Yes we had a great time!

It is really amazing how many ballons they get onto the field and the crews start working side by side to get them ready for flight.

Every where you looked there were balloons.


Friday night they had a balloon glow set to music.

More fun in Quechee

The Thursday arrivals enjoy some of the sun we had for the weekend.

Susan, Rich, Sue, Andre' and Sandi in front of our Camp.

The "Disk Dogs" were a lot of fun. All the dogs are rescue dogs

training in the fine art of Frisbee catching. A really great

show all done to music.

We were treated to several sky jumps of four sky divers.

No need to mention our love of diners. The Farmers Diner is a classic example

of a well restored vintage diner.

The interior is completely restored to its original state with a very large addition.

Thursday in Quechee, VT

We arrived at the Balloon Festival Thursday and set up camp.
Andre and Susan, Rich and Sue and us in the middle. Ken and Kathy will be joining us later.






Happy 15th Anniversary to Susan and Andre'!

Mr. Bill joined us for Happy Hour and as usual he jumped right in.

Sara's Wheel

Sara's Wheel of Fortune is all done and ready to go.

She has lots of fun carnival prizes and we know

everyone coming to her Airstream Kids Karnival

are going to have lots of fun.

See you all there!

New Neighbor

Gardens

This year has been a tough one on our gardens with concerns to wildlife.

It appears someone place a "free buffet" sign at the edge of

our property this year. This Chantily Lace hosta should be

about three feet wide by now.

The ferns have done much better since they do not seem to be on the menu.

As new addition, Patriot. Of course we just planted this so it has yet
to be placed on the menu and eaten yet.

Our grasses always do well each year. I should have taken this photo two weeks ago

when the cinnamon fern was in full bloom.

The left side of the walkway down is completed for the season. A little feeding

and wild life monitoring and we should have a lovely mid summer

shade garden to enjoy.

Sara's Carnival

Sara is hosting her first Airstream rally next month with a wonderful theme:

Kids Karnival.

The idea is that each attendee bring a carnival game to set up at their rig

with raffle tickets and prizes to be awarded.

Sara decided to have a "Wheel of Fortune" for her booth and we had started

working on the construction with pretty good results.

The wheel is almost done; needs a coat of clear and the inserts need to be done.

But the base still has work to be done.

We are looking forward to finishing this up soon. All of the "prizes" will be here next Friday.

So true

Last week the sensor light on the barn stopped working. Not the end of the world, but something that did need repair. At first I tried adjusting the settings, but that didn't solve the problem of the light not coming on. I then proceeded to taking the unit apart, cleaning the pieces and then reassembled. Well that too proved to not be the answer. Later that night I explained to Sandi the details of the light failure and the rescue operations resulting in failure. It was at that moment that true intelligence prevailed; "Did you change the light bulb"?

Oswego, New York

Sandi and I headed up to Oswego, New York for Memorial Day weekend and a family wedding. My cousin Fred Vigeant and Michele were getting married. We were able to find a campground right on Lake Ontario just a few miles from the church.

Their recption was help at the ELKS Club and it was a wonderful event. Great family fun and food and a wonderful way to celebrate their wedding.

And here are the lovely Bride Michele and her husband Fred, who is looking more and more like his father every year.



Mom and DAS joined the fun but they decided to stay at a local hotel rather than join us at the campground.



Every night on the lake was a light show. the sunsets were wonderful. A shame to say we never saw a sunrise since we slept in late each morning.

Sandi and I are usually drawn to the ocean rather than large lakes and this was a very large one. Here is the light house at the port entrance to Oswego outside of Fort Ontario.

We were treated to a special day at the fort. The local Civil War Militia was set up on the parade grounds in the center of the fort. It was pretty exciting and loud and we pretty much had the whole fort to ourselves.

I did say loud right? From the second floor of the officers housing we could see and hear the canons firing.

From here we are looking down from the embankments onto the parade grounds. Behind the gun crews you can see the entrance to the fort and to the left of that the enlisted mens quarters.

Herkimer Diamond Mine

We ran up to the Herkimer Diamond mines for a weekend with the Colimore's in New York.

It was our first visit and we came prepared with hammers and other impliments

of destruction and had a really great time.

Yes, there I am in the middle of a bunch of rocks looking for diamonds. There more rocks you crush the more diamonds you find. Or so Sandi told me.

We had two sites side by side right on the river. Very small sights so good thing the Colimore's were our neighbors.

Need I say more? It is a wonderful river and I would look forward to going again and bring our canoe for a good run down.

Gee, the truck looks bigger than our Airstream!

Thanks to a customer of ours, Don and I were able to enjoy a very expensive bottle of beer together. Who ever knew a bottle of Belgium beer could cost so much?

I don't think Donal really believed us that there were diamonds in the rocks but he had a great time making gravel.

Stella was busy digging for diamonds but she never found any.

Sunday morning Don treated us to a wonderful Mother's Day breakfast.

First '09 Rally

For the first NEU rally of the year we had a wonderful time. We took a moment to take a photo of all the units dogs, oh yea, we included their handlers too!

There is never a food shortage when we all get together.

Nor is there ever a shortage of silliness!

Easter 2009

Our first weekend out was Easter again this year with the new truck.

We camped at a local CT campground, Braile for the first time.

It was a cold rainy weekend but we did get out.

Sandi and I checked out the rally field and we will most likely hold

the Lost Dutchman 2010 rally here next year.

They did have plenty for the youngsters to do over the weekend, Easter Egg hunt, horseshoes,

speed sledding, and a scavenger hunt.

Did I mention a fishing derby?

Good-bye Dad

It is never easy to say good-by to a parent but today I lost my father.

He was a speacial man as all parents usually are.

Not to say we didn't have our differences but we always found our way back to each other.

One of the biggest reasons this blog exsists is that Dad always wanted pictures

of what we were doing and where we were.

So I say Good-bye to my number one fan and I will always keep

posting pictures because this is what I did for Dad.