Kaylee, Lunch, Kaylee and Websites

Today was Kaylee's first day of swim class, and she had a great time. It was really chilly this morning, and the water was extra cold-I was cold sitting outside in the wind watching. Last year she did fine, but she was hesitant and didn't want to go under the water. This year she's just in there with the rest of the kids there. She floated on her back, on her face, picked up stuff off the bottom of the pool, that kind of thing. She did well, and I hope she passes Level 2 when this ten-day course is over. :)

After her lesson, we went to lunch with Chuck, Nathan and Jamie, Steve, and Nathan's friend Matt J., who is also a renowned pilot, warbird pilot, Reno Air Race winner, etc. He had a table full of people busting a rib talking about how his engine blew during the Reno Air Race one year...his engine went with a flash and a bang, and he unknowingly mashed down the push to talk switch during the whole emergency (the button that transmits what the pilots says over the radio frequency so everyone can hear). Over the airwaves where all the people who were attending the race could hear, he "talked" to himself all the way down, as some pilots are known to do. (Glad I'm not the only one. ;)) Later his crew guy told him he started off sounding like a girl with that high-pitched voice, then did an excellent Darth Vader impression heavy breathing into his oxygen mask, then making a purely professional sounding radio call deliberately, then back to Darth Vader, then talking himself down out loud. Apparently it was highly entertaining to listen to, at least in hindsight once he and his flaming airplane were down safe and sound. The first thing they told him when he landed was "we have got to move your push to talk switch." The reason so many of us were laughing so hard at it is that we can totally picture this, and picture anyone at the table doing something similar. In fact, at least three of us at the table HAVE hit the push-to-talk switch at an inopportune moment and made a comment over the air that we didn't intend to broadcast. Thankfully none of them were in front of a crowd, nor while we were riding an on-fire airplane down to the runway! :O

The rest of the day was Kaylee's. I took her to ballet, tap and cheer. She was happy to have those classes as they are part of her routine. Afterwards we met Steve at a pizza place for dinner before making it home. On the way home, we were in two separate cars, and Steve tried to make me get another speeding ticket, but that's another story. ;)

Well, it's the end of the month and we've got to enter time sheets and do the billing again, among other things. I'm rather...behind...again. I know, shocking...

One thing I meant to talk about earlier, but Kaylee brought it up again today so it reminded me. She has become fully aware that she has a website, and what is on it. She has read her guestbook, looked through her photos and videos, and wants to know if people can email her. She also informed me today that she's not sure she's comfortable having her pictures on the internet, and in particular wants me to take down a video I have on there of her singing a song and then lifting her skirt up briefly. Which I will go do shortly here, in fact. We've talked about it, and I told her that the website was for family and friends, and that other people really don't know the place exists, wouldn't know to look for it, and wouldn't care. But she's really contemplating it, and has said she wants a site that the public can see and then she wants only family/friends to be able to see this site. Depending on how serious she is about it, her site may indeed go down or become password protected. It is her site with her pictures after all, and I will respect her wishes on it, whatever she chooses. :) Along those lines, she's really interested in getting emails and reading guestbook entries, so if anyone wants to write to her, please do! :)

Today...

This morning I woke up to an email from Steve that said "STORE RUN!" It seems we were out of a few slightly important items like dental floss and toilet paper. Can't have that, now can we! I also wanted to get a George Foreman grill with removable plates, because we used our previous grill quite a bit. So I went to Meijer which would have about anything I need without making me deal with Wal-Mart. :) I did indeed find the little karaoke machine for Kaylee which was a reward we'd told her she would get for some previous things she'd done. She was so excited, it lights up and plays words on the tv and everything...she's already spent hours singing along to it. :) But I ran out of luck on the grill. The store had about five of them, but they were all really little. Target didn't have the big one either. So apparently I either have to go to Wal-Mart anyway, or order one online, which is a pain.

While I was in the store, I ran into Dale (he is the "Dale" in "Glenndale" airport. :)) and he told me that the pop/soda/whatever you call it was on sale today for $3.99 a case. Too bad I stopped in there yesterday to buy 8 cases of pop for our Meet & Greet at which time it was NOT $3.99 a case. I try not to dwell on these things lest they disgust me. ;)

I stopped and picked up lunch on my way home, and Steve set up Kaylee's karaoke machine for her, which was the last I saw of her for awhile!

Later that afternoon I went up with a student who had just soloed (flown by himself) for the first time a couple of weeks ago. Today was supposed to be another solo for him, but the winds were much too strong for that, so we went up to do crosswind practice, for his first time ever working on them, and the winds were gusting up into the 20s at 60 degrees off the one runway. We started off on the other runway which was only 30 degrees off, and by the third landing, he had it. So I switched him to the other runway with the tougher crosswind. By the last landing, he made a textbook crosswind landing, dead on the centerline, smooth touchdown and all. Not that common in actual pilots in those winds, let alone students who just soloed, particularly on the first day they tried it. :) He was good at listening, which always helps.

I went out to Glenndale today to put back some of the stuff we'd used at the hangar at Kokomo, and on my way out of there I was paying very close attention to the speed limit signs. My car almost wouldn't do it. I had cars lined up behind me annoyed at me doing 35 mph, because nobody goes 35 down that stretch. I couldn't do it either, and bumped it up to 40. *sigh*

Tomorrow is Kaylee's first day of swim lessons for the season. She's excited, and I hope she does well. Tonight Kaylee is watching "Ice Princess", which is a Disney movie about ice skating. She is really into it, and I am guessing that she will next express an interest in trying skating. ;)

Kaylee had lots of conversations with Steve today, most of which leave me kind of grinning. She has been pushing-hard-for pierced ears. She again tells us how many kids her age have pierced ears, yadda yadda. So today she asked if she could get her ears pierced. No. Then it went into an odd litany. "Can I get my eyebrow pierced?" No. "Can I get my nose pierced?" No. "How about my tongue?" No. (Where did she HEAR about that stuff??) I know, I'll get a permanent tattoo on my lower back. What?! No! She said "So when I'm 40 years old and married, am I going to have to call my DAD and ask permission to get my ears pierced?" Yes. ;) Smart aleck! She's always entertaining...

Meeting and Greeting

The day started with questionable weather. When I left the house, it was gray and overcast, which is not the best possible weather for an airport event. I had to stop at the store and pick up a ton of drinks on the way, and as I was walking out of the store to my car, the sky opened and it just started dumping rain. I was soaked in seconds. I was also wearing heeled sandals, and when they got wet they got slippery, which left me walking like someone who can't walk in heels and really should practice at home prior to going in public. ;) But I went barefoot for awhile instead while they dried out, and that helped--at least until my feet got tired from standing.

The event was supposed to start at 11 am, and at 11 am the rain was still just dumping, and we just had our own crew there and a couple others, standing there watching the rain pour. Soon enough though, the cell passed through, the sun broke through, and the people started coming. We ended up over 70 people there for sure. Chuck counted 60, then saw another batch walking up, and quit counting, and we had a few more rounds of people come after that. The airport manager and a couple of board members made it over, several hangar owners out there, and quite a few local pilots. I spoke to several people interested in regular flight lessons and a couple people interested in warbird training. I set up a table with brochures, business cards and flyers, and we had an easel that Chuck made that had a big aerobatics poster on it Pam made up. Justin cooked burgers and hot dogs non-stop for several hours, and fortunately enough people brought side dishes and dessert that we had enough food. There wasn't a lot of actual flying because of the winds/weather, but it was a good day to hang out and talk and that's what a lot of them did. It was a good introduction to putting a friendlier face on Kokomo Airport, and it was a busy, full, but fun day.

Kaylee played with Jamie and Gwenie, rode her bike and scooter, and generally ran herself into tiredness. I'll bet she sleeps well tonight! For that matter, I bet Steve and I sleep well tonight too...

After everything got cleaned up, several of us went to dinner before calling it an evening.

I did take a few photos, but not when we had the most people there, and I'm not sure why. Got busy, I guess. Anyway, you can see the few I took here. For now I'm fighting off the sleepies again, yawning all over while I'm typing this. Like I said, a busy day!

Friday Follies and Fun

This was a fun Friday for Kaylee, because when she got to Glenndale for our Friday lunch, she had her friend Maggie to play with. She hasn't seen Maggie in ages, and they had a great time together, for hours.

Shortly after lunch, I went out to Kokomo, and Nathan and I went in the T-6 over to Huntington after a low pass at Glenndale. The weather was still moving through up there by Huntington, so we just flew around and watched the rain and clouds move through, until the airport was clear, and came in to land. Nathan's plane has been run, and they are basically buttoning it up and getting it ready for the FAA to come do their thing, after which it will be legal to fly. I got to relax and ride in the back for the trip over, and there's just very little I find more peaceful and...pleasing...than cruising along looking at the wings over the fields, with the canopy cracked open and the rumble of the radial. I even get a kick out of looking at my own reflection in the back of his red helmet. Of course, I am easy to amuse. ;)

It was my turn next, and I flew us back to Kokomo, from the back. You know, the T-6 has been called "The Pilot Maker" for 70 years now? I find myself a little...aggravated; I've flown it I think six or seven times now, and it's not hard per se. It's not super fast, or overly sensitive. It's a little squirrely on the ground, and it's different from what I'm used to, but it's not like it is alien or anything. And yet... I can get it in the air, fly it around, and get it back on the ground. I can even do so so that it looks fairly decent from the ground the majority of the time. I've only had to have the one landing saved (so far), and only had one embarrassing bouncing-like-a-basketball-down-the-runway landing which I recovered myself (so far), both in the first few flights. But man, consistency and smoothness is evading me. I don't have it, and I should have it after this many flights. At least it's feeling more comfortable, and I can tell that once it clicks in, it'll be fine. I just want to sit out there and do it until I start nailing it. My tally for today is two "okay" landings, one nice takeoff and one truly sloppy landing. The back is a little tougher for me down final as unfortunately I'm not very used to landing planes where I can't see the runway until I'm fairly close to flaring, but that is a definite area of weakness of mine and I need to just get "seat" time and get comfortable with it. Anyway, that's my gripe at myself, but I enjoyed the flight all the way up to that last landing. ;)

When we got down, Charlie Brier drove me over to Glenndale so I could take the 172 out of the wet field there and take it over to Sheridan. The last time I'd looked at the runway, it still had some standing water on it, so I expected it to be a wet and true soft-field takeoff, but it wasn't as bad as it could have been. In fact, I was well in the air before I even got to the threshold markers for the runway. I got it put away and tied down at Sheridan, and Nathan came and got me, and we went to Outback for dinner. Steve and Kaylee met us there, and Jamie and Gwenie came along too. I was hungry, and we did the whole ball of wax. I ate most of my salad, I had a slice of warm bread, I had a few "bloomin' onion" peels, I had steak, baked potato, a side of crab legs, and even a "Chocolate Thunder from Down Under". They make those MUCH smaller than they used to, by the way. Best of all, they were out of whipped cream, so they gave three out of four of us who were supposed to have whipped cream our desserts for free. Why, thank you. :) I almost never eat that much there, and I'll probably be full until tomorrow around noon, but hey, it was really very good and it hit the spot.

I came home and printed off some stuff for tomorrow because my laser printer cartridges came in today, and I came home to a freshly cleaned house too. Tomorrow is going to be a busy one with our Meet & Greet, and I'm fading fast for the night...

Thunder...

It may not officially be summer yet, but don't tell the weather that. It got up to 88 degrees today, with pop-up thunderstorms that grew very large, very loud, and very powerful in a very short period of time. Nathan and I were going to go flying. I got to the airport first, and I was just sitting there with the doors open when I heard the rumbles and saw the dark wall outside. About then I got up and started closing the one hangar door, when I got a text that just said "Close the doors!" There was hail and everything. I got everything buttoned up. When it hit, it hit hard. Hail, heavy winds, and it kept getting worse. We were going to wait for that cell to go through, but there was just wave after wave of them, and it was obviously so unstable that it soon enough became "tomorrow will be another day".

Before we got hit, it went through Glenndale, and a lot of Kokomo was suddenly in the midst of a flash flood, including our little airport. The picture to the right is the lake by (and in) our hangars. Kaylee took this photo with my cellphone-I thought she did a pretty good job of it. :) Anyway, the weather came in so fast and so strong that we had several pilots stranded for awhile. Two people were on checkrides; one couldn't fly and the other couldn't get home for a long time. A third guy was only a few miles away from Glenndale and couldn't get in because the storm blew up and dumped a flood on the runway. It was a bit of an unusual day. I'm just hoping that Saturday doesn't end up like it's looking like it will end up, since we are having our Meet & Greet out there, and it would be nice if it wouldn't storm, if we could have the event and a good turn-out and decent weather to go with it...

One of our people was on his CFI (Flight Instructor) checkride. This is The doozer of a checkride, which currently has a 13% pass rate the first time. Yes, there is an 87% first time fail rate on this checkride, and that's an improvement from what it was a few years ago. The Federal examiner that our guy went with is the same one that has done another of our guys, and he just has a serious attitude problem. He took 7-8 hours to grill our guy, and he didn't come close to approaching nice. He was rude, mean, sarcastic, and pushy. He even went through our guy's logbook, inspecting every endorsement he had ever been given, to see if he could 'nail' any of his former instructors or examiners. "We're the FAA, and we're not happy until you're not happy." Indeed. Much to this examiner's dismay, our guy was quite well prepared by Steve and did pass the oral part of the checkride. Next he gets to fly on a day without storms and finish off the ride. I don't know why some people feel their lives aren't complete unless they can terrorize others...

Anyway, I'm just glad I don't have to do that again. ;)

Speaking of authority figures, I was coming out of Glenndale and on my way to the bank, and it was 4:30 and I had to be at the bank by 5. There's an area on one road where the speed limit drops from 50 mph to 35 mph. I didn't get slowed down fast enough for the officer who was waiting on a side street, and as I was looking at the back of the check I needed to deposit, I saw the lights in my rear view mirror. At the time, I actually did not know why he was pulling me over, because I glanced down at my speedometer and I wasn't speeding. The nice officer asked what my hurry was, and when I said I hadn't realized I was in a hurry, he told me he'd clocked me ten miles over the speed limit. When he told me what intersection, I knew it right where he meant, because it drops to 35 there, and I looked at him a little funny. I was slowing down-trust me, or I'd have been a lot more than 10 over the limit-but hadn't made it to the 35 when I passed the sign, but I was at the speed limit right afterwards, and he knew it. The not so funny thing is I got a ticket out of it. The funny thing is that HE kept apologizing to ME. "I'm sorry, ma'am, I have to be consistent here." "I'm sorry, ma'am, but I have to give you a ticket." "I'm really sorry, ma'am, but I put this is the lowest bracket I could, and you can come to court if you like." I ended up saying things like "It's okay." and "I understand", and "That's fine"...and then I stopped and cocked my head to the right in confusion as I thought "Shouldn't HE be comforting ME here??" Then I realized I had forgotten to cry. ;) I'm just kidding.... :) But he really wasn't overly comfortable giving me a ticket. Either he is new to the ticket-giving business, or he felt sorry for me. Regardless, I now have a ticket to pay, a potential increase in insurance rates, and I have to be very careful with driving for awhile, because two tickets in a short time frame is grounds for Defensive Driving School, which is a place I don't care to visit. Phoo. More good news--I wasn't actually driving in a hurry, and I still made it to the bank before they closed. Hey, you have to take the good news where you can get it sometimes, right? :)

Wednesday

Wednesday passed with a couple of very big thunderstorms rolling through, a lot of work being done, quite a few errands being run, a fire-fly capturing episode, a large meal, and a too-late inadvertent nap.

See ya tomorrow. *yawn*

De-twitch Central

This morning I tried to get Kaylee moving, but she is on summer vacation, capital "V", and she was not going to be moved along. :) It was almost 10 a.m. before she decided she was ready, and then she decided she didn't want to go with me to run errands and go to the airport after all. I told her I'd probably be gone until 3 pm or so, but she wanted to stay with her grandparents. Lucky for her, they were free! She found out last night that her Moon Sand can in fact go in the water, so she wanted to show them that little trick among others.

By the time I got my errands run and got out to Kokomo, it was 11:15 or so. I dropped off something up front, then headed back to Nathan's hangar, and I thought--while I'm here, I'll take up the Citabria. I didn't realize or remember it had been moved back to Glenndale, though I should have known. No go, and it was a beautiful morning, too. Lunch was at Applebees with Steve, Chuck, Ty, Steve C., me and Nathan, after which I went back to Kokomo with Nathan while the others broke for their respective flights/activities for the day.

After he got some springs fixed on a golf cart, Nathan pulled out the T-6, which kind of woke me up from a little dainty post-lunch-doze on the comfy chair out there, and we went to Muncie. I flew from the back this time. It was still quite the bugger to start/keep running. Anyway, I taxiied out to the runway, and since there isn't a working push-to-talk switch in the back seat, he had to make all the radio calls. I said that worked for me, because if I goofed any of these up, it would look like he did it since he's up front and doing the talking. ;) The standard approach doesn't work so well for the back seat person, since I lose sight of the entire runway the moment I turn final. Keeping it in tight and more of an oval shape than a rectangular pattern helped. How'd I do? Let's see. One lousy takeoff (eh, it was a fluke), two okay; one level off too high landing (first one from the back today), two okay. More practice necessary on tight turns with the tailwheel unlocked. No perfect ones, but I did end up with one of the best I've done so far at least. They all probably look fine from the ground (except the one takeoff), I just need to smooth them out-fewer jerky rudder actions on roll out and takeoff. Nathan did one to end on, and for grins on takeoff he was goofing around and putting it on one wheel, then the other, lifting off, touching back down, just a terrible "student pilot" kind of takeoff where the person is trying to "kill" you...

There was a hangar door open and a gentleman watching us while he was waiting for me to finish up and go up and do a flight review with him in his airplane. I got out of the T-6 and drove over to his hangar, and he asked if I was flying from the back or if Nathan was. I said I'd been flying from the back until the last one, and he said "It looked good from here, nice wheel landings." I said thank you, and then that takeoff occurred to me, and I said "That last takeoff was not what it looked like! We were just goofing off." He started laughing-he'd seen it. I wonder how many people enjoyed what they may have thought was one of us really hosing a takeoff. Even my bad one out of Muncie wasn't THAT bad. ;)

I went up next with this gentleman in his Cherokee 180, and we flew for about an hour. At the end, I asked if there was anything specific he wanted to do while he had an instructor on board, and he said he'd like to do spins. I can say I haven't had that request from a flight review before, but the plane is certified for spins (as long as it's loaded properly which it was), so we went up and did that, too. Just a couple, out of respect for his gyros. I really do enjoy spins. Come on, what part of this doesn't look fun?? :)



I came home, and Kaylee wanted to invite a friend over, so she's been playing with "N" for the last two hours, mostly with the sprinkler. A little water has a high entertainment value for kids! Throw in a snack and a towel and a playhouse, and they're good for hours. :)

Ms. Right

I think I'll list the things that went right today, since that would be a shorter list...

1. The weather. At least it's nice out.
2. Swim Lessons. Kaylee is signed up and registered for swim classes the end of June through the beginning of July. She is quite excited about that. I not only wasn't late, I got us in the first day registration was available. I was slightly surprised by that myself.
3. Movie Returned. It's taken me 12 days to give up finding an evening in which we had time to watch a movie, and finally today I got it successfully turned back in.
4. Lunch. A decent lunch with good company is always cheering.
5. Kaylee's website. She wanted me to add a page of kid shows and their 'rankings', so you can see her page here. ;)
6. Photos. I got her ballet and tap pictures back today! I'd scan them in and post them but I'm too tired, lazy and behind right now. Soon. If you're a family member or friend and want a wallet or 5x7 of her ballet and/or tap photos, tell me what size and how many and I'll send them off. If you're a stranger, don't be creepy.
7. The two and a half hour long finance meeting I was at tonight didn't last three hours. I find some kind of irony in me spending 2 1/2 hours with a calculator, a budget, and a small group of people trying to make the outgoing and the incoming match and deciding what goes and what stays, where the priorities lie, how to make things work.
8. I put out three fires. I won't mention the ones just lit or still burning since this is my things that went Right list.

Well, that about covers that. Tomorrow is supposed to be lovely, and amidst the stuff I have *got* to finish, I am also going to have to go de-twitch, one way or another...

Something Wicked This Way Comes

Sort of, anyway. I just got an airplane pushed away, hangars locked up, and headed home as a big ugly storm came blowing by. It was another particularly nasty one, and north of us got hammered pretty hard. Anyway...

Steve and Kaylee went out to Kokomo today, and Kaylee learned to ride her bike with no training wheels! We just do not have an area at our house that is good for bike riding, so we kept saying "one of these days we'll take her out to Kokomo and do it there." It's perfect out there-big ramps, smooth concrete, long straightaways, the whole ball of wax. Nathan's kids all learned to ride bikes out there. :) We've always kind of figured this would be one of those things where she would decide she was afraid, where she'd fall and get all upset, etc. We were just totally wrong and should have done this awhile ago. Kaylee had a little trouble figuring out how to arrange the pedals so she could get going, but once she got that down in a couple of minutes, she got on, she pedaled across the floor, stopped, turned around, did it again and again. Not one fall. She got slow once and wobbled her wheel back and forth-and kept it. So Steve opened the hangar door and let her go outside to see if she could make turns and such-No Problem. I mean, she hasn't had a single fall over yet other than one she did on purpose so Steve would let her take her wrist pads off. Steve made her wear jeans and a long-sleeved shirt with all her pads so that when she wiped out she wouldn't get hurt-but since she didn't, eventually he let her put her other pants and a short sleeved shirt on. She just took off riding like she's been doing it all along. That was pretty cool. It reminded me of when she potty trained. One day I tell her she can have M&Ms if she goes potty in the toilet instead of in her diaper, she did it once, I gave her chocolate, and she was done. I'm still relatively amazed at how fast and painless that whole exercise was, and I'm still in a little disbelief that she just hopped on there and rode like she's always only had two wheels.

I was on a trip when Steve and Kaylee were doing this, and when I landed and we pulled up, I saw her riding her bike out there and noticed there were no training wheels, and for a minute I thought it was must be another girl (Gwenie) or something. But nope, there she was, cruising around with her Princess Protective Gear. Bike riding and conquering swimming were our two big goals for the summer. One down, one to go! I'm proud of her. :) I took a video clip of her riding which you can see here if you have high speed internet. Steve also took two video clips on his cellphone to send me while I was gone. The quality is terrible (cellphone quality!), but she starts off and says "This one's for you, Mom." and rides around. The second one is her coming around to a stop and saying "I can ride a two-wheeler now!" Hmm, I just tried to view them off the page and I can't get those to work. I'll have to look into that later...

So that's what Kaylee did today!

As for me, this morning I headed to Waukegan in the 172RG with Justin to pick up his wife. Out of four legs into and out of Chicago, I must say three of the four were as easy as you're going to get in busy airspace like that. The fourth, coming out, was more typical. They sent us a long way out of our way, changed our heading a bunch of times for traffic, etc. It was a lot more bumpy, and there was some standard popup summertime weather, too. I just realized I forgot to turn the music on. I had XM music and forgot to turn it on? Humph. Oh well, it was probably busy enough over the radio without the music...

A little later I had another flight in the RG, this time taking up a friend of a friend on his 50th birthday. There were four of us in the plane, and we wandered around and looked at some local places. The only problem was that there were three fairly good-sized storms out there; one of them a big ugly one. So I kept an eye on those, and after 30 minutes I had to tell them we had to cut it short and come on in. It was a bit of a gusty wind for landing, but we got everything put away and locked up and got headed out before the rain and real winds hit.

That reminds me. Yesterday when I landed at Muncie for the second time in the Baron, a man came up to me and said "Did you land here earlier, too?" I said yes, and he said "Okay, I had never seen a lady Baron pilot before, and I kind of doubted there would be two of them in the same day at the same airport." He was there doing formation training with the Grumman group, and we talked for awhile. Some of the few strangers I rarely mind talking to are fellow pilots-it seems like you can always find something to talk about in flying. ;)

Today is also the 9th anniversary of Devon's death. Some people sent us memories they had of Devon, and that always means a lot to know that others are remembering too. This isn't a day that holds the best memories for us-the birthdays you can celebrate the memories of birth and joy and life and happiness and hope. The "death day" or "angel day" as I phrased it years ago just doesn't come with anything but the hardest memories. But we focus on the good, because we were blessed to have him in our lives...

Now it looks like we will have a good evening in which to unwind and relax. Kaylee is trying out the new shower head that Steve just installed in our bathrooms, then heading into bed. It's a good time to go relax on the deck and feel the cool post-storm breeze and hang out for awhile. :)

Storms and Stuff

Kaylee woke us up this morning around 6 something a.m. She came into our room, hopped in bed, talked to us, asked us questions, jumped around, until finally Steve just got up. I tried to ignore it, but finally I realized I was just Awake, so I got up. At this point, Kaylee crawled back in bed, and that little bugger slept until 9:20 a.m. I think tomorrow I'm getting her up early just for paybacks! ;)

Anyway, I got her up and hauled her out to Kokomo, where she got into the back seat of the Baron with Nathan while Chuck and I flew Nathan over to Muncie in order to pick up his airplane (Cheyenne). I liked this arrangement, because, see, yesterday Kaylee had a little...problem...in the Baron. She got very upset in that tiny seat in the very back where nobody could reach her, and she had a bit of a temper tantrum. Today I told her that if she started having a fit in the airplane, Nathan could now reach her and had my permission to thump her. Since he's about five times her size, I'll bet that would hurt. ;) Of course she did just fine, and as I was coming into Muncie I was a little distracted looking for the pack of airplanes working on their formation training there. The Cheyenne was done, so Chuck flew me and Kaylee back to Kokomo, where Steve met us all, and we went in the Cheyenne down to Greencastle for lunch. The acceleration on take-off in that thing is such fun. It's been awhile-it felt almost downright unnatural...though of course I rather liked it. ;) At this point there was a line of storms to the west of us that looked like they might interfere on our trip home, but we went, enjoyed our lunch, watched a few airplanes land (too fast and long) down there, and then as we got into the Cheyenne to leave it was just starting to rain on us. Funnily enough, we were on the edge of the weather all the way back to Kokomo. It was just fine where we were, and off to the west and east both was weather. Unfortunately a few things weren't yet right on the Cheyenne, so as soon as we landed at Kokomo, Nathan dumped off everybody and took off for Muncie to drop it back off, and I took off in the Baron by myself to be "chase" plane. On my way to Muncie, the Nexrad weather kicked on, and lit up like a Christmas tree. Over there it was just nasty. The green (mild weather) disappeared and was replaced with orange, red, even purple and hot pinks. (Not Good). But I could visually see what was where, so I kept going until I got about 12 miles out from Muncie, and there it looked like the world ended in a line on the ground. There was sunshine, green fields, blue skies and sun behind me. In front of me it was just a black wall that went to the ground, and looked like there was just nothing on the other side. Obviously, since I do have a few remaining brain cells, I just circled around out there kind of goofing off and watching the storm and waited for it to move off of my airport. On one of my circuits, my traffic monitor showed traffic 1000' above me, and I looked up and saw Nathan in the Cheyenne circling around, waiting for a break in the weather too. So I did the opposite pattern he did, kind of keeping him in sight, and following the storm. Eventually I realized I was over the interstate, which meant I'd moved in several miles, and I looked up and saw the airport, but it was still under too much ugliness, so I waited another circuit or so, and then called in to Muncie that I wanted to come in and land. As I was headed for downwind, the lightning show started. I hadn't seen any of that while I was circling, but it was popping off lightning to the north and east of the airport now. Where I was it was fine, maybe a tad close, but fine, but it made for an interesting view none-the-less. I kept a rather tight pattern and came in to land on a wet runway, and Nathan was just behind me. We dropped off the Cheyenne and headed back to Kokomo for our last trip of the day. It was a bumpy one, even though it was in clear air...we put everything away and we all headed out, and by this time it was around 4 pm or so.

This evening we had a little fire in our back yard, and Steve and Kaylee played Frisbee for awhile, Grandma & Grandpa came out to the fire, and I made it out after awhile. It was the perfect summer evening. Not too hot, not too cold, a nice little fire going, good company, and Kaylee caught a few fireflies and held them for awhile before watching them fly. She played with a few sparklers, and played Frisbee some more with a disk that lights up in the dark with red LED lights. Sometimes she'd go off and play on her swing set, sometimes she'd go get more firewood for the fire, sometimes she'd sit and eat snacks and watch the flames, sometimes she would chase glowing bugs. It was a peaceful, enjoyable, lovely evening; the kind all kids should have now and then of a summer.

Another Kaylee story. When I took her to Goodwill to buy her shoes, she knew all about this place. She informed me of which doors I could and should go in and out of. She told me that Wednesdays are Senior Citizens days when you get a 30% discount, and since it wasn't Wednesday we wouldn't get the 30% off, but that's okay because things are pretty inexpensive anyway. When we were in there, she made a bee-line for the shoe department, found her shoes, and then said "Now does it have a blue tag? If so it's 50% off." I said "No, it doesn't have a blue tag." and she said "That's okay, they are only $3.99 anyway." She was quite the experienced little shopper there.

Today she went to Greencastle in the Cheyenne with us (she loves that airplane, says it has a "living room" in it), and at the restaurant she got up to go to the restroom, and everybody that saw her walking stopped, stared, and laughed. Not in a bad way, but an amazed way, because she was wearing those 4" wedge heels and she looked, as our waitress put it, "very tall for her age". The scariest part is that the lessons I have tried to give her on how to walk in high heels (yes, I know, irony alert) are paying off, and she is really getting much more natural in them at times. And they aren't even close to her size. :O

I had one more Kaylee story but I lost it, so I'll see if I can remember tomorrow...

Friday...

This morning Kaylee and I got up and went out to Kokomo and met Nathan and Jamie there. We flew the Baron over to Muncie, and we heard several of our other guys flying around at the same time. Steve C. was in the 172 bringing it to MIE for radio work, my Steve was up in the RG doing instrument work with a guy, and KS was up flying too, though not at Muncie. It was just a nice morning for it. Nathan took the Cheyenne up on a test flight while I hung out with the kids, and then I flew us back to Kokomo to drop off some batteries. At this point we were running late for lunch, so we piled back in the Baron and Nathan flew us into Glenndale. Today was Burger Day, and Chuck did an excellent job as always. :)

We made it back to Kokomo, where Kaylee and Jamie played while the rest of us let them ;), until I needed to leave and run a few errands. When Kaylee bought me the gold shoes, she had found a pair of shoes she wanted too, but hadn't been able to get them right then. So I took her back today so she could buy her white heels. Four-inch wedge heel with white ribbon you tie up the legs. $3.99 plus tax. She was quite happy. A few more errands, a run home, and it was back out to Kokomo by 6.

This evening was a trip to the Chicago area. That had to be the easiest trip I've ever taken to that area. They were fairly quiet, they weren't that busy, they changed our routing a few times but it was all easy stuff, the weather that could have been an issue just wasn't, the bumpy air that was there earlier just wasn't, the sun was out, and all in all it was just a nice little trip. I got to see the sun setting by the Chicago skyline and the orange moon rising after dark on the same day. Nice...

Sorry this is so factual, stilted, and uninteresting, but I'm sleepy. Or that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it, anyway. ;) *yawn*

Slacker Thursday

Steve's Part of the Day:

He flew, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. It almost seems like he's home early since it's now 8:30 p.m., it's still light outside, and he's home before bed time. One of his students just soloed an airplane for the first time, one just passed his instrument rating checkride, and several more are getting close to getting their licenses. If you think about it, he's helping a lot of people follow what could range from a goal to a dream. Not a bad way to make a living. :) He's now setting up his daughter's walkie talkies so she can chat at him from her room when she's supposed to be going to bed. ;)

Kaylee's Part of the Day:

Kaylee spent a lot of the day with her Grandma and Grandpa. They took her shopping at Goodwill, which is a great place for a budget-conscious seven-year-old, and the one thing she really wanted to get was a present for me. So she spent half of the money she had (just over $4) on a pair of gold dress sandals with high wedge heels, for me. What a sweet girl. She was so pleased to hand them to me, had such a happy smile to give me a gift. She said I don't have many shoes so she wanted to get me a pair of pretty shoes. Kaylee also passed her cartwheels at gymnastics today! She was so excited to do that, she's been trying for a long time to get those cartwheels, and she was so proud of herself for finally mastering them. I'd told her I would take her out for ice cream once she passed them, so today I asked her if she wanted to go get her ice cream, and she said "Can we do it tomorrow? I'm tired. I've had a very busy day you know." Oh my! :)

My Part of the Day:

I did some work during the morning, made some phone calls, etc. When it was lunch time, I got a text about Greencastle, IN which is one of the few closer restaurants to fly to and eat now that Muncie's restaurant is permanently closed. So Chuck, Nathan and myself flew on down to Greencastle in the Baron. (Their tilapia sandwich is quite tasty by the way). When we left there, we flew south of Indy a bit and you could really see the flooded areas clearly from the air. The area where the river blew out into the surrounding fields and left a swath of mud and muck. There was a little town there that was just high enough to have missed the water and mud, but it was almost an island-surrounded by the brown mess. We then went over to Huntington to check on the T-6 progress, and it's great! They're probably going to test run it for the first time tomorrow, and the first test flight won't be far behind. I can't wait to see it fly-I'm like a kid at Christmas and it isn't even my plane. :) A little more work in the evening, and it's time to wind down...

Who Says Pilots Don't Have Fun?

a.k.a "What B-747 pilots (er, and only those pilots I'm sure) Would Do If They Could." Not me, of course...


p.s. You don't have to understand what they are saying. ;)

Wednesday...

It was a busy day, but nothing that interesting.

I went up and did spin training with someone for awhile, and that was rather fun. Climb up high on a pretty day and watch the world go round a few times, climb back up and do it again. I like spins. :)

I forgot to mention, I had one new person who scheduled me for something awhile ago because they said I was a female and they wanted a less aggressive pilot.

hehehe

(Come now, of course I behaved!)

In the odd news department today, a 12-year-old girl from Indiana had a lemonade stand that was robbed by an 18-year-old guy. He stole the $17 she had made. As he left, she chased him down, chased him into a house, called the police, and he's now on $50,000 bond and facing felony charges. I'm amused by her moxy and appropriately horrified that someone would rob a little girl's lemonade stand of all things...

Boy, I don't even have any Kaylee stories today. This was apparently not a day to write home about, so I'll leave you with the quotes that came to my inbox today and catch back up to you tomorrow...
--------------------------------------------------------------

"We are told that talent creates its own opportunities. But it sometimes seems that intense desire creates not only its own opportunities, but its own talents."
~Eric Hoffer

"A man must be obedient to the promptings of his innermost heart."
~Robertson Davies

"The starting point of all achievement is desire. Keep this constantly in mind. Weak desire brings weak results, just as a small amount of fire makes a small amount of heat."
~Napoleon Hill

"There are no great people in this world, only great challenges which ordinary people rise to meet."
~William Frederick Halsey, Jr

Printing Woes and Kaylee Conversation

I had almost 60 letters I needed to print and mail out by today, to invite local pilots, board members, business owners, etc. to our function at Kokomo Airport on June 28th. It's a "Meet & Greet" to introduce the local hangar renters and pilots to each other and to us as the new operation out there, and to the local airport board members, etc. Well, since this is coming up rather fast, I had to get this in the mail asap. Late last night I started printing letters, and got exactly four of the 59 done when I got the error message "Cyan cartridge needs replaced prior to printing." Do you think I had a cyan cartridge in the house? No, of course not. So I go to our other printer. For some reason, it is only printing in black ink, even though the color cartridge is almost full, and it's printing half tone or something. I can't get it to work. So I spend the rest of the night saving off 59 versions of this letter with the appropriate names and addresses on them, and emailing them to myself one at a time so I can pull them up at the office without remote desktopping in. No problem.

So today I go out to the office after I met up with the lunch crew. I pull up my web-based email, and it will not show the letters as openable files. I don't know why. I still don't know why. Fine. I remote desktop in anyway, pull up the file, go to print, and...it won't print on the color printer. Print job failed. Fine, I'll go to another printer. Oh, I can't, the others aren't set up. So I exit there, and go into my login (which I never use), set up the Outlook on there with my account, and download all 59 letters into my inbox there. Go to print them out, and they won't print either. Printers aren't set up on my login. I exit there and go to Steve's login, and once again set up the Outlook with my account and once again download the letters. I try to print to the color printer, and it won't. But hey, here at least I can print to the other printer. Which is black and white only. At this point I just print them black and white and am done with it. The only bit of color in the whole thing was in the logo anyway, but still, I am obsessive compulsive enough that it has bothered me ever since. Because it wasn't right. I might need to get help for that. ;) Anyway, that was a long, annoying process. Printer problems really only happen when you're 1) in a time crunch, 2) have a lot of stuff to do, or 3) both of the above at the same time. I folded all the letters, Kaylee helped me lick and seal about half of them, and I got them to the post office before the end of the business day at least. Mission Accomplished, though not without more effort than it should have been for a simple letter mail out.

On the way out to the airport, Kaylee and I had a typical Kaylee conversation. We passed a cemetery, and she yells all excitedly "MOMMY! I just found where God is buried!" Pause and regroup. "You what?" "I just found where Jesus is buried! There was a statue of Jesus and a big stone under it. That's his tombstone, right?" "No, honey, Jesus wasn't buried in Kokomo. A lot of cemeteries put up a statue of Jesus to symbolize that he is watching over everyone there." Pause. "But they bury people under those stones, right?" "Yes, the stones go on top of where they bury people, but Jesus isn't buried there." "Okay, wipe all that out and start over Mom. I'm not talking about Jesus any more. I'm just talking about people that are buried." "Oh, okay. What about them?" "Well, if you dug up under the stones, would you find the people?" "Yes, they are put in coffins and sealed in a box and buried in the ground." "Can I see one?" "No, that wouldn't be respectful to dig someone up after they were buried." "When you die, can I see what you look like?" "I'd just look like me, kiddo, but it's just the shell that's left behind. Remember how the caterpillars you kept made a chrysalis and then when they left it they were butterflies and left the chrysalis behind? That's kind of like this. We leave our bodies behind and the real us goes free." "I know all that, Mom. But if I poked a person who died in the eye, they wouldn't feel it in their new body or their old, right?" "Right. But why would you want to poke..." "I wouldn't really poke them, I was just wondering." "Okay." All the way home this was the discussion. She certainly has a lot of questions, and she never fails to make me think of things I am not used to thinking about. ;)

I had a flight tonight at Kokomo, and it was a really lovely evening for it. Visibilities were great-you could see all the way to Indianapolis. I didn't get home until about 9 something p.m., so I stopped at Steak -n- Shake for dinner for everyone, and here I am catching up. It was a busy day of moving around schedules, setting up students with instructors, Steve flew most of the day, just...busy!

Ricken Schmicken

You know how sometimes you just can't figure something out, it worked before but it's not working now no matter what you do, even if you know you're doing it right, and you know it could be something stupid you are missing, but if it is it is escaping you? So you wait and you wait until you have convinced yourself that it couldn't possibly be you, and you finally call in help, and as soon as help arrives, whatever did not work for you works for them right off the bat and they did the same thing you did? Yeah, well, here's one for you to enjoy.

At the Poker Run, we were all sitting there, and Nathan pipes up with "Go on out, and if you can get the T-6 started I'll hop in the back and we'll go fly." If not, I have to come back and sit down in embarrassment. (This T-6 is hard-ish to start/keep running.) Up for the challenge, I wander my way out there, climb in, spend all that time buckling up in confidence that I'll need it, get everything set up and ready to go, and all I have left to do is prime it and fire it up. I pull out the primer and get no fuel. Not a big deal, the first 3-4 shots are usually 'empty'. Five or six shots in, I'm still not getting any fuel. I work the wobble pump some more just to be very sure I've got fuel, I pull out the primer and stare at it, I go very slowly, I do everything I can think of. No fuel. I bite my lip, look around, poke it with my finger, try the wobble pump again-yep, getting a rise in fuel pressure-try the primer again. Nada. I tried the primer 30 times, I tried everything I could think of, I tried asking it nicely and I tried telling it not so nicely. Finally I have to concede defeat. It runs too lean anyway, and without the prime there's no chance it'll start. Charlie Brier drives over in his golf cart, and I mumble "I can't get the primer to work". Steve wanders over, and I repeat "I can't get the primer to work." Nathan walks up, hops on the wing, leans in the cockpit, pulls out the primer twice, AND IT WORKS. The bloody blasted thing WORKS.

If I could have hopped up and down in indignation I would have, but I was too securely belted in. Before Steve could even open his mouth, I said something along the lines of "GO AWAY, Get out of here, Don't talk." and he wisely exited the premises. The plane belched and rattled and banged and barely ran for awhile, but finally it settled in and away we went. The rest of the flight made up for the ignominious start. I stuck to the centerline for once, and made an okay landing, and of course the flying around for almost an hour in between on a beautiful day was quite fun. I had to put up with a little harassment, but that's the name of the game. ;)

So why am I sharing this story? Because Nathan may have figured out why it did that to me, and if he's right, there is an actual reason, it would be easily worked around, and I'm only partially the moron I felt like for awhile there. ;)

Seriously, isn't that the way it goes?? *sigh*

Bug Days are Contagious

I woke up this morning a little left of center (that means 'off' for any literalists out there) ;), and a little too early, and then couldn't get back to sleep. Kaylee crawled in bed with me this morning and fell back asleep, but I couldn't sleep, so I just got up. Awhile later, Kaylee woke up screaming in my room, just lying in bed and screaming. I go running in there to see what the problem is, and the problem is that my cell phone was going off on the end table and it annoyed her. I guess kids just do what sometimes adults feel like doing-waking up with annoyed scream that sleep has been so rudely interrupted. She's been short-tempered and cranky all day, which hasn't helped improve my mood any either. So we go to lunch, and meet up with Nathan, who says right away that he had trouble getting up this morning and isn't in a peppy frame of mind either. Steve walks into lunch 20 minutes late after dealing with his 4,002nd phone call of the day, gritting his teeth. Meanwhile, Chuck stated that he was in a perfectly good mood, poor guy. ;) I'm not sure if his windshield mood has withstood all the bug moods splattering on it today, but I hope so. ;)

Let's see. I worked this morning on several things for the Kokomo Flight Training Centers, broke for lunch at Applebees, and then went out to Kokomo to pick up the rest of some SMA supplies that needed to be moved, and took them back to the storage area. I almost managed to run out of gas, so I stopped at a cheapy (well...) station as the first thing I could find, and my car took 15.5 gallons of fuel at $4.19 per gallon. Almost $65 to fill up my car, which is just unbelievable. Oh, and since people had asked, I figured it up today and my car got 16.8 mpg this fill-up. Almost all in-town driving around, all the time. What else was surprising is that I thought I only had a 15 gallon tank in my car. So I looked it up and it claims to have an 18 gallon tank. Good to know how much room I had left as my needle hovered at the "E".

Kaylee was asking if we could go home yet, but I told her I had to go to the post office and the grocery store too. Cats that are out of crunchy food are unhappy cats. We go run our errands, and finally she says "Can we go HOME now?" I told her that this is what I do all day while she's at school, and that she's going to have to put up with some of it too. :)

At the grocery store, Kaylee sees the total of the grocery bill, and she looks at me in some dismay and says "Mommy, you bought food for me too, and that's a lot of money. I need to give you some of my money." I told her not to worry about it, that it was my job as mom to take care of her food needs for now. We walk outside, and Kaylee looks up and says "Mommy, is it bad of me to say that I'm going to give you some of my money whether you want it or not?" She was quite dead serious. I make it home and unload everything, and she comes up to me with her $1.52 she had in her purse, and she insists I take it. When I refused and explained why again, even mentioning that I owed her allowance money, she was really bothered, offended, upset, and insistent. So I took her $1.52. I told her thank you and that it was very kind and generous of her...

While I was at the store, I got a phone call from the long-time girlfriend of one of our instructors, who said that there was a family emergency and she needed to reach him asap. He is having to leave town right away, and I really hope to hear better news about his son soon. He has a packed out flight schedule, so my job this afternoon was to call his students and inform them of what's going on and trying to prioritize (some are ready for checkrides, etc.) and get taken care of what we can.

I also got to call an internet company to find out about service to Nathan's hangar and why it wasn't working. The service tech was actually quite helpful, and diagnosed it as an antenna problem from a distance, which is what the guys thought it was too. But then he sent me over to schedule a "service call", and the woman told me it would be Wednesday. I paused, and then said with a laugh "Any particular time frame in there?" "No", she replied. No?! I said "Well, this is a hangar out at an airport, and we do not just sit out there all day long. I'm going to need a better idea of time than 'sometime on Wednesday'." She said "Oh, would you like us to call you prior to coming out?" I left the "You THINK??" unsaid and went with "That would be great, thanks." since my mother did teach me manners. :) So sometime between 1-6 p.m. on Wednesday, we may get a call that they are coming out to fix it. Sheepers.

On the slightly head-shaking side, here is a tutorial on how to nap, just in case anyone hadn't figured it out yet.

Last night, Kaylee asked me if I would put up a webpage for her. I told her she already had one, and she said "I know, but I want to put something on there. I want to put up a listing of kid shows with how many points I think they all should get, and I want everybody to be able to see it on line. Will you do that for me?" So, when I get some time here, I am adding a page to Kaylee's site of kid and tween shows and how many points they each get in her opinion. Pretty soon she's going to be wanting her own MySpace page or something! :O

When it was time to go to her cheer class, Kaylee informed me that she did not want to go. I asked her if she wanted to stop cheer classes altogether, and she said "No! I just don't want to go today. We've been so busy, and we just got back, and then the recital wore me out, and I'm just tired today." I told her that if she ended up being too tired to go to cheer too many times coming up here, that we would drop it completely. She said that wouldn't happen, she just needed a break. So this evening she gets a break.

This day is going to keep going for awhile even though it's 5:30. Steve's out flying, and I have a lot to do prior to our Meet & Greet function at the airport coming up soon, including getting a stack of letters off into the mail by tomorrow. So I guess I've put it off long enough...

Unwinding...

Happy Father's Day to all you dads (and thus grandpas too) out there. I hope you each enjoyed your day. Kaylee made her dad a card that I thought was really sweet, and it was all her idea. She created a card that said "Happy Father's Day" on the front, and then on the inside she numbered, listed and drew matching pictures of several of her favorite things to do with him. She's a lucky girl with a good daddy and he's a lucky guy with a sweet girl. :)

I'm sitting here typing this while the wind and rain are blowing and the thunder is rumbling. We've got another severe storm going through-and in fact we lost power for a few seconds at the house here. I expected Kaylee to start screaming in the dark, so I ran up to the front of the house, only to find her plastered against the window watching the storm. Steve's on the deck with a friend watching the storm from the comfort of the indoors, and I'm doing it from the living room, out the windows. We are a storm-loving family, I guess. Well, we love them as long as the storm isn't quite violent enough to disturb our home, and as long as we are not trying to fly in it. :)

My mom went home today, and after she drove out of the driveway, Kaylee collapsed against me, bawling about how she wanted her Grandma back. She's really tired, has been running non-stop for about a week, and is just a little emotional. She's also been used to non-stop attention for a few days here, so the quiet days coming will probably take a little bit of getting used to for her.

I don't know why, but these last couple of days I've heard bizarre news stories that just leave you shaking your head. The guy who went up as a sightseer on a skydiving jump plane and decided to commit suicide by jumping out of the plane after the skydivers left, sans a parachute. As Nathan said, if a person was going to do that, they ought to wait until they're only 100 feet in the air, not 10,000 feet, because it will still do the job but leave much less time to see it coming. Personally I'm a little horrified by that action and whatever despair left him feeling it was the best choice, but it's still an odd news story, compounded by the problem that the pilot who was also the owner of the business was operating quite illegally and thanks to this guy jumping will now be shut down and in quite a bit of trouble. Another odd news story was a woman in Florida who was fired for laughing with a customer. Her boss said that his bar was a quiet, restful place and when she laughed for a minute with a customer, it ruined the atmosphere-even though no patrons complained that she was laughing, and her laugh was not "unusual or unpleasant". Oookay. Why am I telling you this? I don't know. Because they are odd and they stuck in my head, I guess.

I did get a video of doing an aileron roll in the T-6 after all, which you can see here if you have high speed internet. Don't even try, mom. ;)
Well, my day wasn't really noteworthy and I can't think of much to impart, so I'll catch up to you tomorrow. :)

Poker Run and Ballet Recital 2008

Steve was up and out of here before dawn broke. Kaylee crawled in bed with me sometime before 6 am, and asked if she could wake up Grandma. I said no, let Grandma sleep because it's only 4 something a.m. her time. Kaylee whined "I'm not TIRED!" before promptly falling back asleep and sleeping in until 9 a.m.!

I went out to Kokomo after Kaylee and Grandma got up, as our Poker Run was under way. This is an event we hold every Spring. Pilots take an airplane to several local airports and pick up a playing card sealed in an envelope. Best "hand" at the end of the day wins prizes. You pay to play and eat, and the proceeds go to various charities each year. It's an excuse for us to have an event in the Spring, good for camaraderie, and it's usually fun. Last year the weather was bad, but this year we ended up with blue skies, warm temps, and light winds. The perfect flying day. The Poker Run was better populated this year than I think it has been thus far; we had quite a few visiting airplanes. It was fun. This was the first year I actually didn't make the 'run' at all. Usually each year I fly around to all the airports and drop off the boxes and cards, and then make a circuit around the airports once during the event. I've done it in the Baron, the Citabria, and with Nathan in the Cheyenne (that was fun). This year, the cost of gas is so bad, we just drove the boxes to the airports rather than flying them, and I ended up busy doing other stuff so didn't do the airport circuit. But our end results were more than double what we made on it last year, so even though it's not as big as the BBQ Bash, it still had a decent turn-out this year.

While I was at Kokomo, Kaylee and Grandma stayed and played at the house during the morning, then went to Kaylee's first ballet recital of the day. Grandma got an introduction to ballet world. He he.

Late in the morning, Nathan and I went up in the T-6 for about an hour. I found the centerline. ;) We had fun-he did some aerobatics and I tried to take a few photos and videos. I don't think I got a single video, since I apparently need to try to figure that out at a time prior to hanging upside down, but I did get a couple of photos. After the second time around in a roll, I learned not to inhale or leave my mouth hanging open, because all the dirt and grit came off the bottom of the plane and flew into our faces. I have grit in my hair, my nose, and I kept finding it in my teeth, too. Of course even when I quit inhaling and talking, I was still smiling, so the teeth got it anyway. ;)

I took a young lady and her boyfriend (one of our students) up for a ride in the Baron then. She had never been on a small plane before, but she wasn't comfortable going with just me in the Citabria. She wanted her boyfriend to go along too, and all the other airplanes were busy on the Poker Run...so I took the Baron for a quickie. They seemed to enjoy it. :)

A little later that afternoon, Mike took me up in his Pitts for my first time in one ever. It's funny, that has the same poor forward visibility of the T-6, but it feels like a little sports car. It's not squirrely, but it's rather sensitive. We did some aileron rolls, snap rolls, hammerheads, inverted flight, several things. And then I realized that unlike times in the past, I had reached my limit on aerobatics for the day. I considered not saying anything for about 20 seconds, during which time we did a few more maneuvers, and I had the realization that if I didn't call "uncle", in another few maneuvers I'd probably be calling for the barf bag. Which would be much worse and would totally ruin my record of being able to say I've never barfed in an airplane. So I said I thought that was enough for the day, and we came back into Kokomo. The hot sun, warm day, bubble canopy, while being strapped in place quite tight with parachute and seat belt harnesses were all part of the problem, but mostly I'm simply not used to that type of flying any more. You have to work up a tolerance to it and I just don't have it. I felt a little puny for awhile on the ground, and ate some crackers to take the edge off, and then finally things settled down for me. But man that was a fun airplane. It's so responsive. I joked that you could not know what you were doing at all and pull off aerobatics in that airplane, because it's powerful and responsive enough that you could wallow around with no technique at all and get it done. It was a fun experience, and I enjoyed it.

Finally it was time to run home, change clothes, try (unsuccessfully) to comb my hair and fix my face, and go out to Kaylee's second recital of the day. I couldn't find my make up anywhere, and I couldn't get the comb through my hair at all (again), so I changed clothes, freshened up, and ran out the door. Apparently Kaylee stole my make up to use for herself tonight, the bugger. So I fixed my face in the waiting room backstage, but my hair was a bit of a lost cause. Oh well, people weren't there to look at me, anyway, and the room was mostly dark. ;) The recital went off without a hitch, the two Grandmas noticed the same thing I had noticed about the, uh, maturity level of some of the dances and outfits, but it was a fun evening, and afterwards we went to Wendy's to eat and get Miss Kaylee a Frostie.

At this point, everybody else is asleep and I am pooped myself. I look forward to a quiet day tomorrow, probably mostly doing laundry and consoling Kaylee after Grandma goes home. :)

Productivity

Ah, I'm feeling pretty good about this day, nasty storms and all.

First, I'm glad that I cancelled the trip I was supposed to take today. This would not have been a "weave around the storms" day, it would have been a "sit on the ground and wait for hours" day, and that would not be good.

I got several things caught up in email, I got a few small things done for the Poker Run tomorrow, I got my house entirely cleaned (well, okay, *I* didn't do it, but it got done anyway and when I walked in it smelled quite fresh), I got some banking and errands done, some bills paid, some laundry done, I made it out to lunch at Glenndale for awhile, and I got all my photos up. And it's not even 7 pm yet. ;)

My mom made it into town, and Kaylee is so excited to see her that she hasn't stopped jumping around and chatting in the last two hours since Grandma arrived. I haven't seen her this wound up in awhile!

All that productivity and such a short post. So I'll leave you with various photos to look at from the groups of photos I put up, and you can feel free to go check them out if you get too much time on your hands and wish to look at a lot of photos. ;)

Kaylee's Tap Photos

Kaylee's Ballet Photos

Us with Nathan's T-6 Photos

Shaffer Family Reunion Photos

Dancing Queen

It's good to be home, though I have more to do than I have time in which to do it. Today Steve and I flew to Muncie in the Bellanca and met up with Nathan and Chuck there. Our goal at Muncie was thwarted, so we had to fly on to Eagle Creek, where unfortunately the Bellanca broke down. Fortunately we could hitch a ride back in the Baron, after a stop at Huntington to see the progress on the T-6. Its wings are on, and they let me hop up in there, where Nathan pointed out some of the differences between the "G" model we've gotten to fly so far and this "D" model that is being built. Chuck took some photos and I'll post them once I grab them from him. :)

When I was getting the Bellanca ready to go, there were a couple of guys painting on the hangar door. I asked if it was okay to move them so I could get the plane out, and they said that would be no problem. Then one said "Are you going to take that plane up all by yourself?" I just smiled and said "No, I'm waiting for my husband." Why not, it was true. :)

This is probably only funny to me, but I'm writing it anyway. When we were eating lunch today, I heard the "rest of the story" about coming home yesterday. See, I called in on the radio that I was 10 miles to the west inbound for landing at Kokomo. Shortly after that, Nathan called in that he was 10 miles to the northeast inbound for landing at Kokomo. I tried to beat him in-I kept the power up, kept a tight pattern, considered using a different runway, but I figured I would lose because the Baron is a faster airplane than the Saratoga. I did in fact lose-he was turning off the runway as I was coming down final. Today I find out he figured I would try to beat him in, so even though he was really about 13 miles out, he "floored it" so to speak, and dove down just to beat me. Nothing wrong with a little friendly competition, is there? ;)

Anyway, we got back to the airport later than anticipated from our journeys today, and as soon as we landed I had to leave and run home and get Kaylee. I threw her and her ballet and tap clothes into the car along with comb, pony tail holder, bobby pins and hair spray, and we made a dash for Western High School where her full-dress recital rehearsal was. It started at 5:30 p.m., well, it was supposed to start then. It really started some time after 6:15 p.m. I took a bunch of pictures, which I will work on putting up soon along with the Ozark photos. Kaylee made me smile, because she has that big scrape on her chin and two big scrapes on her knees, making her look like a less than delicate or ladylike ballerina at first glance. And yet she got the outfits on and did her thing on stage, and did it with a good amount of grace. The tomboy ballerina. As I was trying to fix her hair in that annoying bun, I was having trouble, and the lady next to me looked over and said "I see I'm not the only one who has never done this to her own hair or anyone else's before." No! :)

While I was sitting in the audience waiting to take photos of Kaylee, there were two women in front of me and one to my right. The one lady was the mom of a girl in Kaylee's ballet class who also went to school with her last year. The lady to my right asked if I remembered her, and our daughters were in gymnastics together last year. Then the lady right in front of me turned around and told me she'd fixed Kaylee's hair back stage (thank you!) when it fell down a little, and said that Kaylee had mentioned something about her mommy's plane needing fixed, and asked if I flew. I said yes, and she said "You didn't fly a Pizza Hut plane, did you?" I kind of blinked and then said that yes, I used to fly it for them until they sold it. She then said "You flew my parents and my children once. At an event at a little airport called Glenndale." She said she'd asked around about me before letting them go up and was told I would be a safe pilot. I smiled and said my usual, that I want to come home safely just like everyone else, and do my best to make sure that happens. I just found all that kind of funny; there are definitely roots and connections here in Kokomo now, in many places.

The rehearsal itself went just fine. Long, but fine. We were there until quite late, something like 9:20 p.m. or so, and we left before it was over because Kaylee's parts were done and we could leave. I took a few photos of people and kids I don't know, just because it was kind of fun and interesting. They did a "Thriller" dance remake for one routine, with adults, and it actually came out pretty good. My only complaint is that it seems like this year there is a lot more sensuality or sexuality present in a lot of the dances. Last year, the most "explicit" thing was "Love Potion Number Nine" and she was dressed just fine. This year there's a girl in a full black fishnet outfit with a red satin underlay thing and it looks like a negligee. She dances to "Nothin' but a Good Time" by Poison. The teenagers several times come out in shorts or outfits that you couldn't wear in public, and they do a lot of moves that left me not very comfortable thinking about my daughter doing. Even some of the tweens were doing some stuff I raised an eyebrow at. One reason I liked this place was the family-friendliness of it. It wasn't THAT bad, but it was...a little much sometimes.

Last year we all noticed a little blonde girl who could *really* dance. I spotted her right off this year-she has her own routine this time, not surprisingly. She's taller, looks older, and can still really dance. Kaylee was watching her, without me saying a word, and Kaylee turned to the girl next to her and said "look at her; that girl has some moves." While I'm not sure where that phrase came from, it was accurate.

Kaylee did well on her part of the rehearsal. The tap routine to "We'll have fun fun fun till my daddy takes the t-bird away" and the ballet routine to "somewhere out there". Like I said, I got plenty of photos and I finally got them up Here for Tap and Here for Ballet. :)

We got home late, I threw in a pizza as the fail-safe back-up dinner, and sent her to bed, to start again tomorrow!

The Last Day

Well, if this feels like a choppy version, it's because I had a nice long version all written out, with nothing left to do but hit "publish", and it got wiped out irretrievably. I am tempted to say "we're home" and let it go at that, because I could not be more annoyed right now and still be sitting down. Here's a hint-if anyone out there is tempted to give me advice right now on blog postings, I suggest you not share it. (Edited to add that the post is done, the annoyance has passed, we can all go back to our regularly scheduled evenings, thank you.) ;)

The day started off with a variation of the same routine we'd been doing. Steve and Kaylee got up and went to breakfast, and I got up and started packing all of our things to prepare for our trip home. She didn't fall down and get hurt today at least! Mostly we spent the morning talking, and once I finished my packing, I started the book "Twenty Wishes". We got everything packed up and in the cars by 11 a.m., and went out to the lodge for the group family photo on the deck, prior to eating our last lunch there.

I have to tell you, it's a good thing I don't work there, or I would be as big as a house, because every meal is a full, large buffet. I never ate breakfast once, I didn't eat a single potato chip or other snack that was brought except for a few pieces of licorice our last night there, and I didn't eat an unreasonable amount for the two meals a day I DID eat, but it was still way too much food.

After lunch, it was time for everyone to go their separate ways. Kaylee was decidedly sad about that, and did not want leave. Lately she has loved the sense of being part of a 'big' family, and this year it finally seems to be sinking in that she has a very large extended family. From the Kansas reunion where everywhere she turned people were her aunts, uncles, and cousins, which she really enjoyed, to this week where she found more aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents and great-grandparents, she has really just appreciated the connection with family. And several of them went out of their way to really make her feel like part of the family. Her cousin Micah in particular spent SO much time with her. He took her swimming, waiting at the base of the slide so she could come down over and over, catching her so she wouldn't sink to the bottom of the lake and be scared. He took her to feed the fish, out for ice cream treats and walks, out to a fire with S'mores, he played games with her, and he sat in her room at her bedtime and told ghost stories with her. He was patient and kind and very sweet with her, and she felt like she had a special friend who was also a "cuz". She also had several aunts and uncles who also just took the little extra time or effort-they listened, spoke to her like a "real" person too, went along with her little games, and just made it an enjoyable time for her, too. That really meant a lot to her, which means a lot to us.

When we got to the airport, there was actually life out there! The hangar was open, there were airplanes inside, and a few guys hanging out by a Chief (that's an airplane). They were really quite friendly, and the guy who runs the place came out and talked to us for awhile. He let us know that had the weather gotten too bad, he would have come out and towed our airplane into his big hangar, which we appreciated of course. I was doing the preflight, and I got the fuel cap on facing the wrong way. My hands were kind of full, so I left it that way for a minute while I put my stuff down, and then I came back and fixed it. He nodded at me and said "very good". Why, thank you. lol I just smiled and said "thanks". :) We left there on a beautiful day to fly. Steve crawled in the back with Kaylee to nap, play games and chat, and that left me in the front with the XM radio all to myself. This time the winds were at least not against us, and we made it home in an hour and 50 minutes or so, which wasn't bad at all. We landed right behind the Baron on a beautiful sunny afternoon, and it was good to be home.

I have plenty of laundry, unpacking and photos to do-I was going to try to have the photos done and up before I did the blog entry, but I took way too many, and that's not happening. So I'll work on them as I have time.

We got home and realized that we'd left our gel candles behind in the back of the airplane, and that with the temperatures like they were going to be, they would soon be little puddles of gel goo back there. So I got back in my car and headed out to the airport to retrieve our candles. I figured while I was out and about, I might as well catch up on a few things, so I stopped at the post office, the video Red Box store (since we are fully into Re-Run season again), and Burger King for a non-nutritious but quick dinner.

Well, I've got unpacking to do, and photos to work on, but I'm now tired enough I will probably do neither. We ate, I finished "Twenty Wishes", and we're going to watch a movie and relax a little before our day starts off gangbusters tomorrow. So to tie up some loose ends:

Happy Birthday to Ernie! Mr. Forty-Nine Years Old (or so). ;)
No, we are not affected by all the flooding you are seeing on TV in Indiana. It's all south of us.
Unfortunately Stephanie, Todd and Gabe can't come visit us after all. Life intervened. :(
That ought to about cover the last of my rambles!

Winding Down, South

This morning I was sitting in the cabin, relaxing, when I heard this terrible loud screaming from outside and up the way a bit. Worse yet, I recognized the voice howling "MOMMMMMY!" I went running outside to see Kaylee being carried by her 18-year-old cousin, screaming quite pitifully. She had been running in her flip flops on a stone/concrete path, and tripped, and went flying head-first. She bloodied up both her knees, one pretty bad, got the palms of her hands, her pinkies, and her chin. She was in a fair amount of pain there. Fortunately there was a first aid kit around thanks to her Aunt & Uncle Konyha, and I got her cleaned up and bandaged up in short order. It was not an auspicious start to her day, but at least it got better from there. :)

We went to the arts and crafts place with Grandma and Aunt Cindy, and Kaylee made a necklace, a bracelet, and an anklet with beads and such that she picked out. One she did with shells, one with beads, and one was a gold chain with a pendant. She was quite pleased, and she did all the work herself.

Then Kaylee got to go swimming with Micah again, and she had a great time with that. She even went down the bigger, faster water slide. Steve and I watched from the sidelines and she didn't know we were there, but her cousin got in the water with the lifeguard, just so he could catch her at the bottom and not let her go under, as he promised. He was really good with her, and it gave her that little extra courage to give it a try.

From the beach it was time to run to the cabin and hose off the sand prior to hoofing it over to the rifle range. Kaylee asked if she could shoot too, and I said I didn't know but we'd find out. She's only ever fired BB guns before, and those only twice. The lady who was in charge of the firing range said that she thought the age was 12 and above, but that she wasn't sure and she'd let Kaylee do it. In order to reach, Kaylee had to sit on her knees on a chair--and her knees were freshly wounded. She decided she wanted to do it anyway, and she did. We all had to wear ear and eye protection, which I detested and so did Kaylee (wouldn't want that loud 22 rifle to blow your eardrums!), but we loaded up and our party of 17 took turns shooting five live rounds at targets only about 15-20 yards away. My 82-year-old Grandpa beat us all. He had four out of five bullseyes, and his 5th round was in the next ring. My dad came in next also with 4 out of 5 bullseyes. Somewhere in here was my Uncle Christopher, who is a US Marshall. Steve was next, and I was barely after him. I'm annoyed that he beat me, particularly since he beat me at archery too, but I was still fairly pleased with the grouping of my shots, etc. I only had one slightly wayward shot, and it was still in the next ring from the bullseye, but it was about an inch away from the others while all his were grouped together. Kaylee loaded, held, fired, and unloaded her own rifle, put the safety off and on in between loading rounds, etc. She did a good job. No bullseyes, which made her angry, but considering this was her first time, we thought she did quite well. :)

A little bit later, ten of us went on a pontoon boat ride around the lake here. It was really a beautiful day for it. The sky was that rich blue of fall, not the burnt-out blue of summer. The day was less humid, there wasn't a cloud in the sky, and it was just really pretty. Steve lost his hat overboard to start with, but Uncle Kevin rescued it with a shade umbrella tip, and all was well. :)

After the pontoon ride, half of the family went on a hay wagon ride from the lodge over to a pole barn where they had a dance. They did line dancing to various types of music. The rest of us split up and did other things. Some did miniature golf, and Steve and Kaylee went swimming again, then went "funyaking" which is sort of like kayaking without the tipping over part, while I sat on the beach and watched them and our stuff and the other folks out on the beautiful evening. It was really quite nice.

We found it funny that the same lady who was our rifle range instructor was also the pontoon boat driver and tour-giver, and was also the same lady who drove a van of people to the barn dance. A very versatile employee. ;)

The evening ended up with Kaylee and Micah going down to a bonfire for awhile and bringing Steve and I a S'more, and the adults hanging out and talking in the cabin. It's only 11:23 p.m. here but I'm the only one over 18 still awake, and have been the only one for almost an hour here. ;) It was a good day...

The Ozark Adventures

This morning started bright and early with Steve and Kaylee and a couple of other people getting up at six something a.m. to go to breakfast. I was decidedly un-hungry, so I chose to get up at 7:30 a.m. after those few brave morning souls headed out, instead. We relaxed for a bit this morning, just kind of sitting around and talking. The days' events began with lunch, after which we went to the lake beach and went swimming. It was Kaylee's first time in the water since last summer, so she started off a little hesitant, but her cousin Micah was in the water with her, and pretty soon she was splashing and going down the water slide and having a good time. We were all out there in the swim area, when the lifeguard blew the whistle and yelled that she heard thunder and everyone had to get out of the water for at least 30 minutes. Fortunately we'd already been there for a good while, so we just went back to the cabin and changed clothes, and then five of us went to the arts and crafts building and each made a gel candle. I did a light blue in a martini glass with glitter, sea shells, blue and white glass stones, etc. to do a more 'sea scape' looking thing. Kaylee had a champagne glass with a pink base, light blue center, and orange top, filled with candy canes, shells, a rubber ball, all sorts of miscellaneous things. We had a fun time doing it.

On our way from the craft building, Kaylee started yelling. We thought she was just being a little over-tired and over-dramatic, because she just said she got some of the scent up her nose. Well, unfortunately, she got a LOT of the scent up her nose, she inhaled it, and it burned. It burned her nose, her upper lip, and down her throat. So she races into the bathroom, tries to blow her nose, I give her carbonated beverages to try to get it out of her throat, and finally Steve just flushed water over and over her nose, down her throat, etc. until it finally quit burning. Poor thing.

The whole burning nose thing put us a little behind schedule, but we ran over and made it to archery, where I learned that I pose no threat to Robin Hood's Merry Men. ;) Kaylee actually hit the target a couple of times, but it's hard for her to pull the "string" back as far as she needed to in order to get the distance. But she did pretty well-even the ones where she didn't hit the target, her arrows flew straight. I had two out of 15 shots where I missed the target altogether-the rest of the time I hit usually in the upper right quadrant. You'd think after 15 shots I could adjust my aim, but no, apparently not. I think I need glasses.

We left archery and showed off our gel candles, then headed to dinner, after which we fed some fish, took a walk, came back and relaxed. Kaylee went to watch a movie with Micah, ("The Incredibles"), and the rest of the evening is back in the cabin, snacking and chatting.

It was muggy today, and we had some rain, but it didn't interfere with anything we were doing. I took way too many photos, I think making up for my lack of photos lately...

YMCA of the Ozarks

We had a little trouble getting out of town today, one thing after the other, but eventually we made it. Chuck took me over to Muncie in the Baron so I could pick up the Saratoga, and it was rather windy-again. Gusting up to 27 this time, but at least it was fairly close down the runway. We loaded up the plane, then Nathan drove up with the kids, showed us pictures of the Mustang parts out in California, etc. We left about an hour later; it was still windy, and of course the winds were directly in our way. The flight from Kokomo to Potosi, MO was low, bumpy, hot and slow. I stayed as low as possible to try to have as little headwind as possible, but even at the minimal altitude of 4,000' we were doing a blistering 108-125 knots in a 150 knot airplane. The flight took less than 2 1/2 hours anyway, and when we arrived it was to a very deserted little airport in the middle of N o w h e r e. There is a Notam (Notice to Airmen) that there is no fuel available at the airport right now, and we didn't see another airplane or another soul anywhere around. You could practically hear the wind howling through the empty buildings and see the tumbleweeds blowing across the overgrown grass. Fortunately it had a runway, tiedowns and chocks, and that's all we needed. ;) We are hoping, however, when we return, that the plane is still there, with the fuel still in the tanks and the electronics still in the plane. :O

We are staying in a cabin that has all the necessary amenities. You know, air conditioning, beds, showers, and wireless internet access. ;) It's a large cabin, with four bathrooms, four bedrooms, and two living room areas with fireplaces. Kaylee is in the top bunk of an extra bunk bed in our room, and she's quite happy about that. She also likes the playground right outside our cabin.

When you check in, you are given a wrist band and a "shift". We are shift 1, which means our meals at the lodge are at 7:15 a.m. for breakfast, 11:15 a.m. for lunch, and 5:15 p.m. for dinner. You have 45 minutes in which to eat. We've been having some good-natured fun complaining about that, since most of us are less than scheduled eaters. I'm not remotely hungry at 7:15 if someone can even get me up, but 11:15 is early for lunch, too, so I will be just fine. We had dinner at the lodge, pulling up at 5:18, just in time for our shift. The food is really pretty good. It's a very large buffet, has a drink stand with everything you can imagine including various coffees (and Mt. Dew), has a kid table with kid-friendly food, etc. Steve and I laughed for awhile when we found out it was "meatloaf" night, since I can't seem to escape meatloaf lately-one of the few foods I just find disgusting. But at a buffet of that size, if you walk away hungry, it's your own fault! Oh, there's a dessert table too. Why do they always cut the pieces so small, making you either be good against your will or look like a pig by taking two? ;) I was good against my will...

After dinner, it Finally started cooling off--it had just been miserably muggy and hot, even back in Kokomo, and it wasn't any better down in Missouri. The Saratoga is a sweatbox, too. Anyway, after dinner we took a little walk, kind of splitting up. Some of the teens played tennis, some of the adults checked out the gym, and a few of us went to the playground with Kaylee. They have a giant wooden teeter-totter (see-saw, whatever you personally call them), which you just don't see much any more. After the third kid jumped off sending his little sister flying, I can kind of see why. But still, isn't that a rite of childhood passage? :) The cooler evening was great-the sky was clear, the winds were a little calmer, and the water and the hills were all very pretty. The Ozarks is definitely a pretty area. Up by the playground there was a guy picking something-it wasn't a guitar, might have been a banjo or something along those lines-and he was actually pretty good. There's also a Pepsi machine up by him, which means Mt. Dew whenever needed, which is a good thing. ;)

The rest of the evening we hung out in the living rooms, listening to stories of Dad and my Uncle Rick's childhood adventures, which I can't share here because this is a friendly sort of blog. ;) Anyway, we just caught up a bit, and it was a nice end to the day...

Kaylee Stories Mostly

Flying was cancelled today due to bad weather. That's good and bad both. Bad because we lose the income and because we couldn't get our airplane back from Muncie for the third day in a row. Good because it allowed for a bit more relaxed of a day before we head out for another four days.

Kaylee and I met Steve and Chuck at a pizza buffet place for lunch, and then I took her to the mall, of my own volition even. It had been about six months since her hair was trimmed, so I took her in for a quick trim, and had them cut off my dead and split ends too. $30 for two trims, and that didn't even include a wash. And the mall is the cheap option! Sheepers. The stylist tried to convince Kaylee to cut her hair super short into a bob, which would look cute on her, I agree, but Kaylee wanted nothing to do with it-she wants to grow her hair long. It's funny, she knows exactly what she wants. She wants her bangs grown out and her hair grown long and she wants it slightly curly and she wants to dye it various colors. She's out of luck on some of it, but I told her it's her hair and she could do whatever she wanted with her hair as far as length, style, etc. Just nothing permanent like perms or coloring. Anyway, she's still sticking with growing it long for now. :)

Then she asked where we were going next, paused, and said "You're going to go buy books, aren't you." The Books-A-Million store is in the mall, and I always go in. Today I bypassed it with eyes averted because I already have five books here that I haven't read yet. I think she was slightly stunned. ;)

This time around she read "Ear Piercing" on a sign at the jewelry place, and that started the flurry of begging for pierced ears. Unfortunately, even the information and discussion about the needle going through her ear and blood didn't stop her desire to get it done. Not yet, dear! Funnily enough, I can't really think of a good reason why she couldn't do it. She's not the best at keeping track or taking care of her things right now, but frankly, neither am I and I'm 36. She's not going to swallow them or something. She's a girly girl and she would dearly love to accessorize with earrings. The only thing I can come up with for saying 'no' to that is that it gives her something to earn later, so she doesn't always get everything she wants right when she wants it. One more thing that will make her more grown-up that maybe she can wait until she's a little older to do. Is that even valid? (That's a rhetorical question, by the way.) :)

We ended our mall trip at Bath & Body Works, which is having their semi-annual big sale. I saved $60 on smell-good stuff for the house, soap, etc. off their regular prices, and stocked back up on what we were basically on our last things of. Works for me, and I should be good to go until next year, probably. Kaylee bought a lip gloss and that pleased her greatly. She wanted a fuzzy lamb with aromatherapy lavender scent designed to help you sleep, but for $20 I told her I'd rub lavender on her pillow for her... I know, I'm a kill joy sometimes.

When we went to leave the mall, it was absolutely pouring rain. We had been forced to park rather far away, so Kaylee and I looked at each other with her newly curled hair and my bag full of heavy stuff, shrugged, held hands, and raced across the parking lot in the downpour. We were soaked and straggling by the time we got to the car, but we laughed the whole time. Kaylee did the "Rain Rain Go Away" song in the car, which of course did not work. I told her "you know that's just a song, right?" She said "yes", then folded her hands and prayed for Jesus to stop the rain. Funnily enough, just a minute later it did shut off like a valve had been turned off. The storm had passed through...

We came home, and I tried to take a nap, which did not work. First my cellphone rang. Then as I tried to go to sleep, the house phone rang. Just as I was drifting from that, Steve's cell phone rang. Then a few minutes later my cell phone went off with the voicemail message texted to me from the house phone. I get up and get my phone and shut it off and lie down just in time to drift off until Kaylee comes up to me and asks me a question. I shut off my phone and go to my own room, turn on the white noise and bury my head. A few minutes later Kaylee comes in to tell me she loves me. Shortly after that, Kaylee comes in to ask me if she can play in the sprinkler. She runs out of the room quickly without an actual answer, and I give up and get up. One nap, Interrupted. Repeatedly. *sigh*

Indiana is in a bit of trouble with the flooding from all these storms. South of us they've been hit hard and are in a state of emergency with roads and highways closed, power lines down, dams busted, towns under water, and all manner of just heavy-duty flooding. It's not good. If you see it on the news, we're okay up here.

Another Kaylee story. She went to the Goodwill store with her grandparents, and was looking at a particular dress. Grandma said "That one looks like it's been worn a lot, why don't we look for another dress?" Kaylee was aghast and said "WHY would ANYBODY wear a dress a lot and then turn it back in??" She didn't understand what kind of store Goodwill was and thought that was quite rude. :)

Well, tomorrow we head out for the Ozarks for four days. I don't know if I'll have much computer access or not; we'll see. So, until next time...