Birthday Elk!

Just finished an excellent birthday dinner of New Zealand Elk, washed down with Unibroue La Fin du Monde and a desert of mocha cake. Yum! Thanks for all the well wishes!

Holiday Hockey

While in Madison for the holidays, a few of us went to the ice rink... and a few of those people actually went skating. It was a little damp and wet, but it was a fun time on the empty hockey rink.

Happy Christmasdays

Have a great holiday everyone!

Hello EFHS

Hey! I noticed a few alums heading over here since I posted on the brand new EFHS website, so I thought I would plop a post on here to say "hi". This is just a place to post interesting stuff in my life going on for friends and family to see, and any new designs I post to sell. The Crusty Joe site is a work in progress, hopefully you didn't get frustrated by all the broken links. Please leave a message when you stop by!

Stuff you want for Christmas!

Something tasty and toasty for you at the Mr. Toasty store! The Return of Toast poster! He back and he's p.o.'d! A fine addition to any art collection.

The fun doesn't stop there as a new store opens for Lick Bob's Ice Cream Parlor products. A sweet treat you can't resist, now in a variety of colors! A perfect holiday gift.

Finally, for you motoring fans, MKE Motoring store opens up with tons of great stuff. If you've got a M--- and want to support the Milwaukee M---s, you need some of this stuff! Get it while you can, before M--- shuts us down!

Arrogant Bastard for President

Election night was spent at the Comet for the November beer tasting with Stone Brewing Company. After a great sandwich special (Meet the Press, ham and turkey in a pressed hoagie) Aaron from Stone Brewery walked through their line of beers. The special beers of the night was the Double Bastard and the 11th Anniversary. Both were excellent. All of the beers skewed towards the hoppy side, but many were extremely drinkable, especially their Pale Ale. The Comet got pretty loud as the results came in for Obama and the Comet staff were gracious enough to put out a victory spread of snacks. The cookies were delicious!

VOTE

Presenting Bryan and Carol Volstorf

We attended the small and intimate wedding of Bryan Volstorf and Carol Kelly on Saturday, November 1, 2008. Hosted at Carol's daughter's house, it was simple, elegant and attended by family and close friends of the bride and groom.

This was the first time we had met some of Carol's family. They were all so friendly and welcoming to us, it was easy to feel comfortable. I can understand why Dad has spoke so highly of them. We haven't had the opportunity to spend much time with Carol, but I hope that will change in the years to come.

We want to welcome Carol and her family to ours and wish the newlyweds much happiness for years and years.

New Paint, No Paint

Ahhh... finally, a picture of our latest house improvements. We hired a company to paint the trim at the very top of the house and remove the paint on the lower brick of the house. The painting of the peaks was done on all sides. We only removed the paint from the front. I like it so much I might have to save our pennies to have the rest of the brick done. The brick is a yellowish color, it's specifically from the Milwaukee area, called Cream City Brick.

Once the paint started peeling off the wall from watering the front garden area, I knew for sure it was the Cream City, and I kept watering. :-) The painting and paint removal was fine, but the clean up – lack thereof from the company hired – and the repairs that had to made to our hard-wired landscaping lights has been a nightmare. The painting started on Sept. 3, we just got the lights working last week Friday.

I'm very pleased with how the outside improvements are moving along. Our last step, for a while, is to get some new windows for the front. As you can see in the picture, the top attic window is a nice tan while the 4 bottom windows are chipping-off-gray. And since our gas bill has been increased on our budget planning, we'd better do something to help that. We'll get the other 4 windows replaced sometime next year hopefully.

Next year, we'll look into doing more landscaping to the front yard that refuses to grow any grass in the summer. Bill would like to put a small retaining wall across the front yard to the steps. I don't want people sitting there waiting for the bus, so we need to be careful how we design this. Anyone who is free next year to help build a brick wall, let me know the days you'll be visiting!

The small tree in the front is a white Lilac I received from my good friend. It wasn't doing well in her yard so we dug it up and planted in my yard. It started growing days after we planted it. I've always wanted a Lilac, so I'm so excited it likes it's new home. I'd like to have one in the back yard... but we'll see about that later. I can't wait for spring to smell it's blossoms!

Comet's Secret Supper Club #4

Here's our menu from the Comet's Secret Supper Club on October 28th. I think I liked the first two dinners better, but this was still very good. Death's Door Distillery was there for special pre-dinner drinks, which were pretty good. Bill and I both think Adam's soups are terrific every time. This soup, we wanted to bottle up the scent and put it in a candle! How weird is that? It was soooooooo awesome smelling. 

I was full by the time the main course came, but I still ate it and our two desserts. There was a miscue between Adam and the sous chef, we didn't get any baked apples, but we ate it, figured they couldn't get what they wanted. But Val came around and asked us if we got apples, and that we'd get some in a minute. We each got another full dessert. Oh, yeah, we finished it all... Bill then went home and fell asleep on the couch until I woke him to get up to go to bed. Lazy butt. :-)

We haven't forgotten Europe

We haven't forgotten about sharing our Europe trip with everyone, we are still sorting through photos... But in the meantime, here's an email video from the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. The museum was very informative and learned a lot about the man I had previously not known. The annex was closed when we were there so there were no additional exhibits being displayed. Highly recommend when visiting Amsterdam.

A work of art!

Along with maneuvering around the Harley's all weekend, Bill worked on his pint glass shelves for the computer room. The finished product is shown. He used his router and did a fine job, I think! Now, I can have some of my built-in back for other stuff. (posted by Marcia)

105th Harley Fest Milwaukee

Well, we made it through another Harley Fest. The bikes were here, roaring around for 3 days. It was pretty tricky driving a car around, so I decided not to drive after running errands on Friday. At home, it really wasn't any louder than it normally is. The morning of the parade, I heard bikes at 6am, but otherwise it was quiet. We went up to the North Avenue street party and the Brady Street party, the better of the two, everyone was nice and under control. We saw some cool bikes, and would have taken more pics during the day, but we were busy around the house! (posted by Marcia)

Poopytime

This last weekend the Autumnal Fire was tapped for the first time at Capital Brewing in Madison WI. For those not in the know, this is one of my all-time favorite brews. The formula seems to have changed a little, but it is still delicious. Making it even better was some music by Pupy Costello & His Big City Honky Tonk playing for free! Excellent band and a fellow Milwaukee East-Sider! Some members of Brown Derby joined in for a few songs, if you are in Madison and they are playing I highly recommend seeing either band. My niece highly recommends them! The beer garden was great at Capital with s'mores being cooked and lots of friendly folks.

Where did the summer go?

I can't believe it's Labor Day Weekend and the summer is over!! We spent the entire 1st part of the summer getting the yard pretty, planning and planning for our trip. Then we spent 2 weeks on our trip. Now, we've been spending the last 3 weeks recovering and trying to get back into a routine and the summer is gone. 

We finally met Parker J. Volstorf over the weekend. Grandpa Kipp would like to call him PJ. He thinks it great we finally have a name we can shorten to initials. Parker is pretty cute now. As of today, 6 wks 4 days, he is 14 lbs. I didn't think that seemed too big, but his Mommy said the other two kids were at 14 lb at 2 mos... ok, so he's still big, but he's spread out, he's long. He's proportionate.  :-)

Harley's 105th Anniversary party is this weekend. We'll be volunteering down at SS Peter and Paul, selling food for one night. Enjoying the loud mufflers for the rest of the weekend from home. I swear, we WILL finish an unfinished project this weekend!!

And of course, we'll be listening to the Brewers.... Go Crew!

Back to the real world

Well, we've worked our way right back to where we were before we left. Work, home, housework. Ok, the housework has not been addressed yet, but it's near the top of the list. I think we'll be doing laundry for days. I have a ton of yard work to do, as well. Everything is growing like weeds, including the weeds.

We must not have drank enough beer while on vacation... because we both participated in the Comet's Beer School on Tuesday. Although, the tasting was not as tasty as what we had in Europe, it was still a good time.

Tomorrow, Aug 8, we'll be enjoying the wedding and reception for Bethany and Glenn. Then, they'll be moving to Chicago next week.

:-( Hopefully we'll be able to visit them soon.

Home Sweet Home!

We're home. All of our flights were on time and pleasant, customs went really well with our 'gun'. Our bus from O'Hare was late, so we didn't get home until 9:30pm.
The kitties are all fine and well, which was our biggest concern. I don't think they noticed we were gone. :-)
Today we're off to Madison for the annual Kipp Family Picnic, and for some traditional American hamburgers! It will be nice to tell the Kipp family all about our trip, while it's still fresh in our minds.

Thank goodness I'm back, so the Brewers can start winning again...

We still have more to post.... photos and video.... stay tuned!!

Wir kommen zu Amerika!

We are on our way home. People in Europe are very gracious, but we are ready to be back... back to our own house, our kitties and cheap soda pop!

For the two people reading ;) , more will come about the trip... meanwhile, see you all at home!

(photo is at Delerium Cafe alley in Brussels)

Brugges

Brugge was great, sorry for the short post.... on our way to Brussels for waffles, mussels and frites!

Brugge/Bruges

We said our goodbyes to the Wissings & Olbrings Tuesday AM. We could not thank them enough for their hospitality. We had such a great time in Alstatte. Even Ralf and Maria woke up to send us off. Andreas was no where to be found.Heike & Andre took us to Enschede where we picked up our car. On our way to Bruge, we stopped at LaTrappe Brewery near Tilburg, NE. Good beer & food, nice tour/history as well.

We arrived in Bruge about 7PM. We headed out to find our next favorite beer bar... as has been suggested to us several times, we went to Beerstel Beerij. Great beer list and nice people. We met an angry Scot and a man from upper New York, Ron. Ron is good friends with the owner of our B&B and he loves New Glarus beer. Small world, eh?

Wednesday AM, we did a canal tour & De Halve Mann brewery tour. It was good too. We ate lunch and are now off to walk the town more to see the sights.

Can not believe we are expected at work on Monday, no one from THIEL has written on our blog, they must not miss us... ;p

Beer count: since leaving Alstatte, 8

Schutzenfest Day 2

Well... what the party they throw here in Alstatte!! Holy cow. I have never seen so much drinking, dancing, singing and clapping in all of my life. Maybe all the weddings I have been to put together would compare. We 'closed Schutzenfest' at about 2:30am on Sunday night-Monday morning. They have many, many traditions around this celebration. Too many to list here. It has been really fun here, though. Video will follow after we return home...


The party continued this AM with church for the men, and another parade to the Queens house. Then... more drinking. The shooting was also this afternoon. Bill did shoot, but only once, and sadly we are not moving to Alstatte. He did not knock the bird down. A new king was crowned, as well as a new queen and court. Then, more drinking. At the festival, children wait tables, clear glasses and order-pay for more beer for the attendees. Funny....

We had dinner at the local restaurant, where we stayed at the hotel. It was awesome, as usual. Heike and Andres freudin (friends) were all very, very nice to us. Speaking to us in English as best they could, and doing a really good job of trying to make us feel welcome... did I mention we drank a lot of beer? Speaking of which, tomorrow we drive to the Abbey in the Nederland and then on to Brugge.


Beer count: 30fd,whvqq,kvv-d-- or so.

Bill: (and yes, i know i was holding the gun wrong in the picture!)

Willkommen Deutschland!!

We arrived bz train on Saturdaz to Enschede. The Wissings and Olbrings made us a wonderful home cooked meal. We sat at their house and talked all evening. We had multiple meats... (Glenn).... it was verz good. Our hotel is verz nice. Nice to have our own bath-shower. The town is soooo cute. All the houses look the same as the businesses. Most of the town was destrozed in the war.
We met with some distant relatives todaz from Alsteatte. Some German and some American living in Germanz. It was fun and interesting and nice to talk to Americans. :-)
Sundaz, Schuetzenfest began this afternoon. All men met to prepare for the parade to the exiting kings home for a farwell partz. The woman watch the parade. There was a slight accident, a man fell off his horse and was taken to the hospital, but he was fine and the parade continued!!



Bill: I am officially a member of the Alstatte Shooting Club now. I got to walk in the parade. Besides being way too hot, it was fun!

More Sheutzenfest tonight and tomorrow!

Beer count: 20....or so.

Auf Wiedersehen Amsterdam!

Our time here is done... we're hitting a market this AM and taking the train to Enschede (won't believe how that's REALLY pronounced!) Heike knows we're on our way. We're looking forward to some relaxing time now... Amsterdam has a lot to offer, but it's really hustle and bustle here, especially now that it's the weekend and the 'tourists' are here!
Yesterday we hit the art museums, flower market, gift shops, had more beer!! and had a Dutch pancake.... I have to learn how to make these!! So good... We went to the brewery tour at Brouwij t 'ij. Really good beer, tour similar to Lakefront.

See you in Germany!!

Beer count: 20

Beer, Boats & Bikes

Our 2nd day has been great so far... we took a canal tour, rented bikes and have been all over the city. Ate Herring... ummm. Frites... umm Chocolate... ummm Ham and goat cheese sandwich... ummmmmmmmmmmmmm Beers... pretty good. Nothing too exciting yet, that is to come tonight and tomorrow as our bar hopping continues.

We're posting from a '"Coffeeshop" right now.. look it up for Amsterdam. :-)

Beer count: 10
Modes of transport: 6

1st day under our belt

Marcia here...
Beer booze and .... politics? Yeah, great vacation, eh? We just spent over an hour talking with twor really drunk Hollanders? Amsterdamderites?? and one bartender about US & EU politics. They're really, really mad they can't smoke in the bar. No, you don't get it, really, really mad.

We ate dinner at a Thai restaurant, that supposedly cooks meals for the royal family of the Netherlands (bartender told us that). It was pretty good. Not the best I've had, but maybe the best I've had is all 'Americanized'? We toured the Red Light District and the gay district, so Bill was on a tight leash. :-) We're off to bed now, to plan tomorrow's adventures.

Beer count: 4

mmmm... beer.

We're Here!

Whewwwwww..... that is just too long of a trip. Europe should move closer to the US. :-) Flights were fine and on time. US Air... has issues. We brought a Europe ready phone, it's not ready. Weather is good, so far. Hotel is cute. Wow... stairs....
We're going out for beer now -- shocking, I know, and to plan the rest of our evening.

Modes of travel so far: 4
Beers: 0 :(

And it begins...

Parker James Volstorf

This is Parker. He is all of his 10.5 lbs! Notre Dame football, watch out!  Love you!

Well... I'm not really ready, either.

Bill's right, he usually gets all panicked and I wonder to myself "why am I going on a trip with this guy." 

I have to do some shopping for a pair of capris yet. Yeah, fun. We're still organizing what sights we'll see. And we should do a dry run of packing, making sure we don't have to check luggage. Crazy airlines and their crazy rules... I got some drugs for the plane ride!! I can NEVER sleep on planes. As you can see from the last pic posted, I slept AFTER we got to Germany back in 2003.

We have a guest staying with the cats for the time we're gone, they will really appreciate that. Bill and I really appreciate it.

Finally, a bit off subject, Bill and I are new Uncle and Aunt to Parker James Volstorf, born July 10, 2008 @ 7:30pm. He rolls in at a whopping 10 lb 5 oz. Mom and baby are doing fine.

Yikes!

The stress is building! Anyone that knows me, knows I nearly explode with stress before a trip. We actually have most things set to go. We just need a map, a new German translation buche and to make a single source of notes of things we want to see. Some new pieces of tech to make our trip more fun/easier: digital camera, phone, multi-charger. And of course we will have the handy-dandy Rick Steves and Belgian Beer Guide books along. We plan on posting on here daily when we can, so please read and post!

Now I just have to figure out how many shirts and socks to take.

Where are we going?

View Larger Map

It makes more sense on paper.

Countdown begins

The trip is coming up fast! I know I haven't posted much on it due to lazyiness, but for those not in the know, we will be hitting Amsterdam, Enchede/Alstatte/Ahaus, Brugge and Brussels. So lot's of Beer, Cheese, Chocolate, Frites and Waffles!

We will be blogging the trip here, so stay tuned! If all goes well, we will be posting video diaries!

MINIs for Tom

Originally uploaded by mauberley

More than 30 MINIs from Milwaukee, Madison and Chicago wish Tom well in Milwaukee. He's making progress, but being in a hospital is never fun, and it was a delight to be able to cheer up such a great guy!

The MINIs were lined up in the parking lot below the visitors lounge intending to spell out "HI TOM", but because of a lone car in the way ended up just gettting in HI and lined up the rest for him! He loved it!

Some photos from the event: ONE, TWO, THREE

Click here for info on Tom and his fight against Multiple Myeloma.

Ultimate Parking

Ran across this pic and just wanted to share it. Something you might be seeing more of int US cities maybe? Well, maybe not the parking on the sidewalk thing...

Missing

List of things I haven't posted:

Beer Dinner from February:

One of the best dinners we've had. Adam and the crew are amazing. Loved the pork bellies. The food was richer than we are used to and our tummies bothered us a little but it was worth it.

Beer School from March:

Bochs! Mmmm-mmm good!

MINI Drive to Lake Geneva:

I did add a video.. see below! Very fun!

Sugar Maple beer bar review:

Excellent selection! Right on route 15...

Trying Twitter... see how that goes.

Vegas Baby

What's more fun than Vegas? A trade show in Vegas! No brewpubs were visited, unless you count the corporate Hofbrau Haus... which was excellent! Vegas is certainly a place to be seen to be believed, some of what I expected and a some not so much. Luckily I only left four dollars down... although I bet four dollars. Here is a video of me starting to lose one of them,the machine didn't want me to bet:

Dzia

Joe, Slim, Iggy. He was a man of many things. He was a resourceful youth in the depression. He was a talented basketball player in the sport's infancy. He joined the fight in Europe. He was a devoted husband, father of two sons, grandfather of four and great-grandfather. He served the public as a police officer and detective until his retirement. But most importantly to me he was Dzia Dzia... a man that took time for me and my family throughout the time I knew him. A man that to this day made the best secret recipe pancakes in the world. I may never know what the secret recipe was, but I got to know the man and that's makes it all great by me.

MKE MINIs Spring Drive

What a fun event. The MINIs took a drive from Milwaukee to Burlington where we met some Chicago MINIs and then down the backroads to Lake Geneva. Hoo-wee, there were some fun curves! Luckily the snow held off for the drive. We then filled up the parking lot with MINIs at Houlihan’s of Lake Geneva for a great lunch there was a raffle for the Amercian Cancer Society in honor of Tom (MiniShagz). They've raised a lot of money so far, and Tom has been doing great! Looking for to the first Ice Cream social and as many MINI events as we can get to. Hopefully there will be a few light mods to the MINI this summer... stay tuned (heh) for that!

Midwinter Brewfest

Another great time at the Ale House! Beer reviews to come soon. MINI club members were there as well as our friends Glenn and Bethany. And of course ran into many friends from the beer world as well. for anyone attending this next year, ask for a small pour! I know it's counter-intuitive, but trust me... a small-pour!

Whitnall Park skiing

... a fine day for skiing.

Beer School: Three Floyds 101

For our February class, Professor Drew took the night off as the head brewer from Three Floyds took over. These guys sure know their stuff. I will put up a more detailed rundown of the beers later. But needless to say, they were all good. The Alpha Kong was the exceptional standout. Unfortunately it's not really that available, but hopefully next time I'm near there I might be able to pick up some in the Three Floyd's growler I acquired Tuesday night. (Thanks Jeanne and Rick!)

Rewards of skiing uphill

So I have gotten to go out to Lapham Peak State Park to skii three, yes three times this year! Four times skiing total! I'm well on my way to a record year. The conditions the last time weren't the best, a little icy and a little thin in spots, but its a great trail with some great people out there. They are also well on their way to having snow machines for the trails when we don't get lucky enough for snow. They have a candlelight ski next weekend. I put a little lubricant on the old skiis this time so downhill was slightly better. I made a really bad video of that in fact, hopefully you don't throw up if you watch it.

Teaching

So I got my first taste of teaching this week at UWM... it was... interesting! Really is weird being back in academia after all these years. And especially weird looking at it from the other side of the fence. Was impressed by some and underwhelmed by others. They all seem to be trying tho, which is good. Not sure if that kind of thing would be for me, jumping into the middle of someone else's classes might have made things a bit weird (I am less artistic than the person I was substituting for) because I wasn't sure exactly where to point the students. Had some good conversations tho about design and watched Helvetica again, which is always enjoyable!

2008 Beer Events!

They have begun:

Mid-Winter Brewfest, February 10
Milwaukee Ale House, Milwaukee

Bockfest (blessing of the Bock), February 23
Capital Brewery, Madison

Great Taste of the Midwest, August 9
Olin-Turville Park, Madison

Hops & Props, March 1
EAA AirVenture Museum, Oshkosh

20th Annual Blessing of the Bock & Milwaukee Beer Festival, March 9
Bavarian Inn, Glendale

4th Annual World of Beer Festival, June 7
Schwabenhof, Menomonee Falls

...not to mention monthly beer schools and now beer dinners! I'm sure there will be more to come, but that's definitely a good start. Hope to see our fellow beer lovers there! (Food & Froth is purposely NOT on the list this year!)