Family Fest

September 27, 2009

Today was “family fest” day at Scott’s house on Songbird Lane, which Jordan refers to as “Insane Lane.” It all came together very well. Lois and her two sons, Brad Cain[48] on the left and Scott Cain[58] on the right, were having a great time. The party started about one P.M. and lasted until about five. The food array included pork tenderloin, a fresh vegetable salad from Brad’s and Scott’s garden, Lois’ three-bean hot dish, and lois’ famous goulash.

Scott called at mid-morning from 90 miles away. He went to Charleston IL to watch EIU play UW-Milwaukee -- the first encounter for both teams. Co-Captain Chase Cain played the whole game with a broken right hand. She intended to come back with her Dad, but she had practice and homework which prevented her from doing so. Her cast goes from the mid-forearm down to her knuckles. She has a thumb and two fingers free. In spite of all that she made 12 tackles in the game. EIU won the game 28 - 27, by making a three-point field goal at the end of the game. UW dominated, but EIU took it away in the final seconds of the game. Scott described it as “an ugly win. but the 18th consecutive win for EIU.”

Brad brought a bunch of tomatoes, brussel sprouts, green peppers, squash and onions from his garden.They really looked good. Bradley, his son, decided not to come and we don’t blame him because we have seen him maybe four times in the last 13 years.

Jordon and Trey showed up and we had a nice visit. Jordon works for a group of doctors at Rockford Clinic, She is particularly well suited to deal with patients on the phone and recently she was named “employee of the month” at Rockford Clinic.

Laura and Steve called while the family fest was going on. We passed the phone around and they got to talk to everyone. This has been the best family get together in years, Lois concluded. Whatever issues people have were left at home and that made everything that much more pleasant.

Lo 'n Pat

September 25, 2009

We spent most of the day with Pat Scadden at her home, for lunch and for dinner. Lois and Pat go back 60 years. Lois was 20 when she met Pat at Cable Printing Co. in Mt. Morris and Pat was then 18. Over the years these two have spent a lot of time together. Lois’ family used to spend the holidays together with Pat and Bill Scadden, who passed away over four years ago.

It was fun to get together again. The two ladies seem to have picked up where they left off. Pat lives in the same beautiful house which they built 23 years ago. She showed us the two beautiful bathrooms she just had remodelled. HDTV is Pat’s favorite TV channel and house redecorating is her favorite hobby. She told us of the plans she has to redo the floors in the main part of the house and to replace the furniture which she now has.

Another important part of Pat’s life is Swedish American Hospital. She just completed working there most of the summer. She retired from there after more than 30 years of service. She gets called back to fill in for vacations or to fill a vacancy while a new hire is being interviewed. Pat told us how much she enjoys working there.

We went to lunch at Garrett’s on Bell School Road, which is part of the Golf Shack. The food is excellent there and we all had something different. For dinner we went to a fish dinner at the Hoffman House, a place we have not visited in years. We had enough left over for fish sandwiches so we asked for a take-out box.

Three Generations

September 26, 2009

Lois has two Bradleys. The one on the right is her son, Brad, age 48. The one on the left is her grandson, Bradley, age 15, and a Jr. Tackle member of the Oregon Hawks. The Oregon Hawks played the Morrison Colts at Morrison IL this morning and got blown away 26 - 8. Bradley and his friend thought the refs did a bad job but we could plainly see the Morrison team was much bigger than the Oregon boys who played well.

Thanks to Scott’s generosity, we used his car to drive the 82 miles to Morrison. We left at eight A.M. and got there by 9:30 A.M. The game started at ten. Jr. Tackle has nine-minute quarters and uses the two-point conversion, because the kickers haven’t had the experience to be accurate about the point after between the goal posts. Brad explained the game to us as we watched. This was the first time in 40 years that Lois observed a school game since Scott played at Rock Valley College. [Brad was a fine baseball player, but never played school football.]

Morrison got four touchdowns (24) one two-point conversion. The first two touchdowns were in the early minutes of the first quarter. They came into this game at 4 - 2 for the season and now are 5 - 2. Oregon answered in the second quarter with a touchdown and a two-point conversion. They came into the game at 5 - 1 and now are also 5 - 2.

Bradley’s name was mentioned several times during the game for making tackles. He was also on the receiving end of kickoffs for the first time this season. He played on the line for both offense and defense and, except for a minute or two, played the whole game.

It was good to visit with these two Bradleys -- a father-son team who live together in Pop and Gram’s old house. For the last year or so these two have worked out a good routine in their daily living which allows them both to spend lots of time together.

Locals dominate on rugby field

Chase Cain (Dean's List) and Grandma Lois; this photo did not appear in the newspaper.

September 23, 2009

Jay Taft of the Rockford Register Star covers college sports for the newspaper and today he wrote this following item in his daily column:

Led by Chase Cain (Jefferson), the Eastern Illinois women’s rugby team extended its winning streak to 19 games by opening 3 - 0 with a trio of blowout victories.

Cain leads the team with 37 tackles and she set a school record with five steals (similar to a fumble recovery) during the team’s 61 - 5 win over Iowa State on Saturday. EIU has also knocked off Ball State 90 - 0 and Grand Valley State 35 - 0 this season.

Emily Harrison (Jefferson), with an assist, four tackles and a steal on the year, also has an important role on the team as the starting lock.

Top Cat Chase Cain, senior rugby player

September 23, 2009

The photo of Lois’ granddaughter, Chase Cain, was taken from the Eastern Illinois University student newspaper, September 10th edition. The following article by Neil Schneider, staff reporter is quoted verbatim as follows:

The Eastern rugby team defeated Ball State 90 - 0 on Sept. 5.

The score indicated the Eastern offense was putting up strong numbers, but it was also an impressive day for senior Chase Cain and the rest of the team’s defense.

Cain finished the game against Ball State with a career-high 19 solo tackles, which ranks her third on the all-time Eastern single-game tackling mark for rugby.

Cain also ranks second, behind teammate Stephanie Militello, for all-time tackling leader for the program.

Head coach Frank Graziano believes Cain’s fitness is a strong reason why she is able to tackle so effectively.

Half of the battle of being a good tackler is the ability to get around the field and get to the ball as soon as possible,” Graziano said. “There are prbably girls on the team that have a better technique of tackling than Chase, but they do not have the fitness or the desire to tackle as she does. Half of (Cain’s) tackling is having the desire to go in and make the tackle.”

Cain’s teammate, junior flanker Tiffany Kennedy, said Cain’s endurance and knowledge of the game helped her develop into a strong contributor for the team.

“Her defense is probably untouchable when it comes to this team,” Kennedy said. “Her tackling and experience of defending certain situations has really helped her develop her game.”

Despite the high praise by teammates and coaches alike, Cain actually didn’t come to Eastern to play rugby. She came to swim. It wasn’t until she realized she could do both at the same time that she finallhy took up an interest in rugby.

“It wasn’t until I spoke with (senior center) Ashley Jenkins that I realized that I could play both sports.” Cain said.
“Since rugby is more of a team sport, I kind of decided to pursue it further as opposed to going forward with swimming.”

Cain, a flanker, credited the Eastern coaching staff for her quick introduction and development in the game of rugby.

“(Graziano) really knows the game of rugby and that has allowed the team to advance and develop much quicker,” Cain said. “Coach teaches methods that aren’t used by many other teams, which puts us ahead of a lot of other teams. Most teams don’t even know, or have ever seen, the passing techniques that we have developed and applied to our game.”

Even though the rugby team opened the season with a win, Cain said she would like to see the momentum continue. The rugby team currently has a winning streak of 17 games.

“We want to go undefeated again and we want to continue with our streak of consecutive wins,” Cain said. “We would also like to put up as many shut outs as possible this season.”

Chase Cain BIO: From Cherry Valley, High School: Rockford Jefferson Major: Psychology and Family Consumer Services 2008: Co-Captain, Co-Outstanding Defense Award, Then-career best 15 tackles vs. Kansas, Three double-digit tackle games.

Jean 'n Rich

(Right) Lucas Simons, younger son of Steve & Carrie (pictured with Lucas) is a sophomore at UW Seattle; he towers over his mom quite a bit.


Jean & Rich Simons

September 20, 2009

In the morning we drove from West Salem WI to Fond du Lac WI to meet with Jean and Rich Simons. We got off I-94 at Mauston and took a state highway (#23) east to Fond du Lac to meet at a sports bar, called The Back Door. There we had lunch together while the Green Bay Packers tried to win over the Cincinnati Bengals, to no avail.

In a week, Jean will have hip surgery at Sheboygan Memorial Hospital. She was walking with a cane and it was obvious that she was in pain. She is ready for this, but a little anxious because this is the first surgery she has had since a tonselectomy as a child. Jean said that her doctor told her he doesn’t see how she can walk at all on that hip joint.

We had a good visit at the restaurant, catching up on family news. It has been three years since we last visited. The plan was to go to the cottage on Lake Winnebago where Steve and Carrie of Maple Valley WA were vacationing with their sons -- Wes and Lucas, a sophomore at UW in Seattle. Steve has been at Boeing for 25 years. Carrie still works as a nurse in a Seattle-area hospital. Also visiting later was Amy and BJ from West Bend WI and their two sons -- Zack(age 14) and Josh(age 11). Zack is now taller than his mom, Amy. Amy, a math teacher, is looking real good; she runs four miles a day.

Steve and Carrie and their sons were at a family party in Hartford WI for the afternoon. One of Carrie’s brothers and his wife had adopted two Ethiopian boys (ages 3 & 5) and the party was to welcome them into the family. To mark the occasion, Ethiopian food was prepared and served with a flat bread. Ethiopeans use no utensils and mop up the various sauces and meat dishes with the bread. Steve described the meal very well and we could therefore enjoy it vicariously.

There was room to park the RV at the lake property so everything was very convenient. It rained all night, bringing down the acorns and hickory nuts with the rain drops. That made things interesting at times during the night.

Visiting Jerry Schmidt

September 15 - 18, 2009

We arrived at the farm near St. Peter MN about 10:30 a.m. on Tuesday and got right into the visiting for a few hours. Jerry was ready for us because, for the next three out of four days we played bridge for hours on end. The fourth in this endeavor was Ann Rohlfing, who is Kathleen Schmidt’s mom. Both Jerry and Ann play bridge often so we had a wonderful time at cards.

On Tuesday afternoon we played 72 hands of bridge. Lois had the most points but the point spread was very close. Here is the tally: Lois 4,110, George 4090, Jerry 4070 and Ann 3,150.

On Wednesday afternoon we played another 72 hands of bridge and the men took over: George 6,330, Jerry 5,470, Ann 4,860 and Lois 2,700.

On Friday, the ladies took over: Ann 7,390, Lois 5,680, Jerry 5,030 and George 1,910. Ann had a spectacular afternoon of cards. For the three days Ann totalled 15,400, Jerry 14,570, Lois 12,490 and George 12,330.

Each of these bridge parties was followed up with cocktails and dinner. Greg and Kathy came out Tuesday and Friday night and had dinner with us. They were loads of fun. Paul and Kim came to visit and we enjoyed that a lot.

The Penning’s were out Thursday evening for dinner. Daughter Amanda and Hayden (age 6) and Marina (age 4) added a lot of excitement to the evening. We had a special treat on Friday when Adam Schmidt and his girlfriend, Amy, came to visit and learn a little about bridge. Since Adam is Ann’s grandson, it was all a big, happy family.