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Wind Cave Trail
We hiked up the Wind Cave trail this morning and had a great time. Tammy declared it perhaps her favorite hike ever. It was 1.7 miles with 800 feet of elevation on the way up. It took us just short of an hour.
The views were fantastic and the terrain was challenging and varied. Lucky went up with us and did a great job. The trail was already busy at 8:30a and when we were going down we passed large groups. So get out there early!
Noah Purifoy Outdoor Museum
Today we visited the Noah Purifoy Outdoor Museum in Joshua Tree. We weren’t familiar with Purifoy, but his background is very impressive and the outdoor museum he created here is unique, interesting, and a little confusing. We spent a while walking around and taking pictures. We didn’t read up about Purifoy until we left which we actually liked since it allowed us to see the art “as is”.
Skull Rock Trail
After hiking Ryan Mountain Trail and checking out the famous Skull Rock, we decided to take a hike amongst the giant rocks along Skull Rock Trail.
The kids had a fabulous time running and climbing up the rocks while I anxioulsy watched worrying someone might fall. 🤷♂️
Salt River Wild Horses
Today we visited Coon Bluff Recreation Area to see the Salt River wild horses. The non-profit Salt River Wild Horse Management group helps provide for these wild horses, and they are currently putting out hay for them each day. You can visit while they do this and walk among these wild horses but you need to be slow and calm, and keep your distance. The horses themselves were skirmishing a bit. It gets your attention when twenty horses start stirring and running around you. I brought the good camera with a long lens to catch some photos of these beautiful horses.
Sabino Canyon
We visited the Sabino Canyon Recreation Area today on our day trip to Tucson. We took the shuttle to the top of the trail and then made our way down stopping at several locations. It was a very pretty walk and fun to see the spring creek with running water down the canyon. We had to cross it barefoot and the water was very cold!
Kayaking Pokegama and the Mississippi
We spent the morning kayaking down the Mississippi. We put in at Tioga Beach on Pokegama Lake, then Big Jay Goulde Lake, then Little Jay Goulde Lake into the Mississippi River. Portage around the Corps of Engineers Pokegama Dam and out at Paddle Hoppers. 2h 35m paddle time. We saw nice Lily Pads and huge swaths of Wild Rice along with gorgeous scenery.
Our newest floor opened up in SPS Tower today! Great setup to enable #TeamSPS to continue winning. I love the conference room names from Women Who Code. The text on the quiet room desks? EDI. The team moves in soon! 🤩🙌
A ton of activity happening at our #TeamSPS Think Tank booths with product specialists working with the field sales team. 👏 Love this! 💙
Minnesota Kubb 2019 Winter Tournament
The Kubbchucks played our 8th annual Minnesota Kubb Winter Tournament this weekend. After a week of record cold temperatures we were treated to a fabulous day in the mid-30’s, nice sunshine and no wind. Perfect for winter Kubb!
Round Robin
We opened the round robin versus Team Dondante. This was their first tournament and we helped them with tournament rules. They were good players, but needed to work on their drilling technique. We took the match 2-0 and it went on way too long because we were able to close it out. We went very cold on our 8m and that makes for a long game, if you don’t lose.
We played the Free Agents next, serious Kubb talent here. We had an epic fail in our first game and left a field Kubb on our very first turn, throwing 4 batons at 2 Kubbs. The Free Agents then kindly put us out of our misery. We drug out the 2nd game for a good long time. We got to 8 Kubbs in play and went back and forth for about 20 minutes. Sadly we broke first and left a line, which resulted in the expected immediate loss. 0-2 on that match.
We finished the round robin versus The Four Old Guys, however there were only three of them. They had a good game, just lacked some consistency. We were never really at risk in these games, and closed out the match 0-2.
Bracket
With a 2-1 record out of the round robin we went into the difficult end of the Round of 16.
We had to play Skol in the round of 16. Three monster Kubb players including Evan Fitzgerald. We didn’t stand a chance. On top of that, we played horribly. I don’t mind to lose, but our play was really sub-par. It took about 10 mins for them to put us away.
Free Agents, the team that we lost to in the round robin ended up winning the whole tournament.
We had a great day of Winter Kubb! 👍🏻
SPS Tower 16th Floor
We opened up the 16th floor in SPS Tower this week! What an amazing space for our growing team! 👍 The Library space, bright colors and fun references in the space are great!
Franconia Sculpture Park
We had a great morning exploring the Franconia Sculpture Park! We are lucky to have great public art in the Twin Cities!
Jack-o-Lantern Spectacular
We had a great time at the Minnesota Zoo Jack-o-Lantern Spectacular last night. I was blown away by the artistry and overall experience. It is created by Passion for Pumpkins with 5,000 pumpkins! The big, photo style pumpkins are very cool. 🎃👍🤩
2014 Olson Family Weekend
This years Annual Olson Family Weekend was planned by Don & Kaye and the extended family had a great time at Grand View Lodge!
Congratulations Alona & Dylan!
On September 27th my sister Alona tied the knot with her fiancé Dylan! They had a very nice ceremony followed by a reception at the Maple Grove Community Center. The ceremony was family and close friends standing in the gardens off of the reception area. Alona and Dylan had a Bahá’í marriage ceremony which does not have an officiant. They asked me to start things off with a few words.
Good evening and welcome to the marriage ceremony of Alona Thingelstad and Dylan Maas-Morgan. Alona, my sister, and Dylan have asked me to greet you all today and welcome you to this wonderful ceremony of love and dedication.
I am sure that you have all been to a many weddings, however this may be your first Bahá’í wedding. You will notice that no clergy is present, we are not in a church and everybody is enjoying a wonderful Minnesota fall evening. A Baha’i wedding is a simple exchange of a single statement. Once both the groom and bride make this pledge in the presence of two witnesses, Dylan and Alona will be married.
Today, Alona’s mother Rosalin and I have agreed to serve as these witnesses. While a Bahá’í marriage is a decidedly simple affair, Bahá’í’s take the institution of marriage with the utmost seriousness.
From the Kitáb-i-Aqdas: “And when He desired to manifest grace and beneficence to men, and to set the world in order, He revealed observances and created laws; among them He established the law of marriage, made it as a fortress for well-being and salvation, and enjoined it upon us in that which was sent down out of the heaven of sanctity in His Most Holy Book.” That fortress is filled with that most important thing, love. From `Abdu’l-Bahá: “…[I]n the world of humanity the greatest king and sovereign is love. If love were extinguished, the power of attraction dispelled, the affinity of human hearts destroyed, the phenomena of human life would disappear.”
In a moment Dylan and Alona will exchange those blessed words. This will be followed with a Bahá’í prayer. Please listen closely. As with many great things in life, it all goes by much too quickly.
And now a reading from Dylan’s mother, Cynthia…
Here are the photos I took. I also put them on Facebook for all the people that like that kind of thing, but I’m also putting them here so they are still around after Facebook (A.F.).
It was a great evening filled with family and fun. Congrats to my sister and her new husband and I wish them years of wedded bliss!
See also: Wedding day, Tammy and I, and Party Hat.
Pictures from 2013 US Nationals Kubb Championship
I didn’t get much time to take photos at the 2013 US Nationals Kubb Championship. Saturday was a day focused my team the Kubbchucks progressing through the bracket, and hoping that our club, Minnesota Kubb, did really well. Sunday I was mostly focused on scoring games for Planet Kubb and running the final parts of the Planet Kubb Club Championship. I did get my camera out for about an hour and get some shots in, but only from Sunday.
2013 Minnesota Kubb Tournament Photos
Spent 12 hours outside on Lake Calhoun yesterday. Dressed right, but still gets cold. Great day of Kubb!
2012 Dallas Oktoberfest Kubb Tournament
The Kubbchucks played at the 2012 Dallas Oktoberfest Kubb Tournament on Saturday. In between games I took out the camera.
Remodel Update Week 18
There are still a number of things on our punch list, but, the remodel is done! When we started the project it was expected to take 16 to 20 weeks, and we ended it right at 18. This week the flooring was installed, the electrical was finished, the network and other low voltage infrastructure got punched in and the security system was turned back up. The carpet was an amazing transformation. In one day the space went from a construction zone to a place you walk around in bare feet and goof around with the kids in.
We love everything about the new spaces we created. We wouldn’t change a thing. We’ve moved a bunch of our stuff back in and the rest of it will come together in the next couple of weeks. This will be the last set of weekly photos I post. I will do another final wrap up post when all the furniture is in place to show what it looks like when completely done.
I’m posting more photos than normal for the final recap. You can see there is still another day of painting to be done this coming week, and the AV guy will be out to install the in-wall speakers and put TV’s in place.
Remodel Update Week 17
This was a big week for the project! The painting is mostly done now. The final colors are on all the walls, the tape is off, the trim is all painted. The railing is finished above the mudroom and I’m really excited about the space up there. I’m completely sold on putting a door in next year. The utility and electric rooms are complete enough that we were able to move a bunch of stuff back in. I was super excited to get the network and low voltage systems coming back together. Both built-ins were completed as well. The fence was installed around the egress window wells. One of the carpenters even came on Sunday and finished the railing on the front door and the new surround around the front door.
The coming week should be the last big week. The final electrical work is starting on Monday. The cork flooring is installed in the exercise room on Wednesday, and carpet is the next day. The theatre and network wiring should be all done as well. We’ve now taken down the plastic barrier in the kitchen so we can now get into the new space without going outside. Just a bit more now!
