Brylee Who?

This is my Crazy, Goofy Girl her name is:

Brylee Ann

she informed me today that her name is:

Brylee Ant

and Jacob quickly corrected her and informed her that her name is:

Brylee And

Happy Resurrection Sunday!

He rose and conquered the grave!

John 14:6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

My Gander Man

ONALASKA - The big new Gander Mountain Co. store that opened last Sunday in Onalaska's Crossing Meadows Shopping Center is attracting customers with its expanded staff and merchandise selection, and the chain's soon-to-open second firearms academy.

The new 57,120-square-foot store, built at the former Walmart store site, replaced a 33,000-square-foot store that opened in 1995 along Hwy. 16 in Onalaska. The Walmart building was demolished in 2006, two years after Walmart moved to a larger building in the Market Place shopping center in Onalaska.

The new Gander Mountain will celebrate its grand opening next weekend. Some highlights will include appearances Saturday by fishing celebrities Dean Rojas, Brian "Bro" Brosdahl, Tom Neustrom, Tony Roach and Tommy Skarlis, and the Landry family, stars of The History Channel's "Swamp People" documentary series.

The store's Gander Mtn. Academy firearms academy will open by the end of this week. It will be the first in the Midwest for the St. Paul-based chain, which has 116 stores in 23 states. The chain's first firearms academy opened in February in Lake Mary, Fla., and more are planned.

The firearms academy is expected to attract area law enforcement agencies, as well as the public. It will offer a variety of classes, for beginners to advanced enthusiasts. Classes include basic firearms ownership and safety, concealed-carry fundamentals and permit requirements, marksmanship, self-defense for women and family firearms safety.

The academy also has a live range where gun owners will use real bullets, as well as a virtual range where participants will use actual firearms that use laser technology and realistic recoil but no bullets. And there are two interactive high-definition simulators, featuring scenarios that range from hunting to self-defense.

Extended hours will be available for law enforcement agencies that want to send personnel to the academy.

The academy will feature highly trained instructors in a safe environment, store manager Bryan Cavanaugh said. It occupies about 5,000 square feet of space.

The Onalaska store features the chain's latest store prototype, said Joe Herter, district manager. The Onalaska store it replaced was the chain's standard size, when it opened.

"It's all about the customer," Herter said of the reason for building a much larger store in Onalaska.

Customers had been asking for a wider variety of products, Cavanaugh said.

The new store features a much broader selection of merchandise. For one thing, Herter said, "You'll see a lot more name brands in apparel" than at the old store. "And our firearms assortment is much broader." So is the selection of merchandise for camping.

The new store has a full-service firearms department, as well as a full-service footwear department.

The new Gander Mountain had a staff of about 85 employees early last week, and Cavanaugh said that number soon will increase to about 90. About 50 to 55 employees worked at the smaller Gander Mountain on Hwy. 16, he said.

Cavanaugh, who became local store manager in late August, said the old Onalaska store closed March 21 in preparation for the move to the new, larger location. TCI Architects/Engineers/Contractor of La Crosse was general contractor for the new store.

Onalaska Mayor Mike Giese said he is pleased by Gander Mountain's decision to build a larger store, and in Onalaska. "It certainly helps to invigorate the whole area," he said.

The new store is very visible from Interstate 90 and should help attract more visitors to the area, Giese said.

"I don't think it will sit vacant for terribly long," he said of the former Gander Mountain location, north of Woodman's Food Market.

Page After Page After Page....

Brett is still my reader. He reads a Crazy amount of pages daily. I record the number of pages he reads for school. Some days he reads 500 pages. He never leaves the house without a couple books.

He has an amazing vocabulary and sometimes makes me giggle. The words that come out of his mouth sound like words of a grown man.

And his love for reading has rubbed off on 2 very important little people in this house!

A Beautiful Spring Day

Wisconsin Style.

Today I miss Wichita!

Wonder how many times it will snow in May?

Auntie Style

I love that Talli can only go at the maximum of 2 months without seeing the kids.

The best Auntie in the world will jump in her car drive 9 hours one way just to spend a couple days with them.....

There was lots of:

Reading with Jake

Begging and pleading of Brett to do Talli's homework.

Dehydrating of food for Talli to take home.

and Board games with Brylee
Miss you Talli!
Until next time Tal....5222!

Work it Girl!

Real Men Wear Pink

Jake was pleasing his Mama by wearing the pink shirt I layed out for him. I saw him zipping his jacket up all the way and then making sure there was no pink showing. He then told me he would wear the pink shirt if he did not have to take his jacket off at school.

For Jake it goes:

"Real Men Wear Pink if No One Sees"

A quick change of shirts and Jake was able to take his jacket off!

The Boy Who is NOT Crazy About Ties

Alphabop!

Jake's Kindergarten Concert

Spring 2011

Jake was pumped for his concert! Excited to play the drums!

But there was one problem.....

His music teacher asked for the boys to wear ties.

I knew this was not going to go over well with Jake.

Jake does not wear ties, button down shirts or khakis.

It only took him 1 hour to agree to wear the tie and brush his hair. Not bad I reserved 1.5 hours for the battle.

Proof of the Tie Battle:

When it was time for him to shine....He rocked it.....all was good.....tie and all!

My Girl.....

Is growing up way too fast!

What am I going to do when she starts 5 day a week preschool in the fall? How is it posible that my sweet girl is already 4 1/2?

Why does time go by so fast?

How can I freeze time?

Oh how I love this girl!

Preschool? Really? It does not seem possible Brylee starts school in the fall. In WI preschool is part of the public school system and means she will go to school 5 days a week for half days. Maybe because she is my last baby but I am already having a hard time.

Brylee is 100% ready....me not so much!

*Sob* *Sigh*

Out of the Mouth of Jake

I love my Jakey!

My favorite comment out of his mouth this week:

"You know lady bugs don't have to be married to have babies."

And he set the girl straight at recess who told him that "Girls go to college to get knowledge and boys go to Jupiter to get more stupider."

It sounds like he convinced her that both boys and girls can go to college to get knowledge. And they are friends again.

Love my Kindergarten boy!