Andy and Sara

Saturday August 29, 2015 is a big day for the Baird family.  We welcome little miss Sara into our humble family.  She is a great addition to our family and compliments Andy perfectly.  I thought a few pictures of them growing up was in order for my blog.

Yep, he was a cute little guy at 3

Sliding with dad.  Wow look at those bangs Tim is sporting : )

 Andy and I, Christmas of 1986  Wow look at those bangs I'm sporting!

The wide world of Legos  8 years old

 Who doesn't love the Minnesota Twins and Kirby Puckett?!

 Andy and Scratch (my mom's dog)

Chili bowl haircut...in the Cayman Islands  1995

High School at Richfield High School

 Life guarding at the Richfield Pool

Andy and his CRX he is 19

Sara and her mom

 Sara and her dad

So cute!!! Same smile today.

 This is such a cute picture of Sara and her brother Chris

Ski Team RHS

 2003 Graduate RHS

Such a cute blonde!

6 years ago

Charlie as a puppy!

 Last January

What's on the Menu?

One of the neatest things we did when we were on the north shore last week, was visit the Cross River Heritage Center.  This is a museum of the lodges and resorts that speckled the north shore for decades. Looking through the pictures and artifacts of the old north shore was fun.  We had Henry in arms so I wished I could spend more time - transporting myself to a forgotten time on Highway 61.
I did take a few pictures on our visit:

I would like the Fresh Lake Superior filet of bluefin - No bones...

I really want wall-eyed pike BUT I will try this.  

That New Tamron Lens

Well as I sit sipping on my gin and tonic, I think of how I should really add a piece to my blog about my new lenses that I bought this summer.  A new lens is a big deal to a photographer and I am no exception.  After all I will be making payments on both of my new lens purchases I made this summer ; (

The Tamron 70-300 f4 is a nice crisp lens.  I like it.  Not love.  And it is a better telephoto lens than I had.  Here are a few images I took at Osh Kosh using this lens.

 This photo has been zoomed in with lightroom, but nevertheless still pretty crisp.

 The Airbus 350 was such a delight to watch perform at Osh Kosh....this is a non-edited fly over shot.

Non-edited shots of T-6 Texans.  I have the wrong shutter speed!  Ugh...when will I get that right?
If I slow down my shutter the whirl of the propellers will look awesome.

My new canon 100mm macro lense is to dye for.  I just need to read up on macro photograpy and practice.

Lamar Hunt

You know you have a problem when your husband says: "let's have a picnic on the St. Croix river today" and I immediately pull up my Google map to see what school house I can find in the area.

This is my Google school house map.  The stars indicate located one room school still standing.  So as you can see, the St. Croix river does not have a whole lot of stars.  20 minutes later, Tim was napping and I was in serious google map tracking mode.  Waalaa!  I know the Lamar school!
I've seen this website in the past and finally plan a trip to go see the hard work restoration project.
Read about the Lamar community and school on their website here

 What a beautiful pristine-white two room school house!

 I just love the windows.  I'm sure the inside of this school invites the sunshine and outdoors right in.

This is the back of the school.  Two sets of windows for the two classrooms.

And of course Henry was there.  I'm thinking of naming him the "premiere one-room school pup"

or something like that.  He is usually with us on these travels and I have many pictures to prove it.

After the Lamar school we traveled east on 140th to 160th... and south on to Hwy 8.
On Hwy 8 we headed west when out of the blue appeared Deer Lake School.

 Now very overgrown and forgotten Deer Lake School sits among spiny shrubs and highway thwart 

where once children played hopscotch and kickball.

Peeking through the door window we both spotted a framed picture still on the landing.  We couldn't quite tell what the picture was, but it certainly indicated that someone just locked the door on their way out...thinking they would be back.  

#campgramsey

What's more fun than visiting a cemetery, seeing the first house built in Minnesota, learning about cellar doors & walking a railroad rail?  Maybe it's placing a penny on the train track!

Recovering the pennies!