Celebrating with Family


Celebrating with Family
By Allan Olson
On the road again, that seems to always be my motto – often by my own choosing since I have a hard time sitting still, but the first road trip of the weekend was a trek north to my parents for Christmas.
My wife and I discussed a time to leave on Christmas Day and decided between 6 and 6:30 a.m. – I informed her I was leaving my alarm
Abigail and me getting ready to ride.
set for 6 a.m. since that’s what it’s at all the time. Of course the alarm wasn’t needed as we woke up shortly after 5:30 a.m. We started packing things up and getting the vehicle ready along with the children and finally made it on the road about 6:50 a.m. – a little later than planned but we still had several hours before we were expected. We arrived in Baudette about 8:30 a.m. and went to visit with her mom before heading a little further west to my folks – who already had a house full of guests. It took a few trips into the house before we had the vehicle unloaded, winter clothes, pies, gifts, overnight clothes and all the misc that goes with a trip.
We visited a little bit, we opened gifts and we dined on a good meal, but I was getting antsy – I thought about heading to the state park to get the geocaches but didn’t think anyone would’ve went with and I really had them on the next day’s schedule – along with several more. My brother suggested a snowmobile ride over to our other hunting grounds and I thought that was a perfect cure to my restless bones.
A short time later – well probably about 90 minutes later after the Christmas stockings, getting outdoor clothing ready we finally took off on the sleds – it was a perfect above zero somewhere in the teens and the wind wasn’t blowing, what else could we ask for? We were cruising along at a top speed of around 40 mph – probably putting to some at that speed but I was comfortable with it. As we were cruising a field almost to the hunting ground when my brother who was in the lead hit a drainage ditch – that neither of us realized was there and he came to an abrupt stop and went over his snowmobile into the ditch. He rolled up flashed me a thumbs up sign that he was okay – thankfully his helmet protected his noggin from getting hurt and aside from some sore muscles he was fine. We called my younger brother and along with our dad they helped get the sled out of the ditch. A quick test of the machine proved that it too was good for driving – just cracked the hood a little bit, so we continued on our ride. We drove around our field and by some of our stands – looking for lots of deer activity sign – but saw nothing fresh and not a lot of old trails either – hopefully this will change by next November.
Once we got back to my folks I waited a few minutes for Abigail to get the rest of her winter gear on and I cruised around the fields with her for the next 15-20 minutes, before heading back up the house to give Nikolai a turn. I picked him up got into the field and then let him drive while I sat in the back, letting him practice and coached him a little as needed.
That evening – some of the family played spoons and a dice game and during the final game of the evening Marcus was complaining about his thumb hurting. Apparently while playing earlier in the day, he fell backwards and landed on his thumb and it was all swollen. We decided to just leave it for the evening and see if the swelling went down by morning – it didn’t. So instead of my geocaching plans for the day we headed home to get him and his thumb to the doctor. It was determined he likely has a small fracture and he will need to return later for another visit after the swelling goes down – likely for a cast. Of course Alivia was excited that finally someone else in the family gets a cast as she’s already had two.
On Sunday the family – except Nikolai who went to his cousins over the weekend, went on a geocaching outing. We headed to LaSalle Recreation area south of Shevlin and north of Itasca and eventually made our way south of Park Rapids and west of Sebeka hitting the backroads and ultimately finding 21 caches for the day. My goal was to get into Wadena and hit a bunch in that area but the daylight diminished too fast and we headed back home in the dark.
I still have hopes of getting three state park caches this week along with a bunch in the Warroad and Roseau area but I still haven’t figured out all the logistics of this trip as of yet, as there are several scenarios that could interfere with these plans. I know at least a short trip somewhere will be planned as I’m currently 17 short of last year’s totals and I only have three days left to carry out this mission.
Happy New Year!
Please remember to watch out for the buses that are carrying our most precious cargo. Also snap a photo or two to preserve a lifetime of memories. Thanks for reading, and have a great week! Feel free to drop me a line at cltimes1@arvig.net or stop by the office for a visit.


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