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Toddy Pond, Maine

mullerj — Sun, 08 Aug 2010 19:20:26 +0000

We have been blessed with wonderful weather during our vacation. We went swimming every day – usually twice. We did jumping competitions from the dock; swam to a large nearby rock for sunning; and twice we took out the pontoon boat for tubing and swimming in the middle of the lake. We played Jump or Dive, Marco Polo and any other ad hoc water game we could think of.

Below Eric, Kathryn and Scout lounge on the large rock and then Scout, Kathryn and Eric swim in from the rock.

Below Pam relaxes in the tube while Eric prefers being thrown into the water.

Below Jim prepares to dunk Eric, who can be seen below the water in the next picture.

Kathryn and Jim Helmer ride the waves while tubing.

Kathryn picks blue berries. Jim and Eric enjoy fishing from the end of the dock at evening.

Scout, Kathryn, Jim and Eric around the evening fire. Kathryn and Pam on top of Blue Hill Mountain.

We had lots of native blueberries – in fact every other day 2-3 people would pick a bowl from the surrounding bushes for our breakfast cereal. We had a home cooked lobster meal one night, did take out lobster rolls one night, got invited to friends for chicken BBQ and ate at an ocean side restaurant last night to celebrate our 34^th year anniversary.

We had a campfire for 3 nights. On Sunday or Monday night we saw a meteor shower with 8 meteors in a 10 minute span including one of the brightest single meteors I have ever seen.

In ‘down’ times we played lots of Sorry. We picked up a new board game called Scotland Yard and played that several times between swims as well.

We had one more quick swim before lunch on Saturday and then drove the 4-5 hours to stay in a motel 6 just NW of Boston and then completed our trip on Sunday morning. Somehow a single 9 hour drive isn’t that appealing.

Hunting Fossils in Trenton Gorge

mullerj — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 18:56:01 +0000

We hiked into a nearby gorge hunting trilobites. It was a steep path down by the bridge. The bridge is hinged and was hauled in two sections and bolted together.

It was a short hike downstream.

Everyone got looking. Skip and Kathryn ponder the rocks.

Eric decided to try going behind the water fall. Kathryn checks a cliff.

Eric found a great specimen.

Billie Jo and Joel. Everyone is accounted for.

We hiked out and went tubing on the West Canada for the remainder of the day.

Balloon Ride

mullerj — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 18:09:49 +0000

My sister Barbara gave her husband Joe a balloon ride for two as a Christmas present. Joe asked me to accompany me on Sunday morning for a balloon ride out of the Columbia County Airport conducted by BalloonNY. Saturday we drove to Delanson to stay overnight and arose at 3am to drive to the airport in time for our 5:15am balloon prep.

Below we lay out the balloon envelope and inflated the balloon with air prior to heating.

Our balloon held two youngster, a driver and Joe & I. As we took off we manufactured a sunrise. A little later we were able to see the shadow of the balloon on the fog surrounded by a rainbow aura created as the sun heated the balloon fabric.

The balloon had tremendous altitude control and several times the pilot would drop it down to brush the tops of trees. We landed at an orchard and quickly dumped hot air out of the top of the balloon. When we were finally out of the balloon we squeezed the remaining air out of the balloon and stowed everything in the chase van.

Keuka Lake

mullerj — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:24:02 +0000

Tom & Debby were visiting from Seattle for the Skelly Family Reunion. Following the reunion they booked a camp on Keuka Lake and invited us to spend the week with them. It was hot and sunny with temperatures in the 90s every day. Sunday we went grocery shopping and swam. Sunday night we watched Flares Around the Lake and 90 minutes of fireworks. At times there were 12 simultaneous fireworks visible from our viewpoint on the dock.

Monday Kathryn, Eric and Debby went to Roseland Water Park. Tom and I went to the Glenn Curtiss Museum in Hammondsport. Tuesday we stayed home to swim and in the evening we drove to Victor to shop at LL Bean and met Pat and Janice for Dinner . Wednesday Kathryn, Tom and Debbie went on a Wine Tour while Eric and I swam and had water gun wars. Thursday we swam and fished. Friday we returned home.

When we weren’t in the water and spraying each other we had marathon Sorry games – below Eric and Debby do battle.

Skelly Family Reunion

mullerj — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 17:12:49 +0000

The week prior to the 4th of July weekend we worked to empty our house of furniture such that all the hardwood floors could be refinished while we were gone. Saturday morning Billie Jo came to our house and we drove 2 cars to Syracuse to meet with Ed & family and proceeded to Rochester for the Skelly Family reunion. There were 120-130 attendees. Each family unit was organized by Tribe. The tribe of John Francis Skelly is shown below.

Back row: Tom, Debby, Tim, Sarah, Chris, John, Billie Jo, Reid, Danielle, Pat and Janice
Middle row: Jim, Kathryn, Ed, Kellee
Front row: Dakota, Izzabella, Eric

Bennington, VT

mullerj — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 19:10:05 +0000

We left home on Sunday afternoon to travel 3 hours to Bennington, VT to meet our friends Kent, Kathi and Julia who were visiting from Eugene.

We met them for dinner Sunday night and then played tourist on Monday. One item of interest was the Bennington Monument celebrating the Battle of Bennington. During the summer of 1777, the British put in motion an ambitious campaign designed to isolate New England from the rest of the colonies and thereby crush the American rebellion. For two months, General John Burgoyne led his army down the Lake Champlain-Hudson River corridor toward Albany with apparent ease, capturing several American forts along the way. In August, however, he found himself in desperate need of provisions, wagons, cattle, and horses. Burgoyne then made the fateful decision to send an expeditionary force to the small town of Bennington, Vermont to capture these much needed supplies. At the Battle of Bennington, which took place between August 14 and 16, the British army and its Canadian, Indian, and Loyalist supporters faced Patriots defending their newly proclaimed independence. What might have seemed like a minor victory for the Patriots contributed to the British defeat at Saratoga a few months later and thus helped decide who would win the American War of Independence.

We also did a walking tour, looked at all the painted street moose and spent a couple of hours in the hotel pool to combat the heat.

School’s Out – Let’s Go to Soft Maple

mullerj — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 19:20:08 +0000

We celebrated Eric’s completion of 1st grade by going to Soft Maple for 3 days. Eric finished up a 1/2 day of school on Wed and we left on Thursday morning with a plan to return home on Saturday afternoon. Our trip ended up to neatly fit between rain storms which occurred on Wednesday night and started up as we drove home on Saturday roughly about noon.

Trevor accompanied us. We did some fishing both from the canoe and shore-side. The boys went swimming on Thursday and Friday – or at least were in the water for games of ‘Mother May I’/”Your Majesty May I’ and Red Light/Green Light. They rode their bikes around the campground continually and we had vicious games of Sorry.

Sleeping with the cat

mullerj — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 21:14:34 +0000

Chim Char enjoys sleeping on Eric’s bed. He enjoys the company.

Mount Saint Helens – 30 years ago

mullerj — Tue, 18 May 2010 18:14:11 +0000

On May 18th, 1980, thirty years ago today, at 8:32 a.m., the ground shook beneath Mount St. Helens in Washington state as a magnitude 5.1 earthquake struck, setting off one of the largest landslides in recorded history – the entire north slope of the volcano slid away. As the land moved, it exposed the superheated core of the volcano setting off gigantic explosions and eruptions of steam, ash and rock debris. The blast was heard hundreds of miles away, the pressure wave flattened entire forests, the heat melted glaciers and set off destructive mudflows, and 57 people lost their lives. The erupting ash column shot up 80,000 feet into the atmosphere for over 10 hours, depositing ash across Eastern Washington and 10 other states.

Kathryn and I were living in Eugene, OR at the time and it was a Sunday morning. I was awake and reading in the living room while Kathryn was sleeping in. The blast shook the windows in our house and got Kathryn awake. She came out and asked what the noise was. Not knowing, I told her it sounded like a quarry blast, but I didn’t know there were any quarries around and who blasts on Sunday morning.

About 9am we heard the news.

The next day I drove to Portland for a computer training class and saw the reddest, most spectacular sunrise.

Some outstanding pictures of Mt Saint Helen are here.

Eric’s 1st Little League Game

mullerj — Sat, 08 May 2010 11:49:32 +0000

Eric decided to play Minor B Little League this year, primarily because his pal, Jack, was playing baseball. In Minor B there are called strikes, coaches on the field and a coach pitching. After 3 practices they had their 1st game. Eric was tagged as catcher for the game. He said he didn’t like the position because he got hit with the ball a lot – even though it didn’t hurt. By the end of the game he was catching a few of the pitches / tips.

Eric batted 6th and in his 1st at bat came up with bases loaded and two outs. He made contact; a slow roller down the 1st base line. The 1st baseman picked up the ball, stood up and was mesmerized by all the kids running. His coaches, parents and spectators were yelling for him to step on 1st base. With all the chaos he froze and Eric beat it down to 1st base safely. Over the 1st two games Eric has 5 hits for 6 at bats. You got to love playing on stone dust, because once the ball is rolling it carries out of the infield.