Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I am so incredibly thankful for all that I have - we are truly blessed in so many ways. Looking forward to a fantastic day spent with friends and family. May your Thanksgiving be just as wonderful!

Happy Anniversary Mom & Dad!

A Toast To 36 Years! 

Wishing you both happiness

as you look back

at all you have shared

during the past

and still more happiness

as you look to the years ahead!

Congratulations!

Love,

Us

1st day of the build ...

was very successful! Everyone was ready to go and the crew got an incredible amount of work accomplished. The bowl was the day's project. Tomorrow will be more of the bowl and the vert ramp. See pics below!

 

In approximately 12 hours,

there will be a GREAT deal of activity in this building! That's right people ... the build begins tomorrow! We might as well be waiting for Christmas morning here ... Bryan and his crew of guys are soooo ready to get this thing going! The bowl and vert ramp are the first to be built, although most of the "pieces" and transitions have already been cut. Now it's about putting it all together. The landlord's crew has been in the space all week with the electricians, plumbers, etc. working on the lighting, building out the bathrooms and office, putting up the pony walls, sprinkler systems, doors, etc. Haven't seen it yet, but am anxious to check it out tomorrow. I'll be sure and post pictures of all the hubbub.
I'm sure it will be quite the circus. :)

We got our boards in ... FINALLY ... here is the first batch of our shop boards ...

And here is what the "natural" board looks like up close with the trucks on it ...

Keep checking the website for construction pics as well.

Trying to keep our "fans" on the edge of their seats!

Bryan's 1st day

... of his new job. Ha! We had fun with this one today. As I assumed he would be, he was awake VERY early. Sleeping in for him was maybe 5? When I got up at 7:30, he had already been to the grocery store, gas station, brought Starbucks home, and was bored. Yes, bored. At any rate, he took Cam to school today, and actually has a full day of activities ahead of him. Thank god - I'm not sure I could handle him being here today. :) Friday morning, bright and early, is the first day of the build! In other news ... our first official co-sponsorship of a skate event is already scheduled. We've teamed up with some friends of ours to help out in a skate comptition they put on every year. Two of her boys skate, are sponsored, and receive an incredible amount of product throughout the year from contests, demos, give-aways, and simply because they are sponsored. The boys don't come close to using all of this stuff, so they "regift" it if you will and use the items as prizes in a skate contest. It's called SKATE-GIVING, and is put on the day after Thanksgiving. Tricks are judged, prizes are given out, and we are a part of it this year! We're donating some items from our park, and figured this would be a fantastic way to get the word out. In addition, for every canned food item brought, a raffle ticket is handed out to win prizes. This benefits one of the local charities in our area that serves the homeless and less fortunate. So it is a win-win for everyone. Very excited for this to happen! The website has also been updated a bit. Slowly but surely adding more information and tabs. Looking forward to adding pics of the build and soon ... people actually skating! :)

We had a busy weekend as expected, but it was great. Cam and I had a GREAT time at meeting my girlfriend Kerry and her kids for lunch, got a bit of Christmas shopping done, worked on the website, made some more appointments with people for the week, visited with some "snowbird" relatives, watched the Beaver Game (tape delayed - but that's okay because DAMN it was good! Go Beavs!), a little bit of housework was thrown in there, and that brougth us to the Cards game and dinner at Mike & Denise's. I need a weekend to recover from my weekend. :) Looking forward to a productive week and a great start to the beginning of SK8 ASYLUM. It's finally happening! Have a great week everyone!

The flier that was put together for the competition is shown below:

TGIF

I have been waiting to say that since Monday! How awful is that?!!! So our busy week has continued ... Cameron's report card for this quarter was just as fantastic as the last one ... All A's and B's and he made Honor Roll ... AGAIN! So proud of him. Bryan signed the papers to close on the route sale on Wednesday, and that is a DONE DEAL, PEOPLE! Technically he still works tomorrow, and has visits a few accounts on Sunday, but after that ... he is done with bread. Ummm ... and ... unemployed. VERY SCARY thought, a little unnerving at times, but we've got this! It will work and be successful. :) So the weekend brings even more activities related to the park: ordering lumber, coordinating build schedules with the contractors, ramp builder and their team of guys, finalizing some magazine ads, working on the details of our first co-sponsored skate competition (I'll post details on that soon ...), finish our online shopping and ordering from our supplier for the the items in the pro shop, pick up our shop decks and start handing out some freebies at various parks and so on and so forth. Somewhere in that mess Cam and I have a hot lunch date with my besty and her kids, a Beaver Game to watch and perhaps a little bit of Christmas shopping? Yikes! It's creeping up on me! Below are a couple of pics that were taken by a friend the other night. He's a great skater AND photographer!

Happy Veterans Day

Thank you to all of our service men and women and their families who have sacrificed their lives for our freedom. We are so very grateful for your service! God Bless you today and always!

Just one stamp is all it takes to help!

I read a post on a local message board this morning, and thought it was a great idea. Maybe some of you can participate - if you read this post in time. I double-checked this story with snopes.com, and it appears to be valid. Cameron and I put a couple of cards in the mail today, what a great opportunity to have a little chat about how truly blessed we are. A couple of links to read up on it if you'd like, are also attached at the bottom:

"Five year-old Noah Biorkman is in hospice and we need your help to make this the best Christmas ever by sending him Christmas cards! His family will be celebrating Christmas this weekend.

Noah was diagnosed with Stage IV Neuroblastoma in February 2007. He went into remission in August 2007. In September 2008, Noah relapsed with lesions in his right arm and right leg. After going through six different trials, the cancer continues to spread. Noah is an angel and we are blessed to have him in our lives.

Please help the fulfill the Biorkman family's wish to make this the best Christmas ever for Noah. You can send your Christmas cards to:"

Noah Biorkman
c/o Scott Biorkman
3480 Petoskey Way
Milford, MI 48380

It appears they don't expect Noah to make it through Christmas, thus the early Christmas celebration. Send a card and make this boy's Christmas!

99.5 WYCD - Detroit's Country

Snopes.com - Rumor Has It

Robin Williams' Plan

From an email I received today:

Robin Williams, wearing a shirt that says, "I love New York" in Arabic. You gotta love Robin Williams ... Even if he's nuts! Leave it to Robin Williams to come up with the perfect plan. What we need now is for our UN Ambassador to stand up and repeat this message.

Robin Williams' plan ... (Hard to argue with this logic!)

'I see a lot of people yelling for peace, but I have not heard of a plan for peace. So, here's one plan.'

'The US will apologize to the world for our 'interference' in their affairs, past & present. You know, Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Tojo, Noriega, Milosevic, Hussein, and the rest of those 'good 'ole' boys', we will never 'interfere' again.

We will withdraw our troops from all over the world, starting with Germany, South Korea , the Middle East, and the Philippines . They don't want us there.

We would station troops at our borders. No one allowed sneaking through holes in the fence.

All illegal aliens have 90 days to get their affairs together and leave. We'll give them a free trip home. After 90 days, the remainder will be gathered up and deported immediately, regardless of whom or where they are.

They're illegal!!!

France will welcome them.

All future visitors will be thoroughly checked and limited to 90 days, unless given a special permit!!!! No one from a terrorist nation will be allowed in.. If you don't like it there, change it yourself and don't hide here. Asylum would never be available to anyone. We don't need any more cab drivers or 7-11 cashiers.
No foreign 'students' over age 21. The older ones are the bombers. If they don't attend classes, they get a 'D' and it's back home baby.

The US will make a strong effort to become self-sufficient energy wise. This will include developing nonpolluting sources of energy but will require a temporary drilling of oil in the Alaskan wilderness. The caribou will have to cope for a while.
Offer Saudi Arabia and other oil producing countries $10 a barrel for their oil. If they don't like it, we go someplace else. They can go somewhere else to sell their production. (About a week of the wells filling up the storage sites would be enough.)

If there is a famine or other natural catastrophe in the world, we will not 'interfere.' They can pray to Allah or whomever, for seeds, rain, cement or whatever they need. Besides most of what we give them is stolen or given to the army. The people who need it most get very little, if anything. 

Ship the UN Headquarters to an isolated island someplace. We don't need the spies and fair weather friends here. Besides, the building would make a good homeless shelter or lockup for illegal aliens.

All Americans must go to charm and beauty school.. That way, no one can call us 'Ugly Americans' any longer.

The Language we speak is ENGLISH...

Learn it... or LEAVE...

Now, isn't that a winner of a plan?

'The Statue of Liberty is no longer saying 'Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.' She's got a baseball bat and she's yelling,

'You want a piece of me?'