Easter was enjoyed by all of us this year. As usual, the Easter Bunny made a visit to our house and left a large supply of Easter eggs strewn across the front yard. In addition to the eggs, he left lots of good stuff in an Easter basket. The Easter Bunny has good taste in books. “Don’t Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late!” by Mo Willems was a great pick.

Samantha’s cousin John and his wife had the whole family over for an Easter luncheon. Amazingly enough, the Easter Bunny visited their house as well. This meant many more eggs for Peter. I suspect he will be eating Easter candy for a long time. We took lots of pictures of the “Egg Retrieval Process”.

 We visited the Gulf Coast of Alabama this spring for a week in March. We stayed in the Mobile Bay area. Samantha’s family rented a beach house on Dauphin Island just outside the bay. The tiny island has a history going back 300 years. At one point it was the capitol of the Louisiana Territory, which covered nearly two thirds of the United States.

The west end of the island was damaged by Hurricane Ivan and then pretty well destroyed by Hurricane Katrina, but the east end of the island where we were staying was hardly touched. Our end of the island was pretty sleepy, but the damaged west end experienced a traffic jam of contractors each weekday as they rebuilt the multi-million dollar beach houses.

It was a relaxing week spent walking along the beach, eating good food, visiting with family, and sightseeing along the coast. We put a about 1000 miles on our rental car during the week, so there I guess there was quite a bit of sightseeing.

Samantha’s dad has spent a lot of time over the last year working in both Biloxi and New Orleans. We spent some time in both cities during our trip.

The damage in Biloxi from Hurricane Katrina was dramatic, as the full force of the storm sat over the city for many hours. There are whole areas of the city that were wiped off the map, with only foundations left standing.

The damage in New Orleans seemed more widespread, partially because the population base was so much larger. You can drive for mile after mile through New Orleans and it looks like a ghost town. In many areas everything is still standing, even the cars parked in front of apartment buildings and homes, but you don’t see any people. Everything you can in every direction is uninhabitable.

The difference between the areas of New Orleans that flooded and the area that didn’t are striking. The areas that weren’t flooded are filled with people and commerce and look as nothing has happened.

We finished our afternoon in New Orleans with a walk through the French Quarter. This was the only area of New Orleans where I felt comfortable taking any pictures.

On our trip to Alabama, we visited the Gulf Coast Zoo in Gulf Shores, Alabama. This is a little zoo with about 300 animals. It was a great place to visit with a little boy who likes animals.

The zoo had only recently reopened after having been closed for 18 months due to hurricane damage. The zoo took the brunt of by three hurricane strikes over the course of 14 months. Each time they were close to finishing reconstruction, they were hit by another hurricane. The zoo staff had to evacuate all of the animals to higher ground each time.

The zoo has been the focus of a television series on the channel Animal Planet entitled “The Little Zoo That Could“. The series chronicles the zoo’s efforts to rebuild after the hurricane damage.

My understanding is that the zoo’s long-term plans are to relocate to higher ground.

Peter was the Boy Wizard this Halloween. I have only praise for J.K. Rowling for creating a such a wonderful series of books. She has not only encouraged a whole generation of kids to excitedly read complex plot-driven novels, but she has made the the whole British “boarding-school” look cool for Halloween.

There was little question what costume Peter was going to wear this year.

Once again this year, Santa and his elves happened to stop by Peter’s grandparents house right while Peter and his cousin were decorating the Christmas tree. Talk about being in the right place at the right time!

The elves were a little bit rough around the edges, but you would be too, if you had spent the last eleven months making toys for kids. The days before Christmas are a really busy time for Santa and his elves, as you could tell from the fact that several of the elves needed a shave.

Santa and Elves Shifty, Dicey, Studly, and Flasher along with “reindog” Rudolph made a visit to Peter’s grandparent’s house last year. These are very lucky grandchildren to have received personal Santa visits two years in a row. This year the boys had wrapped a present for Santa and carrots for Rudolph just in case they stopped by.

See our Santa 2004 photo album to view more pictures from the big event, or see last year’s Christmas 2003 photo album for last years Santa encounter.

In case anyone would like to see, here are the photos Peter took at the Heine family Christmas party this year. Peter started using the digital camera as soon as he arrived and continued to shoot pictures all night long.

These pictures are the party as seen through the eyes of a pre-schooler. I know I am a proud daddy, but I do have to say these pictures are pretty cool. Peter is very proud of them.

Between visits with grandparents and parents, Peter visited the Minnesota State Fair three times this year. We figure he was there for at least 29 hours over the three visits.

The animals and barns were a big hit, so were the huge pretzels and the kiddie rides. Peter rode his first roller coaster. He declared the ride “bumpy”. Photos of our trips to the State Fair are available in our photo gallery.

This picture is of myself and Peter admiring the “Mars Rover Rover” snoopy doghouse stature at the Fair. It was created by Dave Brynestad & Go East and sponsored by Met Life Auto & Home. This was one of many snoopy doghouse statues on display at the fair.

The Snoopy doghouse statues were part of Saint Paul’s Doghouse Days of Summer celebration. There were 104 Snoopy doghouse statues scattered around Saint Paul this summer, each designed and created by different local artists.

We spent a wonderful summer afternoon having a picnic at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum in August. This was one of those “found” days where we had an unexpected free Saturday. We spread out on top of a hill overlooking an apple orchard. This was a great way to enjoy a beautiful summer afternoon. I’ve added a few pictures of the afternoon to the website.

The Landscape Arboretum was running their Totally Terrific Treehouses exhibit. They had set up 12 one-of-a-kind treehouses around the grounds of the Arboretum. Each was designed by different artists and architects. Kids were able to climb around in and on the treehouses.

For more information about the Arboretum, visit www.arboretum.umn.edu.

We celebrated Elaine’s birthday at Kafe 421 early in July. Elaine celebrated with her mother, husband, her sons and their wives, and her three grandchildren.

Kafe 421 is a wonderful bistro in Dinkytown that serves a fusion of Greek and Russian food. I’ve added photos of the Elaine’s birthday to the website.

To learn more about Kafe 421, read Jeremy Iggers’ review from the StarTribune or visit www.kafe421.com.