Mother's Day at Ruttger's

May 8, 2010

Hey there-

How goes it? We “enjoyed” some May snow yesterday. We’re spending Mother’s Day weekend in the Brainerd area, and I think there was something like three inches. Craziness! I’m happy to report that as of about 10 a.m., it was completely gone and we’ve enjoyed a beautiful sunny day.

Chris and I indulged ourselves with some Ficus enterprises (Chris’ vending machine empire, in case you don’t know) profits and bought a Garmin for running this week. It’s pretty much the coolest dang thing ever for a couple of running nerds such as ourselves. We had eight miles scheduled for this morning, and it was awesome to just take off and go and have your time and distance measured, requiring no thought or advanced planning whatsoever. We got to run along lovely Bay Lake, and despite yesterday’s snow (BOO!), it turned out to be a splendido day for a run.

Jerod had his first soccer practice of the season this week. He is a member of the mighty Pelicans. At this point in time, I am receiving a failing grade as a soccer mom. The coach sent an email a couple of weeks ago. Being that it’s “summer soccer,” I quickly skimmed it with the intent of reading more carefully and digesting the info later. On May 3 I got around to reading more closely and read “first practice will be Apri 28.” DOH. I then saw that the next practice would be May 5. Cool, I think, I can get us on the ball now. It also mentioned that the first game would be coming up at Pamela Park. So, on Wednesday we got J all suited up and headed to Pamela Park. There was no sign of Pelicans anywhere. The email was older, so neither Chris nor I could pull it up on our phone, so we had to go all the way back home to pull it up. Turns out practice was at Normandale Park. Double DOH! We did make it to the last 15 minutes of practice. Ugh.

Chris and I got to trek back to Target field last Thursday. Sadly the weather was not as nice as it had been on our first visit. It was yucky rainy. We watched a few innings, then decided to head to Kieran’s to watch the end. The Twins stunk it up against the Orioles and lost 2-0, so I’m glad we didn’t stick around. Yesterday’s (Friday) game was cancelled due to crappy weather. First weather related baseball cancellation in 30 years for the Twins. I personally think it’s a good problem… well worth it to have outdoor baseball (though perhaps we should have given that retractable roof a little more consideration!). They dropped another one to the Orioles today… hopefully they’ll get back on track soon.

We found out this week that Elise had been assigned to a.m. kindergarten for the fall. I had really hoped for p.m., because she gets so stinking bored in the afternoons. One of my well connected Countryside neighbors this week managed to get her daughter and Elise switched to p.m. Yahoo!! She’s counting the days and ready to go J

That is pretty much all the news that Bernard Place has to offer this week.

This is not all that interesting

May 1, 2010

Wowza—it’s May!

We are chugging along, still generally enjoying this early spring. Big news of the week for Chris and me is that we are now on a Ragnar team… a.k.a 12 people crazy enough to sign on for a 198 mile relay running race from Winona to Mpls. We’ve talked about doing it for years, and this week it finally came together. Four of the people we know, the other eight are total and complete strangers found via a ‘find a team’ function on the ragnar website. We’ll each run three legs—that can vary in distance from three to eight miles. And, here’s the kicker, the race goes through the night. Hmmm…

My parents arrived on Wednesday as planned. We went out yesterday evening and had dinner with them. Their place is really nice. I wish it were just a wee bit closer, but overall it’s great. I think they’re going to come tomorrow evening (Sunday) and we’re going to eat with Donna.

Today and this evening will be a first for this Kansas rooted family. We’re going to a neighbor’s Bar Mitzvah. I’m pretty excited to experience something different. The ceremony is this morning, then tonight’s the par-tay. I can already tell you that I would compare the amount of planning work that Valette (the mom) has put in is on par with that of a wedding. It’s pretty insane… I cannot even begin to imagine what the final price tag will be. All for a 13 year old boy!

Chris and I are looking forward to our next Twins game on Thursday. Those damn Tigers won the series last week. Can’t win them all I guess J Seemed like last night they were back on track against Cleveland.

The kids are good. Hard to believe we’re just 16 days away from having an eight year old. J’s decided that he wants to take two kids to a Twins game and then have a sleep over. While I’m not thrilled about the sleep over part, I’m totally stoked that we’re not looking at a party with throngs of seven and eight year olds!

Elise is… umm… just Elise. She’s spent pretty much the whole week in a foul mood. Not exactly sure what her deal is, but I think she’s officially sick of me and ready to go to school.

That is kinda sorta all I know.