Great day for a Packers game! Jeff went up to Lambeau with college buddies for their annual tailgate and game. One guy did a fantastic job organizing the tailgate. Jeff was assigned soda and water. He should be home around 6:30 tonight.


We got Paige a loaner cell phone while we waited for the insurance company to approve her claim. Paige loved going retro with her tiny loaner phone and remembering how to text without a full keyboard. Her replacement phone arrived in the mail Friday so all is good. Paige will be babysitting to cover the co-pay.

While Jeff was present at the monthly Booster Club meeting, I accompanied Bryn to the Badger Girls/Boys Potluck Dinner at the American Legion. The Legion is the organization that puts on the statewide Badger Girls/Boys program. Each student was asked to give a few minute report on their weeklong experience last summer to the Legion members. Upon presentation of their certificates, the Legion chose one to read aloud. It was Bryn's. Unfortunately, they repeatedly mispronounced her name as "Brian Sanders". It was excrutiating to hear again and again. Poor Bryn.

Bryn's Cross Country coach called me at work in the middle of the week. I was a little nervous. He was calling all the runners' parents asking them to recruit a "Fab 5" for their respective daughters. This "Fab 5" was to be a fan club for that runner encouraging them at this important conference meet. I contacted 3 of Bryn's good friends who didn't hesitate to say yes. Natalie even came over that morning (after Bryn got on the bus) to help make posters. And what good friends they were: it was really chilly Saturday morning! Bryn was the happiest I've seen at a meet, so I think it worked.

Abby called me Friday morning all excited that she's found a house to live in next year at La Crosse. It has 5 bedrooms, and there will be 6 girls living in it. They put their deposit down on Monday. This coming weekend is Friends & Family Weekend, so we'll surely schedule a drive-by. We Skyped with Abby today and she was very tired and sore from playing 3 Powderpuff football games yesterday.

I'm happy to say my two weeks of working full-time are over. I know: I'm spoiled only working part-time. But I guess I have a certain balance I like to maintain between family, work and myself. It wasn't hard being at work that long. But it was hard not having that time at home to clean, do laundry, organize bills, talk to the kids, etc. It seems like sitting at a computer all day shouldn't make you tired, but I sure didn't feel like going to the Y those days! It'll be nice to have Mike back at work. He emailed pictures of his new baby girl, Lydia, on Friday afternoon and she's a cutie! Finally, someone at work who can relate to having kids!

Mike at my work had his baby last Sunday. A little girl they named Lydia. He is taking a 2-week paternity leave which requires me to become a temporary full-time employee. I'm more than happy to help out while he and his wife adjust to having a baby in the house. We've been king of slow at work, but took on a surprise rush job that turned out to be a ginormous project. Good to have the work, but I had my 40 hours in by Friday morning already!

Paige considered auditioning for the local community theatre's production of A Christmas Carole last Monday, but when the audition required a 3-minute singing solo with sheet music, it seemed a bit beyond what she was anticipating.

Abby was in town on Thursday with her art class from UWL to tour a couple art museums. She had a lengthy lunch break and called me at work to have lunch with her. We dined at the Public Market. It was good to see her again. Bryn had a cross country meet Thursday, but didn't run. She's been having some tendonitis issues in her achilles and with the conference meet next Saturday (17th), the coaches advised her not to chance it. So I didn't drive to watch this week.

Friday Jeff got picked up by 7:30am for his annual hunting expedition to Waubeno with his college friends. One friend wasn't able to go because it's too close to his wife's due date - and here we are sending ours off to college! Jeff got back by supper tonight and said he had a really great time. I'm glad the guys have kept the tradition up all these years.

I worked Friday morning, then went off to Carroll (my alma mater) in the afternoon for a new Alumni Networking event. The students were encouraged to attend and ask us alumni what we did with our degrees from Carroll and what words of encouragement we could offer them. Boy, did I meet the most enthusiastic and interesting art majors! It was so worth it for me to go and get re-energized! I do so much better talking one-on-one vs. presentations. I ended up going to the Y on Friday night because my increased work hours kept me from going during the week. Then Paige and I just hung out while Bryn went off to a bon fire with friends.

Saturday I got a lot of errands done: grocery shop, drop a ton of old computer stuff at the high school band's recycling fundraiser, drycleaners... Bryn worked all day. And Paige was planning her date.... New boy. I drove them up to the movies just before 6:00pm, and when I didn't hear anything by 9:00pm I started texting. Little did I know that they decided to see a 2nd movie. At 11:30pm, the boy's mother and I met in the theatre parking lot knowing we needed to put some stricter ground rules for dating in place after tonight. Paige ended up losing her cell phone at the theatre, so that's been a huge punishment in itself.

I thought the oven died yesterday. I broiled some chicken legs, then was going to slow cook them for a couple hours. The broiling went fine, but there was no heat after that. Overnight I figured out to check the circuit breaker, but that didn't seem to help. Of course, when Jeff came home he magically flipped the same switch and the oven came back to life. Go figure. It'll never die. I finally got around to scrapbooking Bella's 3-year page. I try to do it for her birthday, but that was almost 6 months ago! Better late than never I guess.

Twas the morning after Homecoming
and all through the house,
not a creature was stirring,
not even a mouse.

Homecoming week overshadowed all other happenings of the past week. Themed days every school day helped with deciding what to wear every morning: Monday was Tropical Day (this year's Homecoming theme), Tuesday was crazy hair/hat day, Wednesday was class color day, Thursday was rival day and Friday, of course, was spirit day.

Wednesday night was the big Powderpuff game. Bryn was a major player being a starter. She played wide receiver and scored the 2nd touchdown for her Senior team. She was way excited! It was chilly out in the stands, but very bearable. The seniors won (tradition) 46 - 20 and will go down in the history books as the "most penalized team ever" with penalties of 300+ yards.

I drove up to watch Bryn run in Fond du Lac Friday afternoon. In the rain. Her coaches actually wanted to pull her from this race because of some tendonitis in her right achilles, but she fought to run. This is her favorite course as it's very flat, so runners typically get some of their best times. After the race, Bryn said she felt very relaxed while running and she did get her best time this year. She really needed that. I drove her back because Bryn was scheduled to work at 7pm. Jeff stayed back to welcome Abby home for the weekend and to get Paige where she needed to be for the game. We all sat in the drizzle and watched our undefeated team do it again, but I did convince Jeff to go home after the halftime festivities.


Our house was the host for Paige's group to take pictures at. I had fun and bought some pretty mum and gourds for decoration. Jeff and I cleaned the house most of the day to prepare. We welcomed Paige's date, Taylor, and 8 of Paige's closest girlfriends for pictures. Taylor did well amongst all the princesses. They went from our house to eat at UNO's, then to the dance. Jeff and I watched a movie before heading back to the high school for the Grand March at 10:30pm where we ran into Abby and her friends. We also ran into Paige and Taylor (the reason we came), to find out that they were just waiting for his dad to pick them up because they weren't doing the Grand March. His dad took them out for ice cream and delivered Paige home. We turned around and delivered Paige to her next gig, the bon fire/sleepover party. It'll be a big withdrawal today!

Paige opted to cancel her Homecoming updo appointment to get a haircut that couldn't wait this week. Also, since she and her girlfriends didn't see anything at the mall shopping for dresses last weekend, I picked a couple up for her and luckily, one is a keeper. Paige is all set to go to the dance with a group of friends. I'm still waiting for an update from Bryn.

Tuesday night Jeff and I had separate assignments. Jeff attended the high school Band trip meeting while I went to my Art Guild meeting where I nervously presented a "work-in-progress" of their new site I've designed and have been programming. I had hoped to have it launched for this meeting, but now I'm resolved to have it set for the October meeting. The artists all gave me nice compliments, but not the constructive criticism I'm used to from my work clientele. So I guess that's cool because I pretty much can do whatever I want with the content and the design. Jeff got to socialize with a lot of our friends at the Band trip meeting. The kids go over spring break again and will visit Boston and New York. The itinerary looks fabulous! They won't be having a performance for us to attend, so Jeff and I will just drop in on them during a different activity while in New York. Warning: Be prepared for lots of fundraising requests from Bryn and Paige for this band trip and their mission trips!

Jeff followed Paige's schedule while I walked Bryn's at the high school Open House Wednesday night. Reminded me to follow up on Abby's CAPP credits for Spanish! There sure are a lot more kids at the high school with those 9th graders there now!

The Saunders took a turn hosting one of the weekly Cross Country Carb Crams Thursday evening. I prepared 3 pans of taco lasagna and served it with yellow rice and lots of fruit. Jeff helped to rearrange furniture to make more eating areas available in case the entire team of 26 decided to come. The girls were very rowdy, but polite.

The rain held out Friday for Jeff to get in 18 holes of golf on Friday afternoon with a couple of Dads from the area. Abby found a ride home from La Crosse and arrived about 4pm. She nearly toppled her boyfriend Mark over when he arrived here.

We woke Paige and Abby up early to watch Bryn run Cross Country out at Nagawaukee Saturday morning (a stop at Panera for bagels and coffee helped). Bryn always looks great, but she's very disappointed in her times this year. Too much pressure on herself. Her coach called her at home later in the day to check up on her. Paige had a friend sleepover Saturday night seeing as they were both committed to being at the same event this morning at 8:00am. Bryn volunteered also and drove them to the high school for Student Council's annual Senior Citizen Prom. Senior citizens in the area mark their calendars for this event where the students join in dancing and there's lots of food. Abby came along with Kristin and Kristin's sister-in-law to the Cheery Cherry Art Fair. Always some good finds at this one!

Happy Birthday Maggie!!!! (At least she'll she I got this posted on her actual birthday, card to follow...)


Last Sunday we attended our church's first Generations of Faith program for the year. This program is replacing Sunday School at our parish. We get to mingle with other families and share breakfast while conversing and doing activities related to our faith. We were seated with Birschbachs and Erin and Bryn now have matching love ferns from the pots we decorated at the program. After lunch, Paige got to babysit Lucy and Bella while Kristin and Carlo walked through a Parade of Homes. Lucy only cried for the first 5 minutes, then both Bella and Lucy had a lot of fun skype-ing (video chatting on computer) with Abby and bouncing on the trampoline.

Tuesday morning was a mess. And it was all my fault. I saw on the orthodontist appointment on the calendar for 8:40am, so I let Paige sleep in a little longer and Bryn went off to school. I notified school about Paige's tardiness. As Paige and I were about to leave, I grabbed the reminder card from the orthodontist and discovered - it's not Paige who goes to the orthodontist today - it's Bryn! So I quickly texted Bryn and let her know. Of course, she has a test that hour. I drive Paige to school and explain my poor parenting skills to the Attendance Office. Yea.. I'm organized...

Paige is going to join the Demo Team with TaeKwonDo which means that at the beginning of testings, she'll perform routines and/or tricks with other black belts. She'll get a new blue uniform for this. She's excited: I get to buy her her own set of nunchucks!

Bryn and Paige had early release from school Friday so had some extra social time. I took advantage of this by working on the Art Guild web site. So hard to find large blocks of time to devote to this, but I am making serious progress. The first Art Guild meeting for the season is this coming Tuesday, and unfortunately I won't have the site live quite then. So I'm shooting for our October meeting. May bring in Jeff's laptop Tuesday to give them a preview. Abby and I had quite a text conversation that afternoon. She was homesick. I texted that her boyfriend stopped over at our house to purchase a Cross Country shirt from Bryn and she replied "You suck." I think she misses him too. Friday night we all went to the home football game. Separately of course. Paige won't even been seen driving to the game with us! Our team is undefeated so far this year and we played a really exciting game against a rival (Sussex Hamilton) and won again! The student fans stormed the field afterward. It was really fun to be there.

Saturday morning Bryn's Cross Country bus left at 6:20am for her meet at UW-Parkside (Kenosha). But Bryn wasn't there. She overslept and Jeff and I didn't set our alarm, so... I got to frantically get dressed and drive south at 6:40am! Thank goodness for Pop Tarts! Got her there in plenty of time and apologized to the head coach. He embarrassingly confessed that he didn't make the bus either! The bus had to drive to his house and wake him up! Bryn's times are coming down, but she's not happy with her progress. After the meet, Jeff took her out to the Badger Bus stop and she made plans to visit some friends at UWMadison this weekend. She couldn't arrive early enough to make the game because of her morning meet. We texted her to make sure she arrived OK and her friends found her. I bet she had a lot of fun. We're picking her up at the bus stop this evening.

Today we watched Bella and Lucy again as Kristin and Carlo get closer to building a new home. I'm glad for the interruption, because I have so many tasks that involve working on the computer, I really need to be forced to take a break.

So these are the birds that make the sounds we wake up to practically every morning now. I think they're cranes and these 3 hang out by the creek.

Jeff and I went to watch Bryn run at her Cross Country meet at Greenfield Park last Friday Sept 4th. She cut over 20 seconds off her time from the previous meet. We picked up a pizza on the way home which made Bryn a very happy girl when she arrived home. Abby went with Mark and Paige with her friends to the annual high school Corn Roast followed by the first home football game. Jeff and I couldn't pass up the beautiful night and also went over to the field after our pizza to watch our team score a big win.

We woke up early Saturday morning to drive Abby back to La Crosse. Her scheduled move-in time was 10-11am, so we had to get out of Dodge by 7:30 at the latest. Getting Abby's stuff up to her room was a breeze as UWL has such a nice system of student volunteers who carry your items to your floor for you as long as you label them with your room #. Abby is in a new dorm this year and is rooming with an RA due to a housing shortage. She happily accepted early last year already. Abby's room overlooks the just opened, newly constructed football/track field and stadium. Just yesterday Abby was to partake in her first college football game at home - tailgating and all. Abby brought my bike to school this year as hers was stolen last year on the day Jeff and my Dad came to move her out.

Paige and I chased down the UWL mascot for this couldn't-be-missed photo op. Paige was sad she didn't do a "thumbs up" with the eagle.

After driving to La Crosse Saturday morning, we drove back across the state to Shawano in the evening to arrive at my parents' cabin. Again, the weather has been so perfect, Bryn didn't have to work or practice, so we enjoyed the lake. The lake was so busy that the waves were optimum for jet-skiiing! Jeff took Paige out for a wild ride. Kristin, Carlo, Lucy and Bella were also up north and we took a long pontoon ride Sunday afternoon.

We did leave Sunday night just so we could have Monday to get the house back in order after Abby's move.
Bryn opted out of UWAY (band program at UWM) this year with her added responsibility of holding a job. I think it's a wise decision. Senior year is a busy one.
Bryn had another meet yesterday and did about the same. She wasn't feeling the best and ended up feeling dizzy and puking toward the end of her race. Yuck! We talked about concentrating on hydrating better the day before the next race.
Colleges begin accepting applications Tuesday (Sep 15th), so Bryn's been busy with paperwork. She turned in ones to Carroll University (Waukesha) and University of Minnesota (Twin Cities) last week through her guidance counselor. Today she finished up her application to Marquette (Milwaukee), then she only has one left: to UW La Crosse. All these offer programs in her intended major: Physical Therapy with Marquette and Carroll having a shortened 6-year program that you're accepted into right away as a freshman.

Glory hallelujah! Our digital camera has not been working for a couple weeks now. It just gives us a mysterious error message that apparently is only decipherable by the Canon repair dept and they're not sharing! We pretty much knew we were going to have to purchase another and I was OK temporarily taking pictures on my iPhone. But Jeff the Engineer couldn't let the camera go without a fight, so he took it apart last Saturday afternoon. Not seeing anything obviously sticking out or disconnected, he simply reassembled the mess and it now works! Who am I to question!

Bryn toured Carroll University in Waukesha last Friday and actually liked it! They have a unique 6-year, freshman-entry doctorate program in Physical Therapy which is what she wants to go into. Carroll was a great contrast for her to Univ of Minnesota, which she still likes also. It was fun for me to see all the beautiful building improvements since I went there back in the 80s. Bryn even got to meet with the Cross Country/Track coach who was very interested in her and talked running strategies with Bryn. Since we were so close to Kristin's, we stopped in for a quick lunch. Unfortunately, Lucy wasn't so welcoming and cried most of the time.

Bryn and Paige had their first day of school this Tuesday (Sept 1st). Each had a half-day with Paige going in the morning and Bryn in the afternoon. They both go to the high school now with Bryn being a senior and Paige a freshman.

With Bryn and Paige in school this week,

Abby has had a lot of time to herself to get ready to go back to UWL. One of her projects was making a quilt/blanket from squares she cut from old t-shirts. Kids receive t-shirts from so many events, the blanket really is a great idea for a keepsake. Abby went over to Kristin's last

Sunday after church to use her sewing machine to finish it up.

Abby also had several pictures printed and replaced all the pictures in her frames.

I collected the pots Abby and her friends decorated last summer and potted new plants for this year. Only one of the four plants from their freshman year survived! I'm hoping I made better (hearty) plant selections for them this year.

And finally we took Abby and Mark out for a "back-to-college" dinner at Stir Crazy last night. It was delicious. We all had fun watching the chefs torch our dinners in huge flames and then try to eat it with chopsticks. Hard to believe she's leaving us again tomorrow. It's been nice having her home.