Walking on Water

The weekend started early with a ski run. I am still nursing a pulled hamstring, but I was able to be the driver. Blake did a barefoot run (walking on water) before it started raining. Noel did a slolam run in the rain. We headed back to the dock and headed for the house for breakfast.

Later in the morning the rain stopped and Blake and I moved the deer herd to the pens he had constructed. Blake and Apryl started a deer ranch this past spring. they have seven deer most of which are newly born fawns. They built stalls in a part of their garage and had been bottle feeding them for a couple of months. Saturday was the day to move the herd. We figured out that we could put a fawn in Blake's wake board bag, zip it shut and carry the critter to the pen without anybody getting injured or loose.

Karen and I went to some friend's house for dinner and spent a peasant evening visiting.

Blake and Apryl were out of town Sunday, as were most of our friends, so most of the rest of the weekend was fairly quiet. Sunday afternoon we hung out on the deck, Karen doing needle point and I worked on another water color painting.

In the evening we went for a four and a half mile walk out in the country. I took my camera along and shot some interesting patterns and scenes. With a couple of recent rains most of the lawns and fields had gotten greener. It was also a lot cooler as you can see Karen started out with a sweater. When you have to wear a sweater in mid July you begin to wonder what happened to the summer.

I saw some pretty flowers along the road. All in all it was a nice quiet weekend.

Mid Summer 2009

Well we are beyond the midpoint of the year and there have been some interesting experiences. The summer has for the most part been somewhat cool and rainy so a lot of the boating activities have had a slow start.

We got through the July 4th weekend with all of its activities and travel. The weather has been pleasant; softball and waterskiing have been pretty much on track. I did have a bit of a stumble on Wednesday July 8th while attempting an early morning ski run I ended up with a hamstring pull. It is somewhat painful and will limit my skiing and softball for a couple/few weeks.

This past week also provided a bit of a snag to my schedule and activity level. After conditioning and running in the Indy Mini in May I started feeling some discomfort when I ran or rode a bike hard. So on Monday July 6 I had an echocardiogram done and on Friday July 10 an angiogram. The doctor was able to fix the 99% blocked artery and so I am back on the mend. Friday and Saturday Adelphia, Andrew and the kids were at the lake for swimming and fishing. Ethan caught his first fish and fishing has caught Ethan. He thinks fishing is pretty cool. I got a few shots of the national cannonball contest finals.

The judges were still reviewing instant replay of the action so it took a long time to get the final scores tallied.

Sunday July 12 I went out for a quick 5 mile bike ride and did it without any chest pain and that’s a good thing. It was a beautiful day, weather wise, on Sunday so Karen and I enjoyed sitting on the deck and do a couple of art projects. I did another watercolor and Karen worked on a cross stitch. Blake and Apryl took Trae to Hunters Camp and then stopped by for a cookout of burgers and corn on the cob.

July 4th Weekend

The 4th of July weekend was a real mixed bag. Since the 4th fell on a Saturday this year the University holiday was on Friday the 3rd. The whole week, leading up to the 4th, included a visit from California cousin Connie and her Husband Jim on their way to Ohio, and a whole gob of other events and preparing for events. We did an early morning ski on Thursday morning. Later in the morning I took Skyler and Trae out tubing, had some lunch and then headed into the office. Jim and Connie followed me over to campus and I gave them a quick tour.















I had Friday off so we did another early morning ski run. I had time to do a quick water color, of redheads.

Nature note: Skyler is holding a moth with interesting color and pattern that we found. Skyler is quite the naturalist and treats animals very well. Unless he is trying to shoot them of course.

Saturday the 4th we did a really quick ski run, had breakfast on the deck got everything put away and headed over to Fort Wayne for the day. Skyler and Trae have spent the 4th with Karen and me at the IPFW campus for the past three years. The campus hosts the City’s July 4th celebration with a concert and fireworks. Since I am head of the Physical Plant I get to spend the 4th on campus from about noon until almost midnight. There were about 20,000 people on campus so it does get interesting at times. The fireworks are shot off the top of the parking garage. The chancellor hosts a picnic for 450 of his closest friends.

Covered Stages, sunsetting over the parking garage, a few of the Chancellor's friends

I do get to attend the picnic and for the past couple of years Adelphia’s family has joined us for the fireworks part of the event.

Elisea and Grandpa injoying the fireworks, Elizabeth under the princess umbrella waiting for the show to begin. Trae and Ethan being boys.

We got home about 1:00 AM Sunday morning and then headed to Detroit at 7:00 AM for the wedding of the youngest daughter (Elizabeth) of our friends Dick and Jan Berry. It was a full day, a little over 8 hours of driving and a nice small intimate wedding and reception in a beautiful setting. It was a beautiful day so the trip was enjoyable. The quilt that the couple is holding is one of Karen's creations.