Francesca's wedding shower / Mother's Day weekend

On May 10th, I hosted a wedding shower for our friend Francesca. She and Jeff are getting married on June 20th at the Boerner Botanical Gardens in Milwaukee. We played my favorite shower games - trivia and The Newlywed Game. I also asked each guest to fill out an anniversary card for Francesca and Jeff so they will have a card to open each year from a different person. Click on the photo of me and Francesca to see more pics from the shower.

On Sunday, my family came over to celebrate Mother's Day. Sue and Scott made brunch for everyone and Jay and I provided the kringle! Click on the Thysell/Rodgers/Matter family photo to see more!

Photos and more photos

We've been busy this past month and haven't updated the blog. Instead, I added 6 new photo albums to our picasaweb site. Check them out if you're interested!

- Mandy and her horse Montana visited April 11-13.
- The Ranua family visited on April 19th. We met Cade for the first time. He was born on March 22.
- Our nephew Alex celebrated his 4th birthday.
- We visited Alina, Steve, Elliott, and Rosemary in Naperville. Rosemary was born on April 16.
- We traveled to MN for Claire's baptism. Claire was born on March 28. We also got to spend some time with the Liens.
- We celebrated Cinco de Mayo with the Modiners. Amy, Casey, and Lauren returned from Australia on May 4.

We have a busy summer ahead, but hopefully we'll have some time to keep the blog updated!

Heather & Mac's wedding

Last weekend, we travelled to Omaha, NE, to attend the wedding of my college friend Heather. We had met her fiance Mac one other time - at our own wedding - shortly after they had started dating. We had a great time catching up with my college friends and exploring the Old Market area of downtown Omaha. Heather and Mac live on the east coast - Heather in Cambridge, MA, and Mac in Providence, RI - but they met while in med school in Omaha. Congratulations to the happy couple! Click on the picture of Heather & Mac to see more photos.

Sunny California

As I write this, the snow is coming down steadily in Racine, but my memories of my visit to California are still fresh in my mind. I returned last Monday from a week in northern CA.

The previous Tuesday, I flew into San Jose and visited a customer for work in Sunnyvale. The weather was gorgeous - low 70s and sunny - but we were working hard, so we didn't get too much chance to enjoy it. On Thursday at about 11am, I started my drive north to Napa Valley. I spent the afternoon in downtown Napa at Annette's Chocolate & Ice Cream Factory and then at Artesa Winery. The views at Artesa were beautiful, so I spent about an hour and a half tasting wine and soaking in the sun on the patio.

My journey continued that evening to Sacramento, where my friend Andrea and her boyfriend Ryan picked me up and drove me to their house in Folsom. On Friday, we had breakfast at Mimi's Cafe and spent a few hours catching up. Both Andrea and Ryan had to be at work in the afternoon, so I rode Andrea's bike to Folsom prison, which is only about a mile from their house and also where Ryan works. I checked out the museum that was on the grounds, but it was quite small and had a lot of Johnny Cash memoribilia, so I left after about 30 minutes. I continued my ride to historic old town Folsom, which was a really cute part of town. The picture of me to the left is next to a cool old truss bridge, just for pedestrians, in Folsom.

Friday evening, a few friends picked me up and we drove to South Lake Tahoe for the weekend for Sonia's bachelorette party weekend. On Saturday morning, we went snowshoeing in Emerald Bay. It was my first time snowshoeing, and it was really fun! It was a good workout, and with the high altitude (over 7000 ft), I got pretty winded! That afternoon, we went to lunch at the Blue Angel Cafe and then to a local spa for some relaxing treatments. We spent the evening back at our cabin eating dinner, watching movies, playing games, and giving Sonia fun presents. I also enjoyed looking at the stars in the outdoor hot tub.

On Sunday, we drove back to San Francisco and I got to stay the night at Sonia & Chris' house in the city. Sonia took me on a walk around their cool Noe neighborhood, once again in 70 deg weather.

It was a great getaway from Wisconsin in February! Click on the photo of me and Sonia to see more pictures from the weekend!

Obama visits Racine

With the Wisconsin presidental primary scheduled for next Tuesday, all of the candidates are making their way through the state, but only one has stopped in Racine - Barack Obama! I got word on Monday night and got a ticket on the internet. The event was free, but only a limited number of tickets were issued. Tuesday morning, there was an article on the front page of the paper, and by the time one of my friends looked for a ticket at 9am, they were gone. I arrived at 5pm on Wednesday night, and by that point, it was standing room only. That was fine with me since I didn't have to wait outside in the cold very long. The program started about 20 minutes late, but Obama spoke for about 40 minutes and then answered questions for about another 20 minutes. I'm not advocating one candidate over another, but it was pretty cool to see Obama in person and hear him speak. Thanks to Kylie for letting me borrow her camera!

Here is a link to today's recap of the event in the Racine Journal Times:

http://www.journaltimes.com/articles/2008/02/14/local_news/doc47b34500c7a72143942116.txt

Racine's only ice skating rink

Last weekend marked the opening of Racine's only ice skating rink as we cleared the snow away on the river in the backyard to expose a perfect ice sheet. This is a significant difference between Racine and the Twin Cities where every park has an ice rink. Weather conditions only make this possible for a few weeks a year, so we enjoy it while we can. We had the gang over to experience what Minnesotans do fer fun ya know. Click on the picture to link to the full album.

Blackhawks Down

The Wild were in Chicago on Friday to play the Blackhawks. Laura and I had never been to the United Center, so we thought it was a good excuse for a trip to the windy city. The Wild won 5-2!