Grandcamp Day 5

Today was our last full day of Grandcamp Phase One.

Mimi loved her birthday napping puppy!



We had pancakes and juice at McDonalds for breakfast.



We picked up a few things at Walmart. "Run!! Run!!"


We baked cupcakes for Mimi's birthday.


The main part was putting the sprinkles on.


Lighting the candles required lots of coaching. "Light that one next!"


Blowing out candles was a team effort, as usual.


But the best part of all was eating sprinkles - straight!


It was another nice day, so we did some cleaning up outside...


...and helped Pa get a plastic bag out of the tree.


We dug in the flower bed...


...and cut a flower for Mimi's table.


For supper, we went to Jalepeno Tree for mexican food, and finished with an ice cream cone.


We stayed up really late watching Veggie Tales and Maisy (Pa loves Veggie Tales). Grandcamp Phase Two is going to be even more fun!

Grandcamp Day 4

We all went to church this morning, and some of us played on the playground while Mimi worked in the library. After church, we ate and got the house ready for our Life Group meeting.
Pa took a nap.
Mimi took a nap.

Naomi took a nap... finally!


After that, we watched some videos -- making sure Mimi stayed very close.

Grandcamp Day 3

Today was Museum of Nature and Science Day (formerly the Dallas Museum of Natural History and the Science Place - www.natureandscience.org).


First up was ping-pong ball levitation.



Next came man-eating bubble making.



There was a hot air balloon that went all the way up to the ceiling.



We operated the slot thingys on the wall.



And played tunes on the xylophone.



The funny mirror made our legs look very long.



While we were playing in the water table, we noticed the safety sign had fallen down, so we set it back up. Safety First!



Finally, we built a toothpick-and-marshmallow structure. There were LOTS of marshmallows.

Grandcamp Day 2

Today was sunny and warm, so we spent a little time in the range box house.



After a busy day, a sink bath hit the spot.



We brushed our teeth (with a hairbrush handle, naturally.)



Slowing down for a little reading - but it's still a lonng way to bedtime.



Time to practice martial arts -- hiiiiiiiieeeyaaahh!!!!

Grandcamp Day 1

One of the events of the day was baking cookies.

First, we washed hands.


We cracked the egg.


... and measured stuff.


Mimi handled the mixing.


After baking, we did the oven mitts dance...


... and played the keyboard.

Fast Lane rally

The CMA Fast Lane rally was held in Hatfield, Arkansas last week. I rode the DR up, and participated in the Easy dual-sport ride on Friday.

As we were getting ready to head out, I noticed a very nice Honda CBX preparing to go on one of the sport bike rides.
Hirem was our dual-sport ride leader.

We rode mostly gravel county roads and National forest roads.
Of course, we stopped now and then, so everybody could talk and compare notes.
And do other things.
We stopped at a vista point to admire the Fall colors.
While we were there, a local resident came by.
And a few trucks. We were glad we didn't meet these guys on the road.
On Saturday morning, the bike was loaded up and ready to head home.

Pumpkin, pumpkin, who's got the pumpkin?

One of the key ingredients of a good Halloween is Carving the Pumpkin. This year, John helped Mimi with mucking out the gooey stuff.


It takes a lot of concentration!
Unfortunately, there is no documentation of the final product. However, in the spirit of Green, I can attest that we roasted the seeds and actually ate some. They aren't too bad.

Track Day

The Buell Company (division of Harley Davidson) sponsored a track day at a nearby track, which I attended. Besides a really good price, they also provided a set of demo motorcycles covering their whole line of sport bikes. I tried out the 1125R sport bike and the Ulysses adventure bike. Both were splendid - although the Ulysses was so tall I needed help getting the kickstand down after my demo ride...

Here is a sampling of the day, including one lap of Eagles Canyon Raceway aboard my VFR. (A very slow lap... A good lap time for motorcycles is about a minute and 50 seconds! The track record (for cars) is about 1 minute 28 seconds. My lap time was about 3 minutes...)

Overachiever Lemon Tree

Here's our potted lemon tree, doing its best to be a big producer.




Four lemons! One yellow almost ripe one (back behind the leaves), and three others.

Of course, its little Lime Tree buddy is trying hard to catch up.... I see six limes.

Grammie's Got New Shoes!!

Check out Mom's new walking shoes.
Aren't they beauts?!!

Today I finished re-reading C.S. Lewis Screwtape Letters.

I found it striking in its unusual structure and wonderful language, and convicting in its masterful reverse-psychology skewering of most of the errors of today's denominational Christianity, as well as many of the old heresies that have emerged since the beginning. Amongst all that, Lewis subtly paints a picture of what Christianity really is about.


Mr. Lewis is high on the list of folks I look forward to visiting with when I get to Heaven.

Weird words

So, if Real Estate means land and buildings --
then what is Imaginary Estate??

Our friend Wink