Roaming The USA: July 14 through and August 17, 2015 - Lots of pictures! Our month in North Dakota

Where has the time gone! We visited family and friends, attended the 1st Ouren family reunion and drove around reminiscing and showing Myron and Karen the area. Karen's sister, Ronnie, joined us on the 8th of August. Loved being "home" again, even if it was for such a short time. The weather was absolutely beautiful - in the 70's and 80's most of the time and cooler at night. I took lots of pictures and will post a few below.

The skies in ND are sooooooo blue with such puffy white clouds.

We are in the middle of the Bakken oil formation. Oil wells everywhere. Between the Eagle Ford in Texas, the Bakken, and other oil fields, we could be 100% independent and export oil to pay off our national debt. Maybe the next administration. We stopped in Alexander, ND at the Oil Company Oil Can Event. Lots of good food and give-a-ways

Myron, Dennis, Karen and LaVerne (my brother-in-law) visiting

Had to take this picture for our Grandson, Alexander

On our way to NW North Dakota - my home stomping grounds.

Pictures of buildings and places that brought back lots of memories

Courthouse in Crosby, ND.

The church my Grandparents help build in the early 1900's. The church burned down in 1965 and another church moved in. Dennis and I were married at Glenwood Lutheran Church.

New church moved in to replace the original Glenwood LC that burned down.

One room school house that my Uncles and Aunts attended as well as myself and my brothers and sisters. The school closed in 1961 and everyone was transferred to the schools in town.

Attended the "Threshing Bee" in Crosby. This is held annually in a Pioneer Village where they have preserved the old churches, one room school houses, businesses of the day, etc. People come from everywhere to see the threshing machines, old tractors and demonstrations on how the pioneers and early farmers planted and harvested their crops and original buildings from the pioneer days. The first event is a parade of equipment old and new, antique cars, and lots of other items. I have only shared a few of the pictures. The parade lasted for over 2 hours due to the number of entries.

Crosby has developed a Pioneer village and preserved history by relocating one room schools, churches, businesses, homestead shacks, and other buildings. Some of them are shown below.

Isn't this ironic. Dennis was born and raised in Roseville, Mi. I was from Wildrose ND, and my Dad's replica of a High School is stored in this one-room school house named Roseville (see below). Oh ya, Dennis lived on Maryland street (close to Marion?). His birthday is 2 days before my mothers and mine was 2 days after my Dad's.

My Dad built this miniature replica of the Noonan High School, a school near here. It is located in the one room school house on display.

Our home town (Wildrose) newspaper was done weekly by individually placing each letter and number in plates and printing from the plates. Boy have we come a long way...........

One version of a claim shack. They raised families in these 12' by 14' shacks and survived harsh winters with up to 40 degrees below zero and blizzards. Were these tough/strong people or what!

Notice the newspaper on the walls.

Demonstrations of sawing logs into boards. Reminds me of the Waltons!

And here we are with the threshing of the wheat. took several men to make this work!

My brother and niece and grand niece and nephew enjoying the Threshing Bee

Lake Sakakawea - This was created by the Garrison Dam on the Missouri River. The Lewis and Clark Expedition went through North Dakota as they followed the Missouri River. Lake Sakakawea is 177 miles long wandering through western North Dakota.

A few pictures of our 1st Ouren Family Reunion. I don't have all the pictures posted as would be way too many...so below are a few of them. We all had a great time and are looking forward to the next one!