Warm weather fun & field trip to Frederick

Philip discovers chocolate lollipops! Do you think he enjoys his food?

The next set of pictures is from our recent Saturday trip to Frederick, MD, where the museums were all open for a free day. I am back to researching the life of Francis Scott Key for a book I hope to write, and he lived for a while and is buried in Frederick. Two other benefits of the day: it counts as a school day field trip and we got to visit with Aunt Lois, cousin Jason, Cousin Hilary & kids (Jonathan & Abby) for the whole day (they live in Frederick, a little over 90 minutes from us).

Mt. Olivet Cemetery. Grave of Francis Scott Key & his wife (they are buried under the monument). Note how he is pointing to the flag--the star-spangled banner still waves.

Beautiful church steeples on the Lutheran Church in town. Just a random shot on a beautiful clear day.

Cousin Jason and Sarah Beth. We appreciate Jason so much for the love he has for the kids; they always look forward to seeing him; he has a real way of relating to them.

Lydia at the Rose Hill Manor kids museum. Once the house of a Maryland governor in the revolutionary days; now a hands-on museum.

Learning how old black & white photos were hand-colored. (They were just using paint with water.) Sarah Beth, Abby, Lydia, Sharon, Jacob, Aunt Lois, Jonathan, Hilary.

Aunt Lois treats us to Five Guys Burgers & Fries. That was a neat experience. More fries than you can possibly eat, a double-thick hamburger, and boxes of roasted peanuts for the taking.

Another random shot: Jacob taking a ride in my climbing saddle. The kids love when I bring my gear home for the weekend.

Lawn mower humor

Last year when visiting brother Josh in Pensacola, he told me he wasn't going to borrow things from people anymore because they always break while he has them: now he has something broken and the lender ends up with a new item (at his expense).

Now it's my turn.

So I needed another lawn mower (new year, new mower--this is getting to be a trend). Enter brother Mark who suddenly has a glut of mowers from the Parkers. So I don't want to buy something big right away, so, says he, just borrow it for a while to see if you want this old Allis Chalmers.

So I cart it home on Easter Sunday. Next week, I enjoy cutting my grass with a 4' mower deck. Hey, this is cool, I feel like I've got a real tractor here.

So last week I get it out for cutting number 2. Now I'm 90% done with the lawn and bang, boom, mower stops driving and a bolt comes flying out the discharge chute. Aw nuts (and bolts)!

The thing weighs a ton (seems like), so I come-a-long it into the shed for the night. Remember this is my 69 hours away from home week, so it sits until last night.

Monday night: finish cutting the lawn with the electric weed wacker (3 extension cords stuck together--now there's a great idea); next time I'll try the scissors.

Crawl under mower to see where flying bolt originated: lucky me, I just sheared the drive shaft collar & bolts off the back of the motor and bent the shaft.

Today: now I'm online trying to find parts for a 32 year old mower made by a company that no longer exists. So far I've found the drive shaft ($78), a bushing ($9.81), a fiberglass collar ($17.43) and I'm now waiting for a call back from the parts company to see if they have the sheared-off thingy from the Kohler motor (any guesses on how much that might be, if they even have it)? Hold that thought--he literally just called--good news, they have it; and the price? just $120.

I think you already know what the moral of the story is. . .

. . .get rid of the grass and plant concrete.

Promises, promises

So maybe I sound like a politician, but I had good reasons for not posting like I had hoped to last week. All told, I was gone from home 69 hours for work/commuting. Last night I was up till 12:30 since I had an order for 3 pens that needed to be done by today. So I am dragging but still alive. Due to a heavy backlog at work we were required to work the past two Saturdays (I had plans for the first one, so was able to get off), and we are scheduled for 6 days this coming week again. I don't know how long this will last, but till then life is crazy busy.

Since we do one major shopping trip a month, we were overdue for groceries, and Sharon couldn't go on Saturday like she usually does, because I wasn't home to watch the kids. So she did a partial trip on Saturday with all the kids: 3 ambulatory kids, one kid on her back, and one in her front! She said it went well.

Until later. . .

I'm not dead

I once promised that I wouldn't let 2 months go by again without posting. So far I've not broken that promise. I will try to get some more pictures and details up in the coming week. Honestly, having facebook has made me lazy!

Too late to put up anything more now, but I will try. . .