Grand kids

All posts tagged Grand kids

Sunday ~ June 09, 2024

Posted by Dave Updegraff on June 9, 2024
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , , .

Thank you for coming to my blog.  I hope you have had a great day.

Monday is this little guy’s first birthday. His Mom and Dad held a pre-birthday celebration and invited all the family to attend. It was a fun event and got to meet lots of people.

Brooks got to do the smash cake routine, but for some reason he wasn’t all that interested in the cake. His actions were pretty funny. If you like you can check out the video at the bottom of the blog. It’s only 4 minutes.

It took some help from Mom and Dad to get into the cake but as you can see below He did a pretty good job of it.

Check out the video below.

Monday ~ May 06, 2024

Posted by Dave Updegraff on May 6, 2024
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , , , , , , , .

Happy Monday!

We had a wonderful weekend.  Our daughter Angie J. Roling graduated with her Doctoral in Nurse Practice.   She has a long history of nursing.  Earning her BSN degree in 2007 and working as a floor nurse, a surgical nurse, and an ER nurse all at Mercy One hospital.

Obviously I am very proud of her.  She accomplished the feat while be a Mother of 4 young children.  Her support group included her Mother, her Mother-in-law and her wonderful husband Dr. Ben Roling.

After all the festivities from her pinning on Friday to her graduation commencement on Saturday, she and Ben had all of the family over for dinner on Saturday evening.

Angie and her Brother Mark, who is the General Manager of a large dealership in Dubuque.  They have supported each other through the good and bad times and I feel very blessed to be their Father and Jeanne as their Mother.

You know I had to show this picture of Brooks.  He is in his Daddies lap.

Since this is a basically photography blog I have to mention that  I purchased a new “bang around camera.  It is the crop sensor Nikon Z50.  I got it  because I got tired of lugging around all my gear every day just to lug it back to the house with nothing on the sensor cards.

The Z50 is tiny compared to my Nikon D5 or for that matter the Nikon P1000.  I take the Z50 and P1000 with me everywhere I go in a small back pack so there is no excuse for not getting “THAT” shot.

I am going to do my best to post on a more frequent basis.

Enjoy your day and be careful.

Friday ~ January 12, 2024

Posted by Dave Updegraff on January 12, 2024
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , , .

Happy Friday to all my Friends who are working.

Yesterday evening our granddaughters, Gabby and Addie came over to do some snow boarding on our hill.   Gabby pm the right and Addie on the left.  We have a great hill behind our home and they wanted to use it.

Before they went snowboarding they decided to clean off the patio and grandpa’s grill.  It’s so fun to watch them do things and the level of energy they have.  I’m not sure I ever had that much energy when I was there age.

Click on any image to reveal a larger and more detailed version.

They did a decent job clearing a path to the grill and to the back door. (spoiler alert) today mid-blizzard the grill looks the same and there is no path to the grill.  🙂

Then it was time to go snowboarding. “you want to come with us Papa?”  I would have loved to but not in the condition I’m in now.  😦

Even Grandma got into the act.  It was a fun evening with the girls and then all to soon they had to go home.

Thanks for stopping by the blog.  Enjoy the rest of your day and be careful.

Monday ~ March 27, 2023

Posted by Dave Updegraff on March 27, 2023
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , .

Happy Monday!

OMG, two days in a row posting on my blog! 🙂  If I have been consistent on anything it is that I’ve been very inconsistent with this blog since my retirement.  Go figure.

Yesterday (Sunday) was Gabriella’s10th birthday.  We were blessed to have Art,Paula, David, and Nick Roling as well as Mark & Julia.  This is (I think) the first time we’ve been able to get a group photo with everyone present.

Angie made a delicious cake for Gabby and guests.  She of course got lots of presents from her Mom and Dad and the two Grand Mothers.  It was a wonderful time to get to visit with everyone and to get caught up on everyone’s life.

It took her three tries to get all the candles out but she made it.  One of her biggest joys is that at 10 years old she can ride in the front seat without any type of booster seat.  This was a very big deal to Gabby.

Prior to dinner and presents it was snowing heavily with big flakes.  This image doesn’t really capture the beauty of the large flakes but you get the idea.  Want to see a larger more detailed image?  Just click on the image and it will happen.

Enjoy your day and be careful.

Monday ~ December 26, 2022

Posted by Dave Updegraff on December 26, 2022
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , , .

Belated Merry Christmas

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas with family and friends.  I feel very blessed that we were able to get together with our family & friends yesterday and enjoy wonderful food and fellowship.  The Grand Children had lots of new toys and the adults enjoyed watching them open presents.

Enjoy your day and be careful.

Saturday ~ December 19, 2020

Posted by Dave Updegraff on December 19, 2020
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , , , , .

Happy Saturday!

Every year on the Saturday before Christmas the City of Asbury takes Santa Clause around the entire community so that all the children can see him and get candy from him.  When we first moved here in December of 1992 that next day we heard all the sirens and thought something bad must be happening but it was just the Santa Clause tradition.

And so every year our kids looked forward to it and every year Angie brings her kids over.  In fact the entire neighborhood was out this morning to welcome Santa Clause.

Right on time the big fire truck pulled out of the station with lights flashing and sirens wailing and drove right on past all the parents and kids waiting to see Santa.  Ironic as it may seem this was a real emergency run and this truck and another were actually responding to a real event.

A few minutes later the truck carrying Santa came by and the kids were delighted.  I had already gone in by the time it came by so I didn’t get any images of Santa.  😦

After some sledding the kids built a snow man in the back yard and Addie was putting some final touches on it when I got my camera back out.

There was more sledding and then the boys built a fort and the girls built a second fort in anticipation of a huge snowball fight.  Apparently it didn’t happen but we still have two large forts in our back yard should an attack happen.

After all the activity of seeing Santa Clause, sledding, building a snowman and a couple of forts, Addie needed a little Mom time.  I couldn’t resist capturing this moment.

Enjoy your day and be careful.

Saturday ~ December 12, 2020

Posted by Dave Updegraff on December 12, 2020
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , , .

Happy Saturday!

We had a little house guest sleep over last night and as luck would have it we also had a big snow event.  Probably 8 inches at least and it is still coming down as I write this blog. 

If there’s anything that goes together, it’s snow and kids.  The first thing she wanted to do was go out and play in the snow.  “Mama Jeanne” and her went out as soon as breakfast was over.  Grandpa didn’t go out as I’m probably going to spend most of the afternoon clearing this stuff out.

Addie eats more snow than she makes for snowballs. 

Love having this little munchkin with us last night and today.

Enjoy your day and be careful.

Sunday ~ November 01, 2020

Posted by Dave Updegraff on November 1, 2020
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , , , .

Happy Sunday!

Hope you had a safe and happy Halloween.  Jeanne and I went over to Angie and Ben’s house to help with the candy distribution while Angie and Ben took the kids through the neighborhood.

I use to wear this costume when the kids were little and Angie asked me if I would wear it again and sit on their porch more or less like a Halloween display.

All the kids and parents that came by looked at me closely as it was hard to tell if I was real.  I didn’t jump up and scare anyone just moved a little when they were there. 🙂

Ben did not wear a costume but Angie dressed up.  I was trying to get a image of their entire family but that was like trying to heard cats.  The kids were so excited about Trick or Treating I couldn’t get them all corralled.

The kids were also excited to have both of their Grandmas there.  It was a fun night and I’m glad we were able to participate.  Paula and Jeanne monitored the candy and encouraged the treaters to take all they wanted.

This was the best costume I saw all evening.  The little boy being abducted by an alien. 

Angie looking very stylish in her costume.  Josh as the grim reaper.  All the kids came back with their baskets over flowing.  They only went in their neighborhood under the supervision of Ben and Angie.  They had a lot of fun.

I have to end this post with an image of my favorite little model.  Every time I point a camera at her she smiles and says “Cheese.”

 

 

 

 

 

Monday ~ January 21, 2019

Posted by Dave Updegraff on January 21, 2019
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , , , .

Happy Monday!

Angie brought the grand kids over yesterday as Ben was on call and working.  We had about 7 inches of fresh snow and you know what that means when you have kids.  🙂

The only one who didn’t get to enjoy the sledding was Addie.  She stayed inside and after I took these images I went back in and spent some quality time with her.

Austin had his share of mishaps but never quit smiling.  He would get back up and carry his sled back up the hill and do it all over again.

Josh had his form perfected after his first few runs and he set the longest slide of the group.

Angie didn’t slide but she was taking pictures of the kids.  This is the same hill that her and Mark slid down when they were young.  Spent hours watching them come down that hill.  🙂

Got a nice pose from Gabby.

Enjoy your day and be careful.

 

Saturday ~ September 01, 2018

Posted by Dave Updegraff on September 1, 2018
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , , , .

Happy Saturday!

For my Facebook Friends, I have three images for today.  If you want to see them all just click on the link.

We have had a lawn service for many years and have been reasonably happy with the results, although the last three years I saw my yard go downhill to the point this year where half of it was dead.  When the guy came to do the treatment a few days ago we talked with him and he said, “Well it’s been a tough year and I’m sure it will come back in the Fall.”  That also did not explain all the new weeds in the yard as well.

So I called another service and they came over and looked at it.  They said, “It’s been a tough year and it will probably come back in the Fall if you use our service.”

My Son-in-law Ben had similar problems with his yard and he called “Lawn Doctor.”  I called them Tuesday and the guy came over.  He spent 45 minutes actually digging around in the yard and pulling up the turf to see what was going on underneath.  He discovered that we had grub worms and they were killing our yard.  Within the last three days they have killed the grubs, re-seeded the yard and put down a fertilizer.  We were told to water the new grass and keep the ground moist.  I spent 50 minutes last evening watering the grass and then about 2:00 a.m. this morning we got a 3 inch 5 hour rain.

Needless to say I won’t be watering anytime soon.  🙂

Angie brought the kids over for playtime and lunch today.  Addie is now standing and cruising.  She was having fun looking outside at the rain.

I braved the rain to capture this moment.

Enjoy the rest of your day and be careful.