September 2011

Seldom has September been so full and so varied a month in Rudolph. It was wonderful starting off the month with a Labor Day weekend with John and Evie. The weather was warm and rainy, but Mark and John managed to do all the rust repair and painting on the pathfinder…probably the last of these fix up efforts as she is getting pretty old. It was great to be able to grill out and enjoy the newlyweds in lush summer aspect of Rudolph. The following Friday, Mark and Hilde drove down to Palatine for their first visit since the transformation of the condo. John’s work on the flooring and the paint job of John and Evie combine for a great improvement in their home. The weather was perfect the next day as all four headed to the Hamfest in Bellvadere. Mark and John found some good buys in gear, followed by a fine breakfast at the Steam House Restaurant.

This has been one of the craziest month’s for Mark’s schedule ever. As he struggled to complete work on the hen house, the two cases in MN kept morphing and changing, with lots of phone calls and conferences. By the very end of the month, it looked like all of October would be spent in Minnesota. The drive over to Mark’s depositions in Buffalo MN was beautiful with colors of trees, shrubs and purple asters, but Mark spent much of the time on the phone struggling to set up last minute farm visits. Then during the depos, the decision was made to delay the one trial, much to the relief of Hilde, who really didn’t want to spend October in Marshall.

Fall harvest and meetings kept Hilde super-busy in September. The magnificent tomatoes meant lots of juicing, cooking and canning, so the tomato sauce, ketsup and tomato jam are all stocked up for the year. Tomato soup simmering on the stove frequently made a wonderful aroma in the house and many containers have been frozen. Hilde had several extra meetings, including a 4 hour meeting with DNR specialists in floodplain regulation (which wasn’t dull, but intense!) the land conservation fall tour, budget meetings and the finalization of the county redistricting plan. She attended the Wisconsin Counties Association convention, which was fairly intense this year also, coming right before the run to MN.

September was also a month of firsts for our Rhiannon. She has begun to take two or three steps on her own, but then goes to her knees for speed. And just at the end of the month, the first of six imminent teeth popped out. John had a work trip out to VA, so he and Evie were able to visit Jim and Kayme, gaining new appreciation for the challenges of DC traffic and child-rearing in an apartment, too! It was good for the brothers to get together.

In addition to John and Evie’s visit, Terri stopped in one day and Donna another---getting to feed family and friends is always a joy. All month, as the weather cooled and the summer ended, the landscape was beautiful. Early in the month there were several misty mornings and some bedewed spiderwebs just beautiful in the roadsides. The fall bounty from the garden made for daily tasty and attractive meals—God has been very good!