Vintage Noelle!

Every now and then, you snap a picture of your child and happen to capture a moment in their lives that signifies who they are. I happened to take this one the other night at her Christmas concert at Martin Luther and it made me smile. She might only be a mighty 3 years old, but that magical, whimsical persona shines through every now and then like the sun after a long day of rain.

A Fresh December Snow!

I remember as a kid sledding down any hill that we could possibly find on the Antigo Flats. This basically amounted to the drifts that formed as the winds whipped across the winter barren potato fields that surrounded our house. Mark and I ventured with Dad up to Kettlebowl a few times to race our fire red plastic torpedos down the hills of Northwest Antigo. Next to skiing, I remember laughing louder and having more fun burning down those hills than any other time we could spend in winter. Around Madison the topography is much different than Antigo and with that, Jon and I deciced to take advantage of the new snow and let the kids expereince a snippet of that oh so much fun activity. They had a blast and as well it was worth sharing some of that with you on this beautiful day.

8th Wonder of the World!

We woke up this morning and something had attached itself to Noelle's head. NASA is still trying to explain this anomaly with their new radiophotosensitametermagnitron, but have yet to truly understand how so much polarity could exist in such a small body.

They have yet to meet my Noelle :)

Another beautiful day in the works.

Enchanted Forest

Saturday was one of the nicest fall days we have seen this year. Tonight we went up to Fitchburg to enjoy the annual Enchanted Forest pre-Halloween celebration at McGraw park. We got to dress up in our Halloween costumes to show off a bit before the actual day.

James enjoyed dancing around the fire...

Until he decided it was more fun to wear Dad's wig. I made him move away from the flames then because I didn't want the hairspray to catch fire :)

Crazy Summer!

Back on the farm...

I have been on the road a lot over the past few weeks and don't have to travel again for a little while which is great. It's so nice to be back and enjoying life at home. Best part is that the terrorists enjoyed the lazy Sunday afternoon as much as I did.

Noelle and I found this tree right about this time last year. I think I got a picture just like this one back then...although I remember her face not being so dirty. Permanent dirt someone might say :)

James resorted to another form of entertainment that has consumed

a few hours of our time during the summer this year...

Single-handedly trying to pull the willow down in the front yard.

And in our family of course...

Someone else is never far behind :)

Castaway!

Free Hugs Campaign

I had a good friend send this my way and I got a kick out of it so I figured I would put it on the blog. Supposedly, this guy got off a plane one day and noticed everyone getting off had someone there to welcome them home...all except him. He decided to turn it around and started giving "free hugs" away. The music behind the video is awesome as well. Figured I would share on this beautiful day.

Lisboa!

The company I work for is headquartered in Lisbon, Portugal. I had the opportunity to spend about 10 days in Lisbon training and will probably be over there 3-4 times a year. It's an amazing place and I figured I would share some pictures with you from that trip.

This is the entry way to the square where I got attacked by a posse of Mormon missionaries. Elder Sheldon and I got into a religious discussion and well as most of you know I am always up for a good debate.

Saturday afternoon in Lisbon...

80 Degrees and sunny...

Happening past interviews for a modeling contest...

Priceless!

See the car I am standing in front of? Almost got ran over!

To wrap up the evening, I enjoyed a couple of glasses of Tawny Port down on the water by the docks (Docas). I can say after this beautiful day, I will be carrying home a couple bottles every time I get over there. It is awesome stuff.

Two Peas or should I say beans in a Pod!

It seems now every fall we have taken a beautiful Sunday afternoon stroll out into Behnke's field across the road to enjoy what has become sort of a tradition...trying to remember what soybeans taste like.

Of course, it doesn't take James long to recreate his version of "Where the Wild Things Are" and anything along that line his partner in crime tends to follow.

Especially if there is an opportunity to make a really goofy face

:)

Soybeans don't taste so good dad!

Little America

Getting Big!

It's crazy how fast kids grow up. The funny part about it is that you only seem to notice every so often and mostly for me its not a real time event. I see it in a picture. That frozen, historical event makes me notice something that I don't often see in every day life. I compare it to watching a movie to some degree. It's hard enough just trying to keep up viewing 25 frames a second and in doing so that one frame, that one moment in time that has so much depth and purpose flys right on by. I guess that is why I can fill up the flash card so quickly on my new camera. It is fun trying to capture that moment and more often than not, I find myself scrolling through the frames of life hoping I can see something that passed me by.

Probably the same reason I don't mind watching movies I have seen a dozen times. There is always the opportunity to capture that moment that will help you better understand the framers message. I am not sure if God purposly hides moments for us to find or if there are just so many that we just can't comprehend them all. I guess the fun in it all is to spend every beautiful day trying to figure out how.

Hold on, were going for a ride!

I told this story to a couple of you but I have gotten such a kick out of it, I figured I would put it out on the blog.

A while back, I had an opportunity to go pick up the kids early from school. When I got to Woodsholllow, I first stopped in Noelle's room to grab her. The room was empty so I ventured outside to find a dozen kids stripped down to their underwear covered in green paint. Of course, Noelle was in the middle of the green paint. I took one look at her teacher and said, "I am not taking that thing home with me, you gotta clean her up." So I left and went up to James room to get him. When I got up there James and Logan were engaged in a heated game of something and it was clear that my intention of grabbing them early to go do something "fun" was out of the question. James asked me to leave after about 20 minutes because he wanted to go play outside with Logan.

I traipsed back to Noelle's room to see if she was cleaned up. I walked into her room and there was my little girl, dressed to the nines in a sundress and heels and accessorized to the max sporting star sunglasses, a purse, necklace and matching bracelets in place...and green paint all down her neck, arms and legs. She took one look at me and the only thing I gathered from her face was "what took you so long? Its time to move." And so I followed! We made our way to the Tahoe and and from there to Copps as I had intentions of getting some provisions for the evening...boy was I mistaken.

We pulled into the parking lot at Copps and started making our way into the store. From that point on our world transitioned into something of the surreal. As I followed my little girl through the parking lot, so did the rest of the world. Traffic stopped dead in the parking lot and people gawked like Paris Hilton was walking into the grocery store. I honestly could do nothing but follow. We made our way into the store and I felt like I was was following Moses as the Red Sea parted before us. People in the produce aisle dropped their cucumbers and ogled at my pint-sized diva as she made her way past the onions. The woman behind the deli counter took one look at her and almost fell over the counter. Noelle gave her a stiff "what you lookin' at?" response and kept on moving. I looked at the woman and shrugged my shoulders because it was clear this was out of my control. She was on a mission, off to the bakery where a chocolate fix was awaiting...double chocolate chip muffins to be exact. Noelle walked right up to the counter and pointed at her cache. The guy behind the counter smiled like someone who hadn't seen the sun in a hundred days. He reached back behind the rack and pulled out the biggest muffin you'd ever seen...reached down and handed it to her and said "this one is on us."

This blurry, surreal event continued as we made our way through the store and out the front door. People's head spinning, mouths open and me just following like a dog on a leash. We finally got the to Tahoe and she stopped, looked up at me and smiled standing by the door finally acknowledging that it would not open without my help. It was the first time in the past 20 minutes that there was one hint in her mind that she needed my help. I smiled, picked her up and put her in the car seat. "Thanks dad."

As a parent I think you kind of tend to magnify things that your kids do because well, they are your kids. Had I not witnessed this one first hand and lived the event, I would not have believed it, but it's the honest truth. What's scary is that she's not even three yet. On this beautiful day, I am a bit frightened at what may come when 13 rolls along.

Carpapolusa

Jon, Conor and Carson took us carp fishing last weekened and we hit it bigtime. I think we caught 8 or 10 all together and two were almost as big as Noelle. Needless to say we are hooked and will be back for more.

Snippets from Salt Lake...

This pretty much sums up the demeanor of the entire trip. No sleep and a lack of oxygen from laughing...

One of the many shoots we tackled at Alta

Over twenty years in the making...

We have been talking about going out west skiing for over twenty years and the stars finally aligned this weekend to make that happen. Mark and I met up in Minneapolis on Thursday afternoon and caught our flight out to Salt Lake that evening. In classic Hanson fashion, we checked into our hotel and then proceeded to drive around for 15 minutes trying to find a place to grab dinner. Final destination...McDonald's right next door to our hotel...30 yards from the place we parked at the hotel.

The next morning, Mark and I headed up to Snowbird and proceeded to lace up our pink boots and walkers as we meandered down the hill like a couple of old ladies.

To make ourselves feel better about that, we made up the excuse that we were just saving our legs for the arrival of the "electric ape" who was scheduled to meet us at the Snowbird tram at 1:00 PM...his flight arrived 1.5 hours late, but the Pontiac G8 hit mach 2 on the way up the mountain and he was at the Snowbird tram 15 minutes behind schedule.

We got a picture of his better half.

Snowbird pretty much put us to bed that day. We ended the day exhausted, but still managed to go to Park City to grab dinner at a Mexican restaurant. We were up at 3:30 the next morning and the accompanying video captures the air better than words can do it justice.

Saturday's destination was Alta and we threw all caution into the wind. 6 - 8" of new snow and there wasn't a double black we didn't hit including "Alf's High Rustler" which we had to remove our skis to traverse across a rock ledge before we could get down into the top part of the run. From there it was straight down at a 45 for what must have been almost 1/8 mile. Needless to say it was an adrenaline rush like no other.

Speaking of adrenaline rush, how about the vat of chili we tried to consume at lunch.

The trip was amazing...beyond my expectations.

Thanks Hunts and Don. I could not have imagined a better time.