sweet corn, ribs, hash browns, and smores.  It was great to be able to spend time around the fire with them (until the mosquitoes drove us indoors).

This morning, Bill went to play guitar at church while Pam and I went to the Lost Forty.  No matter how many times I go through there, I continue to be in awe of God's creation!!  How can you not always enjoy seeing trees that large and majestic!  For those of you may have missed earlier references to the Lost Forty, you can find info here:  http://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/fsm9_016469.pdf.  On the way back, there was an elderly gentleman sitting on a motorized wheelchair at the road turning into our area.  We stopped to see if he needed any help.  Turns out that his wheelchair had quit on him and his walkie talkie had too much static to explain to his wife where he was stuck.  Luckily, Pam was able to figure out how to disengage the brake so that we could push his wheelchair off the main road.  He appeared to be a stroke victim (with braces on his arm and leg) and he indicated that he needed side boards to get up into a truck.  We went and swapped Pam's truck for ours and managed to get his wheelchair turned around and positioned with the door open for him to get in.  It was a slow process and Pam ended up having to give him a push while I pulled from the inside.  We told him that we would bring his wheelchair on the trailer after Bill got home from church and Pam followed me to his house (in case we were both needed to get him out of the truck).  His wife was calmly painting and indicated that she had gotten part of his message but couldn't find him by the bridge (as he was down a road past the bridge) so she had come back home!  She went and got another motorized wheelchair and helped to get him moved from the truck to that.  I was amazed that this couple was still able to function on their own with his severe disability.  After lunch (Bill's yummy mac and cheese!), we went to take back the wheelchair but they had already come over and changed the fuse and gotten it home.  It was a God thing that we happened to come along right after his chair broke down or he could have been sitting there for quite some time in the heat and the bugs.

Pam headed back home after lunch and Bill took Matt and Diana fishing while I got to relax and read a book!  I started a fire and hung out and wrote up instructions and info for my aunt and uncle (Jan and Damian) from Kentucky who will be living in our house for several weeks while they visit with family.  This is another God thing as they really wanted to have an extended stay in the area this summer and it is hard to stay with anyone for a long time and also hard to keep moving.  It worked out great that we have a house sitting empty that they can use for as long as they want...well, we do expect to be back by late October!! :-)

Bill, Matt, and Diana caught enough sunnies for a fish fry for lunch tomorrow.  We grilled burgers on the fire although I had gone a little overboard on the fire and Bill just about fried off his hand while grilling!  However, it was a great fire for smores!!!   I think that they may go fishing again tomorrow morning to see if they can add to the lunch fish stash.