Meeting Baby Cade!

Here is the newest member of the Branstad household. Cade was born on September 5th

and he is just adorable! Don't you just want to eat him up!

The girls and I went Thursday to the Town of Branstad to meet the newest family member, have lunch with Kallie and Nolan, see their new home, just catch up and give the kids the chance to play. We had planned to be out of our house by 10 am however 10:30 was more like it. We picked up lunch and headed north! I was a gorgeous day for the drive!

Here is Kallie and her new baby boy enjoying the fresh air.

Madi absolutely loved him! She was all about the baby.

It will be very interesting to see what she thinks when her new cousin comes along in November.
Hopefully she will love him too!

Here is Big Brother Nolan and the Blonde Girls!

Enjoying the sand box!

Kallie and her number one son!

Nolan was two in May. He is a great big brother!

Both girls were very tired when we left and sleeping shortly after we hit the highway

so I too the long way home!

Thanks for the great day Kallie and the boys!

Our Long Weekend!

The girls and I headed off Thursday for a long weekend at the farm...no boys! Bret was heading over to the Grandpa Ed's and Mark was on his own.

I had offered to help my girlfriend Lina with the flowers for her nieces wedding on Friday.

It is always good to keep up those corsage skills...you never know when you will need them!

Let me tell you the car ride with my youngest really started to worry me when we had stopped four times before we had hit the apple river! I was not sure if we would ever get there or not. She did finally calm down and found some ways to entertain herself.

The kids really love the farm and all the animals. Madi loves the Baby Cows and they both love to go across the road and pet Greg and Terri's Baby kitties. The also love Fuzz the dog that Dan and Heather bring over. I wish we were closer so they could spend more time there. Oh well, I guess we take what we can get! There is always some sort of action there too. Madi really likes to watch the tractors and Kacy just likes to help Grandma where ever she can.

The girls and I went in to visit Great Grandma Soley, we have not been there since August and I am not sure the last time we had their picture taken with her., This is pretty good! At least they are all almost looking at me. Madi is always a challenge if she does not want too do it!

I think this is sweet picture of Kacy and GG.


Saturday night after Madi drove the golf cart into the cornfield...yes the cornfield, we headed up to the wedding reception.

The golf cart story.... Madi, Grandma, and Kacy were out watering trees Friday with the cart, Madi got back up on the cart, hit the gas and shot out into the corn field uncle Dan had just chopped. Some how she stayed on the cart and it did not tip! I heard Grandma yelling her name and running so I knew there was trouble! Madi was about 50 feet away or so. I think Grandma lost a few years off of her life and now needs to color her hair. Madi did not seem too worked up, in fact she wanted to ride the cart out of the corn field with Grandma! Kacy thought the whole thing was funny....We are just very lucky we can laugh about it now!

Kacy and Madi were quite excited to head up to the wedding reception. Kacy loves to wear a fancy dress! Once we got there my kids were scooped away from me by the Glavin Girls and Faith, they played and entertained them most of the night. Madi did fall asleep before 9pm in my arms with the music blaring...if we were at home that would not have happened. I really did not see Kacy the whole night, she had a great time with the other kids. It was fun to see people I had not seen in quite awhile, aren't wedding receptions such a great way to reconnect with people!

Kacy did some decorating at the farm.....notice the "one" pumpkin by each tree in the yard!

She did this all over! And she could only put one by each tree...no more!

Sunday we headed down to Easton with Papa and Nana to go fishing in the pond and ride the horses at CJD farms. Kacy was very excited to get the Dora pole out again.

I have to say the fish were not biting too well, but we did manage to hook a few hungry ones!

Look, I got one!

Madi had a great time checking the fish out.

Here is Kacy's big one!

After fishing we went over to ride the horses at the farm.

This was Madi's first time on a real horse. She loved it......

You know she wants to do anything and everything her sister does!

Kacy thought she was the ridding queen! She loves to ride horses....well the small ones at least!

Do they look like real horse girls?

Kacy and Dave doing laps.

Wow what an eventful weekend. After lunch and the Packer game the girls and I headed for SCF. Madi slept all the way home and Kacy did well too! Luckily it was not a repeat of the ride down. ( And no one needed a potty break so we were able to keep on going?!)

Yep, Another Parade!

Sunday after church we all (minus Bret....he wanted to watch football) headed down to Osceola, to check out the parade. The weather was gorgeous so a parade seemed like a super excuse to be outside. Kacy was also very excited to go.....not only for the candy, but because Hope was going to be riding on the St Croix Float as First Princess!

Don't these look like some hot kids?

The parade was long and it had some huge lulls in between the entries. The kids had a great time picking up candy, watching everyone, and playing with each other. Kacy's favorite give away of the day........the box of crayons that the library handed out...she was super excited!
We met the Elden's and the Anderson's in what was a shade stop at times, the good news is you just had to take a couple steps down into the ditch and there was alway shade.
The house behind us also had the football game on. Thank goodness!!


Finally Hope came along! She was warm too!

We had a great time at the parade. Lisa and Linda helped keep Madi entertained. Mads fell asleep on the way home and took a good two hour nap. Kacy and I also curled up on the couch for a nap. That parade really took it out of us!

Kacy's First Day of Sunday School!

Today is Kacy's first day of Sunday School at Redeemer. She is very excited. Becky is going to be her teacher and Trey will be in her class. She was also thrilled to pick out a fancy dress to wear. Becky said she was very good! Kacy likes to get to do things on her own....not sure if we can count this as her her own when she goes with Becky, that is her second Mom, but she still goes. Last year Becky took her to Little Lambs and Kayli took her to storytime at the library. She loves it!

This was one of Hope's dresses...Kacy thinks it is beautiful and loves the butterflies.




Here she is right outside the church. Our Sunday School is before church. This is kind of nice, then we all are able to leave church together and get on with our day.
It is funny I have both kids excited about SundaySchool this year....Kacy, because she gets to go and Bret, because he does not have too. He does have confirmation however!

50 Years of Marriage!

Today after work and a football draft at our house we headed North of St Croix Falls to Cushing to celebrate Joyce and Darryl Nelson's 50th Wedding Anniversary. They are wonderful couple who are very generous to the community, they also have seen their own share of tough times. Joyce is in remission however she is not back to her old self quite yet. It was wonderful to see them and help share their day.

Bret went to the Tree House Daycare Joyce owned when he came home from the hospital after his accident. We had a lot of good time there and Bret was one of many children

Joycie took care of!

The girls got pretty antsie so we headed outside! Not before Madi threw a fit however because she wanted one of the balloons!

There was a great climbing tree close to the building...

yes Kacy was the girl in the dress climbing the tree....

Well I guess there are worse things she could do, and probably has!

We then headed back to St Croix. Mark mentioned Dairy Queen, to which every one's eyes lit up....while it was crazy! So we headed across the river to the Ice Cream Shoppe in Taylors Falls!

It was wonderful and ambiance to perfect! It was a great night for sitting on the deck and

eating ice cream

Papa Is 60!

Labor Day weekend was spent at the farm! We were have a Farm Tour/60th Birthday Party for my Dad. Luckily my husband's job switched on Wednesday from nights to days. This way we had the opportunity to leave St Croix closer to 5pm rather than 10pm from Minneapolis. This makes it a tad better for traveling with young children. Madi never slept on the way down, in fact I do not think she ever shut up either...she was either singing or talking...thankfully no crying. Kacy napped from Amery to Baldwin....not far either. We ate in Black River Falls, and hit the farm by 8:30.

Saturday was spent preparing for Sunday...I did a lot of cooking, and Mark did a lot of hauling. A tent was put up, picnic tables were brought in, bales were hauled for seating, coolers were set up.....and the list goes on and on....oh yeah the girls had to pick flowers for table decorations and Bret had to wash the golf cart, that was a mode of transportation for the day.

Sunday was the party, the weather was great! Everyone enjoyed the tour and the food. They did have flies to contend with, but that is what happens at the farm. Everyone seemed to have a good time and we seemed to do well with the amount of food. There was not too much left over! It helps that some people ate twice!

Everyone say Cake!

Madi is testing Papa's frosting at this point!

The whole darn family!

Heather and Dan

Dan and Grandma G

I think Fuzz maybe checking out the beer too.

Jack, Jason and Sara Hohenstien

Jack worked over the farm that day, he really wanted to

take a tractor home. Jack ran from one thing to another, he was very busy!

I know Sara hates this but it was great to see him have a melt down...it helps us all realize that our kids are normal and it is just not just ours children who throw tantrums.

Grandma and Dad with Leo and Sue

This is Dad's old college roommate.

Yes this is Mark's daughter with a can of beer.

It is empty...and was before she got it!

I did not see Kacy for much of the day. She and Lizzie played and played and played!

In fact when it was time for Liz to go home Kacy got very sad and said she did not want her to go home, because "I so not want play with her." Referring to her sister who was standing near by!

All in all we figure there were about 125 people at the farm today. It was a fun day and well worth the time and effort it took to make it happen. It is nice that we did it over three day weekend, this gave us and extra day to take things down and kind of regroup before we headed back into the work week.

Now we can start planning for Nana's 60th next year!

The First Day!

Today was Bret's first day of 8th Grade. I cannot believe how fast time goes.

He looks so much older, I find it hard to believe next year will be High School!

Here is to a great year with lots of fun, friends and studying!