2018-02-04 - Sunday - Tomato

Stephanie and Brett came for a visit and brought their dog, Tomato with them. Tomato's bed is the size of  a small couch and he gets lost in it, but he loves it.

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2017-12-24 - Sunday - Festive shrubbery

On Christmas Eve I was outside grilling and noticed that the Harbor Belle dwarf nandinas were fruiting. It made me think even the shrubs were in the Christmas season (even though Karen and I are spending Christmas alone and I was grilling).

It was odd without the kids. Stephanie and Brett spent Thanksgiving with us, so they spent Christmas with Brett's family. Meredith couldn't get time off for Christmas until the 29th. We will all meet up in Pennsylvania after Christmas. That will be nice.

I love Karen, and we love spending time together, but it was a strange Christmas without the kids here. Binkley isn't here either, and he always LOVED Christmas.

We discussed going someplace for Christmas next year, possibly a cruise.

We'll see.

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2017-12-03 - Sunday - Stephanie's birthday

We went to Greenville on Sunday to celebrate Stephanie's birthday a few days early. Karen go her a gluten-free, dairy-free cake and it was delicious.

First, we went out for a nice dinner, then back to Stephanie and Brett's apartment for cake.

All too soon it was time to hop back in the car and head home.

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2017-10-22 - Sunday - Greenville, SC

Sunday we went to Greenville, SC to visit Stephanie and Brett. While there we went to Falls Park on the Reedy. It's a beautiful park with a lot going on, not least of which is the Liberty Bridge.

Karen in front of the Medusa Tree.

The falls.

Stephanie, Brett, and Tomato.

The Liberty Bridge.

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2017-09-02 - Saturday - Mom

This month (September) my mom turns 80, and mom and dad will be celebrating their 60th anniversary. To celebrate, she wanted to get the whole family together for dinner. Unfortunately Meredith couldn't get time off work, but the rest of us were there.

Stephanie, Brett, Karen, David, me, dad, and mom.

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2017-07-15 - Saturday - Wedding Day!

What a wonderful day! The wedding reception was amazing and I'm pretty sure everyone had a great time.

We were worried about the weather being too hot, but it rained for about an hour in the middle of the day which cooled things off nicely.

Stephanie and Brett got their marriage off to a great start on Saturday.

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2017-07-14 - Friday - Wedding preparations

Friday we set up the Vintage Barn for Stephanie and Brett's wedding. It came together great with the leadership of Kimberly, the wedding planner. She really outdid herself.

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2017-06-18 - Sunday - Art from Poland

Stephanie and Brett wanted a "thumbprint tree" for the guest book at their wedding reception so I found one on Etsy that would be custom made --in Poland. It was a great deal, with lots of options to customize it, and the shipping was only about $15. It even came with three color choices of thumb ink pads.

It arrived and looked great. The print is actually on canvas stretched over a wooden frame. Unfortunately I did not remember to snap a photo of the finished tree, but here's the shop so you can check it out yourself. StudioGoldArte.

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2016-11-24 - Thursday - Thanksgiving

We went to Pennsylvania for Thanksgiving and Brett came too. While this year's family gathering was bittersweet with the loss of Karen's dad earlier in the month, it was nice to all be together for the holiday.

Stephanie and Brett made pumpkin cookies and were very proud of them.

Later, at the table, I caught them clowning around. Good kids.

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2016-09-24 - Saturday - Back in the mountains

Saturday we were back in the NC mountains in Sylva to look for wedding venues. Stephanie and Brett are planning on getting married in July of 2017 and the wedding will be in Sylva near where they met.

View from the library on the hill.

Stephanie and Brett in front of the library on the hill.

We had supper at Haywood Smokehouse
and I got a kick out of the sauce descriptions.

This was parked outside of our hotel
and I felt sure it would transform into a robot.

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2016-09-11 - Sunday - Range hood

On Sunday we went to Lowe's and Home Depot to find a new range hood. Everybody is a apparently going to 30" hoods and ours was a 36" hood. Lowe's only had 30's and I was beginning to think Home Depot was in the same boat, but a sales associate showed us the closeout section and there was one 36" model.

It was a fairly easy installation and only required a second set of hands for a moment to get it on the mounting screws. Stephanie's boyfriend Brett was gracious enough to wait a few minutes before leaving to give me a much needed hand.

I think it looks pretty good.

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2016-02-06 - Saturday - Glazing like a crazy man

Saturday was a marathon.

I started out with one of my new favorite breakfasts.

Took some photos of the flowers blooming in the front yard.

Went to the farmers market with Karen and Stephanie.

Went to Clayworks and helped Kimberly remove some stuck fuses from a misfiring kiln. Re-slaked some of my clay. Did a little housekeeping on my shelves. Talked to a few people for a while...

...and THEN the real day started.

Eggs and oatmeal and sriracha.

Daffodils.

Vinca Minor.

Remember all of those Empty Bowls I've been making? This year I decided to glaze them all at once instead of doing them in small batches.

It seemed like a good idea at the time.

I had to wax all the bottoms and after that I started experimenting with painting underglaze as a wash and using my squeeze bottle as a pen to fill in details. Suddenly I realized it was 7:00 pm. I dropped everything and ran to the grocery store. I bought some food for supper, went home and fed us, and then back to Clayworks to finish the glazing. I left Stephanie making a batch of fudge while her boyfriend, Brett was on Skype with her. Crazy kids.

Everything was where I left it (I left a note saying I'd be back after supper) and I was alone. I turned the music up and got back to it.

While I was having a lot of fun trying new things, I had to keep a pretty good amount of pressure on the squeeze bottle to keep the flow going and after a couple of hours of it I realized I was hunched over and my mid-back was killing me. I stretched my back out on one of the tables for a few minutes before continuing the process.

I finally got finished with the underglaze at about 11:00 pm. Next I had to paint clear over all the paintings. After that I painted wax resist over the clear. I dipped the bowls in the main color glaze for the non-painted areas. Finally, I wiped all the excess glaze off the feet of the bowls and took them to the kiln room.

By the time I finished cleaning up my mess it was almost 2:00 am and every joint hurt from standing on the concrete floors for so long. I'm almost 58 now, and these marathons are not getting easier.

Next year I'm going back to glazing small batches.

Stack 'o bowls.

Waxing the bottoms.

Having fun with underglazes. These are just some of them.

Stephanie making fudge with Brett's support.

Finished the underglaze.

Almost finished the glazing.
I still have to finish the six in the foreground.

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2015-07-28 - Tuesday - Fishing

Tuesday a bunch of us went flounder fishing on the Duke o' Fluke. It's a tradition that we've kept up for at least 15 years. We usually don't catch a keeper (since NJ says it has to be 18 inches long), but it's still a fun four hour trip.

On this day I caught 8 flounder, 2 sea robins, and a sea bass, but no keepers. It was a good day with lots of action.

This year was a little different as nephews Justin and Ryan went, and also Adam (niece Audrey's beau) and Brett (Stephanie's beau).

Afterwards we went to Uncle Bill's for a Texas Tommy. Good stuff.

Brett, Adam, Justin (Ryan was at the stern)

Adam, Brett, Justin.
We all got Texas Tommys except Brett
who just couldn't pass up the pecan pancakes.

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2015-05-09 - Saturday - Stephanie's Graduation

Been a long time. Let's catch up.
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On Saturday, May 9, 2015, Stephanie graduated from Western Carolina University.

It was glorious. We are very proud.

Stephanie is the first person in my family to get a college degree and it was the proudest day of my life. It was joyous. I teared up, but I had the biggest smile on my face that you can imagine.

Congratulations Stephanie! I'm sure you will continue to do great things.

Rich, Scott, and Karen.

Stephanie is in the purple and gold Batman hat.

On her way.

Happy.

Faculty.

Batman.

On her way up.

On the ramp.

On her way back.

"I did it!"

Very happy.

Brett and Stephanie.

Stephanie with her grandfather.

Posing.

Jennifer and Stephanie.

Pop-pop was worn out.

Meredith and Stephanie.

Views off the deck.

More view.

Even more view.

Sunset view.

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