Christmas 09

I've added a slideshow of my photos. I'll add some from other cameras as I get them. I know they're better than mine.
It was wonderful to have so many of us together again this Christmas. We missed Charles, Dawn, and Brent, who spent Christmas together in Tucson.
At our house Great Grandpa was represented by the hospice crocheted angel hanging high on our tree. Today when we were all at Great Grandma's, digging in to the ham, roast, Elizabeth's salmon and scallops, Carolyn's shrimp, potatoes and gravy, creamed limas, sweet potatoes..., I suddenly had such a vivid memory of Dad's smile and his joking manner. I was remembering the Johnny of a couple of decades ago, cheerful and welcoming. I think he approved of dinner today. I think he was "there" as he hadn't fully been able to be for years.
Today the little ones--and their dads--wore themselves out sledding in the morning and then again in the afternoon. Beth and Elijah got in on some afternoon snow fun, also, and John Wayne got to use his cross country skis. What a beautiful snow it was, powdery and glittering, falling for 24 hours or more. Of course there was lots of playing with new toys and lots of snacking. Early bedtimes tonight!
I've been opening gifts for three days and love every gift, each thoughtfully chosen.
Dawn and Charles gave some great gift cards!! And as my secret Santa they gave me a crown photo frame and computer gizmos that will help me move data and photos between computers and camera to computers. Even the wrapping paper had crowns! And although they weren't Christmas presents, the three tiaras for the Princess Project were an awesome gift!!!!!!!!!! Their hand made soap and the prickly pear jelly were much appreciated by everyone.
Elizabeth gave me an awesome knitting tote from the Crazy Girl Yarn Shop!! Yea!! If you haven't been to one of their two locations in Iowa you've missed out!
George and Beth gave me a digital photo frame that I'm going to sit and stare at a lot. How can I help that with such cute people to look at!!!!!!!! Knit one, purl two, look at photo!!
John J gave me something from Hobby Lobby that I've been wanting for quite awhile. How did he know?
John got me warm sheepskin slippers and leather chore gloves. No more frozen fingers from wet hands when I take care of the animals.
As always, the socks at Great Grandma's were hung with care--and forethought. Highlights were the dresser scarves of Swedish weaving that Judy did for all the ladies. Cindi made each of us a different set of jewelry- necklaces with earrings or bracelets, each unique and in natural stones and gemstones. Hmm!! There were also some interesting necklaces made with dried and painted bread beads that Great Grandma stuck in each.
I was able to finish some Pilates socks for Elizabeth, two silk bow ties for George, a scarf for Beth, pieced mats for Charles and Dawn. And I helped Judy with the quilts for JT and Gabe--Thomas the Train for JT and firetrucks for Gabe. Nathan had his earlier this year and selected all the fabrics himself! So, I did finish a few things for gifts. And of course I did a lot of scarves before Christmas and gave them away earlier. Maybe if I start in June this next year.......
I do want to finish the bunny and alpaca mitts I started for myself. And maybe do another pair of socks.

Merry Christmas from us and all our varmits!

Early Thanksgiving visit with John and JT

We had a great visit with John and JT Thursday evening through Sunday noon. Elizabeth and Brent came down on Saturday and we had a wonderful meal together at Big Muddy's. Brent's mother and grandmother came as well as my mom, mother-in-law, sister-in-law, John and I, and of course, John J and JT. Thanks to Elizabeth and Brent for thinking of this as it was a lot of fun. Obviously JT enjoyed himself a tremendously!! :-)
JT also enjoyed all his time with my mom!!
John J and JT left here and went to George and Beth's. An early Christmas present for George was tickets to the Bears game!! He and John rode bikes to Soldier Field and back!! I know this was a great present for George!!
Charles started basic training yesterday. I've been thinking of him so much that I've decided to make cheese soup tomorrow in his honor! John C's family is going to help serve the community Thanksgiving meal in Burlington. John and I had planned to have a quiet day at home (and I DID help with Elizabeth's meal at the Ronald McDonald House) but we'll see.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Well, it's another birthday! :-)
I had a good time this weekend at Elizabeth's. We each had a Dr apt on Friday that went pretty well. Then, Friday night Elizabeth was in charge of organizing a meal by her ODK Honor Society for the Ronald McDonald House. That went really well. LOTS OF GOOD FOOD. My mom sent a huge sweet potato casserole. In between everything, Elizabeth and I did a lot of shopping. :-)

Pensacola

We've had a great show at The Great Gulf Coast Arts Festival. We walked on the beach Thursday afternoon and every morning before the show, getting up about 5:30 so we'd have time for a nice walk. With the rain coming in before the hurricane, tomorrow is just not going to be a good day for shelling. We hope to have time to get in a morning walk before the rain starts. We'll be heading home later in the morning. John C doesn't find shopping in Pensacola to have the same appeal as playing in the waves!

Friday at Pensacola

We had a very successful Friday. Sales were great and the weather was awesome!!!!!!!!! I don't think we've ever had a prettier day here.
I wanted to share the photo of the tatting/smocking/French hand sewing booth next to us. It makes me drool. I can tat and smock, of course, so I don't need to buy anything there. But, I LOVE to look! :-)
I also enjoyed watching the spinners for awhile. One of them was spinning her dog's hair. He wasn't overjoyed about getting brushed. :-)
And here's a photo taken this evening from the bridge to Pensacola Beach.

Hello Pensacola

Our trip to Pensacola was smooth and uneventful, except for driving so far yesterday because there are so few places to stop on 45 in southern Mississippi. We arrived at the show at 9 am, a record. However, we couldn't set up until 12:30 because of a tour. So, we put chairs out beside the car and enjoyed the warm breeze for awhile, walked around awhile (I found a great consignment shop!), and had lunch. We still had lots of time for a long walk on the beach and visits to some of the shops. There's much less in all of the shops this year. The rates at all the motels seemed down. BUT, there were more people here on the beaches today than we've seen for a long time.
We really enjoyed the Kia! I can't believe how much room it has. The seats were taken out and left at the rental place in Burlington. We got the workbench INSIDE and had plenty of room for the suitcases and the large cooler. I suppose John C has less for sale this trip, though, so there may have been less boxes. The gas mileage was about double that of the Suburban. We really like the doors, also. It's easier to load and unload with the door alongside the car instead of sticking out at an angle. Hmm. What else? Oh, there are separate temperature controls for the driver's side and passenger side. The seats were REALLY comfortable and there was lots of leg room.
I'll get better photos later and we'll send postcards to all the little ones.
Thinking of Ft. Hood tonight.

Weekend in Chicago

We had such a fun weekend in Chicago!
Elizabeth picked us up Saturday morning and drove us to George and Beth's. A great advantage to having a college age child with a car is having a chauffeur! We had a smooth trip over and arrived in time to relax and visit before heading out for Trick or Treating. We went to the same wonderfully fun street as last year. I noticed a lot of homes for sale on the street this year. Lots of yard displays making political commentary again this year, and one had hung an effigy of a real estate agent! :-)
John and JT arrived later in the evening, after JT went Trick or Treating with his mom in Kenosha.
Sunday morning we had time to visit and get ready for Gabe's birthday brunch. YUM!!!!!! Lots of great food! Gail made a quiche and a spinach casserole, and a wonderful pumpkin bread with chocolate chips! Beth and George did home fries with Iowa potatoes, buttermilk pancakes with Iowa raspberries and Michigan blueberries as well as apple pancakes. The birthday cake was a Winnie the Pooh design.
Gabe got lots of great presents but probably favorites will be the town rug from Mom and Dad and the scooter from Grandparents Dunlap!
Monday morning we got up EARLY and John C drove us back to Iowa City for Elizabeth's check up at the oral surgeons office. Her dry socket appears to have healed sufficiently to leave the packing out now! YEA! We did some quick shopping afterwards and then I drove home and Elizabeth headed back to Iowa City and the rec center for work. BUSY DAYS!!
Tomorrow we leave for our show in Pensacola. We'll rent a van this year and we'll be going through Mississippi again. I probably won't have internet access in Pensacola.

Elizabeth's surgery

Elizabeth is sleeping this morning. The meds finally seem to be helping her sleep. She did switch to Tylenol PM last night and didn't wake up until 6 when I gave her the antibiotic--and Vicodin for another try. She seemed warm to me but she has no thermometer--better get one today.
The teeth came out fine. She just wasn't getting much pain relief and it was sad to hear her say that she had hoped, for just a day or so, to NOT BE IN PAIN and be able to rest!!

Spinning

I had so much fun this morning doing some spinning! The photo shows the wool I spun in about an hour. The border leicester ? roving is so well drafted already that it can really be spun as is for a thicker yarn so it's great for beginners. I have two other balls of it. One goes to Dawn. I also have a ball of Rambouillet. It is soft and spongy and is supposed to make a nice yarn for hats. But it will be harder to draft as I spin.
Little known facts about me:
I taught myself to knit when I was in high school and a few times made up my own patterns. The young are fearless!
Mom taught me to embroider when I was in middle school and I taught myself more from books.
I took a spinning and weaving class. I've mostly spun on a drop spindle and I really LOVE spinning!
I taught basket weaving and wheat weaving at the Art Guild.
I taught tatting at Stoermer's craft store, and possibly through adult ed classes at the college--can't remember for sure. :-)
I took classes in spinning and weaving, wheat weaving, tatting, and tailoring.
I made pillows from wool I spun from fleeces from Uncle Ray's sheep. There's a neckroll pillow on the chair and two unstuffed pillows on the futon--all three of which I wove from wool I spun! Surprise!

Deutsch Country Days

We had beautiful weather for Deutsch Country Days! It was warmer than I expected, although the ground was as wet as it's ever been there! Our sales were good, we had a great time at the Bertram's on Saturday evening, and I got some wool to spin, so it was a great weekend all around.

Scholarship banquet

We had a lovely afternoon with Elizabeth on Sunday. We attended the scholarship banquet with her. Yummy food and interesting people to talk to. The top photo shows her with one of the Deans.

This is Elizabeth in her dining room with the placemats I made for her.

And at the bottom is a photo of Elizabeth and me outside the Ballroom.
I can't seem to rearrange the photos today.
I will be working all week for 5th grade language arts and have very little computer time.

Buy and sell

This weekend was the town wide fall yard sale for Mediapolis. Mom had a lot of company as John and I, Judy and Grandma Weyer, and even Stephen and Carolyn were there to sell things!! It was the best outcome we're ever had, although not all the profits were ours. :-) John C made the most money. :-)
I picked up some great bargains. I love the rug I got for the pantry-for $5!! And I have always wanted Christmas china. This isn't anything fancy but I think it's pretty and I have gold chargers that will really make it festive! I got the china for $7.50!! Mom went back to a nearby sale after we left and got a red feather wreath for me. So sweet of her!!
THEN, the next day John and I went over to his Mom's to help with sorting out the furniture house. That was quite an event!!!!! There were so many nice things in there!! The walnut bureau with the solid burl top--a single slab of wood--was incredible. There is a very unusual rocker that John C thinks could be by a famous maker. There were several tables that were taken apart in order to store them more easily and now it might be a puzzle to decide which legs go with which top! :-)



What I practically ran home with was this OLD OLD spinning wheel that came from an estate sale at the house on Flint Bottom. Grandpa Weyer attended this sale about a year before we moved in to that house. Our future landlord was getting rid of huge amounts of things stored in the house and the outbuildings. The spinning wheel wasn't complete when Grandpa bought it but over a year later we had moved in to the house and John C was checking the wiring upstairs near a crawl space when he looked down inside the wall and saw the rest of the spinning wheel. I heard the story years ago but I don't know if I ever saw all the parts of the wheel. Well, the spinning wheel is sitting in my living room today. It is missing the foot treadle and the connecting rod but everything else is there. There is even some wool on the spindle although we think it might be a flax wheel. It's what's called a low wheel and is very close to the floor, angled, and small. Because of that and the workmanship, John C thiks there's a possibility that it's colonial. The workmanshop is quite fine and all done with hand tools. The metal pin for the spindle is hand forged. I'll put on a photo later of the cleaned up and temporarily put together wheel. The wooden pins are gone which attached the wheel rim sections to the spokes. I'll have to put in temporary pins, or some such, to hold the wheel together.

There was also this wheel which Grandpa Weyer purchased in Delaware years ago. He and John C worked long hours making replacement parts and maybe someday Dad will have a chance to put this together.

Judy and Mom made sure we had refreshments! :-) We didn't however, use the Burlington Basket Company picnic ice chest basket. It has a tin lining and has a compartment for ice!!!!

It was a long afternoon for Mom Weyer. Here she is looking at her mother's (Lottie's) treadle machine.

Scenes from Iowa.

Notes from the trip--part two

Charles was still at pre basic training when we got to his house but we were happy to see Dawn—and Pepper and Bubbles! We got Dawn to show us the medal Charles had won the first weekend of pre basic—for being the best recruit that weekend. When Charles got home we got a quick photo of him in uniform with his medal. He might not always be close enough to come home for the night on the other pre basic weekends. He leaves in mid Nov. for basic in SC and then will go to Virginia for avionics technician training, working on Apache helicopters. A huge change in his life and Dawn will be staying behind with her demanding job as manager of the lab.
We enjoyed some really good meals while in Tucson. Dawn took us to a fun hamburger restaurant downtown on Sunday while Charles was away. We got a look at a lot of the shops there and saw the place where the art show is held. We hope to do that in Dec of 2010. If we do the show I will definitely be shopping at Borderlands, where there is beautifully colored Mexican pottery and some lovely Moravian star light fixtures. There was also a store with turquoise beads…
I got some nice beads in the bead shop near Charles and Dawn’s house. (I then realized that the necklaces in Vegas were a really good buy, just for the beads!) Dawn also shared some Malachite beads with me and showed me the necklace that Cindi made to order for her with Malachite Dawn and Charles got at the Tucson gem show. Beautiful!
John and I, or Dawn and I, or all three of us, walked the dogs a few times, meeting an elderly neighbor who was having a moving sale. Dawn and I bought cookbooks from him. Sad…
We had two great meals at Mexican restaurants. YUM!!! YUM!!!! I had cheese enchiladas with rice and beans at El Sabroso. And then at the other I had a cheese enchilada, a shredded beef taco, and a tamale with rice and beans. The beans were so mild at both places, just perfect. Both of those restaurants had beautiful murals on the walls, especially El Sabroso. And at the other, if you ordered the special, you got soup as an appetizer and a small piece of chocolate cake afterwards!

John, Charles, and Dawn went to an indoor shooting range one day while I stayed home and made cakes. Dawn and Erica (a roomer of theirs) had cooked a pumpkin and we had some recopies for yummy pumpkin goodies. I made a pumpkin cake as well as the confetti cake Dawn requested for their anniversary. We helped them celebrate their anniversary by getting them a ceiling fan. Charles and John spent a couple of mornings installing that. It made a huge difference in the air flow in their living room so I’m really glad we did that!!
We celebrated Charles’ birthday late and Dawn’s birthday early so they had a lot of things to open!! I took Dawn my Ashford spinning wheel as she has expressed an interest in spinning. She has been working some with the drop spindle and wool and alpaca I sent her for Christmas.


It was also their anniversary while we were there!





John and Charles went to a couple of woodworking stores where John searched a long time to find a nice piece of mesquite. He’ll make Dawn some mesquite spoons and maybe have a few extra for me! And I'm hoping some of the scraps will become drop spindles for the girls! They also went to sporting goods stores while I went to World Market (fun items from around the world) or consignment shops. I also love Bookman’s which is a huge used books and magazines store.


It was sad to leave. I always hate leaving any of my kids. I will ALWAYS be their mommy NO MATTER HOW OLD WE ALL GET!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We stopped at Hatch, NM at a pepper stand and I got a string of peppers. Pretty incongruous in my kitchen—oh, well! They were so beautiful! I kept trying to get a good photo of the antelope in NM. Actually I saw them also in TX and OK this year. They’re just hard to photograph from the car! I suppose people there feel about them like Iowans feel about deer. But I think they’re beautiful, and I really think NM is a pretty state.
We spent the night in Dalhart, TX. A high school football game was going on nearby as we settled in. I wondered how anyone could get a bite from the concession stand given the smell permeating the town from the two huge feedlots on each side of town……Oklahoma is amazingly flat as is a good deal of Kansas. But you begin to see farm houses in Kansas. In Kansas it was good to see that the little town nearly destroyed by a tornado had made more progress. They are building a beautiful new school. But there are still Red Cross disaster centers.
We had a long drive yesterday. We got a late start due to the time change. I drove for about 5 hours, I think, if totaled. I drove from about 50 miles from Topeka, around Tokepa, and through Kansas City (yikes!! about 3 changes of interstate!) and I drove from Osceola, IA home. Driving at night isn’t one of my favorite things…
Yesterday it was nice to get up to a mowed lawn—thanks Carolyn!! I found lots of raspberries!! I was thinking that the deer wouldn’t leave us any but they seemed untouched. There are carrots and beets ready to dig and some pumpkins growing. The late tomatoes I planted—Seed Savers striped red and yellow—have small tomatoes. Maybe these missed the blight. My purple aster is outstanding again and some of the roses were incredibly full of bloom. We have the green suburban back with it’s new radiator.
I suppose I’ll get a call to school soon and summer will be over for sure…

Notes from the trip--part one

I really enjoyed the “northern route” to Las Vegas. I’d never been in Nebraska, Colorado, or Utah and I got to add all three to my list. 
The loess hills were interesting to see. John joked that they were made of Nebraska dust and that made me think about what would happen if I never swept the floor! 
I thought eastern Colorado had gentle hills somewhat like Kansas’ flint hills. Then, suddenly, there are the Rockies, as though someone had turned the page in a children’s pop up book. There was no gradual increase in the amount of hills or low mountains. I worried about our loaded car, but the little Chevy Malibu was a wonderful car throughout the trip!
I’m glad I wasn’t driving as the light faded and the rain came down west of Denver. We had planned to find a place to spend the night just west of town but there really wasn’t anyplace! The little towns are fitted into the mountain sides and sometimes have just a gas station and a shop or two or maybe a Starbucks. Everyone is traveling at what seems to me to be excessive speeds for the conditions of dark and rain. But, I guess since it’s not snow they’re happy! Finally, we came to Silverthorne, which is a good sized town, and gratefully stopped for the night. It was quite a nice motel (we had no skis to put in the ski closet), with a really good breakfast. There were three waffle irons and syrup on every table so I guess that must be the breakfast of choice before heading for the slopes! The clerk told me they’d had a warm winter last year, a late spring, and that their growing season was late (which might have explained the awful allergy attack I had—but what could they grow there?). He said that this winter would be very important economically. In the morning sunlight the mountains were so beautiful with their many trees and it was awesome to be driving by Vail and near Aspen! Again, the scenery changed rapidly as we approached Utah. We went from tree covered mountains to high desert to the beautifully colored mountains and valleys near Zion. It seemed as thought the Arizona line brought us immediately to barren mountains with no vegetation. Something unexpected in the NW corner of Arizona was driving into a narrow canyon. The roads were layered to share the small space with a river and a railway. A bit overwhelming! It was the Virgin River Canyon, I believe.
Driving through Nevada with very little traffic—very little life to be seen—turns surprisingly into the city of Las Vegas with traffic jams and masses of people. It seemed to take longer to get from the edge of Vegas to our motel than it did to drive that stretch from the edge of Nevada to Vegas.
The convention was held at Bally’s again. Knowing our way around made it easier to find our way through the casino towards the correct elevators for out 17th floor room. You can’t get to the shops at Bally’s or the Paris or the Excalibur without going through the casinos. This is probably true for some of the other hotel/casinos, but the excessively fabulous Caesar’s mall can be accessed directly.
I saw signs of the economic downturn at Vegas. I found the service at Bally’s to be less impressive than last year. They were pretty stingy about towels, toiletries, and toilet paper… There were more sales in the stores. Well, the fact that there were sales at all was something different! John felt that the food was more expensive. I know I insisted on getting my lunch at McDonald’s one day as I got tired of paying nearly $20 for each meal, just for me…I did enjoy the buffet at the Flamingo.
I would advise anyone going out to Vegas for a few days to take advantage of the meal plan that a couple of the motel/casinos have. The Flamingo and the Excalibur (I think that’s right) will give you a price for all three meals in their dining rooms. You can have all three meals at the Flamingo for about $25 and the Excalibur for about $33 (I may have that backwards). That’s about half what you’d pay for even a hamburger meal at any other restaurant besides the national chains. Of course, it’s fun to try different restaurants but the Flamingo’s buffet was excellent. There was a sushi bar (not for me!), salad bar, a server to cut the roasted meats, many entrees and sides, and breakfast at any time of the day which included biscuits and gravy. Tempting but I had turkey, potatoes au gratin, lots of salad…..The dessert bar was heavenly!!!! Chocolate galore!
I would also advise trying to bring in a small suitcase with bottles of water, pop, or tea. A bottle of soda or tea in most places is $3 or just under. There are no fridges, microwaves, or coffee makers in the rooms. They want you out in the casinos or purchasing things!  The BEST place to buy snacks, juices, milk, pop, water, tea, souvenirs is the ABC store. There are two of them in the Miracle Mile mall. You can get pop for $1.65 instead of $3!
I did most of my shopping at 20wenty. You can get beautiful necklaces of semi-precious stones for $20, or 2 for $20, or in the case of some bracelets, 3 for $20. Really I do almost NO shopping in Vegas! But, I did get out to a lot of the malls just to window shop. And I did see the lions at the MGM this year. Somehow I missed that last year.
There was still construction on the Strip of a new Hotel/Casino and one of the stores coming in is Tiffany’s. It already glitters with lots of glass windows.
On 9-9-09 there were hundreds of weddings so you could about trip over brides that day. When we were out for a walk one afternoon John heard his name being called. It was a man he worked with when at Millard’s. The fellow was really surprised to see John in Vegas!  He and his wife were there for his daughter’s wedding. Their motel took care of the minister, the photographer, the drinks and appetizers…..but I’m not anxious to ever be a parent in that situation!!!!
On our way out of Nevada we made a pit stop at a place called Rosie’s Den. Several locals were having breakfast there and I was pretty envious of the largest pancakes I’ve ever seen, but we had eaten already. Later, in Arizona, we stopped at the Cowboy Café in Wickenburg. Lots of cars were parked there and that’s always a good sign. The sweet potato fries were awesome. We shared some really tasty chili and the burgers were just right! We continued down AZ seeing the Joshua trees, and then the Saguaro. I took some photos of the Phoenix skyline in hopes Elizabeth could point to a building and say “I worked near that.” 

Home again

We returned home about 10 pm last night. What a great trip we had, especially just being with Charles and Dawn. I've spent time adding photos to the slide show so I'll update more about the trip when I have more time. Probably tomorrow.
Here's a photo of our raspberries, which ripened while we were gone.

John and Marian in Vegas

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHARLES (yesterday)!!
Yesterday, while we were on a long walk, John heard a voice behind him calling his name. It was a tinner he worked with for years at Millard. He and his family were here for his daughter's wedding. At the Flamingo alone there were 24 weddings on 9-9-09. There was one mass wedding in the tall sky lounge. Anyway, this couple had been trying to decide whether or not it was John. They said he was the last person they expected to run into in Vegas. :-)
We watched quite a bit of one of the performances of the statues at Caesar's. We left before the "fog" got too bad. There are flames and colored fogs as a brother and sister argue over who will take over from their father, the King. We got to listen to a couple of gondoliers in the Venetian. Somehow my camera seemed not to be recording as I thought it was, but when I looked at it, the size of the video was too large for the blog even though it's a fairly short clip. I did add another video to the OT post so check out a sideways clip of John C and JT at the vise PLUS a video John J did of JT watching a stationary engine!!

Las Vegas

We had a really good trip out. We didn't have to drive as long each day as last year. Of course, the drive west of Denver, in the dark and the rain was a little too exciting and we missed the beauty of it all. But we woke up to a sunny morning in the 40's in Silverthorne. The mountains were beautiful and I enjoyed driving through Vail and near Aspen. Utah was spectacular and the Virgin River Canyon in AZ was a treat! I felt like we had driven through a crevice. Most of the great views seemed to be on John C's side of the car but we snapped some pics through the windows.
I'll put some photos on the trip on with OT photos in a slideshow.

Old Threshers 09

Old Threshers was quite successful this year. Crowds were larger than they have been for a decade and we sold so much that we may not be able to attend Johnny Appleseed, although John hasn't made the decision, yet. He hates to let the show down and could still demonstrate. It would have been awesome to have George's family with us, too, but George was working in the ER. And they had just been down for a visit while Charles was home.
John's Mom received one of 20 Volunteer of the Year awards and is wearing her "Old Thresher" rosette in the photo.
Sweet Sixteen surprised me this year but I came close, picking the actual first runner up and Miss Volunteer as ones I thought would be the winner and 3rd runner up as 2nd or first runner up.
John J has some great photos which I'll try and add later. They give a good overview of Threshers.

August visits

It was great to have Charles home for a couple of days, and to see the other kids and grandsons! Dawn we missed you!
We had some great meals! Charles grilled on Tuesday, after a fun day of canoeing, and everyone brought yummy food. George cooked a pasta and sauce (from garden veggies) on Wed. night. On Thursday we moved Elizabeth into her apartment and then Charles went to the airport :-(. The little ones had fun playing in mud puddles, in the kiddie pool, and on the golf cart!