At Scout camp

Hi everyone,

We are all camping at our Boy Scout camp. We have been away from the internet all week, but we now have access. I will be loading pictures for you.

This past week, Nicholas, Joshua, and Samuel were at camp Tesomas, The boy scout camp. The rest of us were at the nearby family camp. Brian and Andrew are now at Akela's world, the cub scout camp.

Brian and Charlotte will switch, each will spend two nights at Andrew's camp.

We have had a blast. We have done rock climbing and have ridden a zip line. The zip line here is mounted to a 60 foot tower and descends down a 437 foot cable. Andrew and everyone older has done the zip line. Brian did the repel rope down the 60 feet.

It was a awesome time, we spent one and a half weeks. The weather was great. The camp programs and facilies are great as well. Activities included watersports, archery, educational, science, camping, hiking and so much more.

We used some spare time to dismantle and repaint Ethan's bike. We celebrated his birthday at camp. Nicholas has turned 17 and Ethan has turned 6. Joshua will turn 15 this week and Andrew will turn 10 in August.

Brian led worship for the whole Cub Scout camp chapel 3 nights.

We are back home and we will update you soon on all that is going on here.

In Christ

The Haines Family

Colby Cheese Days

Hi everyone,

In addition to everything being super crazy like usual, we had a storm this past Thursday. We had a lightning strike in our neighborhood which took out our internet, our phone line, a T.V. , a radio, and some items from our neighbors. We also had 1.75 inch hail which was wind driven and damaged roofs, siding, and broke windows all over our city. We have also had much heavy rain.

Last weekend was Colby Cheese Days. We had a visit from Peggy and Michael. They were home from CA. We were involved in the regular fundraisers from our church and scouts.

We had a serious house fire in our neighborhood on Sat evening. The Hanson's home a block south of us was seriously gutted by fire. We housed three people Sat. evening as a result of the situation.

Brian led worship on Sunday morning. Joshua and Samuel played in the band as they have been most weeks recently.

Samuel and Joshua have traveled with Pastor Will and Ricardo to lead worship at a youth camp near Superior for the week.

Brian finished the bathroom in Unity. He is on some roof projects again this week.

Rosa and Ethan both had a bout of a fever. They both recovered well. It caused a couple of hard nights.

Next week we will all be going to the Boy scout camp. We will all camp. Those of us who are not scouts will use our R.V.

Sorry for being out of touch, we have not had internet access.

In Christ,

The Haines family

July 4th weekend

Hi everyone,

It is our favorite week of the year. It is the July 4th weekend and our 22nd anniversary.

We spent the first part of the week on the usual busy tasks. Brian finished Laura's bathroom.
He also installed a new commercial door at a Medford car wash. The pictures show the before and after pictured of both projects.
This week Brian will start another full bathroom remodel.

The boys have spent a lot of time with neighbor kids.

We decided to have a bit of fun with the 4th of July and our anniversary. On Friday, Brian came home early from work and we headed to Medford's Mill Pond park with our R. V. If you have never been there, you should check it out, it is a very nice park, and close to home. We rented a campsite and were joined by Charlotte's parents, Becky, and Nathan and Amanda. We enjoyed a nice meal together, fireworks and fellowship.

On Saturday, our family stayed at the camp. We enjoyed a 15 mile bike ride together. Nicholas and Joshua are earning a merit badge for Boy Scouts in bicycling. Even Ethan (age 5) enjoyed the 15 mile ride. It was a very good time. We relaxed and enjoyed the playground and had our meal in the camper.

Sunday morning was busy, Brian led worship, Joshua played drums and Samuel played bass. It was a blessing to lead the congregation in worship.

On Sunday afternoon, We headed to Eau Claire. This would be our first weekend away from the children without a babysitter in 16 years. The kids did great. We made numerous phone calls to them.

We spent a few hours at the Oakwood mall. It was a refreshing time of being alone together.

We packed for and considered camping in tents, but we decided on getting a room. We stayed in Eau Claire. On Monday, we headed to Menomonee planning on tubing the river, but the weather was not very promising.

Instead of going out on the river, we were able to enjoy downtown Menomonee, taking in some shopping, touring the Mabel Tainter theatre, driving a rustic road, touring a natural site called the Devil's Punchbowl and having a nice lunch at a local cafe.

If you have never visited the Mabel Tainter theatre, you should, it is an awesome historic site and the self guided tour cost a whopping 1$.

Thanks for vistiting our blog.

In Christ,

The Haines family

Swimming pool

Hi everyone,

It has been a busy and productive week. We are all busy with the normal activities.

Andrew, Samuel and Ethan had summer school all week. They are now finished.

Last Sunday, we had a suprise 50th birthday for Kevin at Kevin and Sandy's house. It was a total suprise to him. It was a good time.

Charlotte put a lot of energy this week into attempting to get a women's fitness gym back in Colby. We lost our ColbyCurves recently due to a personal bankruptcy.
We have some ideas about restoring a gym, but need some help from others. We are not willing to take it on alone.

In faith, we set up our swimming pool in our yard. It is a 15 foot inflatable. It is only the second time we set up this pool. We did not use it last year as we arrived home from Mississippi on July 3. The weather is a bit cool, we will need warmer weather to use it.

We are starting to enjoy vegetables from our garden.

Joshua and Brian played in the worship band today. Nicholas did the sound. We filled the entire soundboard today. (and the stage too.) We had on vocals Ricardo, Junior, Sarah, Lori, Amanda A, David and Brian.
Duane played keys, Brian on guitar, David on guitar, Joshua on drums, and Ricardo on bass.

Pastor Will moved to Abby this Friday. It will be nice to have them here now.
Our hispanic pastor, pastor John preached in the main service.

Today we will be joining the church for a backyard BBQ at Ken and Dawn's.

Brian is nearing completion of a bathroom remodel here in Colby. It is a custom porcelain tile project. It will be beautiful.

Thank you for checking in, may God richly bless you according to His riches in glory!

In Christ
The Haines family

Summer school

Hi everyone,

It has been a busy week.

First, we had a family funeral for Charlotte's aunt Genny. It was Thursday at Believer's Church. It was there in recent years that she and her husband Kenny were discipled and served. Many attended and she will be missed by all that were close to her.

We all know she is in a better place. We are confident in her faith in Jesus.

The kids were all involved in the public school summer school program. Nicholas took the tractor safety course and after being certified, we let him run a riding mower for one of our lawns.

Samuel took archery, summer sports, karate, and archery.

Andrew is in soccer 1, Hola Mexico, and karate.

Ethan is in introduction to kindergarden.

Joshua was at Akela's world scout camp at Rhinelander for North Woods Challenge, which is a program desingned to teach scouts to be leaders. It is a challenging week, a very good program.

Charlotte and Rosa got to have quiet time together each morning. Wow a quiet house!!

Brian found himself with less help, but completed the Marshfield roof, and did a partial Colby roof.

We have lots of good work, for this we are very thankful. This week we will be doing a complete bathroom remodel in Colby featuring a custom tile shower and replacing a car wash door in Medford.

We had usual practices for the worship band on Tuesday and Thursday. The worship band was good this week. We will change it up next week. Ricardo will play bass instead of Samuel. Duane will play keyboard.

Our Colby children's pastor Aimee will be stepping down in July and returning to Marshfield to help her husband Preston with the children at the Marshfield church. When she was hired, the plan was to help at Colby until a pastor family was hired here. We will miss Aimee here, she has been a big blessing.

Jen will now head up the childrens church.

This week will still be summer school for Ethan, Andrew and Samuel.

On Saturday, two scouts from the troop, Colton and Corwin, were presented with the highest scout award, the eagle. The eagle award requires the earning of many merit badges, and community service. Only 2 percent of scouts earn this award. We are blessed that our kids have good friends surrounding them.

Thanks for checking in, have a great week.

In Christ,

The Haines family

The Amazing Family Race and Aunt Genny

Hi everyone,

We have had a busy, productive and fun week.

We also have had a sad week. Charlotte's aunt Genny has been in poor health for a long time.

She has been on dialasis for 4 years. She was also recently diagnosed with rapidly progressing lung cancer. The cancer would have caused her a painful and agonizing death in the next month or two so she and the family agreed that it would be best to stop the dialasis treatments. This option would cause her to fall asleep and pass. Her last treatment was on Wed. She passed this afternoon at her home. Charlotte is with her family as I (Brian) update this blog.

Brian and the boys spent the week on a roof project in Marshfield this week. It has gone very well except for some bad weather. We will finish about Tuesday.

Joshua will be at Camp Akela's World in Rhinelander, WI, this week for leadership training for the Boy Scouts. Nicholas will be at a Tractor driving class this week. The other boys will be at summer school at the Colby school learning many interesting skills.

Our church partnered with our parent church for an outreach called the Amazing Family Race. It was like the T.V. program. It was a very well planned and fun family outreach. Our family wound up winning the first place trophy on Friday night. We also won 4 passes to The Cedar Creek lodge waterpark!!

We placed 6th on Saturday. We would invite you all to join us next summer for the event. It was a lot of fun. Nice trophy...

We spent the afternoon at a Haines Family Reunion. It was a very nice time. We met at a hall in Granton.

"Bob" loves to entertain the children with his abilities of fun....

Family member "Bob" and his yo-yo tricks...

Brian's brother, on the left, Kenny and other family

Brian's Father on the right with family.

Brian and Samuel played in the worship band on Sunday. It went very well.

We will keep in touch. Thank you for looking at our blog. God bless you!!

In Christ

The Haines Family