goodbye jack, winnie's 1st birthday, baseball tryouts

 last monday was back to school for the kids and back to work, laundry, winnie walks, and grocery shopping for me. oh and a little frivolous shopping. i know it's not technically fall yet, but i couldn't resist this twinkle light pumpkin from michael's. 

 thatcher was in toronto for the next few days for a conference. in the evening, the kids and i went over to see jack on his last night in town before he leaves for college in italy (!!). how amazing, right? it took a lot of effort for him to make this happen and we are all so excited for him.

tuesday was winnie's 1st birthday! i took her to doggy daycare because we had a painter at the house from 9am-4:30pm repairing the ceiling damage in the living room from the roofers earlier in the summer. thankfully this was not our expense and the ceiling is fixed again. we had a little birthday celebration when winnie got back home.

we bought her some treats including a flavored food topper, a couple new toys, and some peanut butter doggy whipped cream for dessert. ha! :) 

ashford had tryouts for spring baseball in the evening (yes, in september). he is trying out for the travel league. azalea and i dropped him off then she and i went to dinner. she had been begging me to take her to an 'olive garden' for probably two years, so that's where we went. she was very happy with her never-ending pasta bowl. we picked up ashford after his tryout and got him some dinner too. he wasn't feeling very positive about his performance, but he's hard on himself.

wednesday i went to the gym and ran some errands and had my weekly staff meeting call. i got these new clogs on monday as well. 

i'm trying to look young and hip with the socks - ha!

thatcher sent this picture of him in front of his 4th great lake (lake ontario) this year due to work travel. pretty impressive!

ashford had piano on zoom in the evening. we got a little thunderstorm in the evening and lots of rain, which was much needed. 

thursday was normal weekday activities for the kids and me. thatcher was supposed to get back from his trip in the afternoon, but his flight got delayed so it ended up being more like dinner time. but we got to walk winnie together in the evening. he was away for a week total, so he was happy to be back. he couldn't believe the fall-like weather here. 

friday it rained all day, so much that i didn't take winnie on a daytime walk. in the morning, i met my friend carolina for coffee at a new spot in st. paul called 'bewick'. it was nice to catch up after not seeing her all summer. azalea had a theater meeting after school for the fall blackbox performance - clue! i never made it to the grocery store, so we decided to order 'hello pizza' for dinner. hello not having to cook :) thatcher and i were able to take winnie on a walk after dinner because the rain stopped. it felt like a very fall night. 

saturday morning we hung out at home and i took winnie for a walk. thatcher left to volunteer at the 'trucksploration' event for community ed. in the afternoon i took ashford to his second round of travel ball tryouts. parents were not allowed to stay, but when i picked him up later, he said he felt like he did better than the first round. he will hear about team placement by early october. we made curry for dinner and apple crisp for dessert. my favorite! 

sunday morning thatcher made us breakfast burritos. in the late morning my mom picked up azalea and me to drive down to vasa to go to the museum again. this is where we had our family reunion in august and since azalea didn't attend, she thought the museum sounded cool. we stopped for lunch in red wing at 'liberty's' which is a place we used to go to 20+ years ago when my parents had their boat at a marina down there. it was fun to go back. we were the only people at the museum. i hope they can keep it going because it has a lot of really cool history. i didn't take any pictures this time. on the way home we drove past the farm property where my mom's grandparents lived until the 1960's. we also stopped at 'the dairy inn' in cannon falls for hot fudge sundaes. yum! thatcher, ashford, and winnie mostly hung out at home. we scrounged up dinner with what we already had and thatcher and i took winnie for a walk.

now it's a holiday monday (yom kippur) and the kids have no school. ashford has an orthodontist appointment and azalea has her first behind the wheel lesson.