Claustrophobia

Do you think a movie can cause you to become claustrophobic? A couple of years ago Rick and I watched Descent. It is this dumb movie about these women that go a cave exploring trip that turns bad, bad, bad. Just watching these women squeezing through those tiny caves and tunnels made me swear I would never go into a cave again. Well while doing research for our trip to South Dakota in July I thought we should go to Jewel Cave Nation park since I have never been there. I started to read about the tours and thought, oh I can do that. Then I read about and watched a video on the Wild Caving Tour  and I started to get all claustrophobic! It was like I was in those tiny caves right then and they were crashing in on me. Needless to say I will not be doing the Wild Caving Tour. I think I will stick to the Scenic Tour  where you are upright the whole time and on walkways and steps. I can only hope I don't go into a total panic attack when I get way down under ground in the cave :) 

Later Sharon

Leaving the nest......

 The baby wren's are all grown up and flew away this week. Rick was home when they made there first flight and was able to get a couple pictures as they made there way out of the bird house.

 I finally got my rake project done. Not to hard to do but I think they look really cute. It is a fun way to keep the wine glasses.

It is good to be home this weekend after being gone all last weekend.  I watched Liam, Josie and Eli twice this past week because Amy had her gallbladder removed. Now that I don't watch them often it was exhausting. Mostly because Eli is into everything :) Good thing he is a happy baby so it makes up for the fact that I have to watch his every move. Every time I think I have the house baby proof he proves me wrong.
Amy is doing very good after her surgery and is very glad to have it done with and on the road to recovery. She said I cannot have anymore surgeries because her and I have had the exact same surgeries. We both have had our wrists done and now the gallbladder. Good thing they are all minor surgeries :) She said does not want to follow in anymore of my medical problems. But really she is the one who started it since she had her wrist surgery before I had mine, so maybe it is her that is causing the surgery issue......

Yesterday Amy wanted to get out of the house and go to the farmers market in Mankato. Since she is still on pain pills I told her I would take her. I had to get up early on my day off but for Amy I did it. When we got to the farmers market Amy talked me into buying some homemade salted nut rolls. They are soooooo good. Now I want to eat all of them! After that we stopped at Kohls and Target. Amy was pretty tired by then so I took her home. I was back home by 10:30. Good thing too because I had some major house cleaning to do. The house was a huge mess. Since I was gone all last weekend and then worked all week I did not get any cleaning done. I got everything looking like it should be and even had time to do my little rake project. Last night we had a wedding reception to go to in Northfield. It was fun to visit with Theresa and Dean and Bruce and Erica. The bride and groom where beautiful.

Today Rick is at  a archery shoot in Coon Rapids. He was there yesterday too. So I am home alone for the day. I have a graduation in Hastings that I should be going to but I am not. I don't want to drive all the way up there by myself. I know I am being a bad cousin by not going.

Poor Dexter has developed separation anxiety since we left him and Morgan at Amy's house last weekend. He has never had a problem like this before and has spent many weekends at Amy's and has been kenneled before. I think it is because Rick was home for 2 weeks and then when we got back home Rick went back to work and I was working so the dogs were home alone for the whole day for the first time in a long time. Dexter was so bad on Monday and Tuesday that I could hardly make a move with out tripping on him because he was pretty much attached to my feet. He even tried to get in the shower with me on Thursday! I felt so bad for him, he was in a total panic. Yesterday he was doing much better since I was home most of the day. He did not even seem to get upset when we left for the wedding. Today he is a little clingy but not nearly as bad as he has been. I hope he gets over it soon.

I am very excited that we are planing a trip to South Dakota with Jane, Paul and Hannah in July. It was a last minute decision so we had to find someplace to camp in a hurry. I really wanted to stay in Custer State Park again but they are all booked up since July in peek season out there. We found a place just outside of the park, I hope it is nice. It is hard to just pick someplace with never seeing it before. It should be lots of fun and I am really looking forward to it. I love South Dakota. Hopefully Dexter does not go into full panic mood when we leave him with Amy....


Later Sharon

The Power of Water

There has been lots and lots of rain in MN over the past week or so. Last Thursday Northfield got hit really hard and they had lots of flooding at Carleton. I was not working so I did not get any pictures of the flooding but yesterday I took a few of the aftermath of it. The wood bridge is in the arb and was chained to a tree so it did not get pulled down stream. It was a huge mess in the area of the bridge, there is several trees that are down and mud everywhere. The big sink whole is on a road that is near the college. It is unbelievable the damage that running water can do. Northfield and most of southern MN is lucky that they did not have as much damage as they have in Duluth and the surrounding area.

Later Sharon

MMMMMM this looks good......

                                          He was trying to eat my camera!

                          Biking on the Luce Line bike trail. It is almost all crushed rock

                                Rick shooting at the MSAA State Target Shoot

                 Some of the 110 shooters at the MSAA State Target Shoot

                 This is what the sky looked like shortly before they called the shoot.


We has a great weekend away from home. It was the MSAA State Target Shoot in Hutchinson, MN and Rick wanted to shoot it so we decided to make a weekend out of it since the shoot was held at a park with a camp grounds.  We left Friday morning and once we got all unpacked we got on the bikes. I have not biked hardly at all this year so it was fun to be out on them again. The trail we went on is almost all crushed rock so we took our trail bikes. We only went 22 miles but it was lots of fun and a good work out.
Saturday was the start of the two day MSAA State Target shoot. I have not really shot outdoors in a few years so I did not shoot it. They had 110 shooters, which is a record for the target shoot. It was nice and calm for the beginning of the shoot but then it got super windy. Rick was not really happy with his score but he still did good. It took all day for the shoot so when it was done we were ready to relax. Well I had relaxed all day with a book but Rick was ready :) Larry White was also at the shoot and staying at a hotel. So we told him to go get himself a steak and bring it over to the camp grounds and throw it on the grill. It was lots of fun and we all ate way to much. After Larry left for the night we visited with some other people that were staying at the camp grounds and shooting. I had a great time meeting some new people.

Sunday we got up early and got the camper down and ready to go before Rick had to shoot at 9:00. I am so glad we decided to do that and not wait until after the shoot ended. It was suppose to be nice out all day but the weather man was wrong! The day started out nice and everyone got to shoot 40 yards with no trouble. Then at 50 yards it really started to cloud up and then the rain came. They managed to finish 50 yards in the rain but then they had to call the shoot. It started to lighting a lot and the radar showed a huge storm coming. They just added Saturdays score with what then finished on Sunday to decide the winners. Rick ended up in 5th place in the money class. We got all our stuff packed up and made a mad dash for the truck. Thank goodness Rick had thought to put rain gear  in so we did not get to wet. It poured and poured all most all the way home. I was happy when we got home that it stopped so we could get the camper unpacked.

Today I got the camper all cleaned up and Rick and I got it put down and all ready for our next camping adventure.

I also had to go to the hospital for a MRI today on both my knees. Not a happy day for me. I will blog about that after I find out the results next Tuesday.....

Later Sharon

Sidewalks, haircuts, grill and walking

 Dexter and Morgan after there haircuts. They are much cooler now

                                 The sidewalk in front of the house before

                                                        The sidewalk after

                                      More of the sidewalk after....

It had been a little hot out there!  I am just happy that I got wonderful weather for all four days I was off. It may have been a little hot but that's is just fine with me.
I had a great weekend. Rick is between jobs so he was home with me all of my 4 days off. It was nice. On Thursday Rick and went to Mankato since I need to get the oil changed in my car. After that we went to a couple places to look at grills. After that Christa and Jese went car shopping so I watched Oliver for a few hours.  I never get to babysit him so it was fun. He loves the dogs and kept trying to kiss Morgan. Morgan of course loves to lick so she was all over Oliver.
Friday I went for a 5 mile run, it was hot out!  Friday morning the contractor got half of our cement work done. We took out the sidewalk and the skirt in front of the garage. It was all a big cracked up mess. We also are putting cement on the side of the garage where we park the camper and trailer. They got that part done and the sidewalk. It looks so much better. I am very happy to have it done. I will put pictures up of the driveway when it gets done.
Friday afternoon we went to Owatoanna so Rick could order some shirts for R Strings. Then we stopped at Lowe's and finally got a grill. Ours was huge and falling apart. We got a much smaller one that fits much better on our deck. They even put it together for us at no charge. Once we got home we had to get the old one off the deck. Since we have the skid loader here for the driveway work we used it to take the grill down. Speaking of the skid loader, Rick is having lots of fun with it. The contractor said he could use it as much a he wants so Rick is doing lots of yard work with it. He is going to miss it when it is gone.
Saturday I watched Oliver again for a couple of hours so Jese and Christa could go pick up there new van. The rest of the day I really did not do to much. I just relaxed.....
Sunday I decided that I wanted to walk around the lake so I asked Rick to come with me. Of course being the good husband that he is he said okay. It is a 7 mile walk from our house. We did it in 1 hour 43 minutes That is just over a 14 minute mile. It was pretty hot out but it was fun to go around the lake. We use to walk around it all the time when we lived in our other house but since moving we hardly ever do. It is over a mile just to get to the lake so we usually just go by part of the lake when running or walking. You would think with all the running I do that a 7 mile walk would be nothing. Well I am more stiff today then when I run 5 miles, which I do a couple times a week. I guess I used different muscles to walk :)
Today I am back at work but only for 4 days and then another 4 day weekend...
Later Sharon

Funny Stories For The Day....

The other day I was cleaning off the deck and I noticed that under the grill there was still a bunch of leaves in it. So I figured I better get them cleaned out before they start on fire. Well Dexter kept going over to the grill smelling around, I did not think to much about it. Well I should of....as I was taking the leaves out a HUGE mouse went running out too. Scared the crap out of me. It was pretty funny, I screamed like a big baby. After I stopped laughing at myself I made Rick finish cleaning up the leaves. Of course the mouse was long gone by then.

Yesterday Rick and I went for a run. While on our way back we passed a group of five teenaged boys. They all spent the whole time we passed them staring at my boobs. I was not sure if I should be offended or happy that my 50 year old boobs were still good enough to get there attention :)

So there you have it, hope I made you smile for the day.

Later Sharon

Congratulations Jese!!!!!

On Sunday Jese got his Masters Degree in Marriage and Family Therapy. Congratulations Jese!!! You worked hard and it has paid off. We are all very proud of you!

"Cousins are those childhood playmates who grow up to be forever friends." -Anonymous

Sorry for the poor pictures, my scanner would not work at home so I had to use the scanner in my office at work so the pictures are not very clear. They are pictures of Christmas past with all of my cousins on the Becker side. Every Christmas they would line us all up and try and get a picture before one of us would start crying. It is fun to look back at the pictures and remember those days.

I have not been up to much the last few days. Busy cleaning and trying to get some more flowers planted. I went for a run on Monday and Wednesday and tonight Rick and I are going to go for bike ride. Rick hopes to get done with work early so we can maybe go on a little bit of a longer one. Yesterday I watched Liam, Josie and Eli so they did not have to go to daycare for 5 days this week. They were all good.

I guess that is all I know for today. I know not to exciting....
Later Sharon