Keep in touch with your White Birch Village Family
Charlie is ready for your vote!
It’s ice out contest time.
We’d love to have you be a part of the contest. Send us an email at [email protected] with the DATE and TIME that you think Charlie will fall through the ice. All guesses are due by March 15th. The person whose time is the closest will be the winner. If Charlie falls through the ice during the night the date will be credited to the next day. Sue and John will be at sport shows March 3-15, but Scott will be keeping an eye on him for us.
Charlie’s journey out to the ice.
Charlie coming out of hibernation.
Getting stuffed.
Relaxing in front of the TV before heading outside.
Rachel giving Charlie a final hug before heading out into the cold.
Sam and Kyle choosing Charlie’s spot to sit on the ice.
How many people does it take to get Charlie ready?
With the frigid temps today (11 below with wind chill of 30 below) the kids decided Charlie needed to be dressed warmer. So on go the boots, mittens and hat.
Thanks Rachel, Kyle and Sam (they were staying with us this weekend) for helping get Charlie ready.
Be sure to send in your guess for when Charlie will take the plunge!
Fall leaf pick up
Adrian having fun vacuuming up the leaves.
Emptying the dump box onto the compost pile.
Hooking the Billy Goat back up. The Billy Goat suctions up the leaves and mulches them. Randy did a great job of building the box for the back of the new dump truck!
Kelly helped blow leaves this fall.
Water level are very high for the fall! It’s good news.
It’s good we got all the leaves picked up, because today’s snow put an end to it.
Dock Day – Sign of a season ending
The docks have been taken out and stored for another winter season. Thankfully the weather cooperated. It was supposed to be cold and rainy, but the sun was out which helped the 35 degree temp feel not so bad.
The boat station getting ready for the journey to the beach.
The crew didn’t do a very good job navigating around the tree and pulled the end of the station off.
Almost there.
1, 2 3…..heave ho and up on the beach we go.
The youngsters are exhausted and taking a break ………..
…….while the seasoned veterans keep plugging along 🙂
Floating the sections along…..
…to their winter resting place.
2014 Rock Bass Contest Grand Prize Winner
Last week we had one our local fishing guides, Bob Bertch, draw for the winner of our 2014 Rock Bass Contest. Congratulations to Addison Wojciechowski you will be receiving a brand new Walleye fishing rod and reel. Not only did Addison win the grand prize, but the Wojciechowski family submitted the highest poundage of rock bass this summer. They submitted 20 pounds of rock bass. Way to go guys!
Thank you to everyone who participated this year. We donated a total of 190 pounds of fish to Wild Instincts. They used the fish to help feed all their injured animals.
Addison with her brothers; Nolan, Aidan and Tristan. Great job fishing!
Final voyage……
For all of our long time guests the swimming raft has made it’s final voyage. After re-weld after re-weld the pontoons will not stop taking on water. This raft has been part of the resort since I was a child. I had lots of fun times as a teenager on this raft and it was sad to see it pulled for the last time. A new raft has been purchased and will be put in the water next spring.
John arriving with the boat to transport the raft to the boat landing.
Off they go.
Randy getting the trailer ready for loading.
Here we come.
Guiding the raft onto the trailer.
Teamwork.
There she goes. Thank you for years of fun and enjoyment.
The resort is alive with color
It has been a beautiful fall week in the Northwoods. We took our last pontoon boat ride of the season last night. The guest who joined us were treated to perfect fall weather along with brilliant colors of red, gold and orange!
Pictures from around the resort:
The trees above Loon.
The sugar maple next to minnow was vibrant this year.
The view from Timberwolfe.
Walking towards the Barn.
One of our guests enjoying the sunshine and warm temps.
Pictures on White Birch Lake:
Entering White Birch Lake from the channel.
Pictures on Ballard lake:
Jim and Ed, long time guests of WBV, who come up every fall for musky fishing.
Final pontoon boat ride of the season turned out to be exceptional weather.
Partridge bay on Ballard.
Wedding bells are ringing!
We spent the summer creating a new wedding ceremony site. In 2015 we will begin marketing for fall weddings at the resort. And what a better way to give it a test run than having our son, Brian, and his beautiful bride, Missy, get married at the resort. Brian and Missy met on a blind date at White Birch Village in March of 2013. They came full circle by getting married where they met. It was a beautiful fall day, the 80% chance of thunderstorms never materialized. We set up a large tent on the grassy area behind the barn and had a wonderful meal that the groom prepared. Our staff did a tremendous job working the reception. Wonderful memories were made! It was a perfect Northwoods wedding! Enjoy the pictures.
View of the ceremony site from across the pond.
View from the pergola.
With the 6 inches of rain we got the week before the wedding the flowage filled up with water to create a beautiful backdrop for the ceremony.
We ran power to the pergola so both music and a microphone can be used.
What would a White Birch Village wedding be without a white birch cross.
Ceremony site
Our son Chris walking my parents down the aisle. all the groomsmen wore hand tied fishing flies as boutonnieres that Brian had made.
The wind was blowing as Brian walked us down the aisle.
Missy’s niece and nephew were also part of the wedding party. If you don’t catch by the time you are done looking at pictures fishing was the theme throughout the wedding, which included Jackson carrying a tackle box. For the unity part of the ceremony Brain and Missy tied two cords together using a fishing knot. The fishing knot is a very simple knot that is very strong.
Missy walking down the aisle with her dad.
The bridesmaids.
The marriage blessing. Pastor Rod Hank from Good Shepherd Lutheran Church officiated the ceremony. Sue was so happy to have him here as she working with Pastor Rod at Good Shepherd in Madison.
Dad and I after the ceremony.
John walking grandma Carol down the aisle after the ceremony.
Brian and Missy with us and my parents.
Our three great kids! Proud of all of them.
The start of the nature trail was a perfect site for the tent. all the kids in attendance had fun running up the hill into the woods and sliding down. Kept them busy for hours.
Sam’s Rental in Woodruff was wonderful to work with for the reception tent.
View of the tent from Timberwolfe.
Instead of a guest book all who attended signed two canoe paddles that Brian and Missy will hang on their wall.
Making use of the cotton candy and popcorn machine; the kids enjoyed the popcorn and cotton candy that was served
The kids couldn’t wait for dessert to have cotton candy and had it for appetizers instead. Then had it again for dessert!
Adrian made over 70 cotton candies. He probably dreamt of them that night.
The groomsmen cooked the brats, hamburgers and chicken.
The beverage station. The wine was a wedding gift from one of Missy’s friends. Many different flavors to choose from including tri-berry and cool mint.
Brian and Missy are pie eaters over cake so Brian helped make 16 apple pies to be served along with the wedding cake. He had to use the ovens in Red Oaks, Musky, Balsam Fir and the lodge to get them all baked. Our polish staff got a kick out of the sign because “pie” in polish means dog.
Brian and Missy’s dance.
Mother and son dance.
Carol and Dick getting a dance in.
And to our delight Kelly and Travis are next with an October 2015 wedding!
Out with old in with the new
Getting ready for fall leaf pick-up meant some changes had to take place here at the resort.
This ford pick-up truck gave a lot of great years of service to the resort, but it was time to say good-bye. It no longer went into park, wasn’t charging the battery and the doors won’t open.
Hello new dump truck. We upgraded to a 1 ton truck with a built in dump. We are ready for any heavy work the resort has for us, including the 200 dump truck full of leaves that will begin next week.
Illinois Outdoors Show and Carrie Z’s Podcast from our Resort
In May we hosted a sports writers event at the resort. Don Dziedzina and Roger Wright from Illinois Outdoors, Inc. were here. The White Birch Village TV Show that was taped while they were here is scheduled to air on Saturday July 19 at 8 AM on Comcast and Insight Cable systems on Channel 138 in all of Chicago, it’s suburbs as far west as the Rock River, the greater Rockford, Peoria, Champaign/Urbana, and Springfield area and NW Indiana and SW Michigan.
Roger’s 23 1/2 inch 6 pound small mouth bass was the success story of the weekend.
For our guests who do not live in these areas you can watch the YouTube copy of the show so you can view at your leisure and forward to family or friends if you wish. Here’s the YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJgPLY9yfEo&feature=youtu.be.
Carrie Zilka was also here who has weekly podcasts. Her podcast was so much fun to listen to. Check out the latest CarrieZ’s Hunting, Fishing & Outdoor Podcast Episode 66…..featuring White Birch Village of course! Listen to the on demand radio episode here: http://wwocz.net/ep66/
Carrie had fun catching crappies.
We hope you enjoy these as much as we did. It was a great group of sports writers to have at the resort and we are thankful for their support of what we have to offer for a vacation experience in the Northwoods of Wisconsin.
Rock Bass Contest 2014
Our rock bass contest is underway. It’s time to tackle the rock bass population in our lake and have some friendly fishing competition. Every Thursday this year is rock bass day. Guests can catch as many rock bass as they can on Thursdays and then bring them to the musky bell between 3 and 4 PM to have them weighed by John. The person with the highest weight of fish for the day will have their name entered into the “Rock Bass Pool”. At the end of the season we will have a drawing for the grand prize winner. The winner will receive a St. Croix rod and reel. The fish will be donated to the rehab center to feed the eagles. It’s open to all ages so get out and go fishing!
Congratulations to this week’s winner, Mason Peterson with a total of 9 1/2 pounds of rock bass.
Max and Brenton came in a close second with 8 1/2 pounds.