Allison - Flight Zone Toptracer Driving Range

Brady & Sara Sitting in a Tree

Brady and Sara were miracle workers in the weather department on the day of their wedding. Easily one of the most fun and laid back couples that I have had the pleasure of working with. It rained for a majority of the day, but the sun managed to make an appearance just in time for their ceremony. They didn’t want to see each other before the ceremony, so most of their pictures took place after they were officially Mr. and Mrs. There was about a thirty minute window of time before the skies opened up with more rain. Nothing phased them! Their personalities were fantastic and I know they’ll have a great marriage because they handled all of the weather curve balls with ease. Congratulations again, Brady & Sara! Also. Thanks to Nuzum Photo for sharing your amazing photos with us!

Alex & Max

Events

A few weeks ago, we had a mad rush to get everything done at our ceremony site for our first wedding ceremony of the year. Thankfully, Melissa, from Gorman House Photo shared all of her photos with me. Melissa from Gorman House was fabulous to work with. She had two second shooters, so Alex and Max had three photographers snapping pictures of them. This worked out well because they didn’t see each other before the ceremony, so Melissa and her gang were able to knock out many photos in a short amount of time following the ceremony. The day started in our bridal suite where the ladies got ready for the big day! Whenever my couples decide not to see each other before the ceremony, they are always filled with lots of nerves when it’s time for the ceremony to begin. Alex is a warm and gentle soul. Max is very artistic. He and Alex did a great job of capturing one another’s personalities in their personal touches at their ceremony. We were all excited to watch the ceremony take place. Having an artistic and talented groom meant there were many homemade pieces to their ceremony like this sign that greeted guests as they sat down. Having multiple photographers meant they could get several different angles of the ceremony taking place. I really like this look from across the pond. When you have an outdoor ceremony, candle ceremonies don’t work very well. Sand has been the most popular alternative, however, I have seen some cool ideas. One couple watered a tree that they planted in their back yard. Alex and Max chose to put some items in a box which they nailed shut during the ceremony. I didn’t confirm with them, but I think they don’t plan to open the box until they have been married a certain amount of time. I thought that was a cool idea. Making the whole thing official! Alex’s brother-in-law is ordained, so he is the one who performed the ceremony. Her niece was the flower girl. Max is an excellent welder and he created this amazing arbor for them to use at the entrance to the ceremony. It has their initials on either side and their last name initial on the top. He also made really tall shepherds hooks to complement the arbor where sunflowers were hung from jars wrapped in burlap. Max also made all of the centerpieces for the reception. They were amazing! We had just gotten new white golf cars which happen to be a nice color for weddings. It hadn’t crossed our minds until we saw Alex in the cart. I’m a fan of the ring shot with the golf ball. It seems appropriate when you’re getting married on the golf course. They definitely had one of my all time favorite cake toppers. Lego people! It fit perfectly with the whimsy of the entire wedding. They were right up my alley in the party favor department. I’m a candy-holic. They gave all of their guests jars filled with candies. I had so much fun working with them. They were a great family who were casual and laid back. Congratulations again, Alex and Max! What do you think about their cake topper? Isn’t that the coolest thing you have ever seen??? Thanks again to Melissa and Gorman House Photo for all of these amazing photos!

Let’s Knock That Out

Project List

You know how you make something look really pretty, then you stop and look around and realize everything around it looks ugly? Yeah. That happened to me. When we finished the pergola for the ceremony site, we were so excited. I stood on the stage admiring all of our hard work, then I looked at the building and thought yuck. As luck would have it, Menards was having one of their random sales on items that I just so happen to need. I loaded up my cart with about 30 gallons of stain and Kim and I got to work. One thing that I have noticed is that I’m not particularly good at taking pictures and documenting the work when I’m the one doing the work. You’ll have to forgive me for these pictures. They were all taken by staff members who had their photos taken by me many times and I think they were trying to blackmail me. The first order of business was to get that deck stained. It was long overdue, but it might be one of the jobs that I hate the most out at the golf course. That’s really saying a lot because I’ve done a lot of jobs around here. As you can see, we decided to tackle this project even with the onset of rain. It was just something that had to be done to make the surrounding grounds look nice. The day began with Kim’s saying, “Let’s just knock that out!” The first part of the deck went really smoothly, then it felt like after lunch we were moving at a snails pace. Just as we finished the final section, the rain began. We high fived and called it quits for the day. There was a problem. With the deck looking so good, the fence behind number nine was looking kind of ratty. Guess what! We knocked that out in a day, too! The first side of the fence went really well, but the side facing number nine green took forever. That forever included a full five gallons of stain just for one side! You can see what a difference it made! The only problem with all of this staining was that after a few days, neither Kim nor I could lift our hands over our head. Finally, just to finish things off, we decided that the upper deck with the balcony off of our bridal suite area needed some attention, too. That made the whole area look complete. You guessed it! We knocked that out, too. While we were up there, we had our carpenter put in some additional screws to make the whole thing nice and secure. That’s the story of how Kim and I put on nearly 20 gallons of stain in a weeks worth of time.

Perfect Pergola

Project List

We have had a count down for two years to prepare for our new ceremony site. The stage of the pergola had been built, so it was time to get our stain on! The trouble with April and May was that it rained. A lot. I’m not complaining about the rain because we have gone without it for several years. However, when it comes to brides, you can’t let them down. Our entire staff knew of our first outdoor ceremony of the year because we had their names posted for weeks to distinguish our goal date. In the end, we finally gave up waiting for the rain to stop or for the temperatures to warm up and got our stain on the Wednesday before our first wedding ceremony. It was a gloomy day, but we had a lot of fun. Kim and I got to work staining the pergola. I had to stick my head up through the slats on the top, so my hair had turned white by the end of the day. Kim has a infamous saying, “Let’s just knock this out.” She always tells me that to make it seem like it’ll be the easiest job to get done. She assured me that we’d be able to knock this out before the rain came. Toward the afternoon, we started to get worried that Kim was a bit ambitious, so my mom and Theresa joined in on the fun. Although this looks like paint, it is actually a white stain. It went on beautifully and covered the pergola really well. We were all waiting for the final moment when we could move on to the floor! The limestone pavers had been laid earlier in the week in the rain, so they were covered in mud. Austin got those scrubbed clean (while my daughter supervised) and the four of us gals finished that pergola about two hours before the rain started. Luckily, it only has to dry for it to cure, so we were in good shape. We were really pleased with the results. On Saturday, Alex and Max got to be our very first ceremony to take place at our new ceremony site. Everyone was so very excited about it. Luckily, the weather on Saturday couldn’t have been more perfect if we had ordered in the weather ourselves. It was a fun rush until the end, but we are so happy to have this journey of the ceremony site come to an end! For a look back at how far we have come, check out these posts: Building the peninsula Trying to seed the peninsula Install irrigation on the peninsula Install electricity and speaker wire We have grass Building the pergola Putting in the pergola’s stage

New Club Cars

Golf Course

We like to lease our golf cars. They are something that we turn over frequently because, let’s face it, golfers are pretty hard on carts. I won’t go into details, but let’s just say golfers definitely don’t treat the carts like their own. Typically, we trade out our carts about every five years. A variety of circumstances fell into place which led us to getting new golf carts after only three years. This made me pretty happy because it meant that I could have some upgrades that I was excited to get. I asked the guys over at NB Golf Cars to take a picture of our cars as they were coming off the truck. They sent me this fine shot! Ain’t she a beaut? The cars are delivered without the tops on them and then the guys over at NB assemble them and get the tops put on the cart. Check out that Club Car sign. That’s right. Our fine cars were made in Augusta, Georgia. That seems like an appropriate town for golf carts to be made, right? Because gas costs nearly $4 a gallon, we juggled our old carts off and on over the course of the week to make sure we wouldn’t be giving away thousands of dollars in gas. The new carts come with barely enough gas to get them off the truck. The blue carts had treated us well, but it was time to move on to newer and bigger things. NB showed up with our first load of fleet carts. It was a cold and rainy day in May. Wait. I think the entire month of May was cold and rainy. Needless to say, we were excited when they started making their deliveries. I think everyone involved enjoys the thrill of a fresh golf cart. It’s fun to be the first one to get mud on the tires. Our main man unstrapped the carts and got to work. Several golfers have asked why we didn’t upgrade to carts with GPS. Mostly because it’s simply not within our budget. We have certainly talked about it, but there are a few factors that we have to overcome first, so it isn’t something that we have completely ruled out. The main reason is that with the onset of so many mobile apps and devices out there, our golfers already have access to the yardage should it be required. The second reason is that we aren’t set up for electric carts. It would require quite a bit of infrastructure that we don’t have at this time. The final reason is that it would require additional carts in our fleet. We have a really hilly golf course and cart batteries don’t last the whole five years, especially with hills. Since we usually turn our entire fleet two times a day, that would simply not be enough time for us to get carts charged and ready for round two. We’ll definitely re-think our decision when we are done with our lease in the next five years. We did have a few upgrades that we had in our budget. First of all, the carts feature our logo on each cart. We noticed right away that the new model has a more sturdy steering wheel and the front end is up off of the ground a little more than old blue. The bag straps all come neatly tightened in their place. While I toured a golf course in Florida, I noticed that they had coolers on their carts. They used them to keep the golfers cool. When it got super hot, they gave their golfers a cooler to put on their cart with ice water and a towel. The golfers could re-ice their towel in several icing stations around the course. I really liked that idea. Since Iowa suffers from both too hot and too cold weather, we thought we’d offer this convenience for at least part of the season. The coolers fit on the carts and will be offered once we hit that hot time of the year. There you have it. Our new golf carts. We are still expecting two family carts. We’re pretty excited about them as they will seat four golfers and they’re electric. They’re our little experiment with electric carts. They haven’t arrived yet, so we’re patiently waiting their arrival. Have you had any fun on one of our new carts?

Outdoor Ceremony Site Staging

Project List

It’s been a long time coming, but it looks like it will be ready for this coming weekend when we host our first outdoor ceremony for the year. Building this new site has been a nearly two year long process. It all started with a drought which made it feasible to build a peninsula. Last year, we struggled with getting the grass to fill in because the peninsula was built from the soil found at the bottom of the pond, but by the end of the season the grass had come up nicely. Once it was in place, we built a pergola. Just before the snow flew, we planted some trees around the site. That brings us to this year. The first order of business was to finish the pergola. We wanted to build a stage and step which would allow our couples to be visible to their guests. My husband began the project one weekend while I was away at a dance competition with our daughter. He texted me this picture of my two boys busy laying the foundation to what would become the stage. We like to start the love of power tools at an early age. Next up, my carpenters built the decking of the stage. They lined the inside of the stage with bracing to prepare it for the deck boards. These boards aren’t rounded because we didn’t want curves which might make walking in high heels difficult. The cart wasn’t fond of the amount of weight, but it did make for some fun driving skills. In a last minute change of plans, we decided to move one of our outdoor outlets to the stage area because my mom says the pergola is calling for a chandelier. Now we have some electricity if her dream is ever realized. Here’s Santa pulling up our previous wiring to bring it over to the pergola. It was a pretty easy fix and they were happy with me that I had changed my mind at this time in the planning process rather than a day later. While this was going on, we began landscaping around those trees that had been planted last fall. While I was off at the dance competition, my staff members surprised me by having all of the wood chips in place when I returned. The boys got busy planting some ornamental grasses along the edge. Our final stage will happen this week when we put in the border to the landscaped bed as well as get all of our flowers planted. Here’s the edging laid out ready to be installed. By the end of the day, we had a nice base for our stage and step. My daughter came down with me to inspect and she was pretty pleased with the work! Our to do list continues to get smaller and we’re looking forward to this whole project being marked off the ole’ list!

Miniature Golf Improvements

Project List

We have been knocking out projects left and right around here. Having a late/cold spring means that time is not working in our favor. When the weather is decent, we do our best to complete as many projects as we can. Here is a post about several upgrades we have made to our miniature golf. Last year, we added a playset. I’m never one to be satisfied. That meant that the area around the playset needed an upgrade this year! We decided to add a tunnel that will be covered in vines for children to run through. My kids have enjoyed the similar one at the state fair since they were small children and we thought this would be something fun for kids to run through. It first required some removal of sod in a large U shape. Next up, my carpenters got busy putting together some bracing that will eventually hold some snow fence that will support the vines. It it made out of conduit that’s zip tied to rods that are bent in a U shape which forms the tunnel. Once the tunnel was built, I had the boys begin covering the bare dirt with mulch. It was a nice day out for once. We had to wait for the ground to dry out because the 13 inches of rain we got in one week made everything very wet. They got all of the ground covered in mulch and the tunnel started to take shape. Here’s a view from above, so you can get an idea of how it goes around the play set. The tunnel will have an Exit and Enter sign posted on the entryways. Meanwhile, we were draining all of the ponds from the miniature golf and getting them cleaned out from winter debris, so we can get the fountains up and running. Here’s the pond full of water from the rains and winter debris. We drained each pond. After the water was removed, we were left with a bunch of gross muck. My brother is the one who got to deal with it. He’s always drawing the short end of the straw when it comes to gross work. Once this is all cleaned out, then we’ll be able to insert the pumps and get them wired up! It won’t be long now!

Jet Setting

Family Matters

Last week, I had my spring board meeting for the National Golf Course Owners Association (NGCOA). I flew down early in the morning on Tuesday and came back on Wednesday. I’ve mentioned before in my account of previous meetings, but I must say it again. I don’t know how people travel for a living. It’s hard on the ole’ brain. I think (hope) that I’m in the busiest time of my life. Not only am I consumed with activities at the golf course, but I also have three children who keep me hopping. My oldest son plays trombone in the Des Moines Youth Symphony (as well as several bands at his high school), so we attended a concert prior to me leaving. My middle child is also in band as well as track, so I also watched one of his performances as well, plus I cheered him on from the bleachers at his track meet. My youngest child competes in dance, so she and I made a quick trip (is there such a thing?) to Davenport for a dance competition the weekend before I had to leave. When I had fulfilled all of my mom duties, I went to bed. Silly me, I thought I’d be able to sleep. Unfortunately, the only thing I could think about was the work that I needed to get done at the golf course before I left for the board meeting. It turned out to be easier to simply wake up and go work at the course. Who cared if it was 2:30 in the morning? I got in two hours of work before it was time for me to catch my flight to South Carolina. Flights at six in the morning always look good when you’re booking them, but seem really foolish when you actually have to get up to get on the plane. I’m sure I will look back at this time in my life and remember it fondly. Cough. Cough. It’s awesome to have kids who are involved and enjoy activities. It always seems that somehow there is time to get it all done. Maybe sacrificing a little sleep along the way. Luckily for me, I truly enjoy the people on the NGCOA board. They are smart, capable golf operators who always teach me something when I’m with them. They are worth jet setting across the country. Des Moines airport size + Charleston, SC’s airport size = three hour layover in New Jersey. I pulled out my sunglasses to blind me from all the gold and picked up a few new swear words while I was there. Kidding aside, I had some great flights and landed on time and made it to the board meeting. When the meeting was over, the staff of the NGCOA asked several members to participate in a marketing piece explaining why we are members. I was the first one to get interviewed. Next up was Mike Hatch. He has an English accent, so I’m pretty sure his interview will be far more convincing than mine. When we were done with the taping, we headed out to the pool side of the Wild Dunes. I always feel like I’m a walking advertisment for Charleston, but I must tell you that you need to visit this area of the country. Our meeting was in an area called the Wild Dunes. It had two golf courses on the resort and many beautiful hotels. It’s within walking distance of the ocean. The resort even had a really quaint shopping district. It’d be the perfect place to vacation. I love this area of the country because it has so much history. One of the towns that I drove past had been founded in the 1600’s. During our meal, it was apparent that I have northern blood. There was a wind that had picked up and all of the locals were grabbing their jackets because it had dropped into the upper 60’s. Because I’m classy, I cut into my orange that was on my salad and it squirted all over the NGCOA staff member sitting next to me. I like to represent my family well when I’m in public. No one at my table had been to Iowa before, so told them about Des Moines being named best place to live in the United States as well as about how our Iowa State Fair is on the top 100 things to do before you die list. They were surprised. I began describing the state fair and the whole table erupted in laughter. It isn’t every day that you can compete for the longest beard, participate in a cow chip throwing competition or a mom calling contest. In an effort to sell them on the excitement that Des Moines has to offer, I explained the Bacon Fest. Apparently our town has a stronger affinity for bacon than others. It was a great meal and I enjoyed the company. I represented Iowa well. The next morning, we had more meetings. I have given up drinking soda and turned to coffee for some help. I was pretty excited that they had a fun coffee bar set up with flavors. Caramel is my favorite. When the meeting was finished, we took a break for lunch. I always enjoy visiting with the staff at hotels. They thought it was cool that I had photographed their work. It’s nice to get some ideas for our own club in different food display options. I had to take a picture of their desserts. I’m the only person on the board who takes pictures of everything. I’ve been on it for a year now, so I think they are used to me by now. I’m a little weird, but they accept me anyway. At least they pretend to. Ha. Their desserts were fantastic, but I was pretty apprehensive about the Collard Greens. They just didn’t look all that appetizing. I am pleased to say that I joined the rankings

Winter Beauty

Golf Course

I was looking through some pictures that I had taken earlier this spring and realized that I had never shared them with you. Since the weather is still making it seem like we’re in winter, I figured now was as good of a time as ever. My brother, Jason, came to get me one day because the freezing and thawing had created some really cool effects on the surface of our ponds. Because it had been so cold, but we had some high winds, we figured that’s what had created an interesting drift of ice on the surface. It’s a little hard to see in this picture, but those dark jagged lines are high peaks of an ice formation on top of the pond’s surface. The darker area is just the smooth frozen ice on the pond, but the white in the center is this amazing ice formation that was formed due to our horrible winter. If I’m going to be stuck in my house for multiple days due to a polar vortex, I may as well enjoy the ice that formed from it! It was truly a beautiful sight. When we were walking away, we spotted a lost ball along the pond bank. Over the years, we’ve gotten selective in the balls we are willing to risk our lives to get. However, my brother and I are huge Titleist fans. Yeah. When we saw it was a Titleist, it was worth slipping into the pond. If Jason is willing to wade into the pond to fix the irrigation, then a little precarious steps along the pond bank wouldn’t phase him. Success! To what lengths do you go to retrieve a lost ball? Did you see any cool ice formations this winter?

Credit or Debit?

Project List

When you grow up in your family’s business, it feels more like home than an actual business. It’s a hard feeling to describe. There’s just a familiarity about it. Every once and awhile, we’ll do something that seems pretty upscale. It’s something you’d find at a big corporation and I feel like we’re a real business, not just something my family built. That’s how I feel about this little improvement that I installed in the clubhouse the other day. Our new computer system has the ability to have forward facing terminals like what you see at Wal-Mart, Target, Hy-Vee, Fareway and the like. Businesses that I would consider to be much bigger than my own. I’ve had my eye on getting these terminals for about a year but they were in a beta mode, so I had to wait. It’s official. The wait is over. The terminals arrived in a big box and I was super excited to get them out of their packaging. The incredibly un-fun portion of the job was getting them set up. This required me to attach something to a wire, so I could send the flimsy wire through the hole in our cabinets. I’m sure they make something just for such a purpose. I don’t own that, so I just attached a pencil to the wire. Then, I had the honor of climbing under the cabinet to send the wiring up through the small hole in the counter top. This all goes back to my title of Wizard of Fun. I truly get all of the fun jobs. Kim waited patiently above the cabinets for the pencil to appear. When I first tried, we had a miss. Kim was able to get the pencil, but the wire had fallen off. Our second try equaled success. Once I had this set up, I had to move on to the other two computers to spend additional time stuck inside of a cupboard. Then, it was time to call tech support, so I could get all of the drivers installed for these devices. I was on the phone long enough that my ears hurt by the end of the day. Nothing was super difficult. It was just somewhat time consuming to get each machine set up. We’re pretty excited about these machines because we will be able to save a lot of money in credit card charges from our merchant service. These machines allow us to take debit cards. There is a very small fee to a business to take debit cards, but it goes up significantly when it’s a credit card. In our old system, we could only run everything as a credit, so our fees were much higher than they will be with this machine. Plus, we’re able to offer cash back at the register if the golfer is interested AND more importantly, I don’t have to keep thousands of receipts with signatures. It’s all stored in the system. It’s a win/win all around. Our merchant service also had me create four images that rotate on the screen of each terminal. Talk about upscale! We were all giddy school girls when our first golfer walked up to the counter after I officially had everything installed. I asked him if I could take his picture for the blog. I think he thought I had fallen off my rocker. You can see that his hand is a blur from swiping his own card through our machine! Yeah for technology! In the words of Napoleon Dynamite’s brother. I love technology. Tell me. Am I the only one who has to do some crazy things to get computer systems up and running correctly?

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