Birthday Weekend at the Lake

This past Memorial Day weekend was chosen for a gathering of all 19 members of my immediate family–Kathie and me, all five of our children and their spouses, and all eight grandchildren. Memorial Day makes it possible for the weekend to be a long one, since most of them, especially Travis (Colorado), have to travel a good distance. The other motivation was the nearing of my 70th birthday. In addition to our own cabin, we rented a neighbor's cabin just a short distance away. This way, everyone had a reasonable sleeping space.

Uncle Will started out the first morning by taking two of his nieces on a paddle around the bay. It does look like they are doing all the work, however.

One of the mothers watched protectively but also got a few pictures of her own.

Penny liked our new boat.

We turned down the temperature in the hot tub, and so there were lots of shenanigans there.

Afterwards, drying off on the deck with treats was a good option.

I am creating a nicer, bigger layout of my electric trains in our new garage, and Frederick was completely taken with them. His Uncle Rob helped him operate one of them. Of course, I loved showing them off to Henry, Anders, and all the rest who came for a peek.

OK. I'm kind of a "toys guy." So, now you have to look at a series of pictures documenting some playing we did. Many of you will remember the toy rocket launchers you used to be able to buy by sending in a cereal box top and $1. They actually worked pretty well, but they were small and doused you with most of the water they expelled when you launched them. I found a new one that launches two-liter soda bottles, and it uses a bicycle tire pump to build up good pressure.

The directions specify that you need to stand well back and use a 15' cord to pull the launch release. Maia did one of the first launches.

Rob actually gets credit for capturing this picture–the moment just after the launch release has been pulled and the water inside the bottle is being ejected. Typically, the bottle went up a hundred feet or so, and we had to retrieve it several times from the woods or from the opposite side of the cabin.

Will decided it need fins and a nose cone, so he fashioned some modifications for the bottle.

They didn't really make much difference, but Frederick was fascinated with the whole exercise anyway.

Fishing was attempted, but mostly it was an exercise in swinging a net through the water or casting lots and lots of times.

I include this picture to show that there was a cake decorated with little pine trees and a man in a boat catching some kind of fish. I managed to blow out all seven candles! I guess that at my age, you get decade candles rather than ones for individual years. Sure makes the blowing out lots easier.

Frederick and his dad posed for me. They are good looking guys.

Will had previously planted trees on his property in northern Minnesota, and he had about 45 of them left over–all red pines, I believe. So, he brought them along and dotted them all around our property. (We are getting a nice rain this morning, so maybe they will all get a little boost.)

On Saturday, all 19 of us went to Famous Dave's for a celebration dinner. Here is one table of revelers!?

And here is the other. Which table seems most festive to you?

Game room features attracted some of the younger partiers.

One, however, was not all that excited by the events.

That is, until his Nana showed him around (and showed him off).

Jess and Maia offered a toast.

Later, when the rocket nose cone failed, Anders chose to turn it into a party hat!

The last evening, a professional photographer came out and took pictures of each family, selected other groupings, and a grand shot of all 19 of us together. This is what I had requested as a birthday gift. What a special weekend this was. Thanks everyone for making the effort to be here! The only disappointment was that no one got me anything from the wish list I posted here a couple of times ago. The list was a challenge, I guess. In fact, my friend Murray later said that maybe people could just get me a big stick, and I could take care of the items on the list myself. That's not a bad idea.

Happy Birthday Betsy!

My beautiful baby girl is officially another year older on the 22nd. I tried to restrain myself from including too many pictures, but there was just too much cuteness to choose from, and so what you see is what you get. After having two terrific sons in my life as a father, it was quite special to welcome a daughter. Her birthday is just a few days short of my own. Because emeralds are the stones associated with the month of May, I couldn't resist buying her a tiny little emerald ring when she was born.

Her brothers welcomed her home with kisses and plenty of admiration.

She was darling from the get-go.

My mother, who unfortunately only got to know her for a short four years, nevertheless doted on Betsy's charm. I love the semi-serious expression on her face as she shares a secret or some special story with Mom here.

She always finished her milk.

And she and her cousin, Sarah–almost the same age, provided lots of opportunities for great pictures.

This is one of my very favorite pictures of Betsy. She is so focused on whatever it is she was watching–sitting quietly and attentively while the rest of us found her more enchanting than whatever else might have been going on.

She has a little bit of an impish smile, and she liked her braids, something I actually attempted from time to time to put up for her.

What were we thinking? Where are the seat belts and child restraints? Betsy loved standing on her head in chairs. I have several photographs of her thus.

Always my Wonder Woman!

The girl was not afraid to climb trees. I always liked this picture of her peeking out of one of our Ginkgo trees, even if it is a little blurry.

Just like her brothers before her, Betsy completed her first RAGBRAI with me when she was ten years old. She is a bit more than that here, as she and her Uncle Tom cruise down an Iowa road.

Then suddenly, she's getting all grown up and dressed up and GOING OUT WITH A BOY! A hard thing for a dad to swallow, I can tell you.

After graduation, she and I spent about a week together with friends in New York seeing the sights. This photo is a little hard to view today, but here she is with one of my best friends, David, in Jersey City looking across to lower Manhattan.

Dad helped me buy Betsy her first car for graduation and to enable her to drive to her student teaching assignments in Lone Tree. Like her mother, father, and brothers before her, she chose to be a Hawkeye at the University of Iowa.

I got this picture of her after the graduation exercises with then President Mary Sue Coleman.

A number of years later, when I worked in Washington for a brief time, Betsy and Rob came to visit me there.

She came back again with this Pete guy in tow.

And eventually they married.

And then one day she starts looking like this.

And again a couple more times, and now I'm rewarded with three terrific grandchildren. Indeed, Betsy is the mother of my very first grandchild, Henry. I know I'm prejudiced, but I believe that Betsy has proven to be an extraordinary mother. And though I haven't seen her working in the classroom, I suspect she is a great teacher too. It shows in her parenting.

A daughter has special ways of making her old dad feel important. She can make me feel better when I'm a little blue. She encourages me, she understand me, and she often has wise and helpful words for me.

Happy Birthday sweetheart!