Little bit of gardening

I've finally gotten around to putting in the little bit of garden that I'm going to do this year.....I grew my own tomato plants from seeds - some Roma's and some cherry tomatoes. I also planted a few hills of squash and cucumbers, plus a little row of lettuce and radishes. That's it!

I decided to put some extra straw out around my tomato plants, just to help them stay moist to start out.




MMMM, I can already taste the fresh tomatoes!!!!

Pretty Irises (Irides)

Yep, I had to look it up again! The plural of iris can be either Irises or Irides. I think I'll stick with Irises....just sounds more Southern!

Just thought I'd post some pretty shots from the yard....I keep waiting for the white ones I planted 2 years ago to show up....I actually bought the tubers (all the rest are hand-me-downs, thank you all very much!!) Apparently store-bought flowers just aren't as good, because they never grew!!

Enjoy!

Easter Trip to Ocracoke

This was a little flying vacation to Ocracoke. The weather was "iffy" - there is no instrument approach at Ocracoke Island. The runway is "fair weather" daylight use only. But the weather gods were kind to us. Leaving Pittsboro was very dreary, but the weather only improved as we headed eastbound!



1 hour and 15 minutes later, here we are on final approach at Ocracoke. The landing strip is parallel with the beach. Duane did a wonderful landing in some pretty gusty winds.


Dick and Lindy loaned us their "folding bikes" - pretty cool!


All re-assembled and ready for some island touring!


We lucked out and rented a little apartment right in the center of town. This was our view from the balcony.



We stayed with Buddy and Sharon in the apartment. Pat and Diane camped north of Ocracoke in the State Park campground. There was a wonderful porch outside the apartment where we spent a lot of time.


Oh, and we had front-row seats to the lovely sunsets!! (View from the deck)


The apartment was the second floor to the business that is bike rental/coffee shop/ ice cream parlor. Very handy. Yes, very handy!


Very pleased with the apartment - much nicer than hotel rooms.


Lots of biking with the doggies - the usual haunts - Jolly Roger, Dajio, Jason's, Howard's Pub and now our favorite "shrimp hour" Jimmy's Buffet....




Several times we saw live music - Pat and Diane dancing....never can get a good photo of the fast pace!



Nice walk on the beach....



Over too soon!

Hedge Trimming

The shrubs at Siler City Airport have gotten a bit out of hand. The City planted them several years ago - the building was very bare, no landscaping at all. But, we don't have a professional staff or anything for maintenance. Over the years, the bushes have grown.....to start with, it was just nice - they looked nice and "mature". But lately, they've just kind of taken over.

Hard to see in this shot because it's in a bit of a shadow, but the boxwoods are a bit "wild".




I brought Duane's electric hedge-trimmer to the airport. Now, I must admit, I've never operated this equipment before. We have "pink jobs" and "blue jobs" by some unspoken rule at home. I do the laundry, the dishes, the groceries.....Duane does the oil changes, anything requiring heavy lifting or working on ladders, and hedge trimming!

But, never the stranger to a challenge, I started the sucker up - and went to hacking! It was fun - for about 3 minutes. Then it was just work!

Here's the front of the building - much smaller cute little bushes. They actually looked cared-for now.




Side building "before" shot.


And after....




Ramp side "before" ....




And "after".....amazing what small, little balls are underneath all that wild growth.



I went to Asheboro during the afternoon. I had some time and decided that I should try to attack a huge bush that has been bothering me for a couple of years. The flag pole is actually sortof inaccessible - you can see it embedded in the right hand side of the bush.



This didn't turn out as pretty - but I'm convinced the bush will grow back in pretty and shaped....hey, at least we can change the flags easily now!!! And the price was right!

I'm Back!

Jump over to Glory Days for an update!

Car Fixes

It was plane fixes yesterday. Today it's car fixes. Richard's car had a little oopsie a while back. It was a minor parking lot thing....."where did that car come from!" Anyhooo, the rear bumper got a little smashed. He had been driving it that way, just ignoring it, I suppose.



So, for his birthday, we gave him a little "facelift" for his car.

A bumper from a junkyard (couldn't find a white one close by.....strange). Here it is all taped up ready to be painted.


Painted white to match!



Taa-daaa! Much better!

Plane Fixes

Our airplane has been in the shop for it's annual inspection for the past couple of weeks. BooHoo, no little trips during the weekends. No real loss, the weekend weather has been pretty bad lately!



The mechanic wanted to do some maintenance on the landing gear - so while he had them removed from the airplane......we thought it was an excellent time to remove the rust and repaint. Easy, peasy, right?



Wrong! This entire past weekend, we spent de-greasing, sandblasting, paint-stripping, more de-greasing, priming and epoxy painting. Wow, what a job!! Lot's of hours spent standing on concrete - we're not used to that!




The end result was quite nice, if I do say so myself!!! Of course, it will be dirty and greasy soon enough....but not rusty!



Airplane is going back together now!




See, doesn't that look nice back where it belongs?

More about Richard's Birthday!

Richard had told Miranda that a certain shirt was his "favorite" of all time.....this is the shirt - circa 1996-7. It's true - it was threadbare by the time he outgrew it. I was hoping that I had saved it, but a trip to the attic proved fruitless.


Miranda decided to try to re-create the shirt for him......here we are at Top of the Hill in Chapel Hill for his celebration dinner.



I think she did a great job! And his smile was proof that he appreciate the effort!



Oh, I got to see his new Paramedic ID for the first time there too! YAY!!!

My "Baby" is 21!

21 years ago, my sweet sis-in-law Denise made me this photo album in preparation for my second born (she had done the same for the first one too!)

I pulled it out today for the first time in a while.....just to look at the photos of Richard when he was a baby.



And it's amazing how many photos I have of various people holding him! I thought you didn't take as many photos of your second child!!!

Here they are (in no particular order)

Well, this one is first, because it was, well, first!

My lovely sis flew up from Jacksonville to help me out...she had a lovely time of it too! Robert caught a virus, Richard had to go to the hospital daily for Bilirubin tests and I was little help.

Always good to have a "little help from your friends!"





Grand-daddy Metcalf




Uncle Buddy....oh, we were so young.....



Great-grandma Hall



Great Grandma - Nanny Gladys



Great Grandma McCraw



Granny of course!


Carolyn - oh, yes, we are young!!


Grandma and 'little Eddie -


A very young Keith and Denise - and before you say anything.....I'm almost positive that is Bridget!!! but the photo was so good, I couldn't resist including it.....


And lastly.....this apparently was a good indication of how my days with two little ones ended then!! It's all good!!