Happy 98th Birthday Aunt Midge -- Wow!

Cousin Carol Gunzel sent this wonderful picture of our hero -- Aunt Midge -- 98 years young!

Aunt Midge Gunzel, my mom's only sibling, is an amazing person. She is sharp, full of historical information, and has her venerable Norwegian humor. She just celebrated her 98th birthday with her kids (ya'll are still kids to me) and we have this great picture as a testimony to God's grace and Midge's perseverance.

Surrounding her are Joy (Davis), Jim, Marilyn (Anderson) and Carol. Cousin Dave was unable to join the celebration, because he is many miles away down in the southwest. Carol says, "...the little 2 year old licking her finger from the cake's icing. She'd stand there and poke her finger in the cake and look around to see who was watching her! That's Jim's granddaughter!" Looks like the cake was good.

Connie and I had the joy of visiting with Midge in February of 2006 and then a year later in February of 2007. We were very interested in her stories about her early days as a pioneer missionary to Mongolia in the mid 1930s. We have a copy of her interesting autobiography, with fascinating pictures, that tell the story of her trek to the Far East to become the bride of Uncle Stuart. God bless you Aunt Midge! You are an encouragement to all of us.

Labor Day Weekend Camping

Over Labor Day Weekend we took our Laredo to a nice campground right off I-95 at Selma, North Carolina. On Saturday we invited the Mincy family to drive out from their home in Clayton, about 15 miles away, to join us for a cookout. We had a great time hangin out together.

We grilled hot dogs and Wisconsin brats, and enjoyed the cloudy afternoon and the shade of the trailer awning. After the cookout ended the sun came out and the heat drove us inside to the air conditioned comfort of the trailer.

Inside we moved on to the activities of the day that included a rousing "Bingo" contest with priceless prizes. All the kids (including Sara and Dave) won prizes, and a good time was had by all! Then the day was topped off with old fashioned root beer floats. It was a great capstone to summer.
On Sunday Connie and I were able to attend Community Baptist Church in Clayton where Dave serves as Minister of Music. This vibrant church plant is a growing congregation meeting in a beautiful new public school. The church owns land adjacent to I-40 on the southeast edge of the burgeoning sprawl of Raleigh. We were very impressed with the ministry of this exciting church.

Chad & Jen Fishing

Recently Chad and Jen took a weekend camping and fishing trip to Devils Lake near Baraboo, Wisonsin. We loved these pictures that they sent us from that trip.

Three Cousins

At our family reunion last month we took a picture of the "Three Cousins" -- Dana, Kristy, and Alison. After returning home we found two earlier pictures from the preceeding decades.

First, is a wonderful shot of Grandpa Cutlan with his grandaughters from the 1980s. Grandma Cutlan noted on the back of this picture that it was "one of my favorites".

Then from the 1990s we have a wonderful shot of the three young ladies at a special time together.













Finally, it was fun to get this great picture at our Beach House on the Outer Banks, of our now three distinguished young women.

Family Reunion on The Outer Banks

We had a great reunion for the Carlson, Brask and Cutlan families over the 4th of July week at The Outer Banks (OBX) of North Carolina. The Outer Banks are the 200-mile long string of narrow barrier islands off the coast of North Carolina, and this area is our favorite vacation spot along the East Coast.
Eighteen of us gathered, and that was everybody in our families except for Greg and Becky Cutlan. Greg had a last minute medical incident that made it wise for him to cancel their plans to come, but Nathan and Alison were able to join us for a great time.
It took several days for everyone to arrive, but on Tuesday night our Carlson family was complete and we took a walk on the Avalon Fishing Pier near our beach house. It was a beautiful night and here we are walking on the Pier. From left to right: Chad, Timmy (Kirk's N.C. friend), Connie, Jen, Kirk, Kristy (her head shows behind Kirk) and Brian.

By Wednesday night the whole gang had arrived and gathered at our 3-story beach house that was both roomy and accomdating. We had pizza, enjoyed fellowhip, and then headed for the outdoor drama, The Lost Colony, which is the historic portrayal of The English Roanoke Colony and the settlers who vanished without a trace from Roanoke Island in 1587.

The entire group came from eight states including as far west as Montana and Colorado, and then Minnesota, Wisconsin, Tennessee, Virginia, New York and North Carolina. The group really enjoyed our place!
On Thursday part of our group (Dana & Jake Huffman, Chad & Jen Carlson, and Kristy & Brian Walker) headed for the open waters on an ocean fishing expedition. They brought about 12 fish back for supper that night at the Brask beach house.

Also during the week the group enjoyed biking, surfing and skim boarding, a trip to see wild mustang horses, a ferry ride to Ocracoke Island, a "Pirate" adventure ship, the Wright Bros. Memorial, beach time, fireworks on the 4th, hot tub at our place, a "Sharing Time" on Thursday night, plus lots of hanging out time on Brasks' deck overlooking the ocean. The girls even found time to do a "beading" session to create unique jewelry.
Our house had a rec room on the ground level complete with pool table, foosball table, TV, etc.
On Friday night, July 4th, we were able to secure a private room for a wonderful family seafood dinner. Here is the whole crowd enjoying the excellent cuisine at Mako Mikes. The evening was topped off with most of the group playing a challenging round of mini-golf, and then on to the Brasks' to watch fireworks from their third floor deck. A great capstone to the week!
Kristy has more pictures and commentary on her blog Life's a Stage at: http://www.tnwalker62.blogspot.com/

March Madness & The Carlson Crowd

For the second year in a row The Carlson Crowd has conducted a highly regarded contest during the NCAA Basketball Tournament. In 2007 Kirk won the first ever “Bragging Rights Traveling Trophy” award for picking the most correct victories among the 65 team NCAA tourney.

This year it was Mom Carlson who won the title. The winner of the annual contest wins the right to possess the “Bragging Rights Traveling Trophy” plaque for the year. This week the coveted plaque arrived via UPS from Kirk. Connie has proudly displayed the plaque in the family room for the year.

For the contest this year we used the Yahoo! Fantasy Sports Tournament Pick'em online format. This is a free online contest format that is completely automatic. All the scoring is done automatically after the actual teams in the tournament play each game. Each family member is able to log on to the contest web page to check his or her progress and post comments. It is a fun event for us every year and we look forward to the Carlson Crowd March Madness contest with eager anticipation.

This report was filed by The Commish!

Carlson Family RVing History

Last weekend we picked up our new 5th Wheel trailer. It was an interesting experience! The trailer is beautiful, comfortable and amazingly hi-tech with lots of cutting edge features. Still, camping is camping and we had a typical adventure over the three days of learning the ropes on the Keystone Laredo 265RL.

The day we did our orientation was like a beautiful summer day – although it was still March. We stayed in the campground at the RV dealership for several days to test everything out, and the day we left was a mini-nightmare. It was cold, rainy and we had a dozy of a time hooking up to leave. From that we both caught colds that resulted in laryngitis later in the week. Such is the camping lifestyle. Not always perfect, pretty, or universally enjoyable. But still, we love it!

All of this brought me back to our Carlson family history with trailering down through the years. Our first experience was when we borrowed Roy and Bev Hodge’s tent trailer in the summer of 1969. Kristy was just two, and we took her to Chattanooga and the Smokey Mountains for her first visit. I remember a cold, rainy and leaky night in the Smokies.

Then in 1972 we bought a Bethany Teepee trailer that we took to the Black Hills, Wyoming and Colorado. Again there were memorable experiences of cold nights in the Rocky Mountains and Kirk’s resulting trip to the hospital in Cheyenne, Wyoming. In a few years we moved up to a fixed wall 16 ft. Shasta travel trailer that we dragged all the way to California. Later we acquired a 19 ft. Corsair that had our first bathroom and shower.

From 1978 to 2002 we were out of trailering, except for onetime in the 80’s when we rented a large pop-up camper that we took to Michigan and Indiana. Here are some pictures that remember our “traveling trailers” over the years.

Kristy & Brian's Trip to Wisconsin

Kristy & Brian made it to Wisconsin for their weekend visit to Maranatha. They had quite a time on Thursday night because of bad weather in the Cincinnati area. Their departure from Chattanooga was delayed and that caused them to miss their connecting flight in Cincinnati for Milwaukee that night. When they finally got to Cincinnati they had a difficult time getting a place to sleep, and, of course, their baggage was not available to them for the night. So, when they arrived in Watertown on Friday morning they were glad to go to the Jackson's house for a quick change before going to campus.

The rest of their day on Friday was a whirlwind of meetings, greetings and eatings. It's sounds like it was a very profitable time. They will appreciate your prayers for them in the days to come. There are decisions to be made by both the College and Brian.

On Saturday they were able to spend the whole afternoon with Kirk, Chad and Jen. Through the wonder of the internet they were able to send some pictures for all of us to enjoy below.

While the kids were playing and partying (well, eating), Connie and I were working. Connie has decided to strip the wallpaper in our Master bathroom in preparation for a new paint job. Then she also intends on redoing our bedroom -- in time, but I think that will be sooner than later. During all of this activity, I had the joyous privilege assembling our annual tax information for Corey Pfaffe, our faithful and favorite tax preparer.


Five for lunch -- Mediterranean we're told

The guys hanging out at Chad & Jen's place

Look at Brian -- no coat! A real northerner

Jen & Kristy enjoying the time together

Connie is at work tearing things up!

Gerry trying to keep us afloat -- kind of...

New Truck and Trailer

Today we bought a new (to us) 2003 Ford 3/4 ton truck and ordered a brand new 2008 5th wheel trailer. We went to the Raleigh RV Show on Feb. 9th to learn more about the kind of trailer we wanted to acquire. This shopping excursion had been planned since our extended RV trip last fall when we realized we needed a bigger rig.

To our pleasant surprise we found a new 5th wheel trailer that exceeded our expectations. Bill Plemmons RV World had an unbelievable offer for the "show only" and that sealed the deal for us. So, today we ordered a Keystone Laredo 265RL, just as was displayed at the show. Then when we got to the dealership to sign the papers we found that they had this beautiful Ford diesel 250 Super Duty truck that will be more than adequate to pull the 5th wheel. The truck has only 18,000 miles on it and is completely set up to pull the trailer.

Here are some pictures of the truck and trailer.

The 30 Days of Christmas

This year our Christmas celebration stretched to the ultimate – a whole month! It all began on Dec. 11th with our annual Positive Action company party, and it didn’t end until Jan. 12th in Madison, Wisconsin, having lunch with Kirk just before we left to return to North Carolina. In between were joy-filled occasions, plus some painful experiences for Kirk, but altogether it was a wonderful example of God’s sovereign leading and control.

After our company Christmas party we had the usual flurry of Christmas activity with a church concert, class activities and decorations. Then Kirk arrived on Christmas Eve (see Kirk’s Ordeal below) and things began in earnest. First, we had Christmas alone with Kirk. Chad and Jen were heading for a three-week vacation trip to Argentina on Christmas day, and Kristy and Brian were scheduled to spend Christmas with the Walker clan this year. We had a blast with Kirk, even though he was dependent on pain pills for comfort.

Next, was a fun gathering of the Fosmark/Mincy/Walker/ Carlson crowd on Dec. 29th in Rocky Mount and at our Positive Action facility. This was a wonderful time! We played the famous Wii video game and saw family and ministry videos on the giant screen at the PAFC media room. Everyone enjoyed the Pizza and goodies.

Then it was Christmas all over again with Kristy, Brian and Kirk. We had a great time celebrating and hanging out. Of course, after the festivities we got serious about Kirk’s Ordeal and the resulting trip to Wisconsin. Our trip up north also allowed a quick run to the Twin Cities for a delightful evening with Judy and Wes Brask and Greg and Becky Cutlan. We even squeezed in a day at Maranatha visiting old friends. When we arrived back in North Carolina on the 13th we were ready to put Christmas 2008 finally to rest. Wonderful memories!

Lots of good food!! Oh, oh -- diets coming!

Chad and Jen in Buenos Aires, Argentina

Here's the fun (goofy?) crowd doing their thing

Cousins and spouses doing Pizza -- with Skye

Kirk hangin out with Wes & Wil Mincy

We are thankful for the special time together

Wonderful fellowship -- Front: Wes Brask, GBC, Greg Cutlan
Back: Judy Brask, Connie and Becky Cutlan