Sporting Weekend II

On Saturday, we continued our weekend of sports by heading to River Falls, Wisconsin. The Kansas City Chiefs have held their training camp in River Falls for several years. It was only 72 miles from Rochester to River Falls so it wasn't too bad of a drive for us. I am the big Chiefs fan, but it was Anthony's idea that we go check out Chiefs family night. Shortly after we arrived sky divers landed on the football field. Later, there was an autograph period and after that practice. We ended up getting autographs from Tony Gonzalez, Larry Johnson, Brodie Croyle, Dustin Colquitt, along with several other players, however they may not all be on the team when the regular season begins. We had a fun night and enjoyed even a glimpse of professional football.

The sky diver. Larry Johnson signing our football.

Tony Gonzalez. This is the crowd to get Tony's autograph. Anthony is toward to front of the pack. I knew his height and long arms would come in handy sooner or later!!
Here is the signed football. Tony's is the one on the upper right. LJ's is on the bottom left. It is upside down in the picture, but you can see the L.

Sporting Weekend I

On Friday night, we went to a Rochester Honkers baseball game with my mom and Nick. Anthony and I have been to other games this season and have really enjoyed them. For those of you who these references may help, they play the Waterloo Bucks and the Wisconsin Woodchucks. Friday they played the Woodchucks and the Honkers lost 2-3. We had fun hanging out with family and being at the game. Nick especially enjoyed the Honkers mascot Slider.

To the faces!!!

The last weekend of July we decided to take a short trip to South Dakota with some of my family. We went with my aunt and uncle, Dave and Pam Bolin, my cousin and his wife, Dan and Lynn Bolin and my cousin and his fiance (also a good friend of mine) James Bolin and Nicole Matlack. We started our trip off in Mitchell at the Corn Palace. In the "Acting Corny" picture it is me, Anthony, James, and Nicole.



We then stopped in Chamberlain to spend the night, but not before enjoying the beautiful view.

The next day we continued to head west. We went to see the famous faces. Anthony, Nicole, and I have never seen Mt. Rushmore.

After touring around the faces, we headed to Wall Drug. For the those of you who don't know about Wall Drug, it became a famous store because of its free ice water. When the store first opened, the owners we having a hard time getting business. They came up with the idea to give away free ice water to anyone who came to their store. This was a big attraction for those we were traveling west, and the store is a big tourist attraction now.

We camped in the Badlands Saturday night. It would have been a lot of fun if it wasn't for all of the mosquitoes. I ended up with over 100 bites, no exaggeration. The next morning we climbed around the Badlands before heading towards home.


For our one last adventure we stopped in Sioux Falls for a short break from riding in the van. It was a good stop because we got to see another example of God's amazing artistry.

Birthday fun!

Natalie opening gifts. Reagan and her cake. Yum!

On July 20th we headed to the cities to help celebrate my nieces' birthdays. Reagan's birthday was on July 16th, she turned one. Natalie will turn 3 on August 8th. We had a good time and enjoyed seeing family and friends. Here are some pictures from the celebrations.

I thought these pictures of Noah and the balloons were super cute!