Boat

If you're wondering, we're over on the Sailing Blog for a while!

Visit home

We drove up to Hendersonville for the funeral....view from Mom and Frank's house.

Frank was feeling a bit better!

Mom and daughter selfie.

Keith and Denise - we're all a bit sweaty as it's hot!

Fun, chaotic dinner....

We also visited a while with Duane's folks before the burial.  Cordy is recovering well from his hip replacement.

After the burial near Weaverville, Buckeye Baptist fed us all a fabulous meal.  Really nice to get to visit with all my uncles and cousins.....Teresa and I with Curt, our oldest uncle.  I was going to say that he was our "spunkiest" uncle....but they're all pretty spunky!!

102 years is a good run!

Rest in peace, Grandma!  She was a bright, interesting lady. 

Flying on a hot, hot day!

We're just putzing around at home, getting alot of chores done.  Lot's of boat chores and a few house chores. 

Since we didn't fly much during the past 6 months, it was time for Duane to get his instrument currency in the airplane.  Pilots have to maintain  and prove proficiency every 6 months to be able to fly in the clouds.....so off we went this morning.  Pretty green NC!

And here is our 2 hour flight with 6 different approaches at nearby airports!  The green line is our actual  radar flight path.  Fun but a bit tiring in the warm bumpy air!

Memorial Day weekend at Oriental

The kiddos came to Oriental this weekend and we had a great visit.

The Avion is all set up.

Pretty crane on our shoreline.

We went kayaking and canoeing.

And spent some time relaxing in the warm weather.

Robert brought me a set of these beautiful watercolor paintings that his friend made of Sojourn.  So pretty!!

And a final little boat ride and it was time for them to leave!

Back to the coast

We headed out to the coast like the Beverly Hillbillies!  Duane driving the truck/trailer - the bed of the pickup loaded with "stuff" - wheel barrow, tools, boat bumpers, ladder, trash can, etc.  I followed in the mini-van/trailer stuffed with charcoal grill, two lawn mowers and various other necessary items.

Mostly set up.  I need to get the awning out.  Lots of grass mowing to do!

Water is calm...boat is just like we left her!

Amaryllis

I plant the Amaryllis bulbs that my grandmother gives us each Christmas outside each spring.  I have 7 or 8 in an outside flowerbed and they seem to do fine, even with the crazy single digit temps we've had this year.

This is the bulb from 2 years ago, I believe.  Lovely!

Weekend

I forgot to put up a photo of my "birthday cake".....Zuccotto cake....oh, my goodness it's good!!  Duane sortof surprised me at the restaurant by calling the waitress over at the last minute and order it to-go.   (We were absolutely stuffed at that point so couldn't have eaten it at the restaurant at the time if we'd wanted to).  I should have put a fork down for size - this "slice" of cake is huge!   We had it the next night with a nice glass of wine.  Lovely.

Saturday, we attended our EAA 1114 chapter summer picnic.  It was fun to see some folks we haven't seen in a while (we don't attend many of the meetings)....but it was a soggy mess!

Trip to the mountains and my birthday!

Unfortunately, we had to make a trip to the mountains to attend Duane's uncle Kelly's funeral.  Sad day for the family.

Stormy skies - the view out back of Granny and Cordy's.

The rain started right after the funeral....Kevin had promised Granny that he'd plant some flowers for her - so they braved the downpour.  Obviously having a grand time playing in the rain!

When I got home, I had a birthday pressie waiting on the doorstep!

From my sweet sis!

All good fun - these especially!!  She knitted a pair little sock-ets to wear with thong sandals!  They keep the sandals from rubbing a blister.

Very cool!!  So comfy!

Back to the boat

Back to the boat blog for a while!

Key West bound

We'll miss the daffy's this year....Diane, feel free to harvest bouquets any time over the next few weeks!

New solo pilot in the family!!

Richard surprised me this week by telling me that he has done some flight training while we've been gone!  And he said he was about ready to solo - with less than 10 hours of flight instruction - pretty fast learner!

First takeoff!

First landing!

He did the usual 3 takeoffs and landings....

Happy day!! 

With his instructor, Bill.  So proud!!

Visit to the mountains

We had our yearly "McCraw Holiday Gathering" this year in Hendersonville.

Although we weren't all together at the same time, everyone was present for part of the long weekend.

Cordy and Kevin 

Christopher

ToniAnn, Kyle and Zoom

Kevin's family

Us!

Sharon and Buddy

Carolyn and Tommy

And Granny and Cordy

All too soon, the weekend was over! 

Boating!

Most blog entries will likely be over on the boat blog for a while!

Wedding!

One of the last "social" things we had to do before heading back to Galveston was attend Pat's daughter's wedding.

It was a beautiful fall day!  The wedding ceremony was down at Gretchen's gazebo.  The bride was flown to the ceremony by Pat in his motor glider.  She got out of the plane on the runway so I couldn't get a photo of that.

Lovely ceremony with lots of kind words.  The bride and groom met at a "medieval times" type group.  Lots of their friends from that group attended the wedding and they exited the ceremony under the crossed swords you see.

We all walked back down the runway to Pat's hangar.  It was an amazing transformation!

Lovely wedding cake with lots of options.

And for the non-meat-friendly folks, they had a great vegan BBQ!  It was really good.

First dad/daughter dance!  So sweet.

As the night extended, the pretty twinkling lights gave a nice atmosphere.

Hard to see, but they're cutting the cake with a long sword!!

 And there was even some "entertainment" - Charlotte does aerial silk dancing, so some of her friends performed.  Interesting!  I'd never seen this before.

And Lindy snapped a photo of us!   Fun times!