September 2016

September ranks up with February as one of the best months of the year. The weather is generally pleasant and the tail end of the month sees the peak of fall colors around here. Although we had a lot of rainy days, there were some gorgeous "textbook September" days. 

Late September also is the opening for duck hunting. We went out a few weeks early to the location we duck hunt to fix up the blind.

Jens was pretty stoked this year as we invested in some new decoys and general forecast of a good duck population including a big jump in wood ducks.

Getting decoys ready to set up later.

Canoe fully loaded.

September was a very busy month starting off with the bike race weekend and than a handful of wedding weekends. Pan frying walleye Friday night as Jonell whips up some home made chocolate sauce.

The Detroit Lakes home cc meet held at the executive golf course south of town. Seems like the first meet where run in to a lot of skiers, especially now that Moorhead has a cc team. Gets a person excited for winter. Jack in the middle of the pack somewhere.

September is also the NAHL showcase. This was the fourth time Jon participated. This time with the Austin Bruins. They played four games in four days. Jonell went down to catch the first two games and I tagged off to catch the second to. Jon scored his first goal with the Bruins and was very happy to be there to see it. Jon was in Sioux Falls the weekend before but released on Monday. That afternoon packed up the bags than over to Austin. Two practices with the Bruins than did the showcase. He will play with them the rest of the season, barring any trades etc. Junior Hockey world is a grind and never know what to expect. You make it through and floating near the top, things will happen later.

The showcase features a ton of college coaches, scouts etc. and a great opportunity for players to showcase their skills and get some looks.

The team went back and forth from Austin and I went down after the first game I watched since they played early to visit with Jon. I went to go check out the hs mtb trail before he got home but unfortunately it was under water.

Speaking of water, we had some beautiful mornings with incredible scenes.

Jonell making flower arrangements. Continues to amaze me with her grace and compassion and efficiency. Puts on over 10 miles a day a wedding weekend, about 2 more than me!

Duck hunting opener Jens got out with his two buddies. They hunted hard and saw a good number of ducks and able to harvest a handful. All the ducks we clean and eat. Some during the week and save as many as allowed for Thanksgiving. As forecasted, the wood ducks were plentiful and probably one of the better weekends for us seeing wood ducks.

Sunday's harvest.

I went out Monday morning, the wind was perfect and a bit too nice for duck hunting but for me, this is what is all about.

We took out cousin Peter who hadn't been out duck hunting before. The ducks weren't coming in but we had some good flight action and at the end a nice flock of geese decoyed in that was fun to watch.

Jack running at Fergus Falls meet, having one of his better races of the year. The team is deep, strong and will be exciting to see the end of the season play out.

 September can be some of the best mountain biking of the year and this month did not disappoint. The track is always buffed, fast and firm from bike race weekend and the colors in the woods almost make it surreal.

Rainbow before the rain. Can't ever recall a scene like this when the morning sun was lighting up the tree tops as a front moved in from the west. There were some amazing colors for about a half hour. Lucky to watch it unfold in 15 minutes.