Lost Dog

December 12
It was 7°
2pm I get a phone call at work from a frantic Maddie.  She's just arrived home from New York and Millie is not in the house.  She did not know til later that Joe had been home at 11am.  He was in and out of the house a few times to carry things into the garage, tidying up from a weekend of surprise construction...a beautiful baking cupboard as a Christmas gift for Maddie. Millie slipped out on one of his trips to the garage.
An hour later the three of us, Maddie, Joe and I  are combing the streets by foot and car.  The Richfield City has been called.  I ask a co-worker to scan the social media. The storefronts- and apartments on Lyndale have been visited.  It's really cold.  Millie is no where in site.  Maddie posts on to Richfield Community Facebook page.  Dog Lost please call.

About 10 minutes later she got the call. Millie was at our next door neighbors house. I'm sure they had tried calling but her phone was on airplane mode.
We figure Millie had been out on the streets for at least 2+ hours.  She left Aldrich and 75th crossed over Lyndale, Nicollet and Portland!  She has never been walked to our house, but brought in the car many times.
This is simply amazing to me.  Thank you to whoever found her, and thank you to our neighbors for keeping Millie warm and safe.  We all feel very lucky and blessed. Merry Christmas.

Joe and Maddie and Millie - Home again safe and sound. 

Last night it snowed over 5 inches.  The snow fell overnight and into morning hours lingering as the day went on. I thought it might be a good time to get a picture of Henry and his new hat.  I tried in the morning and got this shot...

At Christian Park later.

Mom with Camera

The best part of photography is photographing my family.  

After all that is how the love started in the first place.  

On October 16 - I had a very tall order to fill....Maddie and Joe's "official engagement photos"

The perfect Minnesota autumn day.  I picked one of my favorite schoolhouses in Scandia, MN

I'm actually sneaking these few onto my blog...she'll never know.

And there is Carver County

September 4, 2016

I looked right under my nose...Carver county has at least two really neat brick one room school houses still with us today.  When you develop a habit-there is a calling that happens every weekend:  WE MUST GO FIND A SCHOOL HOUSE....

44.769407,-93.687738  Right next to the Dahlgreen golf club shooting range, Carver County.  It was a school that appeared taken care of but not lived in.

 School Number 22   44.689129,-93.705793  On Homestead Road.

I read about this area a couple years ago...finally made it here...

https://www.minnpost.com/stroll/2013/11/exploring-carver-county-ghost-town-san-francisco-minn

South of this ghost town is Belle Plaine.  Driving through the town I recognized a one room school now being lived in.  St. John's Parochial.  The Lutheran St. John's Church was kit·ty–cor·ner \ˈki-tē-ˌkȯr-nər, ˈka-tē-, ˈka-tə-\\-nərd\ from this beautiful school.  

Well it happened...Google Maps failed me

I have had this school pinned on my Pinterest board for 3 years.

On Sunday Tim and I decided to fly to Decorah Iowa.  I've never been there. There  is a nice little airport with a courtesy car and an interesting downtown to check out. I decided on a couple of school houses to find. The oldest in the State, Locust School and the one above.

Can you see the star and the school below it?  This find was sure to be the easiest yet.

But there we were on Madison Rd with a road map, a Google Map and THAT SCHOOL

was NOT there!!!  How old is this map from Google?  Satellite maps don't really show topography, but right along the south side of this road it was hilly and the foliage was quite over grown.  So I asked Tim to park and let me go look down into the ravine to make sure we were not just missing it.  So he pulled over in the driveway to the DeNovo Barn and I ran across the road to look.

Damn it! NO SCHOOL.
Monday afternoon I just couldn't let it go...I was thinking I wonder if it burned down. I think I'll Google Decorah school Madison Rd   The third link down caught my eye...something about an Amish Barn and a School Wedding Venue.  So I went to the website: www.denovobarn.com/

Here is what I saw:

OMG! THERE IT IS!!!

While I ran across the road to look down the hill, Tim waited in the driveway to where the school is.

If I remember correctly there was a slight incline so even if he did look over his right shoulder while waiting he probably wouldn't have been able to see it.

Two schools I DID find:

Norwegian Lutheran Parochial School  1879

Locust School 

Used from 1854-1960

We're pretty sure that Tim worked with Gary Graves at DHL!

We loved Decorah and will fly back some day to visit. 

One last picture to show how I can find schools from the air.

and on Google maps  44.064109, -92.368595