One Little Muggle(s)

Meet Muggles, the newest member of our family!

We brought her home this afternoon, and she has been cautiously exploring ever since. Muggles is about 1-2 years old, has short black fur with one little white spot on her chest. She is a very sweet, affectionate and curious kitty!

Muggles is a name we chose stemming from Harry Potter--Muggle, meaning non-magic person...but we thought it was a very cute name choice for a cat, a little more fitting than Voldemort:)

Muggles can jump very high, she likes to sit in high places, walk the ledges downstairs and the living room, and has even attempted walking the mantle above our fireplace. She is a very long cat, as you can see here. She stretches out over 2 feet! When she walks, she looks very sleek like a panther.

Jenny has been thinking about Toby a little bit, her first kitty, and does still miss and think of him. She had him for about 14 years or so, until a couple of years ago. He had a long fight with diabetes. Toby will always have a place in our hearts. It's a little different having a new cat in the house, but there is always room for more kitty love. We look forward to getting to know our new Muggles!

Look who we met!

Tonight we went to the opening Gopher football game, thanks to Jenny's parents. It was an exciting game the last half. Unfortunately, the Gophers lost by one point in over time. As we were walking into the game, we ran into Vince Vaughn, and shook his hand. How random is that! Apparently, he was born in Minneapols. Bummer we didn't have our camera with!



photo courtesy of movies.about.com

Wedding Bells Ring

Our friends Beth and Jesse got married this past weekend. They couldn't of had a more perfect day for a wedding, especially an outdoor wedding!

Here is Beth with her parents just before going down the aisle.

Here they are, just married!

Beth was such a beautiful bride! Here she is getting ready before the wedding.

The wedding party...everyone looked beautiful!

Chris and I, under the arch.

Ang, Beth, Nicole, and Jenny. We definitely are lucky that we, and our wonderful friend, Jenny T. have remained close since middle school. Jen, we missed you and were thinking of you lots! We know you were so disappointed to have your flight cancelled!

Here are all of the MV alumni at the wedding...Jenny, Angie, Ryan, Jeremy, Beth, Nicole and Joel.

Beth, Nicole and Jenny

We celebrated Chris and Andy's birthdays late Sunday night. Here they are before taking a quick bike ride. Earlier on, we celebrated Jenny's dad's and Chris' birthdays at Jenny's parents' house. We had quite the fun filled weekend!

It Begins!

It's the first day of school! Can you tell how thrilled Chris is to have his picture taken his first day of law school?! I couldn't miss it!


Chris' last day of Best Buy was in July. That day, our employee discount was cut off, and our dryer died! DOH! Here, we finally have our newly installed dryer which works wonderfully!
Here is our friend, Jesse, who we watched run in the Chili Dog race last weekend. It was a wet, cold day, but it was very entertaining to watch so many people run a mile while eating chili dogs! Jesse came in 3rd place! Way to go! Note the chili dog-half in mouth, half in hand!

American Idol!

We had a fantastic night with 40 + relatives at the American Idol concert tonight. Our cousin's husband is Chris Sligh, so we all wore cute little pictures of him...and cheered him on, along with our favorites!
Here we all are...grandpa's relatives.

Kelly and I match, not by any plan....aren't we so cute with our Chris Sligh tags?Here is Chris Sligh all decked out for Minnesota!

Amy, Haley and I.
Jenny, Chris and Amy...

All of the "idols" were so nice and down to earth...it was fun to see Grandma have so much fun too! I think we have a pretty "hip" grandma! And yes, we got to see Sanjaya!

LaKisha was also there...Josh, Amy and I are with her...she sang a beautiful version of Whitney Houston's I Will Always Love You.

Here is Melinda Doolittle..she was so very gracious!

All of the Idols had such wonderful voices and personalities. We were a little bummed that we didn't really get to meet Jordin, Gina, Blake, or Phil, but we had a marvelous time! I also missed Chris, as he was drilling with the marines. I know he would have really enjoyed the concert, and meeting everyone as well. Maybe next year!

Harry Potter Party!

Harry Potter was inevitable on our trip this summer, even if we were away from any towns by a 2 hour boat ride and 1/2 hour switchback gravel bus ride. Here we are at Holden the Fri. night that the books came out. They didn't arrive until the next day on the boat, but we all had fun, kids and adults alike, at the party. Here we are entering the party via flew powder and a fireplace :)

As we entered the party, we were all sorted into "houses". Chris was in Hufflepuff and I was in Ravenclaw, as well as my mom. All of the younger kids got into Gryffindor!
There were all sorts of fantastic treats...
We made our own potions to drink, and many of the kids got their own wands.
After ordering our books, we had to attach our receipts to an owl in the owlery. They came by owl the next day at lunch in the dining hall.
Here we are in our Harry glasses.
As soon as I got the book, I was off, trying to find a quiet place to read. It was hard to put down, and exciting from the beginning!

Chris and I took turns reading the book...in the car, Chris would get to read in the morning, and I in the afternoon...we took turns at our campsites as well. It was a very good read!

Trip to Holden

Here are some of the wild flowers that bloom around Holden. These are Indian Paintbrush. Their colors are amazing.

Here we are enjoying our MRE's at the Fairchild AFB recreation center. They have a wonderful campground and lake area.

We were very excited to visit with Jenny's college friend, Kaia, husband, Will, and meet their new little one, Evie.

Finally, at Holden, we got to do many things, including hiking. Here is our first hike up to "Honeymoon Heights". Holden used to be a copper mining village before being sold to the ELCA. Honeymoon Heights is where the married miners lived, away from the actual village. Here we are sitting on the mine tailings.
Here is our trip back from the Copper Basin. We had to cross snow on the trail...under the snow, you could see and feel the water flowing freely....one slip and we would slide quite a ways down.



Here is the Copper Basin....it was a very steep hike, or as Chris would say, nature walk... :)

Here we are on our way out to our overnight at Hart Lake. Chris, Dad, and Jenny hiked 17 miles round trip in 2 days, making it past Hart Lake out to Lyman Lake. Just before arriving at our overnight destination, we ran into this little fella. We camped quite close to where we saw him...and Jenny hardly slept all night.

Meet Brownie...