Church Photos!

Yes it's that special time of year again for church photos. The photo directory service visited our church about a month ago, and we just recently got the results.

In the past we have had bad experiences with church photo services. One time the photos were terrible, another time the service lost the shots. Then there was the time when the service went out of business two weeks after taking everyone's picture.

This time we were very pleasantly surprised as you can see. The trio photo of the kids is terrific. Now if only these photos were digitally enhanced for a special slimming effect on Dad!


For the rest of this post John wants me to write about his adventure early the next morning after these pictures were taken six weeks ago. At five AM Janine woke me up to say that John needed me. He was in his bed holding his head with blood on his hands. He said he had fallen out of bed and cut himself. I cleaned him us as best as I could in my half awake state and put him back to bed. Later, at breakfast, Bobbie noticed more blood and took a closer look at the back of John's head. His thick hair obscured a nasty gash. So it was off to the doctor, then Children's Hospital.

Because it was a Saturday morning, John missed his ballet lesson and rehearsal. John and Bobbie finally got back at 1 PM. Bobbie was tired and John had two staples in his head. The rest of us were thankful they were back.

Scar Update- John and I got haircuts this past Friday. His wound is healing nicely, but after his summer buzz cut we can now see a half inch section with a small scar on the scalp. I have not heard him brag about it...yet.

A Touch of Whimsy

Bobbie added this nice touch of whimsy to the garden last week. She found an old steel rod bent to hold a hanging plant and then hung this watering can from it.

But that's no ordinary watering can. HGTV sent it to me during my media days. Like most promotional items, it looks better than it works, so it was perfect for this use.

I took this photo last week when the Red Hot Pokers on the left were fading and the Shasta Daisies on the right were just starting to bloom. The Evening Primrose just behind the garden pot had just closed up for the night.

Soon this area will have Black-eyed Susans on one side and purple coneflowers on the other. We will keep you posted...

Laura and Elise

Last night my cousin Laura traveled through town with her youngest daughter to help her oldest daughter move for a new job. Quite a contrast to have three daughters aged 24 years, 19 years and 9 months, but that's what happens when you have a baby at 51.

We all have been looking forward to meeting little Elise and she didn't disappoint. She was bright eyed and very engaging. Janine couldn't keep her hands off Elise and wanted to hold her. We met in a restaurant near the highway. The booths had may hard surfaces, so it really wasn't safe for anyone but Mom to hold her.

We all had a great time and stayed up far past our bedtimes. Janine went to a birthday party this afternoon and was bragging about how she stayed up past midnight last night. Truth be told, she fell asleep in the car on the way home and slept in until almost 9 this morning. Oh, but were we happy...

Ballet Photos

...that is if you can call dancing to the Ramones ballet. John tells me that Ray, David and he danced only ballet steps for the piece in the top photo. I would not believe it if I hadn't been there for every Saturday practice. In fact John got a Snickers bar from his teacher for dancing so many Entrechocotes so well. (For the uninitiated like me, those are the little foot wiggles they do when they are jumping in the air.)

Here's Janine in the middle taking her bow after her class danced a piece from Offenbach's Gaiete Parisienne. They were waitresses with feather dusters who danced up a storm. The Bean was in the center of the stage not only because she was the tallest of the class by far but also because she was the leader the other girls followed.

Finally Sarah and Mommy danced a Jazz piece to Cabaret. Video is in a previous post. Here's Sarah with Allison behind her at a pause in the music. Our friend Craig did a great job of capturing these images in so little light. While it helps to have a nice Nikon DSLR, he really knew what he was doing to get these pics. Thanks Craig.

The Deer ain't Here

What's that you see on the top photo? It's a rose! For the first time in several years our roses (and other flowers) have a chance to grow.

For the past few years, rose buds form, but are strangely severed before they bloomed. But this year all our roses have been able to bloom fully.

We suspect that the deer paths changed when the field behind our house was developed into a park.

In our part of the country deer are regarded as rats with hoofs. They are blamed by gardeners for everything from the loss of vegetables to joint stiffness after digging. They seem to be omnivores whose feasts include not only roses, but coreopsis as well. So, see what came back this year...

Dance Recital

This past Tuesday was the big dance recital. (One of the many reasons it's been two weeks since the last post.) Instead of a full ballet, the studio put on several pieces, each suited to a particular class or style. For example the girls in beginning pointe danced the Tarentella piece from Swan Lake, while the Jazz class danced to Cabaret. (Hint, Sarah was in both.)

Because of my camera's limitations I only have post performance photos. Here's John fresh from his dance posing with Joe and Mary our neighbors from across the street.

In case you were wondering why John has blue hair, John's class of boys danced a piece to an old song by the Ramones. Click here for video of the dress rehearsal. Please note there were three boys in the final piece.

Some of Sarah's friends from Girl's Book Club came to cheer her on. Here's Julia, Victoria and Emily in the middle of the photo. While they dance at a different studio, they all pull for each other. Emily's mom drove them to the performance.

We really appreciate all the people who drove up to and over an hour to the performance. The studio tried a new auditorium that is very nice, but 45 minutes north of our house. All told, it beats most all of the older places they have used in the city, it's just a little more remote.

Oh, would you like to see Sarah and Mommie's Jazz class dancing? Just click here. Sarah and Mommie are the two in the middle of the four dancers. You will have to take my word for it. It's a dark low resolution video I have the other performances on 8mm video. Someday I will get the box to transfer and upload it.

Finally, I hope that my friend Craig uploads his photos soon. He shot both the dress rehearsal and the performance with his Nikon DSLR. His daughter was in the recital too and he is nice enough to shoot all of the dancers and shares the photos with the rest of us.

Five Tons and What Do You Get?

The answer to the question is a garden six inches higher than before. That's what the nearby landscaping service figured it would take to achieve Bobbie's goal of raising the level of foundation plantings.

This morning at 8:00 AM the dump truck showed up with five tons of dirt. If the truck had been carrying paint, the driver would have been an artist. He placed his load exactly where we wanted it, next to the driveway, adjacent to the house.

The top photo is Bobbie getting started. The first order of business was to get the dirt off the driveway. We had expected the worst, a blocked driveway. So we moved both cars to the street about 7:00 AM. As you can see the driver left only about a foot of dirt on the driveway and the rest on the garden.

I helped move the driveway dirt and then grabbed the camera for these photos. Sarah really got her back into it in the second photo. I think she turned her back on me because she knows any photo has a good chance to show up here on the blog.

In the bottom photo, Janine is helping spread the dirt to it's new location.

So far Bobbie bought an azalea for one end and is considering what else to plant. We will give you updates as they occur.

(It really was a) Happy Birthday

This past Tuesday my family was kind enough to take me out for lunch for my birthday. We went to a nearby restaurant with outdoor dining. It was a 30 minute wait and hot outside, so we settled for this nice table indoors.

John already knew what he wanted to order at this point, so he got to take the photo.

Overall, I had a great birthday. I got a very nice card from my Mom and Dad as well as a singing card from my sister Barb. Then my brother Eric and my sister Louise called in the afternoon. (Sorry for talking your ear off, Weeze!)

In the evening Dan, one of my business partners, had John, Janine and I over for rhubarb cake. A nice ending to a nice day. (Sarah and Mommy were at dance practice.) Thanks everybody!

Birthday Party

John (right) went to a birthday party this afternoon for his friend Zach (second from left). This photo was taken at the very beginning of the party. There were 13 more boys to come at this point.

The guys were running down the hill on the Slip 'n Slide when it started to rain for about two minutes.

After fruit and popcorn inside, it was back outside to unwrap presents and the big squirt gun finale. Everyone had a great time. Zach's mom did a great job.

Latin Al Fresco

One of the great things about home schooling is that you have the opportunity to "carpe diem." On Tuesday afternoon Bobbie, Sarah and John did just that when they moved the Latin lesson to the front yard. It was about 80 degrees and very comfortable that day. Perfect for a shirtless lesson for John.

School will be ending soon, but Bobbie likes to keep the kids fresh with summer reading. Janine and Bobbie will read together for most of the summer while Sarah will read just about any fiction she can lay her hands on and John enjoys adventure stories.

Drawing Set

The other day, Janine and I sat outside and drew some of the flowers now just blooming in our garden. Janine wanted to try out the new sketch pad she is holding in the photo.

She has almost filled up the pad that came with the drawing set she got for Christmas from Uncle Eric. It's a really nice set too, with a wood case, pastels, oil pastels and my favorite, lots of colored pencils. I even borrowed one or two, after asking of course.

The rest of the garden will be in full bloom in the coming weeks. We will get back out and perhaps share some of our work with you.

The Bridges of the Merritt Parkway

This past Tuesday and Wednesday I was in New England for business. Along the way we drove along the Merritt Parkway. It is one of the only roads listed on the National Register of Historic Places. There is even a Merritt Parkway Conservancy.

The Merritt Parkway runs through Fairfield County Connecticut. It was one of the first limited access highways and was finished in 1940. No trucks are allowed on it's 38 mile length. But as you can see each bridge built over the parkway is unique. If a highway can be called "civilized" this one is it.

For more information click here for Wikipedia or here for the National Scenic Byways Program

Dinner Out

Last night we thought we would beat the Mother's Day rush by taking Nana and Mommie out to dinner. We went to a 150 year old Inn located in the same town we bought the new washer. (See previous post.)

The town has a historic district that was originally settled before the French and Indian War by both. It was all but abandoned shortly after the Revolutionary War. A religious community resettled the area in the early 19th century only to leave after the Civil War. Apparently the whole place sat underutilized for many decades until it's historical significance was recognized about 40 years ago.

Thankfully the menu had no historical significance so John could order his usual plain hamburger. Nana and Sarah both had single lobster tails while Mommie had the crab cakes and Janine a baked potato. I had the Guinness Meat Loaf.

It was nice to travel 45 minutes north of town for a meal. It reminded Nana of the old days when they would take a Sunday drive and have a meal along the way. The concept of the Sunday Drive is of a bygone era however. We all spend so much time in the car going from activity to activity during the week, we would rather say at home on Sundays. But taking a short drive to shop and have an early dinner on a Friday sounded very attractive to everyone.

New Washer

Our old washer broke once again two weeks ago. The old Whirlpool just hasn't been itself for the past year or so. First it started making funny noises. Then it smelled like burnt rubber from time to time.

Just before Christmas, Bobbie used it to wash a rug and it broke. We called Charlie, our repairman replaced a part and admonished Bobbie to take the rugs to the laundrymat. But in February we had the same problem. Charlie repaired the machine, but this time he didn't have a quick explanation.

Finally, two weeks ago it broke again. So after 14 years and $250 of recent service calls, we decided to buy a new washer.

Bobbie looked at the high tech front loaders at Home Depot, but was put off by the fact that our nearest Home Depot only had two top loaders on the floor compared to several top loaders. She didn't think she was hearing the whole story.

So we set a lunch appointment for two Fridays ago. We left John and Sarah to do homework and took Janine to lunch with us then washer shopping. We returned to an appliance store in a small town north of here. We bought a very nice Bosch dishwasher from them seven years ago. Based on that good experience, we returned only to find their showroom torn apart for remodeling.

But after a few moments of finding out how Bobbie preferred to do laundry and a lot of subsequent discussion, Rose, our sales lady determined that a higher-end top loader would be best. It took almost a week for delivery, but we wanted to make the right decision on a washer we would keep for many years, than a quick and regrettable one.

We ended up with the GE Profile you see in the bottom photo. It does just about everything but whistle Dixie. Most importantly it has the cycles and temperatures that Bobbie likes to use. She is a very idiosyncratic about laundry. She does many small loads at specific settings.

Later Thursday after the washer was delivered Bobbie was on the phone with Rose. It didn't sound as if the machine had started the load. Rose assured Bobbie that this new washer REALLY was that quiet and then said that she could schedule a repairman if Bobbie wanted. The first load really did get clean, and so will many more, we hope.

Darth Pajamas

Requires no explanation...