Trip to Duluth and beyond

The Monday following our picnic, Kirstin, Jeff, Logan , Liam, Kyle, Tiffany, Ellie, Erik, Judy and I took off for Duluth for a day of adventure. We stayed at a water park for evening fun. I was feeling much better after getting sepsis of the blood five days ago. Here are the Smentek's walking across one of the sculptures on Canal Park Drive.And here are the Larsen's. Are we really excited? Looks can be deceiving.
To out surprise, the largest ship on the Great Lakes, The Paul R Tregurtha, was going under the aerial life bridge. It was so large that it looked like it would not fit. I have seen movies of ships going under a lift bridge while the bridge was going down and tore the top half off the ship. The operator no longer works there.
Then it was stone throwing time on lake Superior. If we kept it up for much longer, we would have filled it in.
Logan and Liam are standing by an old tug boat.
Didi loves to swing.
Then came the time at the water park. I won't post many pictures but the Smentek's drifted down the lazy water park river.
Here comes Kyle and Ellie down one of the water slides. There was a giant bucket that filled up with water (probably 100 gallons) and then spilled out over part of the platform. It was about to dump while Ellie and I were in the middle of it. I grabbed her and stood directly under a platform below the bucket, thinking we would be safe. But I did not know there was a back splash and we got doused with about 30 gallons of water. We were surprised.
Jeff decided to wait for the big bucket to dump and see what happens.

Family Picnic in the backyard

On the last day of August, it was decided to have all our kids and their kids over to enjoy a delicious dinner in the backyard. As you can see, Brett is enjoying it.The smallest ones had their own table and did really well . Liam seems to be saying, "It's a Bird! It's a plane! It's ...."
The view from the other side. Gigi is not quite sure of the guy taking the photo.
Didi was taking the giraffe for a little ride up the hill but there must have been too much weight on the back because over they went.
Gigi, seeing the predicament that Didi was in, ran to rescue the giraffe and ignored Didi. Not to worry, though. Didi said, "Go ahead, take my giraffe!", just like Dirty Harry would have said.
Liam liked taking the scooter down the hill where he stopped to talk with "little brother"
Gigi shows us that there are other things that you can do with the scooter, like resting your feet on the steering wheel. Maybe all that food she ate settled in her feet.
BFFs, Ellie and Lorelei, are happy to share a tricycle ride together.
I think that I want to try out this giraffe. Everyone else has had a turn so now it's my turn.
Logan really got the scooter going fast on the driveway.
Lorelei going solo on the trike.
Joseph needed to shoe us his stuff on his own scooter. He could really go. Yea Joe.
Since Didi's legs are a bit short to really get going, cousin Logan decided to give him a hand.
We had the picnic while Kyle and Tiffany were here so that all could catch up on all the news everyone had. We are so grateful for Kyle and Tiffany and all the adventures they have had and that they included us on one of them.
Then all of a sudden the tubes came out
Andrew is playing pick-a-boo with us.
Even Jeff tried out the scooter.
Andrew has had a growing spurt as you can see from the photo below. He must be at least eight feet long and stuck in the tube.
Here we are with all nine of our grand kids. Aren't they cute?
The backyard family picture with everyone. Andrew and Brandon added the finishing touches.

MN State Fair

Well, once again, I need to add several posts. Time has been flying by and the older we get the faster it goes. Kyle, Tiffany, Ellie and Erik came to town for a visit on August 26 for several days. About 3.5 hours before I needed to pick them up at the airport, I got sick, but I picked them up anyway. After three doctor's appointments, the first appointment was a scheduled physical the next morning. It was determined that I had contracted sepsis of the blood, a blood infection that is fatal in 60% of the cases. But as you can see, I recovered. I was out of commission and not able to do anything with our visitors for about five days. Therefore, I missed going to the state fair for the first time in several years. Thanks to Judy and the Canon camera, I got to see what I missed out on. The State Fair goers are packed up and ready to go.
Looks like Ellie and Lorelei are BFFs forever.











I think that Gigi and Joseph are enjoying a fast carousel ride. There are several pictures on the carousel so that must have been the favorite ride.



Gigi likes Barnie and Barnie likes he.











More horsey rides for the gang.











Then we have Ellie on the buzzy Bee ride. Is she excited? Well I don't if I would, being that close to a very large stinger.













We found a couple of desperate characters at the fair. Do they look familiar?







Look at her go! Lorelei popped a wheelie. Hang on Joe.











Ellie, we get milk from those guys. Isn't she nice?











Erik, can you say hamburger? He says Mmmmmooooooooo!
One last horse ride for Didi, and he is liking it. I want more.

Why are there gaps in this blog?

Well, there have again been some gaps in time for my blog again. There are many things that I need to add but haven't taken the time to. So this one will not contain any pictures and will be short.

My last post on the electric bike really kind of a slam on Minnesota for charging fee after fee to register an electric bicycle and taking all the fun out of trying to save money. I have been tracking miles and the cost of saved gasoline. I use "Mapmyride.com" to log the miles. The shortest way to work is about 8.15 miles one way, and with my 40 mile range on a fully charged battery I am able to maintain full speed all the way home. This is a Chinese bike and I saw plenty of them while over there. The new Chevy Volt claims to also have a 40 mile range before the gasoline motor kicks in. I have made about 19 trips to and from work already and have included stops at stores on the way home. I have logged about 310 miles so far. I will ride it if the temperature is 42 degrees or warmer and not forecast to rain. I park it right next to all the Harley's (I haven't been beat up yet by those guys yet). But the total amount of gasoline saved (miles ridden, times the current cost of gas in the tank divided by the average MPG) so far is only $42.50. As gas gets cheaper, the payback time on the bike gets longer.

It is kind of fun riding it and people at work are interested in getting something like that. There are faster electric scooters that have a top speed of 40MPH (takes a motorcycle plate) or an electric motorcycle that goes over 60MPH but the cost of those and payback make it not practical to get, when you consider the number of Minnesota days in a year you can ride it. I can get up to a blazing speed of 19MPH on a flat road but only loose 2-3 MPH going up hills but gain almost 10MPH going down hills. I am not one to actually go the speed limit (usually 5 over) so riding this bike really slows me down. Oh well. I will probably make up for it on the days I am in a car. Almost all drivers I on the road with me have been very courteous and some are afraid to pass me. Stay tuned.

Electric Bike

A couple weeks ago I decided that I was going to do my part to cut back on Gasoline and oil dependence. I ordered an electric bike. It came and I put it together. Top speed is about 24 MPH. I knew that I needed to get a $6.00 license plate to drive it on the street. This is the so called Blue bile I bought (more like sky blue or aqua blue, not a real American blue).

If you live in Minnesota and are thinking of saving money by going electric, forget about it. Any good thoughts I had of getting an e-bike and spending 5 cents per day to charge it vanished as I tried to get it registered and licensed. It took a week and a half because nobody at the Brookdale Center ever did one of these. It is a sub category of a moped. They kept asking me how many cc's the engine was. I kept telling them there was no engine. It had an electric motor. Then they asked me for the title. I kept telling them I didn't get a title because it was a bicycle. They threw up their hands and said that then needed a Title or a Certificate of Origin or else I would need to supply for photos on photo paper and an affidavit proving I owned it. I called for the Certificate. When I arrived I went to get the license plate and pay them the $6. I still had to wait at the counter for about 40 minutes while they tried to figure out what to do. Since they did not know what they were doing, I think they were just making it up as they went. Since I was getting a plate I needed to pay sales tax, a plate fee, and the registration fee. Then they insisted that I needed to buy a title which also required a Public Safety Vehicle fee. I argued with them the entire time. Regular bicycles aren't licensed any longer in Minnesota, so I could buy a $3500.00 recumbent bike that goes just as fast and not pay a penny and I still have to ride in the rode. Well, when it was all done, that stupid @%$&**# MN plate cost more that the plate on our Honda Accord EX V6 that will go 150MPH. I ended up paying $112 for a $6 plate. I will be calling the State offices on Monday to get some money back because I think I was ripped off royally. So don't even think of going GREEN in Minnesota, because the state will suck every penny out of you so you won't even enjoy the first ride. And then to top it off, the plate expired in February and they said that if I waited a week and got the plate in Sept, I could have gotten it for half price.

Olympic Medal count

Here is the latest from Beijing.

Thompson picnic

On August 10 the Thompsons has a picnic to celebrate Jocelyn's birthday. The game is guess her age.
There was fun at the swings.
And there was fun at the kiddy teeter-tater.
More fun at the play ground.

Most of the participants at the picnic were awake. Wake up Josh!
Ralph, Jocelyn, Tiago, Char, Kris, Alicia, and Josh. All of them are legally Thompsons, even though the last name on a couple of them is different.
Gigi is giving a hug to one of the Dudes.
Ralph's with Grandma G. Another four generations.