Tomac Bikes open house

These posts are a few days late...as usual. We had a Tomac Bikes open house at Cycleworks the local shop that carries our bikes. We had great weather considering the rainy week we had. And thanks again of course to our family who stopped by to support us. It was a fun event and a good turnout. The photo credit goes to my mom who took most of the pictures.

Joel is giving Mandy and Bob the rundown on one of the bikes. This display is part of the Interbike trade show booth display that Clarke built.

Mandy and Jeremy are listening as Joel raffles off goodies and gives a speech about Tomac Bikes

Mandy and Bob

Chris (the owner of the shop) and Joel standing with the guy who won a bike in the raffle.

Yeah, my buddy Ethan. He wore his pink helmet in the car and hasn't taken it off yet...

Some of our biggest supporters. Thanks again mom and dad and Jeremy for coming to the event.

Grandma and Ethan. Ethan is usually saying 'go as fast as you can'

The crowd gathered around hoping to win a Tomac Bike

Ethan was helping Joel give his speech

The Clark family checking out one of the employees bikes

Ethan's museum class

We are taking a little museum class with Ethan and either Joel or I take him depending on our schedule. It has been fun to have one on one time with just Ethan. I took a few pictures with my phone. This particular class had lots of trucks and digging equipment but surprisingly Ethan spent all of about 2 minutes doing art projects...

This was one of his two minutes not doing art projects...

This was the other minute.

At home Ethan plays a lot with his cars and digging toys but also loves to paint and color with Evie. He is into trying to trace his hands and feet...you can imagine how much marker winds up on his body. It's cute though.

We usually spend a few hours playing in the museum after his class and before we get Evie from preschool. Today however 240 school kids had just arrived and it felt crazy. This is Ethan moments before the kids arrived...

And a minute after they arrived...he wasn't about to give up the pilot seat just yet...

He was telling these boys to come back later. We didn't stay much longer...it was just too hectic.

A visit from Kirk

We had a surprise visit from our friend Kirk from California who is on the road with ibis bicycles. He was in town visiting Monkey Wrench on his demo tour. He brought some sunny California weather with him. It was the perfect afternoon to enjoy our sushi lunch outside.

Evie is a huge fan of sushi too.

Mother's day and daddy's home

Evie surprised me with this cute picture hanging on the fridge, framed with her magnetic letters. We were working on a card for Grandma Potter and Evie said that she was going to draw me a picture and told me Happy Mother's Day (followed by lots of hugs and kisses). Not only did it make my morning but I was surprised she got it that it was mother's day for me too...

The best part of my day was when Joel arrived safely from his trip to Europe. I always hold my breath until he is on the ground and home safely. The kids had fun watching his plane land...

And they are just a little excited daddy is finally home too.

Evie's stoked; her best friend is home.

Our little monkey is mid-jump off the table between the chairs.

Ethan is calling daddy who is at baggage claim trying to locate his lost luggage. Joel also randomly left his cell phone on the plane and we got a call the next day saying they located his phone and it's on it's way to us via FedEx. Nice.

Evie is learning spanish...

We just finished having dinner with the neighbors and were playing in the back yard for a bit before bath time.

Ethan is being ornery. He was nicely helping me water my flowers until I wanted to take his picture, then he would try to spray me.

...and why we need bath time...

VIDEO: Last week Evie's teacher started teaching the kids numbers in Spanish. I was surprised how quickly she picked it up.

Video - Ethan talking to daddy...

VIDEO: Ethan talking to Joel on video while Joel is in Germany. One of Ethan's nicknames is 'boa'.

Joel's Germany trip

I thought I would share a few pictures Joel took of the Stadler bike shop in Berlin where he gave his first of many presentations this week. Joel would tell me about how big the Stadler bike shops are but it was eye opening to see the pictures. He said one of them was in an old Walmart building - if that helps give you perspective. Joel wrote the text attached to the pictures inside the store. He is in Reginsburg now, his third shop in three days.

Stadler bike shop - Berlin.

Two happy Tomac customers

One happy Tomac Bikes owner

Part of the Tomac Bikes display

This is the line of people waiting to pick up their new bikes. Stadler Berlin sold over 400 bikes on Sunday alone, and they promise to have any bike prepped and out the door in an hour.

With about 20 service bays, you think they could get it all handled, but there was about 500 bikes waiting.

A parts counter at a bike shop!!! Just for selling parts!!!

The nutrition section (bars/gels/drinks) was twice the size of Monkey Wrench Cycles in Lincoln.

Count them, 5 cash registers and there's a line for all of them. The Stadler Bistro is in the background Picture 6: New bikes waiting to be gone over before the customer can take them home.

Need a set of aftermarket wheels?

Or how about tires? I could not fit the entire tire section in one photo.

This was half of the kid's section

Happy May Day

We had so much fun making May Day baskets today. The kids were hard at work filling bags with goodies. Most of it wound up in their mouths or on the floor - but they had fun.

I didn't take pictures but my parents were the first to bring May Day baskets for the kids and they were so excited. They ate their candy in record time. Our neighborhood was having their garage sales this weekend so we walked with my parents to a few of them. It was fun.

I asked Evie to get dressed and we would deliver the baskets to the kids on our block and take her cousin's bags when Ethan wakes up from his nap. She came into the kitchen dressed in her dress up clothes and said "I'm ready to feed the neighbors, It's May Day". We had a good time delivering treats.

Laurie and her kids came over for dinner tonight. Kevin is out of town until Monday. Evie and Anderson are having fun with the May Day treat Laurie brought for the kids.

Anderson and Evie - if you couldn't tell, ha ha...

Ethan, Evie, Clare and Gabriel

Coffee with mom and dad

Joel is usually the one who meets my dad for coffee on Friday mornings at the Mill, downtown. The kids and I were lucky and got to take his place while he is in Europe. My mom surprised us and was there too. It was fun having time with mom and dad like that. The kids got antsy towards the end but I would have loved to stay longer and chat. It was a nice treat for me.

Evie is looking through the glass into the Mill.

Ethan loves planes. Grandma is giving him a closer look. When Ethan sees a plane in the sky he says "dada, plane, fly, bike" I told him one time that Joel took a plane to ride his bike and that's what he says every time.