July Birthdays at Fish Lake

July is the biggest birthday month in the Lundgren family—I count eight July birthdays including cousins, in-laws, etc. We’ve been celebrating at beaches the last few years, and after our recent trip to Fish Lake Deborah suggested we celebrate there.

March and December REPRESENT!

Jennifer and Brian (no July birthdays in this picture either).

Scott (July 17), Jim, and Bryan (July 25). Jim is one of the few guys who can pull off the plaid-on-plaid look.

A bunch of the younger cousins—Laura, Damon, Colin, Justin, Karl, and Wyatt.

Jason, Angie (July 2), Justin, Colin, and Adam.

Getting decent photos today was tough…

…so tough that our pictures of Karen and Carolyn (July 23), Mike (July 17), and Laurie (July 27) didn’t turn out. Sorry.

Dan and Amanda brought their two Chihuahuas Paco and Baby. Adam homed in on them right away.

After a great lunch, the kids (and a few adults) went swimming in beautiful Fish Lake. Karl and Colin played catch in the water most of the afternoon.

Karl finds a way of making even run-of-the-mill catches acrobatic.

Deborah is under the impression that Fish Lake is clothing-optional. I’m not going to tell her otherwise.

Caturday, July 21, 2012

Matt says Saturdays are the only days I can post pictures of Pippa without being a weirdo because every Saturday is really "Caturday." Here's my first installment! The other day, Pippa decided to sleep on Penelope's bed because it was in the sun. Laura thought it was cute too, and started playing with her.


Uh oh! Penelope came back and didn't quite know what to do. She tried to lay down behind Pippa but Pippa just ran away. The end.


Stay tuned for my weekly installments of Caturday. There are always kitty antics going on around here, so the stories are endless!

Farewell Florida Meissners

Nathan has become quite a “Star Wars” fan in the last few months and Karl was an enthusiastic dueling opponent.


Tuesday was departure day for Steve, Megan, Nathan, and Kathryn. The kids took one last long look at Opa’s aquarium.


The former Montgomerian is wearing a Twins shirt, and the Minnesotan is wearing a Biscuits shirt. This must be some kind of North/South cultural exchange.


One last family snapshot before heading out.


It was fun while they were here, but the visit was just too short. At least they’ll be back in the wintertime:
_{Deborah insisted I post these.}

Fish Lake

Last Sunday morning we woke up early (well, early for me) and went with Steve and Megan for the long-anticipated visit to Fish Lake. When they first met, Megan told Steve that she really loved the beach. Steve said he did too, and told her all about this great beach back in Minnesota called Fish Lake…not quite the miles of white sands familiar to Megan.



As we got out of the car, Deborah said to me “They’ve cleaned this place up!” and Megan even agreed that it wasn’t as depressing as she anticipated.


One of the highlights was when Karl and Nathan found a dead fish washed up on the shore. They gave it a proper burial.


We moved over to the playground, but we didn’t stay too long—another difference between the beaches of Florida and Minnesota: deer flies.


Later that afternoon, Jeff, Tanya, Aly, and Emily joined us at my mom and dad’s for a little lunch and some swimming. My Aunt Barb, Uncle Gord, and cousin Kris and her kids Xavier and Amelia came as well. We had plenty of lazy time in the back yard before going to the pool.


The “anti-gravity” chairs were a hit with the kids (and I look pretty comfy there too).


Karl with his cousin Nathan, and their second-cousin Xavier.

Pool Party at the Schneiders’

Megan, Nathan, and Kathryn arrived on Thursday evening and the kids were able to get together a little bit on Friday. But the main event was on Saturday when we all went down to Jeff and Tanya’s to enjoy the pool and Jeff’s grilling.



Oma and Opa took all four kids giving Steve, Megan, Deborah, and me enough time to sneak in a movie before the party. Steve and I watched “The Amazing Spider-Man” while Deborah and Megan enjoyed “Magic Mike.” They were smiling about it for days.


(They had a mini Channing Tatumfilm festival—the following night we watched “21 Jump Street” and Deborah’s crush got the better of us and we watch “The Vow” a few nights ago.)



The pool gave way to the Slip ’n Slide.


Laura was a little under the weather but she was a trooper with her crazy cousins.


After eating some tasty grilled kabobs and corn on the cob, we wrapped up the evening with some group pictures. Laura was really droopy by this time. Getting these six kids to all smile at the same time proved quite challenging.


Karl and Nathan picked up where they left off.

Fourth of July

We had a pretty lazy Fourth of July this year, but we were gearing up for a busy weekend to follow. Steve, Megan, Nathan, and Kathryn were coming for a quick visit and we were planning on packing in a lot of time with the Florida cousins.

Steve arrived the previous Saturday, but he and my dad promptly headed up to Grand Marais for a few days of fishing.

On the Fourth of July, Deborah, the kids, and I invited ourselves over to my mom and dad’s to watch the Twins game and to wait for Dad and Steve to get back home. Then it was off to North Branch for some fireworks.

Sole Survivor

Laura was enrolled in Project SEEK again this summer in the acting class “Shakespeare’s Kids.” The culmination of the class was the performance of the play “Sole Survivor” six times! We saw one performance on June 28. It was a cute play with a cliff-hanger ending involving a group of mystery-solving Girl Scouts whose plane crashes on an Atlantic island. They encounter pirates, ghosts, a shadowy villain, and a TV reality show.

Laura played Julianne Thisby, a Girl Scout who had her nose buried in her iPhone most of the time—a character I could relate to (well, not the Girl Scout part…). She helped her friends out of a few jams by searching on the web for trivia and sending text messages and emails. Obviously she was my kind of heroine.



Saving the day with a phone call.


Saving the day by reading a Wikipedia article. I can relate. I don’t know how many times everyone has thanked me for reading a Wikipedia article aloud to enlighten them.


The kids all had short biographies in the playbill. Laura’s was pretty funny:

Laura Meissner—plays Julianne Thisby, Girl Scout

She is the daughter of Matt and Deborah Meissner and attends Jacobson Elementary School in Rush City. She wanted to take this class because she loves to act. Her past acting experiences include her Fifth grade play, music programs, and two years in the “Sing it, Act it, Shake it!” class. She says she likes EVERYTHING about this class and it is really fun! Some of her other hobbies are reading, reading, and more reading, and drawing cat faces. When she grows up she wants to be a cake maker who can make cakes in cool shapes.

I think six performances wore Laura out: