Time Flies When You're Havin' Fun

Seems like just yesterday we were in our North Minneapolis home with the Oakley's and the Kilanowski's living a short distance away. The days of late night canasta games, house parties and fun nights at the local bars are long gone, but the memories... Oh, the memories... There isn't a time when we get together with our long-time friends where there isn't a familiar story that is told about those days. And they never cease to make us laugh. Whether it be Pete walking in on Michelle while she's giving birth to Julia, or John's trip to the ER after a fall that broke his ribs where Pete picked him up at the door to be the designated driver for the night, the Halloween parties (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles still ROCK), or Jeannie's crazy cat, Kitty, attacking John's feet as we walk in the door of their home. Each and every one of those stories holds a very special place in our hearts. Our kids were born in those homes and we spent our first years getting together at least once a week to hang out, have a backyard bbq, spaghetti dinner and play cards.

Now our kids are all grown up. Jake, the first one born to our family, has graduated and is going off to college at the University of Iowa. Julia and Stephi graduate next year and Kaitlin will be the class of 2012. The kids may be busy with their own lives, but every time we have the opportunity to get together they act like siblings and pick up right where they left off.

We have watched these kids grow up to be fabulous young adults. We have been so very blessed to be a part of each others' lives for this long and hope that we are part of each others' memories for many years to come.

Music Videos

Check out the new music video site to the left.

Back to State, Again

We cannot believe that another year of club soccer has gone by. Seems as though we just wrote the blog a month or so ago saying that "The Girls Heads Back to State" for last years season. Looking back at the blog though and it was one year ago today.

This year the girls had a very good season. They ended the regular season with 5 wins, 1 loss and 4 ties. But they took home the championship in the two tournaments they were in.

New this year, the girls played in the Schwans USA Cup. It was a great experience for all. They had a lot of fun and met players from countries all over the world including Sweden, Haiti, Mexico, Costa Rica, Iceland. During our game against Lake Simcoe, Canada, Stephanie had a head on head collision with one of the Canadian players and they both ended up getting stiches. We do have the broadcast video and are in the process of getting it on the blog. Stephanie and Kelsey (the canadian player pictured on the right) are now facebook friends.

The girls went into districts this year the number one seed. They played the Minnesota Thunder Acamedy in Game 1 and with both Julia and Stephanie each scoring a goal, they won 3-0. In game two the girls played Monticello and again Julia and Stephanie each scored a goal and the game ended up going into overtime tied 2-2. Julia, Stephanie and Racquel(Ducky) scored while Dani was able to stop 3 of Monticellos shots and we won 3-2 in the shootout sending the team back to the State Tournament for the fifth year in a row.

Date Night!!!!!

Big night at the Dovolos household! Julia had a date with Josh and Stephi went to the Shakopee High School Prom with Joey. Both got all dolled up for the occasion.

Early morning mom treated the girls and 2 of their friends to a mani/pedi at the local nail salon. Its always fun to get pampered once in a while. And those soccer player feet needed it!

After we left the nail salon the girls rushed to shower so they could get to Missy's house so Julia could do their makeup and Stephi could get her hair done. 2 hours later.... we finally made it back home only to have Josh show up minutes later. Needless to say, Julia wasn't even close to being ready. Thank goodness she's a natural beauty. ;-) She changed into her dress, pinned her hair back, brushed her teeth and was out the door in less than 10 minutes.

Stephi, on the other hand, took MUCH longer to get ready. Between the nails, hair, makeup, lotion, shimmer spray, etc... it was an all day affair. It was all worth it though. She looked like a movie star. Joey was in awe when he walked in the door and saw her.

They rushed to meet their friends for group photos and were off for an evening in their "time-machine" party bus, dinner and the dance.

After the dance ended a group came to our house and hung out. They got good use out of that new ping-pong table. The last of them left at 5:15 a.m..... Yes, it says "a.m.". Yet, both girls woke up with a smile at 9:30 and happily went out to brunch for Mother's Day. However, I think we'll ALL be needing a nap later.

White Christmas

And some thought we weren't going to get any snow before Christmas... ha, were they wrong!

The storm started Christmas Eve making travel to Lynn's house for the Luhring Christmas a little more adventurous. When we called to tell them we were going to be a little late we were told that all but 4 of the pickle roll-ups were gone. Since those were specifically requested by Julia and Stephi, they were pretty upset. Of course, that was just my family's warped sense of humor... We got there and there was a whole tray of them. We enjoyed time with Michelle's brothers and sister and their families, which is a rare occurrence, and ate way too much. By the time we left, the roads were pretty quiet, but we were thankful we had the Durango and 4 wheel drive to get us home safely.

By Christmas morning we had over 14 back-breaking inches. In good spirits John and our neighbor shoveled everyone's ,which made for a very late start to the day.

Regardless of the weather, all of the family made it safely to our house. We were even fortunate to have Grandma Molkenbur join us this year. The ham was in the slow cooker and the potatoes in the oven. John and Jeff took their usual spots in the garage minding the turkey in the deep fryer and enjoying a cold beer, while MaryAnn and Michelle enjoyed some warm Christmas wine inside. As usual George, Sarah and Tony made it just in time for dinner.

After we all sufficiently stuffed ourselves and enjoyed the gift opening we sent the kids outside to make a snowman. Stephi took control and started rolling, while the rest of them broke out into a big snowball fight. As John was out snapping pictures Tony thought he was going to be funny and chuck a big snow ball at him. John knew he had nowhere to run so he put down the camera, kicked off his slip-on shoes and ran after Tony (in stocking feet) to tackle him in the snowbank! Wish we could have gotten that on video!

It was an enjoyable Christmas, and as we reflect on the past year we are very thankful for the wonderful friends and family that we have.

Another Year of Saber Soccer Gone By

Another year of Varsity soccer has passed. Its almost painful to think that they will only have one more year left. As we look back on the season there were a couple of noteable moments. Of course, there's the 1-0 win over Holy Angels in overtime(the first win over Holy Angels in Saber history!). Then there's Julia's helicopter spin move after being demolished on the field by a Northfield attacker (its amazing she came out of that unscathed).


Overall, the season was a success over the previous year with a record of 8-8-2. Both Julia and Steph were forced to move into new defense positions due to injury and the coach's lack of confidence in some of the other players. Thanks to Julia playing right defense and Stephi playing left defense, the number of shots on goal was cut in half from the previous year and our goalie was ranked in state for having one of the highest number of shutouts and lowest number of goals allowed.


Their hard work payed off. At the annual banquet Julia received the Riggs Award for her toughness and was named one of the Team Captains for the 2010 season, and Stephi received the All Conference Award.

Hoping for a succesful 2010 season...Go Sabers!

Pumpkin Pie Anyone?

Ok... so we've had the pumpkins for a couple of weeks now. We we were lucky to have actually gotten them carved before Halloween arrived. After a nice family dinner Dad, not wanting anything to do with the festivities, disappeared in the basement to watch tv while mom, Julia and Steph carefully picked out our patterns and began the disgustingly fun task of gutting, tracing and carving our pumpkins.

Stephi picked the easiest pattern (hers is pictured in the middle) and was done in no time... Mom (right pumpkin) and Julia (left pumpkin), on the other hand, decided to be a little more daring and go for the patterns labeled "challenging". Mom was next to be done and Julia, who nearly quit because she was so frustrated, finished last. Regardless of the time and effort it took to complete, it was fun to see the finished product. Those carving kits make for some pretty cool end results.