Family Alive

Brian, Kristine, Analise, and Josiah Toone

Archive for January, 2008

Yuck

9th January 2008

We’ve got a leaking sewer line running across the top of our basement, which I found heavily dripping onto the extra car this afternoon. It’s gotten worse since we used a little water this evening, and poor Brian’s been emptying buckets to keep the basement from getting any more dirty and wet. The plumber is coming tomorrow morning. I guess if you have to have a sewer leak, this is as good as it can get. But still, not good.

I wrote a nice long post this past weekend summarizing our wonderful trip, but then it got lost in blog-space. Maybe I’ll be back later to rewrite it. Mostly, I raved about what a fabulous trip we had. The pictures tell the story. I love seeing my family and playing in the snow with my kids. I’ve been busy this week trying to bring the house back to some semblence of order, but Christmas has yet to be put away. Maybe this weekend…

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Christmas Wrap-up

5th January 2008

It was great. Thanks!

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Busy, fun day

1st January 2008

We started out the day by taking Josiah sledding for the first time ever. He had a good time, but he was more interested in walking around in the snow like a little penguin than he was in being pulled in the sled. Analise, on the other hand, enjoyed having me run down the hill in front of her pulling her down as fast as I could go. After sledding, I changed into my bike gear and set out on a 75 mile bike ride to Duluth, MN. The plan was for Kristine to drive everyone else in the car and pick me up alongside the road however far I made it. I didn’t make it very far in the cold, snowy weather heading into a stiff wind. Nevertheless, we made it to Duluth to attend the "Zoo Year’s Eve Party" at the Lake Superior Zoo. Experiencing an outdoor zoo with 20+ inches of snow on the ground was awesome! Finally, we met Kat for dinner at Bulldog Pizza.

getting ready for a busy day in the cold
Here’s Josiah all ready for a busy day in the snow!

first time sledding
Josiah’s first sledding experience was good, but he didn’t like being tied down into the sled.

Analise and me sledding
Analise didn’t want to miss the sledding action. Here I am sporting my new Christmas sweatshirt.

artistic Josiah
Josiah liked walking in the snow. Here is a closeup of Josiah that was a little
blurry, but I touched it up with the "paint daubs" filter in Adobe Photoshop.

playful polar bear
This playful polar bear was a popular animal to see. He was actually kind of far away,
but this picture was taken with the full 12x optical zoom on our camera.

cuddly grizzly bear
This HUGE grizzly bear looked friendly, but I wouldn’t want to get in the cage with him!

sleds not strollers
Sleds were the preferred means of transportation for young kids.

up close with a huge deer
We were able to get very close to some of the animals. Here Josiah was able to pet this HUGE deer.
It wasn’t very tall, but it must have weighed half a ton because it was long and wide.

prowling cougars
These cougars were prowling around their exhibit. One of them climbed
on top of a rock and let out a very large meow — it sounded just like a house cat!

sleepy tiger
This sleepy tiger hardly moved at all, but he did blink once or twice.

snowy owl
This snowy owl was hard to see sitting in the snow — but it was one of the coolest animals to see.

hay ride
Hay rides at the zoo.

sledding at the zoo
Another popular thing to do was sled on the big sledding hill. Analise wasn’t quite big enough to go down this hill.

beautiful scenery
The zoo was overall beautiful. In this distance is the Spirit Mountain downhill ski resort. The far rock cropping was the
cougar exhibit. The middle rock area was the polar bear exhibit. The near one I think was the seal exhibit.

pretty sunset
Here’s the pretty sunset behind the Polar Bear exhibit.

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It’s cold up here!

1st January 2008

The temperature gauge read 10 below this morning with a strong wind making the wind chill much much colder. It may be cold — but that didn’t stop us from going skiing today. Check out these pics and video (at the end) of the kids skiing.

cold sunrise (-10F)
We woke up to a very cold beautiful sunrise. Here it is at -10F (-23C)

beautiful sunrise
And here is the beautiful sunrise.

in the warming hut
Analise gets ready to go skiing in the warming hut at the Timberland Hills ski trail.

the ski trail
Dale skiis on ahead on the trail leaving the parking lot.

closeup of mother-daughter skiing
Here’s a closeup of the skiing mother and daughter.

getting up after the first fall
Analise struggles a bit to get up after falling.

analise and grandma sandy
Analise heads out from the parking lot next to Grandma Sandy.

video of the ski family
The whole family gets in on the skiing action. Watch everyone ski near the parking lot.

video of the cold sunrise
Watch the video of the cold sunrise and Analise’s snow angel.

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