MN Zoo 2

My friend Ashley and I took the kids to the MN Zoo after work on Friday. Despite a few tantrums from little miss 4-year old, we had a great time. It was not very busy at all, so we were able to spend a lot of time with the new Grizzly Bears! Apparently they like to play each day around the time that we were there. Check out the photos below! (For some reason I was not able to get my text properly added in with those pictures below without it trying to act as a link to something, hence the dual post for one event - grr. This blogging stuff takes some getting used to!) Anyway, it was really cool to be so close to a bear. He was pressed up against the glass checking US out! Ashley also bought some dippin' dots to share. Jack wasn't so sure about them at first, but after seeing his big sister gobble it all up, he joined in the fun too.

Happy Birthday today to Gavin Wulf!! We hope you have a great time at your party and are sorry we couldn't be there to celebrate with you. I can't believe you are already turning 2?!?! You're getting so big! Miss you, little guy!

love, Jill

Friday afternoon at the MN Zoo

Kate's Birthday

I can hardly believe it, but our little Kate turned 4 yesterday!  Tina Hansch (the exchange student that stayed with my family while I was in high school) and her boyfriend Torsten are in town visiting from Germany.  They just finished up about a month long vacation hiking all over Canada, and are able to spend a few days in MN.  We are so glad they could fit us in!  Grandma and Boppa (Weidemann) were in town to meet up with them on Wednesday, so we all went to Chuck E Cheese's to celebrate Kate's birthday.  We had so much fun.  We haven't had a chance to get the birthday pics onto our computer yet, so I will post those later.  Kate is quite excited to be four.  She was telling me today on the way home from day care that it is still her birthday because she is still four. :)  Such a cutie.  She's growing up way too fast!!

(Bryan Wulf - check that out - - two posts in one night!  Whattya think about THAT?!?!  HA!)

Our Family Vacation - Summer, 2008

Finally - a real family vacation!  Brian, the kids and I all went up north for a long weekend (July 31-August 3).  We had a great time.  It just so happened that these huge 1800's style tall ships were on a 10 city tour while we were going to be in Duluth, so we checked those out while we were on our way up to our cabin on Thursday.  We stayed in a small two bedroom cabin just south of Two Harbors and right on Lake Superior.  It was so much fun - rustic, but not too rustic.  :)  Kate and Jack loved wading in the water and throwing rocks.  Man, is that water COLD!  We had a cute little fire ring outside and our own private little beach.  It was very nice.  We went into Two Harbors on Friday to check out the train depot and also saw a large ship being loaded with taconite.  We ate supper at The Vanilla Bean Bakery and Cafe.  Delicious food!  On Saturday we went to Split Rock Lighthouse and Gooseberry Falls.  Sunday we had to be out of our cabin by 10am, so we pretty much just packed up and came home after that.  We all had a great time, but it was nice to be back in our own beds - with air conditioning!  

My first Blog post!

Wow - my first Blog post ever.  I'm finally joining the bandwagon and starting a Blog.  Woo!

2008 has proven to be a very busy year for the Surine family.  Let me bring you up to speed, in case you've missed out:

January: Jill's brother Joel got engaged!  He and Ashley Rechtzigel will be married on Oct. 25, 2008.

February: Jack turned 1 and also started walking.

March: Jill attended a scrapbooking retreat weekend with a group of friends AND attended a Bon Jovi/Daughtry concert!  (Good month for Jill!)

April: We travelled to Outing, MN to stay at Julie Maday's (Dad's) cabin.  It snowed almost the entire time and we lost power for a couple of hours, but we still had a great time.

May: Jill's brother Jon got engaged!  He and Christi Dikken will be married on May 9, 2009.  We also travelled to Pierre, SD to stay with Jon and Christi over Memorial Day weekend.  We rented a suburban and went to Wall Drug, Mt. Rushmore, the Needles Highway, and through the Badlands.  We had a great time.  Jill's Mom also retired from teaching and received the Teacher of the Year award.  What a way to go out!  

June: Jill's cousin Missy got married to Jason Ditbenner on June 7th.  Welcome to the Weidemann family, Jason!  The following weekend Jill's friend Krista was married to Shane Peterson.  Both weddings were beautiful.  Kate still talks about the "princesses" in the pretty dresses.  Brian also played in a golf tournament in June through work and had a fun time.

July: We went home to the farm over the 4th of July weekend.  We spent some time out at Dikken's gravel pit where Kate got to go fishing!  We had a blast.  Jack proved that he was quite a man when he touched a fish for the first time (the same weekend as his Uncle Jon also finally braved touching the slippery little creatures! ha ha.  Just teasing, Jon).  Brian and Jon also went golfing at Stoney Creek.  Brian's work, Uline, hit 1 Billion dollars in sales last year, so they had a big shin-dig at the Depot in Minneapolis.  It was a semi formal party so we got all dolled up for the event.  We had a really fun time.  The Green Lake Bible Camp had their annual quilt auction this past weekend.  We were lucky enough to be invited by our friends the Kreies to spend some time with them at the Medayto Lodge.  It was a lot of fun to spend the weekend with them and we can't wait for next year!

I'll do my best to keep this blog updated.  Once I figure out how to post pictures and all that fun stuff, I will add some so you can see how big the kiddos are getting!  Hope everyone is doing well!

love, Jill