Getting senile

Sorry, I guess I posted a few of these pictures before. The ones of the Aquarium. Guess I just like the aquarium. Actually, I just wanted to make my sister famous!  You just get to look at them twice I guess.

Summer fun

Lynn and her friend Ann came to visit us and we had a great day visiting the aquarium and the Coke museam. No trouble sleeping after that day but it was a great time.

The giant whale shark is always a big hit. It's just amazing how huge it is.

Then there's the giant grouper that is just as amazing.

While we were in Buffalo to visit Carol and Charlie we helped them stack wood for the coming winter. This is about 8 or 9 cords of wood. Not even half of what they still had left to do. Yikes! We made quick work of it though and it was nice to be able to help out.

The wood was up behind this barn. The guys would load it up on the pick up truck then drive it down to the garage for us to stack. It was a really nice day at least.

Here's Charlie coming down from the barn. I think we wore him out.

You can rarely see Carol without a camera. That's the garage we stacked the wood in. She did the cooking which is always a good deal. She is one of the best cooks I know and after a bit of work you love digging into whatever she has fixed.

Carol and Charlies son Rick was also in town to help with the wood and visit his parents. Rick was dying to go into Buffalo to scope out their old haunts. Definitely a place to lock your doors and not make eye contact. This was Bill's old Lutheran Church he used to attend as a kid. It looked like it was still in use and still had the same name - Resurrection Lutheran Church - but I would be hard pressed to want to stick around there much.

This is the house that Bill grew up in. Also now a very sketchy neighborhood. The road still had cobblestones. All the houses around were sadly in terrible shape. I can't imagine the neighborhood ever being recovered. It would take more money to redo then it would to tear it all down and start over. Very sad. He said they all used to walk everywhere, to church, school, shopping. They used to run the streets and have a ball with his cousins and family. At least the house was still standing.  I guess the brown siding at the top of the roof peak is the original siding.

Public school #62 where Bill went to elementary school. All boarded up now but still there. I wonder what they will do with it?

Seneca vocational highschool where Bill went to high school. It looks like they are doing a lot of construction on it so I am thinking it is still in use for something if not a high school.

There are two houses in this picture one of which is where Bill and I lived when he got out of the service and started school at Buffalo State. We couldn't remember which one it was. I am leaning towards the one on the right as the house number 586 rang a bell. I will have to look that up somewhere and find out. Anyway, we lived on the second floor and the owners, Mr & Mrs. Stoberl let us use the attic where Bill set up his trains. Oh, the good old days!

We all went for a fish fry on Thursday evening. Bill Carol, Charlie, Rick and Me. It was the best fish I ever had. And it was very cheap too which made it taste even better.

I just had to take a picture of this. It is sideways but I thought it was so cool. It was of a tree with no leaves. At the wedding we went to everyone made a colored thumb print and placed it on the tree and wrote your name by it. A fun way to see all who came to your wedding and made for a nice wall hanging afterwards. I thought it was a great idea.

The wedding was for the daughter of Valerie Taylor, life long friends. It was at Keuka Lake State Park. The day brought some rain but it cleared up beautifully.  Gram, Mike and Donna on the back deck of the pavillion.

Me and Bill on the same deck.

Nyn & Nel trying to escape the loud music and enjoy the lake view.

On the way home we came across this field of sunflowers. I just had to stop and get a picture. They were all so happy looking.

On Tuesday, Mike took a half day off and took Bill and I fishing on Irondequoit Bay. It was a beautiful day made even better by some good fishing. Here is a nice 1 and a half pounder that I caught. It was a great fish and was so fun to catch. I ended up catching 6 fish which is a rcord for me and most of them were pretty nice sized this being the largest. I had to post this picture first because......

..... Mike caught Moby Dick a bit later in the morning and would have made mine look like a minnow. I have never seen such a big bass in person before. It was a 5 pounder and was HUGE!  As you can see Mike was smiling ear to ear and his eyes were about ready to pop out of his head. Even after he let the beast go, after dropping it 3 times, he said his heart was still pumping like crazy. It's a wonder he didn't have a heart attack. It sure was fun to see him catch it. He had a great day catching about 10 fish. Another one was about 2 1/2 pounds also dwarfing my nice catch.  Can't feel too bad though as Bill got skunked. Had to be the best day I ever fished in my whole life. It was hard to have to pull up our rods and get back home for Mike to go back to work. I imagine he had a great half day none the less.

More progress!

With the electric, plumbing, and HVAC now complete we hit the insulation stage of our little house. This was a welcome milestone as it now allows us to turn on the AC and work in coolness. And after several months of 95 degree heat believe me, it is a welcome change. We had the ceiling and the floor insulation blown in and decided to use bat insulation for the walls as a cost savings measure. The blown in stuff though highly efficient is very expensive.

Bill and I spent about 4 hours on Saturday doing the bat stuff. We are over half done. I did the measuring and cutting and Bill stapled it in place. It went pretty fast but I was bushed when we stopped for the day. I think we only have about 3 more hours to get it done. It was sure nice to have the AC working though.

This picture was taken from the tiny hall to the bedrooms looking into the living/dining area.  You can see the green foam insulation and our finished bat insultion on the walls. It sure is looking good and I was especially happy that once the walls were filled with something it didn't look smaller like I thought it would. We will finish the insulation on Monday then when we return from our NY trip we will have the sheetrock put in. Then it's the fun stuff! Yahoo. Those pictures will be a lot more exciting for all of us.

Catching up

 Only have taken a few pictures lately and these are a bit scattered but it is what it is so I thought I'd catch up before we head off to NY for a week. Hopefully I will take more there for everyone.
Lynn and her friend Ann came for a wonderful visit. All us girls headed to Atlanta to do some sight seeing. We went to the Aquarium in hopes of killing Lynn off but she's a tough bugger, cancer can't get her and the aquarium can't get her. She'll live to be a hundred!  We had a nice day even though the Coke museum did us in. No problem sleeping that night.

 Here is one of the hugh whale sharks. This thing is about 20 feet long. Very impressive.

 This is a Grooper. It was huge too as you can tell by seeing the people in the foreground. This place is always amazing.

 When Anna and Stratton and Adeline came we thought Adeline might get a kick out of taking the Sprite out for a drive. She loved it.

 Signs of the times. Adeline chilling out with my ipad. She knows what to do with it. Soon infants will be using Ipads in their cribs to call for mom and dad or ask for a diaper change. Yesh!

And voila! I had this little night stand in one of the bedrooms. We have had it forever and it was just a drab old wood tone. It is mahogony or cherry but over the years just a useful stand. When I looked closely at it one day I discovered what cute details it had and how nicely it was made. So I decided to refinish it. Actually, Anna got me going and actually, she did it for me. All I did was buy the paint. Not a bad deal eh?  It turned out so cute. I just love it and am going to use it in my new master bedroom.  Thanks again Anna. I need you to come back real soon.  She also helped me go through most of my kitchen cupboards and I got rid of tons of stuff. Yeah!