A September to Remember

 

We went to Cleveland for Susie (Sept. 1st.) 

and David's (Sept. 3rd) birthdays with 22 cousins.

Sept. 5th: Ana's girls all heading to their first day

in new schools...Lydia and Cecelia to 6th grade

at the Middle School, and Claire to 9th

grade at the High School! 

On the 9th, the NDSU Bison played Eastern Washington

in Minneapolis, cheered on by these kiddos! :-)

Yes, we did win, by the way!

We flew back to Minneapolis on the 5th

and drove to Iowa.  While Tom and Trina were

working, and the kids were in school,

we did some exploring.  This is the Veterans'

Museum with the eternal flame on top.

Entrance to the Vet's museum

with Grant Wood window in the background.

Inside the museum, we found Grant Wood's

largest stained glass window

and another of Wood's works, too.

Veteran artist's show at the museum.

We did acrylic pour works in Texas,

so this was really interesting to me.

On another day we drove to the Amana Colonies

a few miles south of Cedar Rapids. A lot of changes

from when we were there 19 years ago. This cork

creation was in the furniture shop.

Originally for sorting bolts...a display case! 

Bob said he had one of these in the shop!

We watched the men work in the shop, too.

Trina and I went to "Donuts with Mom"

at Annika's school on Friday morning.  I think

Anni couldn't wait until we left.  Tom helped

serve the donuts.

                                                                Jett's game was Friday night.

                                                                He is the starting quarterback            

                                                                and ran two touchdowns himself. 

It might be the home of the Blazers, but the Pirates won!

Tom snapped us all together after the game. :-)

On Saturday, Caiden and I made grape leaves

while Tom, Anni, and Jett made crepes. We had a

Lebanese meal after church on Saturday.

After eating the crepes on Sunday, we drove to Dubuque 

to tour the LST 325, a ship that carried troops

and equipment to Normandy during World War II.

We took Ari to supper afterward.

She is a sophomore in college in Dubuque.

Caiden's JV game was Monday night. This is all

I caught of his 65-yard touchdown run,

and they turned off the scoreboard just as

I was trying to snap the 36-12 winning score.

Closed up the camper on Saturday, the 16th. 

Camp owners turn off the water on Oct. 1st,

but we lucked out and found a nice day to close up.

Got up at 6 a.m. today and did this. 
Ignore the dates on the lids...I reused lids  

from a couple years ago.

Green ash tree next to our deck. I have never

seen it with so many colors! Fall has fell. :-)

barn door hangin' in there

Andrew's map of the state park quarters

is now complete.  I found the last one,

the North Mariana Islands, in Bob's coin bucket

while looking for dimes, nickels, and pennies

for my coin collection.  Also cashed in all

the extras for $61.00. :-)

The Norsk Hostfest in Minot began on the 27th.

We saw Mollie B on stage first, and I forgot

to take pictures. She is amazing!

Next was the 'Ringling Five' now seven.. This 

group of Montana ranchers write their own 

songs and are really fun and funny.  This is 

their 30th and last year performing :-(

The main stage featured "The Million Dollar Quartet,"

a musical theater presentation of the story

about December 2, 1957, the only time that 

Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, and 

Jerry Lee Lewis were all together. They told the 

story of the Sun record label and gave an 

awesome performance of their songs.

I went plum crazy on the last day of the month.

Good thing I had a bucket of plum juice in the

freezer from last year's plums.  The birds and

deer got this year's while we were traveling!