A Day In The Life - 12/31/2010: Gaming To The End

 And when someone asks you what you did for New Years Eve, you can either tell them that you stayed home or went to some lame party or you can tell them that you partied into the new year with 900 young adults at Game Works. Ok, so I didn't get to party so much as make sure that everything kept going smoothly. You know, no tossing the pool tables around or molesting the hired help.

 But it still was a lot of fun. There are hundreds of games and these kids were outstanding. They were just fun to "people watch" as they gathered and played against each other.
There were tons of video games from racing cars,cycles, snow mobiles to ones with virtual reality helmets. There were several pool tables and air hockey games. And there were several of these "Dace Hero" type games that get played like guitar hero except with your feet . . . like the one at the right.

 There were the shoot em up, hunt em down games and the shoot the basketball games. There was even a huge room just for playing board games for those who were into that with a little less noise. Yes, there was music playing loudly wherever you went. I guess they were just trying to leran to relate to us old people by doing activities where you had to yell at everyone to be heard. But the music selection was pretty good, even by my lowly standards.

And upstairs (yes, there were two floors of activities) in one area was the dance floor. And the later it got the more people gathered there until about midnight it was standing, barely breathing room only. So, of course, they did some of those hopping dances where everyone looks like pop corn jumping up and down. The new year count down was great (as you can see). But were these youth ready to go home? Not by a long shot and so they danced and played some more until we finally herded them out about 12:30. What a fun activity. But next year I'm going to get there early so I can play some before people-watching.

A Day In The Life - 12/31/2010: No More El Gordo

I am gathering far too many gourd test pieces! I was just working with this fragile piece of round wood when it just popped! Just like that. I don't know why it popped off at me like that. But it happened at a spot that is impossible to repair, so into the bin it goes to become one of Sid's mutant toys, to be burned, dyed and painted just to see how it looks.
And the worst part about all of this is that now I have to clean some new gourds before I can start a new project. Soaking and scrubbing and then more scrubbing with steel wool. So off I go.

A Day In The Life - 12/28/2010: It Was A "Knife" Thing To Do

I'm not certain how I became a knife person. Perhaps it was the idea I got as a cub scout that you needed a knife to be prepared. A knife is sure handy to have around when there is a task to be done. You can often aviod doing that task by getting out your knife and carving on something or even looking like you're whittling.

So, here in the picture above we have my knives.
The top two I made while working with the Varsity scouts to make theirs.
The small one on the lower left I collected for the mountain man rendezvous and is actually an old fashioned pair of scissors. But it will still poke you really good if you're not careful.
The one next to the scissors is an old one that has a screw driver and a couple of blades. I think it was supposed to hang on your key ring.
The next three are the same version of Swiss knife that I have carried for years. It has a couple of blades, a pair of scissors, a pair of tweezers and a tooth pick. These are the un-losable knives. They leep falling out of my pockets here and there but always seem to turn up. The blue on is a Word Perfect labeled knife that was sent to me about the time that Jennie was born. It has a crease in one side where, when it was on walk-about it ended up under the Lazy boy and someone rocked on it. The black one is a Scitor branded knife that Ben gave me.
Then there is the end knife. Ben gave that one to me for Christmas this year. I think he is either trying to break me away from Victorinox by giving me a better Buck, or weigh me down so I can't beat him at racing, because I now carry two knives in my pocket. Sorry, but I need a pair of scissors now and then to clip a stray thread or to clip a fractured fingernail. so, please, be "knife" to me.

A Day In The Life - 12/27/2010: Someone Is Off His Rocker

 I know what you're thinking - "Is that an alien with big ears?" Well the answer is decidedly, "No"! This is the rocker that someone is off of.

It actually all started on the trip home from Sahuarita to Mesa on Christmas day. I had pulled off onto the side of the road to check on something. When I re-entered the highway traffic it was with substantial exuberance . . . yes, exuberance is a good word for it. But with such exuberance comes a price. We began to cough and sputter and it was sometime before we discovered that it was not me but the car that was doing the coughing and sputtering.
I was certain that it was just a minor cold and everything would be better with a little rest so we parked our faithful steed in the barn for recovery after checking to ensure that there was nothing visibly wrong with the old girl. (It runs like a man but wheezes and whines like a girl, so this time it is a girl.)

Sunday she was worse and so we hitched rides to and from church from our kids, Quentin and Jennie. How embarrassing!
When Monday came and she was no less whiney, I consented to call the doctor and took her in that same afternoon. The diagnosis was difficult but they finally concluded that she really was off her rocker and needed a new one. Well, actually, she had become a stripper and had stripped the threads right off of her rocker. So they drilled and tapped and put in a heli-coil and a new head gasket (I guess she had a headache, too) and she was good to go. I knew she just wanted a little attention but next time I'd like to do it at home so it won't cost so much.
By the way, if you didn't read this between the lines, the rocker pivots between the cams on the cam shaft and the valves (seen on the right of the picture) and open and close the valves so the darned thing can breath in and out. I guess she had a bad case of asthma until we got her back on her rocker.

A Day In The Life -12/27/2010: Gourd Work In Progress

This picture is a little out of focus but you can see what fun I am having with this gourd project so far - winding vines and drooping leaves. I just need to put in the scenery and it will be ready to go.

A Day In The Life - 12/25/2010: St. Nick Strikes Again

The annual attack of the Clauses has left our homes and sentences in a shambles! There are papers, ribbons and bows strewn about everywhere as though a whirlwind came in the front door and did its best to unwrap every present before exiting the back door. But there you have it. And if you see any garbled sentence structures in this blog, you can just blame those horrible Clauses for that, too.
Jase and Q attempt to unwrap a gift in the morning version of Christmas which takes place in the living room of our house.

Hero is really involved in the new book and begins to howl like a coyote as she and her dad read a pop up book that adds it's own sounds of animals, including, of course, coyotes. Frankly, I think that she get's it from her dad although I never noticed this tendency to howl until recently. First it's zombies and now warewolves - you know, the ones that are more interested in howling about the wares they got from Santa. And we tried so hard to raise him right . . .

Hero is enjoying the animal pop up book again, on her own this time. Look at all that stuff POP! (and howl.)

Jase tries on his new socks in preparation for test driving some new shoes he got from Santa or some facsimile of the same.

Then the festival of the trashed house moves to Ben and Jenn's home in Sahuarita where the ravishing of the Christmas gifts begins anew with even more vigor, if you can scarcely imagine it.

Noah is wearing all of the new tool gear he can manage at one time. Opening so many presents in such a short amount of time requires only the best tools and safety equipment. He is now equipped to handle every holiday and have his gifts opened in record time!

Hair! By golly, the musical is back!

Wait! No, it is Rapunzel from the new movie Tangled. And does that girl love her hair!

Em is busy handing out the presents with Ohmawhile the rest of us do the opening. It's a tough life but somebody's got to live it.

As you can see, the Claus Effect has struck with full force here in Sahuarita, as well . . .

. . . and it has even gotten Paul's attention! "Where has all this wrapping paper come from?", he asks with a wink as he drives out of sight, calling, "Merry Christmas to all, and to all a Good Night!".


What a wonderfully eventful day. I think I will do it again - next year, if you don't mind.

A Day In The Life - 12/24/2010: Elves On The Loose

 It is confirmed! A couple of Santa's elves have abandoned the workshop and are roaming the streets of Mesa dropping off early Christmas gifts. They are probably just trying to beat Santa to the punch and they will get coal in their stockings for certain this year.

And this is the hat that Gaye made for Hero. I hope Hero has a square head because it seems to fit this gift box just fine.

A Day In The Life - 12/19/2010: Gingerbread House Tradition

 Tradition! Tradition! Oh, forget the singing. This is a tradition that we all love to gather for. First there is the food. Yum! Cookies and chocolate popcorn. Soda pop and more - much more. Time to visit and time for the grand kids to play together. Time to re-discover ourselves and our roots. What fun! Food and family - what could be more glorious?

 The families get together for some pictures and everyone piles in because no one wants to be left out. Jenn and Em next to Omah with Hero in her lap and G-G squeezed in, I especially loved the Reindeer hat with all of those miles of smiles.




And how in the world did I not get a picture of Paul, Jess and Hero?! Yikes! You will just have to pick them out of the other photos here. ;(

 Jase and Q with their cute smiles. What a great pair! Somewhere in all of this there was eating. A marvelous dinner fit for a king was created (but only the court jesters came.) And, of course, it was one of those that you get to carry around with you for awhile. It is what I call "a Pounder" because you'll wear a few if you eat many of them.

 Then there was the letter writing. Everyone got to take a few minutes to write some letters to Drew. He and Beth couldn't come down. Drew just went into the Air Force on the 7th of December. He is going through basic training and it is a killer, or so I've heard. It is one of those life dreams that I have never had. Don't get me wrong. I love to crawl around in the mud, swing from ropes and things, shoot weapons every day and get up at 4am as much as the next guy but I like to do it when it is 80 degrees, not 35F, if you know what I mean.

 And then we get to the competitive part of the gathering - the making of the gingerbread houses. This year it was done a little bit differently. There was one per kid and an adult helped a kid. At least it kind of worked out that way and it seemed to be a lot more fun. I guess I should have helped Jennie more with her house from the movie "UP"t.

 Then, to assist with the removal of the Pounders, we went to walk around the Mormon temple to see all of the Christmas lights. They were really quite dazzling. I was the designated carriage horse and pulled the wagon with Jase and Noah all around. They were tucked in with their blankets and enjoying the lights and and the privilege of getting to ride while the girls and adults had to walk. OK, the lights were pretty cool, too.

The temple glows across the pool, reflecting in the pond with the lights of Christmas. Although quite crowded, there is a quietness and politeness that makes that makes it seem like there are far fewer people than there actually were. I think that this is one of my favorite pictures of the season.


I has been a wonderful evening, spent with family and quiet remembrance of the gift that the Savior gave to us and the world.

A Day In The Life - 12/18/2010: The Vaterlaus Gathering

 The Vaterlaus Gathering has been an annual Christmas season tradition since we finally determined that getting us all together for Christmas and/or Thanksgiving was never going to happen. So, in the truest Vaterlaus tradition, we created our own holiday, the Gathering of the Vaterli.
The running of this event rotates between the kids, two

at a time. Stan and Patti are paired together since they both live in the Tuscon area (didn't get out in time) and then Richard (that would be me) and Paul (the "uncle" version) work together. Also Ann and Becky work together. This year we got to travel to Tucson to do the "gathering". A few must have gotten lost and others got the crud.

Some were AWOL but most made their appearance.
The fun begins with everyone gathering, therefore the name. And we sit and play games if we are older than 12 or so. Those younger than twelve get sequestered in the next part of the gym where they run around screaming at each other and trying not to get hit by the basketballs of the older others.
Then there is the food. It is mostly pot-luck. Actually, it is all pot luck. One of the hits this year was Quentin's arrival with a bucket of Eegee's slush mix.There is a kind of a program/talent show event. Most of us have run out of talent as we have gotten older but it is still fun and usually not too long.

Before we get to the cleaning up, there is usually a fair amount of visiting. That is probably the best part. Everyone is doing stuff that is so interesting to find out about and discovering what changes have taken place with each person over that past year.
Then there is The Family Meeting which involves Mom, Dad and their kids. Others can come if they want to but it is not very interesting for those not involved. We decide things like who is running next year's show and Mom and Dad often have a book or some other item for each of the families. But the very best part of the meeting is that lots of other people are busy cleaning up while that meeting takes place. Yes!

A Day In The Life - 12/17/2010: Dinner With The Good Guys

Gaye and I are trying to decide what to get for some of the kids for their Christmas gifts. Gaye had determined that Ben would like to have some equipment and supplies to tryout Sushi-making. Well, that stuff is just not the normal Dollar Store stuff that we would usually have gotten for Ben (our kids are SO abused!) so we finally decided to head to World Market. WOW! This place is Humongous! It has who isles labeled (in English, fortunately) for each nationality they cover. We eventually find the right Japanese food isle and begin to gather the dried seaweed, cans of stuff to go into the sushi, bags of rice (hope we got the right kind because there is like thirty different kinds), sushi roller mats and tools of some kind or other. It was so much fun exploring this place. There was stuff that had absolutely no English on them at all.
Then we are checking out and Gaye, being a curious person, just has to ask the woman in front of us about something that she was buying. We had a great conversation about it and how she and her husband met (he was an LDS missionary in Taiwan and met her there.) They were a lot of fun to talk to.

Then it was off to dinner at Bishop Tyler's home. She got out all of her finest stuff for us and set this magnificent table, as you can see. This was only topped by the food.
Before we sat up to the table there was shrimp cocktails and crab dip. For dinner, Vicki Nelson had brought her famous rolls (yum) and we began with those and a magnificent salad (yum, yum!) Then there was the main course - Prime rib, perfectly cooked for each of us with dill potatoes and asparagus. Then, for dessert there was plum pudding with a white glaze on top.
Oh! I was so well fed - it was simply magnificent!

A Day In The Life - 12/13/2010: Carrots Are Strange

Ah, yes - carrots are very strange. At least my carrots are. They look as if they have been dancing through the garden at midnight. It is more likely that they are the result of a mad scientists evil experiments. Or perhaps these poor carrot people have been exposed to horrible raddish-ation.
I am not certain if my three-legged yellow friend is my favorite . . . or the white cork screw critter . . . or the orange one with the mighty growth. Oh, well - welcome to the family. Until you've been eaten!

A Day In The Life - 12/11/2010: The Funny Ballet

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5QGV-WmjKY

Gaye and I went to the megalopolis of Green Valley, Arizona for a ballet performance by two of the grand kids this evening. There is a woman who studied and performed back east who moved out to southern Arizona who now teaches Ballet (and some hip hop) to the local kids and does a pretty good job as far as my totally untrained eye can tell. So we made the sojourn across the desert on our camels, spitting (the camels, not us . . . mostly) and grunting (OK, some of that was us) all the way. It was a very fun event to watch. Above is a YouTube video of one of their performances. This is a keeper.

A Day In The Life - 12/10/2010: Swinger Climbs Ladder

 Here I am. It is my day off. I mean, a vacation day, right? But I am out enjoying myself in the yard. December is a wonderful time of year in Arizona. While the rest of the world shovels snow we enjoy weather that is mild, in the 70s and 80s.
So, I am out in the sun enjoying sitting in the yard reading an eBook when I get this urge to clean up this corner of the yard where I have been storing jungle gym parts for a couple of years now. You know the story - "If you'll come take this apart and haul it away you can have it for free." Free is the hook, and I took it down to the sinker. But some of the wood was in bad condition and I just never got around to rebuilding the jungle gym. And, mind you, the grand kids aren't getting any younger.
So I figure that I can use a lot of this weathered wood for some wood working projects. So I haul it out to the shed and begin stacking it. Pretty soon, all that is left is this bunch of hardware. I start looking around and this idea just kind of pops into my head.

I have this great tree right in my yard and it is finally getting big enough to be of some use. Pretty soon I am on a step stool drilling holes in my tree.
First it is two holes in this really strong branch (I hope) and a couple of massive hooks that I just happen to have stashed away for just such an occasion. Soon a swing is hanging from the tree branch.
Then it is a couple of holes into the trunk and a branch and all of a sudden, almost like magic, there is a blue ladder on my tree.
Well, being the kid that I am I just have to "test" these new kid toys out. The first ride in the swing is a careful one. Although I have hung from that branch a bunch of times I am not sure what swinging from a branch that now has holes in it will do. But soon I am swinging high and loving it.
Then it is up to the branches of the tree on the ladder. I will need to do a little bit of pruning so that the kids don't break things or hurt themselves or fall out of the tree. I've seen what happens to those baby birds who fall out of their nests. It would probably be better if that didn't happen to the grand kids . . . or to me. So, I just thought that you ought to know that I am a swinger again, in the very best sense of the word.

A Day In The Life - 12/09/2010: Eating From The Garden

I love working in the garden. I love eating from the garden. But carrots are a new experience for me. They grow in dirt. What I mean is, the part that you eat grows right down in the dirt. Now, that may not be news to you, but for a boy who loves to go eat straight from the garden, no washing required, this is a new experience. As can be seen, these things don't come out of the ground washed, scrubbed and looking grocery store nice. These things are ugly with a capitol UHG! They have hair like your grandmother's lip. In fact, if your grand mother had been a mud wrestler, this could be her! But tastee! Yum. I didn't know that carrots had flavors. I guess that is because what you get in the stores don't! They are mostly orange pieces of soft wood. But these babies are great!
So, I am outta here 'cause there are more things waiting for my taste buds in the garden!

12/08/2010 - Gifts and Barrels

Sorry - no picture today. I got so involved that I forgot. Todd Cassel, my boss took us all to lunch today at Cracker Barrel. It was great food (I had the Lemon Trout - yum) and better company. It was good to get to sit around and talk with these people that I spend so much work time with - especially since so many of them work mostly from home.
After the luncheon I gave my Hanukkah gift to Todd - the Faery Gourd that I finished a few days ago. I think that it went over well. He was asking where I bought it and when I told him that I made it, he was quite impressed.
So now I am starting another gourd project. Yipee!

A Day In The Life - 12/07/2010: A Fun-Packed Day

 Today was so busy and SO much fun. Work went fine until about 2pm and then it became GREAT! We all went over to F1 Raceway to do some kart racing. I have needed to get out some serious speeding tendencies for a long time and so I was flying around that track. And our team did pretty well also, taking third place. I had almost forgotten how much I love kart racing. OK, boys, LET'S GO RACING!

After racing, Gaye picked me up from the race track and we went to Scottsdale. One of our favorite places to eat is Grimaldi's Pizza so we hit up that place next.

Then it was off to the Poison Pen, a book store that specializes in mysteries, does some publishing and brings in authors quite often to speak. The speaker tonight was Jeffrey Deaver. He was so interesting to listen to. He spoke about how he gets ready to write a book and some of the things that he does to create characters for a story. He told us that he has been commissioned by the Bond Estate to write the next James Bond book that is due out in June. He read us a portion of his new book and it sounded so interesting that I was ready to buy it. It was a good thing that we already did. :)

When he was done speaking he took some time to sign books. The line seemed to be going a bit on the slow side but we found out when we got near the front of the line, that he was being very personal with each person and even signed the book that we were getting for someone in the family as a gift, with a personal message for them. What a really nice guy he is. Unfortunately, there are many who are not all that friendly and fewer still that are genuinely nice people you would want to know better. Mr. Deaver is definitely one of those.

While we were at the book store, Jennie called to tell us that Bahama Bucks was giving away free 16 oz drinks until 10pm. So we headed that way since it wasn't too far out of our way home and we were both ready for a drink.
Before we even got in the door we could see that this was NOT going to be a fast trip. The parking lot was full, there were cars backed up from the drive-thru quite a ways and . . .

There were people lined up around the store until there was hardly room to enter. It took us about 45 minutes to get out drinks but what a time we had people-watching. Most were young kids in high school or college. There were only a few adults and a couple of younger children. But it was already after nine on a school night when we got there. Gaye saw a lady that she used to work with and spent some time talking to her, so she "won".
We finally got our drinks and they were wonderful. It was well worth the line time for the fun and the drink.
It was after 10 pm when we finally got home and I still had to run a job for work. Midnight - here I come! Another short night on the way. Guess I'll have to sleep fast.

A Day In The Life - 12/05/2010: Winkie Blinkie Lights

 

I got to help out at the Mesa Temple tonight. It was mostly directing traffic and wandering around to be available to assist people who had questions and to watch to be sure that people were not vandalizing, etc. It was very fun.

These are a couple of videos that will give you just a (very poor quality) taste of what the lights look like over there. Drive on over and take a look for yourself, if you have not yet been there.

A Day In The Life - 12/03/2010: The Gourd Is Finished!

 After the last gourd disaster, when I dropped my nearly completed gourd and a third of it broke, I almost took a siesta in the fine art of gourd making. But I just couldn't. After having done some things on the broken gourd that I was liking I had to do them again with a better, more coordinated format. This is the result. - Right side.

 Front.

 To the left of front.

The back side.

A Day In The Life - 12/02/2010: Of Red Carrots And Spiders

Ariel and Hero got to come over today while Paul went to work out with his Army group, making the attempt to get into some shape other than round before he has to report for classes and duty.
Ariel has become a tree climber. She finds a way up into the tree and then just climbs all over in the branches among the leaves. It is very fun to watch her just disappear among the leaves.

Meanwhile, Hero told me that she was a spider and wanted to be in her spider web. It took me a minute to understand that she was wanting to get into the hammock. And then she didn't want to be swung because she was afraid. But after awhile she became more comfortable. Then she needed a blanket and pillow so that she could sleep. Finally she had to have a little bit of swinging so that she could sing "Rock-A-Bye-Baby" as she rocked back and forth above the ground.

About the time that Hero grew tired of being a spider in her web her dad returned. I was out checking out the garden and pulled up a rather large red carrot. We took it into the house and washed it off in the kitchen sink and then handed it to Hero to admire how red it was. That kid was not phased by a red carrot at all. She just stuck that thing into her mouth and took a huge bite and then proceeded to eat almost all of that huge tuber. Well, there are more where that one came from.

A Day In The Life - 12/01/2010: Weird Lettuce

 I was out working in the garden today and admiring how well my winter crop was doing when I began to look more closely at how things were growing. You see, I had purchased seeds from a new nursery than usual and this nursery carries a variety of "different" vegetable plants. You know, round zucchini, red carrots and the like.

So I took a closer look at the lettuce. I had planted three different varieties. Two of them looked fairly "normal" as plants go. On seemed to sort of be head-shaped and the other was more like romaine - tall and leafy. But it was the third one shown to the left here that caught my attention.
As I started stripping some leaves off to bring in for salad I noticed that this set of plants were almost like vines. Weird!