Hawk Lane

 Grandpa Jim has 90% of his stuff moved in next door to Hawk Lane.  What a beautiful home and acreage.  Tonight will be his first official night staying there I believe.  Lots of boxes to unpack but we got a majority of the kitchen put away yesterday and had the first cooked meal there of Crooked Spoon Tomato, Bacon, Romano soup and grilled cheese.  This week is supposed to be a big snow storm so I think that he will be busy putting things away and cleaning up at 910 so the renters can move in on the 21st.  

Brandi and Dave were up this weekend and ended up getting sick so they just laid around all weekend.  

Skinner has been attempting to work on his truck to get it out of the shop.  I think we must be starting the 3rd month of its residency in the shop.

We had our first taste of Simon last night.  The butcher ended up doing a course grind on it which isn't my favorite but all account are that is was very tasty.

Kaj has a bye week this week for curling.  They haven't won a match but they seem to be having a good time doing it.  I really need to go and watch some evening.  It is kind of his thing though and like church when he was little he doesn't like Mom getting in the way.

Uncle Bob Swanson passed away this week at 95 years old I believe.  What a gentle soul he was.  I always enjoyed when he and Auntie Joan were around for family gatherings.  Of course their daughter Barbie was super cool too.  The other 5 kids were older so I didn't get to know them as well, but they are all just so nice.  

Its official!

 Kaj finally reached and surpassed the 6 foot mark by about an 1/8th of an inch!

Going the distance

 On Friday Kaj did his first real distance on 61.  He drove from GM to Beaver Bay and then was too tired to continue to Two Harbors.  He napped and then on the way home drove from Beaver Bay to GM in the dark.  I must say he did very well.  I thought I had other things to share but I am stumped at the moment.

Class pictures

 Well Kaj had his school pics already this year and he wore his cowboy hat and american flag suit jacket.  And then most of the boys in his class wore his cowboy hat as well!  I can't wait to see the yearbook this year!

Kaj has been complaining about school alot.  Useless information to him.  So I called around about different Diesel mechanic and machine operator programs that can be done in high school but he would have to go live on the Iron Range I believe to do them.  I asked him about it and he said "Mom just let me complain about school for the next couple of years.  I don't want to go live on the range."  Alright then I will just put in some ear plugs and carry forth with getting him through high school and try and prepare him for adulthood.

Senior Airman Brandi Erickson was nominated for Airman of the Year at the 148th!  Sadly she didn't get it but she got it for her squadron.  The guy that did get it didn't even show up for the interview so I don't know how that happened but whatever, still so proud of her!

Skinner has purchased 3 new farm implements that he has actually gone and retrieved!  Now just 3 more pieces to retrieve between here and Two Harbors and he will have everything home.  Maybe then he will find that he has everything that he actually needs!

Me-work and home.  The usual.  

Permit

 On September 19th Kaj got his permit.  Let the driving begin!

Brandi bought a brand new truck a few weeks ago and still hasn't told her dad.  I wonder how long she will avoid coming up to visit so she doesn't have to show him?!

Skinner is building a lean to on to the pole barn this fall.  Hopefully we will be bringing the bull to butcher in December.  Skinner also has about a million other projects to get done before winter which feels like it is coming up on us faster and faster.

Spending spree

 So Kaj wrangled a deal with the neighbor and traded his riding lawn mower for a dirt bike.  We had told him that we would give him $500 towards his first car like we did for Brandi.  He decided that he would rather have a 1954(?) International Load Star truck that we had.  Then he found a truck on line for sale in WI.  It was a pretty good deal so I said that I would do a loan for him to buy that truck a 2004 Chevrolet 2500.  Not bad for a guy that doesn't have a job.  Hopefully he will make all his payments.  I told him that if he misses a payment I would lose my job which is technically true but honestly I would make the payment because I like my job, but it made him pretty concerned that he wanted me to keep my job!

Brandi had to try out Kaj's new bike.  She just barely touches the ground with her tippy toes!

Brandi is back from her deployment in Germany!  So very good to have her home.  Lots of good stories.  She got to go to 7 different countries.  We joke that it was a European vacation.  We say thank you for your service to her and her response was thank you for paying taxes so that I could have the experience!  She has a couple of weeks off and then it is back to work at the base in Duluth.  This weekend though excited to have her home to help with hay!  She is bringing a friend up from the base so we have literally called in the Air National Guard to help with hay this year!

Dirt Bike

 Kaj got a dirt bike.  Great.

Foreign Journalists

 This was the first year that the Historical Society hosted the World Press Institute Fellows to Grand Marais.  I moderated the public forum with the 8 journalists from Argentina, Bulgaria, Bangladesh, India, Nigeria, Finland, Iran and China.

The public forum was fascinating and of course I made Kaj go so he can expand his horizons.  One of the powerful parts of the evening was talking about censorship and 5 out of the 8 countries represented have sever penalties for journalists who say things that they aren't supposed to say, even over seas.  The tricky part is that it is totally arbitrary as to what you shouldn't say.  

Kaj was ready to move to Finland after the discussion until he heard they have some strict gun laws.

Duane

 Kaj has been on spring break this week.  We didn't have any plans so he called up Duane Ege.  Duane is in his 70s and last summer hired Kaj to help him out here and there.  He pays Kaj a ridiculous amount to help him and Kaj learns a lot from Duane.  Duane is brilliant.  I believe he is an electrical engineer but one of his many jobs was communication, radio towers, airport tower things.  Fixing anything is really what he can do.  He has been another wonderful mentor to Kaj and I feel so fortunate that Kaj has gotten to know him.  

Grete

 Every night it seems that Kaj has a story about Grete.  She is a senior and he is a freshman but they have shop class together.  They are buddies maybe if they were the same age it would be something more, but I feel that their relationship has been so good for him that I wanted to document it here in case he were to ever forget.  She is the best welder in the class and he is the second best according to him.  So they seem to be teamed up on projects together and from how he tells it they make a great team.  Measuring is something that he isn't strong on and she is.  When extra strength or height is required he steps up.  They tease each other and teach each other.  It is wonderful to hear the stories and someday hopefully I will get to thank Grete for teaching Kaj about friendship and teamwork.  Very different stories that what he talks about when sharing stories of his friends in his class or talking about the girls in his class which he doesn't seem to like very much.

It struck

 Kaj tested positive for Covid a week ago.  Luckily school was switched to online classes because of the uptick in cases for the week so he didn't miss anything.  He was in bed for 1 solid day and then mostly for another but it didn't seem to be more than a bad cold for a few days.  Which is good.  So far so good for Skinner and I testing negative so far.  Nothing else to report other than we are having a few short cold snaps but all the animals seem to be doing alright.