Big Stone County, Minnesota - Living Rural and Loving it!
Meet Main Street Industries! Although most of us are aware of the annual Main Street Industry’s auction and dinner, I’m not sure that many know of the extent of services that they offer – both to businesses and residential homes. In this time of low …
This marked the third year for this new event on Big Stone Lake in Ortonville. Those who worked so hard to start Lake Days wanted the focus to be the lake and getting people together to enjoy the park and each other. As with most, there …
Quote from the MPR Article:
Bonnie Carlson was skeptical. Making money as a small-town grocer was tough enough. How would selling a local guy’s garlic for a premium possibly help her?  But she didn’t say no when Big Stone County farmer Russ Swenson and Kathy Draeger, a local University of Minnesota expert and customer of Bonnie’s Hometown Grocery, pitched a plan to put Swenson’s garlic on the shelves at Bonnie’s and small-town stores across Minnesota.
The best part of MNbump – our people! Looking for new ways to grow, helping coming up with the ideas – and not saying “no” to a try! #MNbumpROCKS –
Check out the complete story, photos & audio!
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2018/06/21/local-food-grocers-farmers-western-minnesota
The Thursday Night Music on Main group brought their “get together” time down to Lakeside Park for the first (I hope there will be more) Music Wednesday in the Park last night! It was a perfect evening by Big Stone Lake – and the …
July looks to be another busy month, here on the MNbump! Graceville’s Annual Toqua Days – June 30th & July 1st The Graceville Women’s Organization Facebook Page (Link!) is always a great place to watch for the latest information! July 11th – 15th Big …
There were 22 teams (ranging from 9 to 11 people)
with a total of 226 number of participants!!
Total weight lost:Â 1,863 pounds (WOW!)
Winning teams (I’m hoping they send in a group photo from each of their celebration gatherings!) were:
1st Place:Â Main Street Industries – Main Street Muscle – with 7.3% weight loss
Amanda Kuefler, Lisa Lindquist, Jeremy Tollakson, Joanne Vangness, Terri-Skog-Anderson, Arlene Athey, Karrie Findley, Lane Lindquist, Robin Olson, Roger Findley
2nd Place:Â OAHS –Â Iron Maidens – 6.57% Weight loss
Nicole Lovgren, Dr. Susan Andersen, Sandy Brown, Kristen Brobst, Melissa Davis, Sarah Velzke, Kendra Fryer, Missica Lowe, Corina Hanson, Natasha Haukos
3rd Place:Â This just Thin – 6.18% Weight loss
Brenda Zahrbock, Anita Longnecker, Rachel Zinski, Josh Zinski, Brent Zahrbock, Lindsey Lee, Alicia Lee, John Thomas, Jeannine Dashiell, Kelsie Thomas, Adam Dashiell
With 1,863 pounds… I’d say all teams (and MNbump!) were winners! However, this Ortonvillian must acknowledge the MNbump winning community was CLINTON! 🙂
If you’d like to watch the Facebook Live video from the weigh-in reveal – USE THIS LINK!
Thank you to those who sponsored this event: Countryside Public Health, Essentia Health, OAHS (along with MNbump – Big Stone Area Growth). And, thank you to KDIO for all of the coverage of this challenge!
There were many that helped – it takes quite a bit of time & help from many to keep communications open with 226 people involved – However, I (Vicki), would like to give a shout out to Lynelle Dwyer & Sara Tollakson for coming up with the idea… and a HUGE shout out specifically to Sara Tollakson of OAHS for leading this event and handling by far the organization and administration pieces that come with an event like this – a very successful event like this! It is easy “not to see” the time and effort it takes for a 10-week event – but I can assure you that it was not as easy as she made it look. Sara is a non-stop ball of energy (and, from just that alone, I’m exhausted) – THANK YOU SARA! …and with many participants indicating that they’d like to see another challenge, she has even agreed to do it again! She has been making notes of things to do differently on the next go-around and looking for suggestions from those that participated (and everyone) for the next challenge.
Again, THANK YOU to Sara Tollakson!
It is getting so busy, so here are reminder links gathered together for activities coming up and a few highlights from recent MNbump events. #MNbumpLife Updated…. 6/17/2018 6/19: Barrel Race tonight June 19th is going to be rescheduled due to the weather. I’ll post …
What a wonderful day! I heard so many great comments while out on the art crawl today – hoping our artists make this an annual event (well, some thought it would be great every weekend!) THANK YOU to all those that helped plan this event!! …
It was a beautiful evening at Lakeside Park along Big Stone Lake for this year’s annual DREAM for Kids & Someplace Safe’s old-fashioned family picnic! This is their third year – and has been a hit with the kids from the first.
Hills family brings their horses every year which is definitely a highlight for the kids! The Odessa Fire Department brought a water truck to show to the next generation of firefighters (thank you to Luke and Mike!) – the kids had fun testing their skills at holding and aiming that hose. Vicki from the Ortonville Public Library was giving away new books during the music game (music provided by Lee Kanten and Wanda Berry – awesome!), 4-H was providing activities during the event. A huge shout out to those that provided food & door prizes: GCC, S&D One Stop, the Moose, Lingonberries, Wade Sweezy, Gloria and Dwayne Larson, Hartman’s SuperValu, Pepsi Company — and to all the volunteers that helped with games, face painting & serving the food (I saw there was quite a group of people from Minnwest Bank helping out (besides knowing them from Minnwest, they were easily identified by their T-shirts! 🙂 )
The video has 2 minutes of highlights from the evening. And, an awesome evening it was!