Fireworks

I went down and picked up James today so he could mow for me. On the way home we stopped and did our annual fireworks shopping. When we got home James lite off a 100 shot battery to let Parker know he was here. I spent most of the next couple of hours supervising. They had a good time seeing what they could make blow up. I never thought to take any pictures so here are a couple of the earliest ones from the 4th that I could find.

The first one is from 2001, before that he was just a bystander.

Here he is in 2002 being supervised by Mik.

After the first fireworks session and a little playing, it was time to mow. James said it was his fastest time yet, he finished in about an hour and a half. Then they had a second fireworks session followed by swimming until it was time to head home. On the way home we stopped by the 5 Guys to try their hamburgers and fries. Not Bad, we will probably go back.

Alder Lake Flying

We were up at 6 this morning and headed for Alder Lake for some seaplane flying. We made good time and were the first ones there. People and the boat started showing up shortly after we got there. The weather wasn't the best, cool and a pretty good breeze, but we flew regardless.

There were 13 of us before long, and a pretty good selection of planes. I had the only electric planes there.

These are Gene's planes, he provides the rescue boat.

This is a brand new plane getting ready for it's first flight. He was a little nervous, but it went great.

Some of the planes were pretty big. This one with all the wires took a couple of hours to get going. Then he had some motor trouble (old fuel) and Gene had to rescue it with his boat. After changing fuel, it flew fine. Other that a couple of engines quitting, the rescue boat was not needed as there were no crashes today.

After the flying was done we stopped at Mayfield Dam and watched the fishermen while having dinner. Then it was on to home where a surprise awaited, my new radio had been delivered. I spent some time playing with it before I came in to write this.

Monday!

I spent most of the day getting ready for the seaplane flying tomorrow. I took one break and went down and helped Mik with a couple of things. I had a good time giving James a bad time about doing his chores. It worked, because he did some of them. Afterwards I hit Fred Meyer to pick up a few things we needed for the trip tomorrow. Then it was back home to finish loading the motor home and program the GPS. Hope this one does better than the one we used last Wednesday! I did not take any pictures today, so I put some pictures from about the same time in 1999 taken with my first digital camera.

James is checking out my friend Dick's Aeromaster at the Goble field.

Cathy at her retirement party.

Sunday Flying

Several members had indicated on the club forum they were flying today, so I decided to join them. It turned out to be a great day. The field had been mowed and they did a great job. We had a good turn out of flyers. My friend Horty had radio troubles that we could not cure, so I loaned him one of my planes to fly. We finally gave it up about 4 and loaded up. After I got home I took some planes out and put the seaplanes in their place. Then I looked at another seaplane I have and did some work on it and will probably take it Tuesday. My friend and flying buddy Bob took these pictures and was kind enough to email them to me so I could put them in my blog. I was too lazy or busy flying to get my camera out.

You can see, I get pretty comfortable when I fly!

I hope you were able to get out and enjoy the day.

Thanks again Bob!

Marriage and Baseball

I don't know if the two are supposed to go together or not! Today we went to Vera's nephews wedding in Vader. It was a nice relaxed wedding and reception. We had a good time visiting and people watching.

Afterwards we ran home and changed so we could run down and catch the last of James' baseball game. If he looks a little sad in the picture, it is because they were behind 14 to 1 at that point. Now for a nice relaxed evening watching Ninja Warrior, Wipeout or maybe the Mariners

Friday Stuff

After the big day yesterday, I slept in until almost 9 today. By the time I finished breakfast, checked my emails, read the blogs and paid a couple of bills it was getting close to Noon. I wandered out to the shop to start getting my seaplanes ready for next Tuesday. A group of flyer's with seaplanes get together a couple of times a year up around Puyallup. This time we are meeting at Alder Lake to fly and have a BBQ. When I went out to the motor home to get my Cub so I could put the floats on it I decided to see what was going on at Dianne's. The twins were there, feeding themselves in their highchairs. I had a great time watching that! I must have spent an hour there watching. When I finally got to the planes, things went really good and they are all ready to go now. The main things I had to do were bolt the floats on the Cub, and water proof the electronic speed controls in both of them. I am really looking forward to Tuesday now.

Thursday Flying and Baseball

It was a great day for flying Thursday. Vera and I headed up about 9:30 and stayed until 4:00. I flew my T-28 and Stuka, both of which had spent the winter hanging from the ceiling in the shop. Barry stopped by in the afternoon and shared some pizza with us. We had a nice visit with him.

After flying we went to James' game at Western. They played great and ended up winning 12 to 2.

Birthday

Today was Vera's birthday! We met the family at the Masthead for lunch to celebrate. Vera had a nice time visiting with everyone and got a new bird house and some hanging baskets as presents.

Afterwards we headed to Woodland for a visit to the Grist Mill. I entered it into the mapping program on my phone and we followed the directions faithfully. We ended up on top of a hill off of the Little Kalama River Rd. The view was nice, so I took a couple of pictures of Vera and the Fox Glove before we headed down. We had been wondering how they could run a water wheel on the top of a hill.

After getting directions in Ariel and discovering we were on the wrong side of the river we headed back to Woodland where the bridge is. Eight miles later, we were at the Grist Mill. It is only open weekends, but we had a nice time looking around and walking on the trails. I took some pictures through the windows.

After looking at the Mill, we crossed the covered bridge and took a walk upstream on the other side. You can see a little of the flume to the right of the building with the excess water pouring out.

This picture from upstream shows the covered bridge.

A stop at Dairy Queen on the way home and our day was complete.

Finally Sunshine

Time to get caught up here. Sunday I decided to install Windows 7 on the house computer. Since I was upgrading from Vista it saved all my programs and files and reinstalled them. The only problem being all this saving and reinstalling takes time. I started about 10 AM and finished up about 8 PM. In that time, I also installed Photoshop CS4, Microsoft Office and the latest Greeting Card Factory. The computer runs much faster now!


Monday, some parts for the Eurofighter and the Mustang came in so I spent most of the day installing them and then programming the transmitter.

Tuesday, this morning I went down and picked up James as we had made arrangements for him to mow. He played with the cousins most of the day until it was time to mow. I did not think he had left enough time to get it done, but I was wrong and he got it done. We did have a little excitement while mowing down by the highway, two police cars came up the road all lite up and started pulling into driveways. They finally appeared to find the right one and went up it. One of those times that I wish my cell phone was also a scanner!

James mowing today, sometimes his pattern looks a lot different than how I do it, but he gets it done. One thing I like, down on the side hill, he is doing it the way I told him without being prompted. The lawns looked great when he got done.

Driving in the Rain

It seems like every time I drove today it rained. I left early for the radio control club's swap meet at Toledo High School. There was a smaller than normal turn out this year, probably because of that darn rain. I did good not buying anything until about 10 minutes before I left, then I ended up with two planes.

After I left the swap meet, I went to Barry's house to visit until the retirement/trip farewell party for him and the people they are traveling with. I wanted to meet Dallan and Helen so when Barry extended the invitation, I took him right up. I had a good time and got to meet lots of their relatives. I spent a couple of hours there, then headed out to James' game. The sports complex where it was held is really nice. Astro turf infields, lots of play equipment, it looked fairly new. They lost both games today, so they play the No. 1 team at 10 AM tomorrow. James played good and came out of his batting slump with a RBI single.

The rain held off for the game, but as soon as I headed South there it was again.

Two Days of Eurofighter

I finally remembered more of what I did Sunday, more mowing. I mowed ours and the rental's, lawns and had a great time out in the sunshine. I even wore my shorts, but one day is probably not going to put much tan on the knee. Yesterday and today I mainly worked on the Eurofighter. It is on the wheels now after a big fight getting the nose gear door to close right.

No rudder yet, the hinges were still drying. It came with lights installed, I moved a few of them to match the plane it will be finished as.


Vera's bible study group celebrated her birthday today, boy the food they had sounded great!

What the heck did I do Sunday?

Must not have been much as I can't remember anything special, so I will write about Monday.
I finished editing the pictures from Mark's Celebration of Life this morning (that's what I did Sunday) and then we went down to get the mail and some groceries. We picked up a BK lunch on the way home. As we were unloading, I noticed Cathy, Dianne, Jillian, Rielee and the twins were out by the sandbox. I headed over to finish my lunch and visit. The kids were all playing it was great fun watching and taking pictures (66 of them).

Harper is squealing like mad!

Ava discovered the sand and was picking up handfuls.

Ava has just had her first taste of sand and Harper is investigating a fir cone.

Big smiles just after Jillian poured sand on Rielee.
After all that fun, I decided to clean the gutters. I looked at the roof and realized it needed to be blown off first. I did the roof, then blew out the gutters. Of course everything I blew off ended up on the decks so they got blown off also. That all ended up on the lawn, so I got the mower out and used it's bagger to clean up that mess. The pond filter was next on the list, no surprises there and I was done in about 15 minutes. After I cleaned up, it was hit the recliner with ice on the knee, that lead to a 2 hour nap. Sorry about giggling during the video, it was just too funny.

Enjoying the fruits of my labor

Once the clouds cleared it was a beautiful day for flying. I got to enjoy the nice smooth runway from the mowing I did yesterday. As always, Mt Rainier looked great in the distance. Six other fliers showed up and we got in lots of flying.

Looking to the South are some of my planes. The green one is Audrey's, she and Ted are watching Leonard land.

Looking North, Bob has not showed up yet and Dave is taking a break on his tail gate.
Vera went to a Shower in Centralia today for her nephew's wife to be. She had a good time and afterwards stopped and saw Marie.

Mowing and more mowing

I went up to mow the Toledo flying field today. It took two passes over it to get the grass blown off and short enough. I hope they don't fertilize it next year! Turns out my week to mow is next week. The member whose turn it is showed up when I was about three quarters done. He graciously agreed to trade weeks with me. When I was done mowing I put a couple of flights on the the Stearman. Afterwards we went up and had dinner at Jammers Restaurant at Exit 68. We have been wanting to try it since it changed hands. We both had Chicken Fried Steak and enjoyed it. Vera had their clam chowder and it is really good, made on site, not out of a can. Other than that, not much happened around here.

Hugs, Tears, Laughter!

We went to the Celebration of Mark's Life today in Chehalis. Mark had made many friends and it showed. There were lots of hugs, tears and laughter between his family and friends. Since it was a pot luck, there was plenty of great food. People lingered for a long time visiting. I took about 140 pictures, which will keep me busy the next day or so editing and putting on CD's for the family.

Murder, Mayhem and Marshmallow Salad

I made a short visit to Dianne's this morning to see the twins, they are so much fun to watch. I spent the rest of the day at the computer editing photos of Mark for tomorrow. Holy Cow did it RAIN! Then it was followed by a big clap of thunder. Luckily Vera got home from bible study just before it hit. We finished off the strawberries with strawberry short cake for lunch today. No snacking this afternoon, I was too full. We are going to dinner and a play "Murder, Mayhem and Marshmallow Salad" at the church tonight. Interesting title, it should be fun!

8:30 PM Update:

We really enjoyed the play! Who wouldn't with characters like, Molly Devaro Keal, Pastor Evan Keal, Rev. Peter Piper, Sister Polly Piper, Tess T. Honcho and M. T. Socket the handyman. The food was good, there were six scenes with a course of dinner between each one. There was lots of laughter during the play. Below is the Rev. Peter Pipers card that he was handing out to guests.

The SU-29 Flies Great!

Finally some nice weather to test fly the Sukhoi SU-29. I loaded up the motor home this morning, stopped at Subway for a foot long Club and headed for Toledo. The first thing I did was get the SU-29 out and fly it. It was a great test flight, a couple of clicks of elevator trim and it was flying hands off. The manual mentioned it pulled towards the wheels in knife edge flight and needed about a 10% up elevator mix. I made a couple of minor adjustments to that figure and it was right on. This is going to be a great Aerobatic plane. I also got out the Cub, Stearman and X-500 helicopter. I ended up flying each of them twice. Vera and I had a nice visit during lunch and we headed home about 2 as it was getting kind of warm from the sunshine.

X-500, SU-29, Stearman and Cub with Mt St Helens in the background.

After we got home, I had a call from Barry. They are planning a Celebration of Mark's Life for Thursday in Chehalis.

Goodby Mark

Strawberry Shortcake

When we were at Costco they had some good looking strawberries. We got a 4 pound box and have been nibbling on them for a couple of days. We decided to have the last of them as Strawberry Shortcake today for lunch. Since there was left over cake from Marie's birthday, we added that. It was a pretty decadent lunch, but it was really good. I worked on planes most of the morning and early afternoon. On one trip into the house, I noticed the deer having a lunch of the roses, so I got couple of pictures.

After the deer left, I was looking at the pollywog's in the pond and decided to try a picture of them. It turned out the flash lit them up pretty good.

I got the SU-29 done today, now all I need is some good weather to test fly it.

I also got the Eurfighter painted so there will probably be a picture of it showing up soon.

After James' game on Saturday they had a Home Run Derby. Each kid was given ten balls off the pitching machine to hit one. James was first up and hit his first ball out. All the other kids went and only one other kid hit one over the fence. James asked for one more ball and hit that one out also. The other kid didn't so he won.

More Baseball and Birthdays

We started out the day at John Noll Park watching James' last regular season baseball game. They lost, but James made a couple of awesome catches of fly balls. It was also the most perfect day for a game we have all year, warm sunny days have been a real rarity.

After the game, we headed up to Centralia to help Marie celebrate her 83rd birthday. I had picked up a cake and we got ice cream and pop on the way up. We had a really nice visit. It seems like Marie has settled in better every time we go up.

I should go out and mow, but I think the rest of the evening is going to be books, planes and TV.

I hope you got to enjoy the sunshine.

7:30 PM

I just talked to Barry, not much change in Marks condition today. They woke him up a little, but he started fighting the ventilator and restrains so they sedated him again.

Demo

I got up early this morning and headed to Longview to be part of the Cowlitz Valley Radio Control Flyers demonstration for the Monticello Middle School science class. Six of us showed up and flew for about an hour and a half for them. There was lots of clapping and cheering so I think they enjoyed it. Afterwards, I went home, unloaded the motor home and put it away. I went over to Dianne's for a short visit and got there just after the twins had bonked heads. Harper had a big red spot right in the middle of her forehead. Ava was helping Steve load the dishwasher. Ava came over later and grabbed my pant leg, so I picked her up and played with her until it was time to go get James. Jame spent the afternoon watching TV and playing on the computer while I took a nap. Then Auna came over and they played in the computer room for a long time before heading out to see what "Aunt" was doing. James ended up talking me into letting him spend the night with Parker. They promised to go to bed fairly early as James has a game tomorrow.

I talked to Barry today and they did not wake Mark up. They are going to wait a couple of more days and let the ribs heal. Barry said all his vital signs are good. It sounds like slowly the news is getting better.

Nice day for a trip!

Mark Update: I talked to Barry today and the surgery was to fuse the back. Mark came through it fine and they plan on waking him tomorrow. He has 8 broken ribs on one side and six on the other and was having trouble breathing because of the pain, which is the reason they sedated him and put him on a ventilator. Hopefully he will be able to handle the discomfort of breathing now.

It was a nice day for a trip to Costco. Vera and I had a good time because we were not on a schedule and only were after a few things. We just wandered around and looked at things. We did buy few new things to try. After a stop at Panda Express we headed home. After we put things away, I spent the rest of the afternoon working on my new plane. The knee held up fine today and I never took any pain relievers the whole day.

Rain, Birthdays and Baseball

We had 1.48 inches of rain today, most of it before Noon. I spent the day working on my new Su-29.

I gave Barry a call, but there is not much change in Marks condition, he is scheduled for surgery tomorrow, which I believe is to install drains as he has fluid in his chest.

Mik called and said there was going to be a surprise party/dinner for Michelle at the Masthead. We had a great time and I got a good picture of Michelle and Bev. Michelle brought along her new iPad to show everyone.

Debbie honored us with a smile tonight.

After the dinner, we went to watch James' team play a ball game.

He is talking with the first base umpire Mike, who he has known most of the time he has played at Western. It turned into an exciting finish when they were down 8 to 5 going into the bottom of the 5th. They scored 4 runs to win it after 5 innings when the game was called because there is a time limit on school nights.