Nolan Family

Every year the end of summer is marked with our church's picnic.  Most years the picnic is in September, but this year the picnic was August 20 th .   Dave, Rosi, the Kids, and I headed to McAuliffe Park to join the rest of our church family.   It was a beautiful day and had it not been for the wind that came and went it would have been perfect.   Everyone enjoyed a leisurely lunch of hamburgers, hotdogs, and salads and of course desserts.   Well almost everyone, Ryan was too busy playing to stop and eat.   Since the playground was right next to the picnic area the kids were able to play and have fun, while the adults visited.   Caryn Sparacio had games for the kids to play after lunch.   The group of kids surrounded her and Nic and had a lot of fun.   They worked hard to win the prizes of bubbles, airplanes, and pencils.   Then it was time for the annual softball game.   While the softball group headed off to the field, Dave recruited a group to go Geocaching. The only oth

One of the organizations that I volunteer my time with is Junior Achievement. JA brings business people into the classroom to teach kids for one hour for five to six weeks. The programs teaches kids that staying in school is important and the things they learn in school really does apply to real life! Each year JA does a Brat Fry at Festival Foods. Josh and I have participated for the last 3 years. Josh really enjoys helping out. His favorite part is giving the sodas. This year his job was to hand out the free discount cards. Unfortunately, the rain kept some people away and sales were not as good as we had hope, but in the end JA earned almost $500.

On Wednesday, Dave went back to work. The boys and I enjoyed three more days of vacation. On Wed. we worked on laundry and then decided to go to Chuck E Cheese for lunch. We then ran to the grocery store and Ryan's reading assessment with his new teacher. Mrs. Rien was really nice. Ryan should not have a problem remembering her name as it is said the same way his first name is said, even though it is spelled differently. She wrote on her assessment that Ryan was very communicative. In other words he talks a lot! Thursday we decided to go bowling. We used our first coupons from the Summer Kids Bowl Free Program. Both boys bowled two games. In the end both boys won a game! I also worked on my new quilting project, which is an eagle quilt for Dave. Josh also had his first baseball practice for the Fall Baseball League. Ryan enjoyed playing in the sand. Friday, Dave was home and we had a nice family day together.

On August 13th Dave and Josh participated in the Jerabek Challenge for the 2nd year in a row. This year Brendan Adam joined them. They choose to do the 2 mile walk. This walk is in honor of a fallen marine soldier. Each year 1500 people gather to honor our troops, veterans, and those who have paid the ultimate price with their life. Snider Trucks were there with the new military honor trucks. Josh, Dave, and Brendan cross the finish line!

On August 13th Dave and Josh participated in the Jerabek Challenge for the 2nd year in a row. This year Brendan Adam joined them. They choose to do the 2 mile walk. This walk is in honor of a fallen marine soldier. Each year hundreds of people gather to honor our troops, veterans, and those who have paid the ultimate price with their life. Snider Trucks were their with the new military honor trucks. Josh, Dave, and Brendan cross the finish line!

Days 10, 11, 12 We woke up at 9am on Sunday and realized that we were supposed to be out of the cabin by 10am.   Well that wasn’t going to happen, so we showered and began packing.   By 10:30am the van was loaded and it was time to say goodbye to the family.   Soon we would all head out to our various areas of the country.   Michael, Amber, and RJ are stationed in Virginia.   Alan, Colleen, and Tim live in Oregon.   Andrea and James are in Washington.     Steve and Jan live   in California.   Pat, Jim, and Danette are in Iowa and we live in Wisconsin.   This leaves Charissa and Keith in Montana. Ryan plays in Bigfork. Our van forced us to stop for one last time in Bigfork.   Dave found a geocache and placed our two new travel bugs in it.   His bug wants to see all 50 states and mine wants to visit all of the National Parks.   Hopefully they will have successful journeys and not be stolen from there cache.   We continued our downward descend and moved eastward through the mountains.   A

Day 9 – The Wedding We were slow to arise today as we had really gone to sleep in the early morning.   After we brought ourselves back to conciseness, we went and said hello to Andrea and James who had arrived early in the morning having driven from Oregon overnight.   It brought back memories of when Dave and I would make the overnight trek from Washington to Montana to visit his mom.   Last year we had gone to Oregon for Andrea and James’ Wedding.    We spent the morning visiting until I was asked if I could help with set-up.   I delegated and recruited Colleen and Jim to help me.   Dave and the boys eventually joined us.   We tied purple ribbons around the chairs and decorated the arbor. Then we all enjoyed left-overs from the night before for lunch and got ready for the wedding.   It was nice to have a 30 second commute to the wedding.   James and Andrea wait for the wedding to start. We enjoyed the beautiful wedding.   The wedding was followed by a cocktail hour.   After the co

Day 8 Well as you can imagine we dragged a little this morning getting up.   We really need to work on getting to bed earlier.   A group headed up to Glacier and left our family and Alan and Colleen behind.   Colleen and I headed to Whitefish to head back to the quilt shop that I had found.   We enjoyed the shop without any interruptions.   I purchased to quilt patterns and then we headed back.   We helped out with some errands and then Josh and Ryan played in the hot tub.   RJ joined the boys in the hot tub.   Dave and Alan announced that they were going geocaching.   Josh decided he wanted to go with.   RJ and Ryan continued to play in the hot tub until a thunderstorm started to build up.   Then RJ and Ryan went into the house to watch TV. When Colleen arrived back from visiting her family we learned that there was a ranch just down the road with zebras and camels.   We decided to go check it out.   We all enjoyed our private zoo!   The groom’s cake needed to be picked up so Da