"My Crazy Kids"

A Geocaching Sunday The kids and I standing with our third geocache of the morning at the Three Birches Boat Landing in the Chippewa National Forest on Lake Winnie. By Allan Olson Another weekend has come and gone in the blink of an eye. So has another chance to sleep until noon – not that there’s much chance of that happening with four kids in the house. My wife and daughters headed to International Falls on Saturday for a baby shower. The girls had been talking about this event all week, and they were excited to go. Their mom, on the other hand, wasn’t quite as excited to be traveling with them. The boys hung out with me at the Fall Festival in Cass Lake for several hours on Saturday, and once we were done with that we headed out in search of a geocache north of Bena along Lake Winnie that had been recently published. We got to the location and we were working against the clock of diminishing daylight, and it was winning. This was supposed to be a th...

A busy weekend By Allan Olson Last weekend flew by, even though it was a four-day break from routine for some people, including my children. Since we already had four kids at our house, we decided adding a couple more wouldn’t matter. Two of my oldest brother’s kids ended up spending the entire four days at our place while their parents worked at the store. Since the youngest is older than Nikolai, it wasn’t a big deal – it was play time. The kids already had hours of play time together before I even got home on Thursday, and of course, there was chaos in their wake. The visitors walked into an ambush, being greeted by four kids armed with rubber bands when they came in the door. From what I was told, my brother and the kids quickly joined in the foray and returned fire. Sounds like fun! That evening we all enjoyed a light meal, followed by a personal-sized pie, your choice of pumpkin or banana cream. On Friday, we attended the grand opening of the store. I did...

Weekend with the kids   Photo cut: Since the cache was nowhere to be found, the kids decided to have some fun and climb all over this huge root cluster. They tore chunks out of it, kicked it and just had general destruction fun. I figured it was better they did it out here than in my house, so I let them have at it.  By Allan Olson I was left to my own defenses for four whole days this past weekend. If a kid asked a question, there was no, “Go ask your mom.” I couldn’t pass the buck. I was even in charge of meals. I picked up the kids from school on Thursday, and we arrive at home to an empty house – well, mostly empty. Bob (the dog) was still there to greet us. My wife had absconded for the remainder of the week with my sister-in-law for their annual migration to a friend’s home in the large urban area to the south. That evening, the kids played outside on their bikes and I sat outside and watched them. I put some air in their bike tires (abo...

 A Weekend Away  Photo: Abigail just had to have some time cuddling with her little cousin while we were visiting the relatives this weekend. By Allan Olson The first week of October is already over, and pretty soon... well, I don’t need to spell out what is going be happening soon. The past weekend, like most, just flew by. We had intended to leave home by 7 a.m. on Saturday morning to head north for the weekend, but that plan fell apart when we didn’t even wake up until 6:45 a.m. We intentionally didn’t set the alarm, but figured either the kids would wake us up or one of us would wake up in plenty of time – guess we were wrong. We finally left shortly after 8 a.m., with weekend plans including a birthday party and a baptism in the two days we would be gone, and sighting in my rifle and hopefully getting a little time to scope out some of the hunting area. I dropped all but Nikolai off at my in-laws, where the birthday party for my nephew was that aftern...

A Fall Weekend By Allan Olson Well, it was most definitely a dreary and largely unadventurous weekend. With no geocaching, we barely left home at all. On Saturday it rained, and it rained, and then it rained some more. Now, I’m not complaining about the rain, because we really needed it, but let me say that the timing (as usual) could have been better. It rained all day long, making conditions unfavorable for outdoor recreation. We went to town in the afternoon and got a few staples for the coming week’s meals, and then returned to the solitude of our remote location as soon as we could. It was a very boring but relaxing day. That evening some of us dined on some very fresh pumpkin pie to close the day. On Sunday, I started the day off by putting off feeding the kids, and then when they got busy, I fed myself and quickly went back to finish my book. I know – mean – but it was nice and relaxing. Soon the kids started bugging me, and I had to feed them or face the c...