This is a recording from last Sunday’s church service. It has myself on alto sax, Mike James on bass, Ty Cooper on guitar, Sharon James on keyboards, Dave Magnuson on piano, and Jon Scroenick on drums. It’s a jazz version of an old hymn – “I Need Thee Every Hour.”
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I hope you enjoy it.
~Tim
It has been an eventful couple of months.
Danielle at Spassabend
Shortly after we got back from Canada, we went to a performance of Danielle’s called Spassabend. There was lots of German music and dance performances. The kids from the German classes seemed to really have a good time. I have one picture here of Danielle performing. My apologies that it is so blurry. The auditorium was packed and I was standing against the wall for the whole performance and was quite far away.
Caleb and the goats
Carrie and I took the kids to her Mom’s farm for an Easter Egg hunt in April. The kids got to look for 15 eggs before they found their ‘treasure’. Each egg had a clue to the next one, and each kid had their own color. Along the way, the kids got to play with the chickens and the goats. We also played some baseball and threw the frisbee around. Carrie spent alot of time putting together the clues for the hunt (15 clues X 5 kids) and her mom Diane hid them at the farm before we arrived.
Joshua wins at track
We also were able to go to several of Joshua’s track meets this spring. Joshua is quite the sprinter and long jumper. We saw meets at LaCrosse Logan HS, Holmen HS, LaCrescent HS, and the Conference meet, also at LaCrescent HS. Joshua is a 7th grader, and normally only 8th graders participate in the conference track meet (there were 11 schools at the conference meet), but he was able to qualify in several sprints and the long jump. The track meet in Tomah that we were going to go to got cancelled due to weather. Joshua got several 1st places during the meets we attended, including a 1st place in the Conference Meet in the 4 X 200 relay. They also broke the Tomah Middle School record for that event! He also did very well in the 4 X 100 relay (4th place), the 200 meter dash, and the long jump. In some of the meets, he also competed in the 100 meter dash, winning it at the Holmen meet. Way to go, Joshua!
Elizabeth at State Solo/Ensemble
We attended both Joshua’s and Elizabeth’s spring band concerts, as well as the State Solo/Ensemble Festival, where Elizabeth performed a piano solo and a musical theater vocal solo. She got a 2nd rating on her piano and a 1st rating on her musical theater vocal solo.
This coming Friday, Elizabeth graduates from high school. She is very excited for graduation! The next day, we are heading to Fort Atkinson, WI to my Grandma Heinz’s farm. She is holding an open house for her 95th birthday. It will be a good chance to see grandma, my parents, my sister and her husband, my uncle, aunts, and cousins. My kids are also going to be there along with their mother.
Hannah and chicken at the farm
Summer looks to be busy again this year. We don’t have any plans at this point to travel, but my brother Paul and his wife Cyndi will be visiting from Colorado in July, and my brother David and his wife Margaret and family are moving back to the States later this summer. Their daughter Katie is also graduating from high school this spring and will be attending college this fall in Wisconsin.
That’s all for now. More another time.
Tim
Hi everyone -
Carrie had some assignments for me when I got home tonight. Clear off my dresser, clear off the coffee table in the living room, and clear off the table next to the couch. In each case, all the stuff was mine, anyway. She had been working all day with getting food ready for tomorrow (the homemade cheesecake looks GREAT), cleaning the house, and doing laundry. I was at work all day and came home at 7:00. I was glad for all she had done to get ready for our guests tomorrow.
After supper and after finishing a movie we were watching, we got going on our tasks. She vacuumed and I cleared off the aforementioned surfaces. The two in the living room got put away quickly. As I was working on my dresser, I got frustrated. Why, I thought, are we making our house look as though we never had any clutter, always had the carpets vacuumed, and dust did not exist in our dwelling? What do these people care if i had all of my “treasures” on my dresser? (Carrie likes to call my clutter “treasures.”) And why are we having all of these people over for lunch, anyway? Ok, I already know the answer to the last question. That’s an easy one.
Tomorrow is Easter Sunday!
Then it hit me. Is this what Easter is all about? Is it having family over for Easter Dinner (and cleaning the house and preparing the food and all the stuff that goes along with that)? Is it having the day off work (Easter is one of the 3 days during the year that the retail store I work at is closed)? Is it “serving your time” by going to church?
I have had various experiences during Easter. One year I led the music for my church when we held a funeral for Jesus Christ on Good Friday. Another year I led music during a Seder service (if you don’t know what that means, google it). One year I completely missed all religious services because I was working, including working on Easter Sunday. For the record, working in sales on Easter Sunday was a waste of my time and energy, not to mention frustrating for me because I missed church.
Some years, as I was growing up, I attended Maundy Thursday services at the Baptist Church that I grew up going to. Other years, there were Good Friday services to attend. I remember one year travelling on Good Friday to see my 3 living grandparents (2 have since passed). Many years, I was very involved in the music of my church during Easter weekend, and this year is no exception. I am really looking forward to playing in our church’s band tomorrow morning.
For whatever reason this year, I have not really taken the time to reflect on the Easter story or the reason why we celebrate Easter. I did not attend any Easter services. Actually, I don’t think my church held one this year. I am rather disappointed with myself, actually. You see, if Jesus had not been crucified and died for my sin and the sin of the world, and if Jesus had not risen from the dead to conquer that sin, then he was truly NOT the Son of God.
Without Easter, Christmas is meaningless. There is no point to Christianity if there is no Easter. And there is no Easter if there is no Good Friday. Jesus cannot rise from the dead if he is not first crucified. And up until the time of this writing, I gave no thought at all to this.
I am ashamed. Not because I helped Carrie clean the house. Not because I didn’t attend any services on Good Friday. Not because we went shopping on Friday to buy groceries for Sunday’s meal. No, not because we are having family over for Easter. I am glad we are having family over. I am ashamed because I took Jesus’ sacrifice for granted. I am ashamed because I did not reflect on all he had done for me. I am ashamed because I realized that the ONLY reason why I will be allowed into Heaven is because Jesus died to take my sin upon himself, and rose again on Easter. Then He forgave my sin so that I can have eternal life with HIM instead of eternal damnation. He did that so that I had the CHOICE to trust in Him.
You see, without Easter, I would not be allowed to become a Christian and live forever with Jesus in Heaven. And for that, I am and will be eternally grateful!
More next time,
Tim
Holding my award after the ceremony
Me with Lowell McAdam at the President's Cabinet Awards Ceremony
Shaking Lowell McAdam's hand while going on stage during the awards ceremony
View from Blackcomb Mountain
Carrie
Carrie and Tim with the Paralympics Torchbearer
The passing of the Paralimpic Flame. Carrie took this picture. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see!
I saved Carrie from this vicious bear in Whistler Village. Ever wrestled a bear statue before?
Thursday morning brought a good amount of snow and made for some beautiful scenery. After breakfast I got dressed to go snowshoe hiking and Carrie stayed back to pack for the journey home.
I headed off to Whistler Mountain, riding halfway up the gondola to pick up the snowshoes, and quickly learned of the challenge ahead of me. Not from the tour guide, but from the fact that I was already out of breath from just climbing up this little hill. Thoughts of “what was I THINKING?” were going through my head. But peer pressure makes people do crazy things, and I wasn’t about to be the person who chickened out before we even got to the beginning of the journey, so I pressed on.
Once we got our snow shoes from the storage area, we got back on the gondola and finished our journey up Whistler Mountain. Once at the top, we put on our snow shoes (all right, I received help), had our group picture taken (evidence of which will STAY in Whistler), and started on our way.
Let me just point out here that the first thing our tour guide did after she taught us how to correctly use the snow shoes was to shout out, “Ok everyone, let’s do a quick warm-up!” This consisted of jogging uphill on our toes for a while, ostensibly to, I guess, “warm up!” I was not warmed up. I was huffing and puffing. This was a signal of things to come, and I knew it! I was questioning if what I was about to see was beautiful enough to risk days of sore muscles and sheer exhaustion. Apparently it was, because I continued on.
We went on our way to our trail, and it seemed rather odd to me that, no matter which direction we were going, it seemed it was always uphill. Well, it FELT like we were always going up hill! Then I noticed with each step that my feet were going deeper and deeper into the snow. As I mentioned earlier, it had snowed quite a bit the night before, and being 7160 feet above sea level (probably 5000 feet above Whistler Village), snow doesn’t have as far to travel to reach the ground.
Yes, there was a lot of snow.
DEEP snow!
Not-yet-groomed DEEEEEEEP snow!
Talk about being a trail blazer! We were it! I, of course, was in the back of the line of the 6 of us, so as to further pack down the trail. Let me tell you, hiking through new, deep snow and having to lift your feet up high with each step is hard. Snow is heavy. Who am I kidding? I couldn’t keep up. I was exhausted! Remember fresh, new, knee-deep snow? A LOT of it?
Fortunately, we had 2 tour guides for the 4 of us, so I received my own personal tour guide with my own personal tour (an abbreviated one, at that) and the 3 in-shape show shoe hikers continued on the normal tour with the other guide.
We met back up near the end of the hike for some hot chocolate and homemade granola bars and then headed to the gondola. Fortunately we took the groomed ski trails (again uphill) back to the gondola. Then we rode down, brought our snowshoes back, and finished the ride down.
When I got back, Carrie was in the lobby waiting for me. We went back up to the room, changed, and went directly to the hot tub. After that, we went back into Whistler Village to go shopping. We found some good bargains at the Olympic Store and got Carrie a necklace with an Ammolite stone. These stones can only be found in Canada, so Carrie was thrilled to come across it.
We headed back and got dressed for dinner. The 4 areas had dinner in Whistler Village at 4 different restaurants. We went with the Midwest Area group to a restaurant called Quattro. We got to meet some couples from Michigan and Indiana. We had a very nice time at dinner. Then we were bussed back to the hotel for an after dinner party. Once all 4 groups were back, Dan Mead spoke briefly and then they showed a video of the week’s events and people. It was a very enjoyable time. We headed up to our room, and there were 2 framed photos on our bed. One was of Carrie and I that was taken on Tuesday night before the awards ceremony, and one was of the 50 Midwest Area winners, also taken before Tuesday’s awards ceremony. It was a great way to end a great week!
More next time,
Tim
Hi there, everyone -
Today (Wednesday) was a little more relaxed. We didn’t have anything scheduled until 1:00, so we stayed at the hotel for the morning. At 1:00, we got on a shuttle bus and headed to our next adventure. We got off at our destination and went into the office. Then we put on our helmets and goggles and went back outside. Then the instructor showed us a few things, and we got on our snowmobile!
We spent the next 2 hours following our guide on the trails on Cougar Mountain. It was quite an adventure. Carrie was a great copilot! It was a beautiful ride.
When we got back, we had some free time, so we went to the hotel’s outdoor hot tub. After that, we went back to our room and got ready for our evening activity.
We went downstairs and got on a bus to Whistler Village. Then we got on a gondola and rode up to the top of Whistler Mountain for dinner and a party complete with lots of games, music, and several activities to do. There were ping pong games going on as well as foosball, air hockey, pool, and several others. There were also caracature artists, a “recording studio”, and plenty of food and drink. We had a great time. We got a characature of us drawn during the evening which was very cute. We left around 9:45 (the party ended at 10:00), and headed down the mountain on the gondola. Then we headed back to our hotel room and went to bed.
More next time,
Tim
Hi there, everyone -
Tuesday started with the Verizon Wireless 2010 President’s Cabinet Olympic Challenge. Kind of a grandiose name for a scavenger hunt, right? There were a few physical challenges, but for the most part they were mental challenges or trivia tests. There were 4 teams (West, South, Midwest and Northeast), and we were further divided up into groups of 6. Carrie and I were on the Midwest team, which took 3rd place. We even got bronze medals for our efforts.
After the challenge was a lunch before the winners were announced, and then afterwards we had the afternoon to ourselves.
We were in the hotel lobby by 4:45 for formal pictures (suit and tie, etc) and then went to a mixer before the evening dinner. During this time, we also had a picture taken of each area’s winners (approximately 50 per area for Midwest, Northeast, West, and South).
At 6:00, the doors were opened and we all went to our tables for dinner. After a brief introduction by CMO John Stratton, we ate dinner. After dinner was over, the ceremony began.
First the Canadian and US National Anthems were played, then we watched a brief video featuring olympic gold medalists, followed by a speech by company President Lowell McAdam. Then the awards presentation began. We were told that our award would be in our hotel rooms when we got back, and that we would be coming up to the stage when our name was called.
The Midwest Area was first. We were called up in reverse order of our accomplishment, so the later we were called up to the stage, the higher our percent-to-quota was. I was called up in the middle of the 50 Midwest Area winners (probably #25 or #24), and the highest from Wisconsin.
After the ceremony, we took a few pictures, including one with myself and Lowell McAdam (after he fixed my suit coat collar). After the end of the ceremony, there was a celebration party and dance in another ballroom. We stayed for a while, talking with a few people we met here. Then we went to bed for the day.
More next time,
Tim
Hello again, everyone -
Monday brought about several new experiences of its own. After a FABULOUS breakfast, we walked into Whistler to go shopping and sight-seeing. We were also able to view the memorial to Georgian Luger Nodar, who died here on February 12, 2010 during a practice session accident. I included some pictures on a previous post.
We came back to the hotel during the lunch hour, and then headed out to take the ski lift (minus skis) to the top of Blackcomb Mountain. After taking some pictures, we went inside to eat a burger and I called my parents to tell them were we were and what had been happening.
Afterward, we rode the world-record-setting Peak to Peak Gondola. This took us from Blackcomb to Whistler Mountain. After we looked around for a bit, we headed down on the gondola into Whistler Village. Carrie wanted to see the passing of the torch for the Paraolympics in the village.
Probably 5-10 minutes after we got off the gondola and into the village, I heard Carrie tell me to turn around and look. The torchbearer was running into the area where we were. The whole event was over in a few minutes. I was able to get it on video and Carrie was able to take some FANTASTIC pictures of the event. Right after the new torchbearer left, we were able to get a picture of us standing with the torchbearer and his extinguished torch. It was truly a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
After that, we headed back to the hotel to get ready for dinner, then rode the shuttle into the village and had dinner. Then we rode the shuttle back to the hotel and went to bed for the evening.
More next time,
Tim
Once we got to Vancouver, there were many people holding Verizon Wireless signs guiding us where to go through the airport. When there was a rather large group gathered together, they led us to a new tram-rail shuttle service that was put in place specifically for the Olympics. Since there were so many people flying into Vancouver, they built the tram to move people to parking lots to aviod traffic problems.
When we got off the tram, we were brought to the bus where we were given a box lunch and got on the bus. We drove about 75 minutes and stopped at a rest area in Squamish to rest, then got back on to the bus to go to Whistler.
When we arrived in Whistler, we went to the Fairmont Chateau Whistler hotel. As we got off, the first person to shake my hand and greet me was the President of Verizon Wireless, Lowell McAdam and his wife. Then I was greeted by Dan Mead, the COO of Verizon Wireless and his wife. As I walked in to the hotel, I was greeted by John Stratton, Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer of Verizon Wireless and his wife. I was ASTOUNDED by the warm welcome we were given.
Once we were inside the hotel, we were directed into a room where we received some jackets as gifts, schedules, our hotel room key, and were directed to a different room for a brief orientation given by a guy who called himself Captain Canada.
After the orientation, we went to our room on the 9th floor (out of 10). Some of our luggage was already in our room when we arrived. We looked out our window and saw some snow-capped mountains. What an amazing view!
Then we went downstairs to the welcome dinner. This was another FANTASTIC experience. When we walked in, a jazz trio was already playing. There were many chefs stationed around the ballroom with various entrees representing the different cultures of the area. We met several Verizon reps and listened to Lowell McAdam speak briefly about the significance of the upcoming week.
After we left the dinner party, we went for a walk outside to explore the area and walk off some of what we had just eaten. After our walk, we went back to our hotel room for the evening. We were exhausted after being awake for 21 hours.
More next time,
Tim
Here are a few of the pictures we took so far here in Whistler, B.C. included are Whistler Mountain, Blackcomb Mountain, the memorial to Nodar the Georgian Luger, and a place we went shopping.