I had to play with my new camera - it's a lot like my old one except it takes quick photos and the screen is much bigger. Christmas was very nice this year - we started the day going up to our neighbors that host a Christmas morning breakfast every year. We missed it last year since we were in the BVI on Christmas day. Since we hadn't opened presents, we made quick work of the breakfast!

The kids ended up with very useful gifts from "Santa". Richard got huge tires for his Explorer (which he needed badly). Instead of regular road tires, he wanted these "super swamper" mud tires. They are ridiculous, but what he wanted......Robert got a bunch of hand tools for his upcoming independence, an Ipod and some $$ to put towards his latest musical purchase, a flugelhorn...
I gave Duane a fancy sailing jacket.







We had a late lunch - thought I'd show how the kitchen counter looked mid-way thru the production. Much too much food, of course. I used our Mills River Community cookbook again - for the refrigerator rolls from Joyce Barnett. They didn't turn out too well....didn't rise...tasted pretty good though!




See, the table clean and kitchen orderly again! I was pooped!!






We're heading over to Ocracoke for New Years, so I may not be back with you for a few days!

Happy NEW YEAR!!

We are doing a small "wintertime" boat project. We unbolted the bow and stern little "perch" seats from the boat and brought them home with us to refinish. The sun apparently does ALOT of damage to varnished teak if you don't put more varnish on every year....apparently, no one had put varnish on this year as you can tell by the damaged finish.






We sanded all the old finish until all the pieces look pretty. I got this special "spar" varnish at the boat store. Here's what it looked like both unfinished and one coat of varnish.





UGH - 7 more coats to go! (and 24 hours to dry/light sanding in-between!)

I have been tagged!

Teresa tagged me to answer this "meme" - according to T's original post - meme is the word me twice - me me - and it's also the French word for same -même because everyone answers the same questions.

Teresa http://affectioknit.blogspot.com/ tagged me for this game so here goes.

THE RULES: Each player of this game starts with the ‘6 weird things about you.’ People who get tagged need to write a blog of their own 6 weird things as well as state this rule clearly. In the end, you need to choose 6 people to be tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave a comment that says ‘you are tagged’ in their comments and tell them to read your blog.”Six weird things about me:

1. I can touch the tip of my nose with my tounge with no hands...ewwh - I know.

2. The hair on the right side of my head is MUCH thicker than the left.

3. There are bite marks on the "head" of my toothbrush - don't know how they get there - don't remember biting on the toothbrush at all. Duane's toothbrush looks like new even when it's old so I'm pretty sure this is not normal.

4. I like to put one sock, one shoe, one sock, one shoe.

5. I sleep on my belly, face to the side directly on the bed, pillow must be touching the top of my head.

6. I wear a watch on my right arm and wash dishes in the sink left to right...backwards from most right-handers!

I asked Duane to help me with these - to which he replied - "how long have we been married" - almost 25 yrs - "long enough to know better than to answer that!"

Oh well. See, I'm not so weird after all!

The weather today was to die for! About 70 degrees and sunny, sunny, sunny. We had a rather slow flight to Asheville airport - had about a 20 knot headwind so it took us about 1 1/2 hours. Fortunately, the wind was still from the west, so we made it home in about 45 minutes! (Believe it or not, it doesn't always work out that way!)

These are all the photos we snapped at Eddie and Trudi's - other people took photos too, so maybe I'll post more later (if they send them to me, that is!!)

As usual, Trudi's house was beautifully decorated. Wish I was better at that, but it's nice to be able to enjoy all Trudi's hard work.

We did our "gift exchange game" - it was fun. The most "stolen" gift was a vacuum cleaner!

We made quick work of a great meal and headed over to Grandma Hall's house. She had a house full! Mom, Ted and Jon were the only "kids" there when we were. I think the other two were coming later. We couldn't stay long because we had to get back to Ptown!

More later - Love, Karen

I'll warn you that this is a long one - lot's going on!



Wednesday was our 10th anniversary of the airport business! We had a little party and invited the local politicos (is that a word??) and some of the longtime customers. Seems like just yesterday I was at IBM and the boys were tiny!! Wow, how things change!






I've been pretty busy this week - the evening after the anniversary party, I had to teach the Aviation Merit Badge to our Boy Scout troop. I had signed up for it at a committee meeting early in the year and had actually forgotten about it until one of the boys called to make sure I was all set.



After that I went up to watch Duane WIN our little pub's Grand Championship for the fall season....he got $80 and a trophy...












Let's see, then Thursady I was up in Greensboro getting supplies for our employee Christmas party and I get the dreaded phone call - "Mam, this is ... from First Alert Rescue, I have your son Richard - now, he's OK, but he's been in an accident..." He takes an Auto-Tech class at the local community college during the school day. He had ridden with a friend to class and they were on their way back when (according to them) a tractor trailer ran them off the road into the cable-retention system on US 64 (four lane). They flattened a long portion of the cable system, so I am thankful that it is there!! Otherwise, they would have undoubtedly been head-on into the opposing lanes. Here is a photo of the friend's car:









Richard had a nose bleed, a blue bruise/burn on his cheek from the airbag and I think he was fairly sore, but otherwise OK. The other fellow is a band friend and Eagle Scout. His father came to sign the "refusal of treatment" forms at the accident site because both Duane and I were an hour away. By the time I got back down there the car was gone and just large bits of "car" were left at the scene. Ugh, I didn't realize parenthood could be so un-nerving!








We had our private, employees only Christmas party last night. A nice time - they gave me a nice leather jacket (sorry T!) It really is warm and soft. Robert came and played some nice jazzy trumpet music in the background (his first "paying gig", I think).

Oh, and Robert's Eagle Scout project is finally finishing up - it better since his 18th birthday is quickly approaching in January (am I that old, don't answer that!)

Here is the structure of the trophy case installed at the high school - his is the lighter wood structure beside the existing trophy case. You can't really tell from the photo, but the trim-work is quite detailed and very professional. He still has to get the shelves, glass and finish trim installed. I think it was a worthy project for Eagle Scout!







We're meeting Sharon and Buddy in Durham for dinner tonight. Then I will need to come home and fix my side-dishes for Mom's gathering tomorrow. The weather is absolutely gorgeous - so we plan of flying into Asheville. Mom is going to leave us a car at the airport, so we can zip over to Eddie and Trudy's. After that, we'll zoom over to Swannanoa to see Grandma then fly back to Pittsboro before nightfall. Should be a busy but nice day!

Gotta go -

Love, Karen

Well, everyone needs Christmas traditions....ours got started a couple of years ago when we had a trip planned to the British Virgin Islands for a few weeks right before Christmas. Because we were going to be gone so much of the pre-Christmas season, I decided that a Christmas tree was not going to be required. Instead, I got this crazy idea to decorate the ficus tree instead! The idea seemed like such a good one, I've used it every year since!

Now, you must know a little history of this particular ficus tree and why it warrents being honored as the faux-Christmas tree. Teresa sent me that tree as a gift when I was promoted to Staff Engineer at IBM in about 1987. Of course, it was just a potted plant at the time!! I kept it at New Hill. Took it to Boca Raton. Brought it back to New Hill. and so on....It gets moved outside every spring and thrives on the sunlight. Right before the first frost every year, I muscle it back inside to the corner of the living room. It's terribly root-bound, but I'm afraid to move it to a bigger pot - it would just get bigger...not what I need!








Well, I'd better get busy - lot's to do!

Small town Christmas parades...gotta love 'em!!




It started raining about halfway thru the parade (hence, the raindrops on my camera lens.) Luckily, it was not too terribly cold. Some of the guys and gals on motorcycles/tractors/floats looked pretty miserable.















Another note to self....get a camera that snaps the photo when you tell it to...not a 2 second delay. This is the best shot I got of Richard. Two other shots have other people in front of him because my camera delays a bit after I push the button. I'm dropping hints to Duane about this - in the form of "I want a new camera for Christmas!!"

I went up to our neighbor's garden and harvested some greens and herbs yesterday. He was afraid that the first real freeze might hurt the tender cilantro - and wanted me to take as much as I wanted. I love the stuff with beans or soup. I cut several handfuls - and thought maybe I could save some for use later this winter.

I reserved some for use fresh over the next couple of days - and then I chopped the remaining and put in bags for the freezer. I've never heard of anyone doing this with cilantro, but I don't know why it wouldn't work as long and I'm going to cook it anyway.















He also has tons of arugula - I took a bag stuffed full....I'll handle that tomorrow!!

Oh, and this is fun - fresh chives! Baked potatos tonight!








Last night we went to the kid's band banquet...Mom and Frank went a couple of years ago in our place when we were sailing....We thought we'd better be sure to be at this one because it's Robert's last year in marching band. He got the "Best Musician" award -- I'm sure he was pleased. Richard got his "third year" pin - I took photos but the room was dark and the photos didn't turn out very well at all....note to self....need better camera!

Oh- and Robert got his acceptance notice from NC STATE Engineering department - a good day!

Gotta run - Christmas Parade in Pittsboro!!!! love, K