Oktoberfest Parade

The Oktoberfest parade is a 3 hour plus parade. Rain or shine everyone has a good time eating brats, drinking beverages, and watching the parade go down the street. My favorite game during the parade is horse hopscotch. Here is how you play. You pay five bucks and you get to draw a 3ft X 3ft square on the ground in chalk. You win if a horse poops in your square. Awesome!

It was a really nice day so we had to put some sun block on Isaac. He is at the stage were he wants to do everything himself. So we gave him the sunblock (that looks like a gluestick) and let him give it a whirl. Here he is putting it where it is supposed to go.

Here he is putting it in his hair. Not really needed there but probably can't hurt.

On the lips, ok. Again, not gonna hurt anything.

Yummy, sunblock gluestick. I am pretty sure I have never heard of someone burning there teeth, but Isaac does not want to take any chances.

Eyeball, really?! This is wear we had to take the sunblock away before he hurt himself.

As the bands were going by Isaac started marching and clapping to the music. He started his own little parade. I think if he would have had a band leader's stick people would have started following him.

Hands behind the back marching. Getting fancy now!

Keeping an eye on the parade to make sure he doesn't miss anything.

The Onalaska Band. My old high school. Every year a group of my friends "steal" instruments and play their old parts of the songs. It started out as a drunk thing to do but it has become such a tradition that now the guys stay relatively sober until they have participated in the cadence.

The band expects it and gladly relinquishes their instruments for a time.

You can see the their backs. They are all drummers. Which means they can make a lot of noise.

One thing to note. As they get ever further away from high school their memory and playing gets worse. It usually takes them a few tries to get it going. The problem is the rest of the band cues off the percussion section, so this can lead to some pretty entertaining sounds.

Heather, Becky and Korrin having a blast.

No idea what they are doing? But apparently they are having a good time doing it.

Everyone just chillin and enjoying their beverages.

Mike and I

Korrin and Heather

First Night of Oktoberfest

Me, Korrin, and Mike having our first beer.

Group photo down at the Fest grounds.

Mike, Alicia, and her sister, Melinda.

Zach (Melinda's husband), me, and Mike a few beers later.

Fishing Trip

Every year a group of guys from Heather's side of the family go up north fishing for a weekend. Some years, the fishing is bad. Those are the years where there is a lot of drinking and card playing. Some years, the fishing is great. This was one of those years.

Brian, Erik, and I found a 2ft X 2ft area next to a dock that if we hit it with a minnow, we caught a 9-12 inch crappie every time. For those of you who don't know, this is very big for a crappie. We did this until we ran out of minnows.

Erik with two of the beauties we caught.

Here are some of the crappies we caught.

A picture of the lake on the morning we left. Still as glass. We wish we could have stayed a couple of more days.

Looks like a postcard advertising the Northwoods.

The fellas. Erik, me, Ronnie, Brian, and Bob.

This picture is to show that Gary was there also.

Total Fish caught that weekend by me: 4 Walleye ~ 17in, 3 Walleye <15in, 1 Small Mouth Bass ~ 16in, 1 Bullhead, 5 Large Mouth Bass ~ 12in, 5 Crappie 8-11in, 1 Northern Pike at 22.75in and 3 < 16in, 15-20 Rock Bass, 5 Bluegill, 12 Perch 9-12in and 24 Perch <9 in. By far the most fish I have ever caught in two days of fishing. We had a blast. I only wish every fishing trip was like this.

Twins

Our friend's Mike and Alicia bought Isaac a Minnesota Twins outfit before he was born. At almost two, he is now able to fit into it.

Hey, even baseball players need to brush their teeth. Not the best picture of me.

Monster Vegtables

Isaac with one of the monster zucchini's from our garden. It is almost as big as he is. He picked the vegetable himself and grunted the entire time he carried it to the house.

Grunting again as he is trying to lift it.

All this hard work has made me hunger. I think I will try some of this zucchini.

Playtime at a Badger Football Game

Grandpa, Isaac, and Bucky Badger

I am almost as tall as Bucky, ok, not quite.

I swear to God that he is not peeing on the wall but it sure looks like it from this picture.

Making faces in the door window at Grandpa.

Ok, not something you see everyday. A boy and his Grandpa doing the bear crawl at a Badger game.

A bird's eye view of the hallway.

Isaac giving himself knuckle bumps.

Wearing sunglasses and eating a plastic slinky. Enough said.

Putting on the sunglasses and saying "Cheese" for the camera.

"Cheese" again but without the glasses.

Our little Pumpkin

Here is our pumpkin.

We had a little pre-Halloween fashion show to see what costumes would fit Isaac and which one he liked best. I was bouncing him up and down and he was giggling up a storm.

Man, the power of a child's smile. Even looking back at these pictures, I can't help but have a huge grin on my face.

Sometimes I don't think kids can get any more cute, then you put them in costumes and it raises it to a whole new level.

Isaac loved his cow costume. When you pushed on the cow face it mooed.

He stood there for about five minutes pushing the cow face. This alone tells you how much he liked it. Standing still for five minutes for Isaac is equivalent to the average adults standing still for an hour.