Family Central

ISAIAH'S FIRST BIRTHDAY

2007-09-06T05:11:00.000-04:00

Birthday Boy Gets His First Moose!

I guess you're supposed to eat this ....but the candle, too?

JUST BACK FROM A SWING THROUGH GRANDCHILD HABITAT.

2007-03-17T22:56:00.001-04:00

THE NATIVES ARE RESTLESS....AND ADORABLE.

OUR N.C. BABY ISAIAH IS EATING "STUFF" THAT ONLY A MOMMY WOULD MAKE A KID EAT.

ONE OF THESE DAYS I'M GONNA GET MEAT! MEAT!

KNOW THIS, PEEPS...ISAIAH IS BUBBASPEAK MEANING CARNIVORE! YOU HEAR ME? RED, MEAT.

IF WE NEEDED AN EXCUSE TO VISIT KANSAS...
'TWAS GRACIA'S SECOND BIRTHDAY.

LOOK GRAMPA, I'M TWO!

WOW! BIRFDAYCAKE! YUM.

GUSTY DIGS OLDER WOMEN

BOY IN LEOPARD DISGUISE

A LEOPARD REMOVES HIS MASK TO EAT..

CHRISTENING OF ISAIAH JOHN HEINZ

2007-01-09T10:08:00.000-05:00

Baby Isaiah was Christened at St. Philips' Church in Durham, NC. Grandparents and friends were present, along with the star of the show, Mister Perfect. Some photos of the event....

CHRISTMAS, 2006

2006-12-26T22:06:00.000-05:00

Christmas this year was pretty spread out....The Kansas Greenhoots had Christmas with Ron and Carol Follmer, and we're going for New Years. We celebrated Christmas in Durham with Jen and Todd. Jerry's Mom and Hal were supposed to be there, but an airplane mixup really screwed up the holiday for them...we're supremely pissed about it...but there's nothing to do but grouse about it, and then make lemonade of our lemon.

Jen did the whole traditional Christmas at her house....the best Christmas Present of course was Isaiah, the star of the holiday. The pictures tell the whole story.

THANKSGIVING 2006

2006-11-30T13:56:00.000-05:00

For the first time, ever, all our children and grandchildren enjoyed a holiday vacation together. Chris and Dea brought Gusty and Gracia, and Jen and Todd came with Isaiah, to meet the entire California family. A great time for all of us with these precious people. Here's the result.

A bit of whiskey drinking...always a treat.

. ....Too sweet for a description...

Pirate Boy

Carolyn Hosted The Feast...Many thanks

Turkeys...who's which?

Ted's Manhattan, again.

Gusty Looooves Brandon!

Emmy's excited about her new house!

A beautiful sight...these happy young people
with their wonderful son, Isiaih .

Santa's Coming

Gusty The Beach Runner

,,,,,,, Gusty the Lawn Boy

Our Madonnas with wigglers

Austin toasts us all.

Connor loves our Isaiah, too.

A visit to San Francisco, with Mother and Hal
at The Spinaker, for lunch in Sausalito

There's more of course, but this is the flavor of it. Some pix can be downloaded from Kodak's site.

This was a special occasion for Kathryn and me....just seeing all these generations of children of "The Wilson Girls" is a treat, and it's a tribute to them that we all still love one another.

Not bad for a bunch of Nobody Kids from Long Beach, California.

CHESAPEAKE BAY.2006

2006-11-06T14:51:00.000-05:00

EACH YEAR WE TRY TO TAKE TWO EXTENDED CRUISES IN "JEWEL."

THIS YEAR, WE MADE IT INTO THE UPPER PORTION OF THE FABULOUS CHESAPEAKE BAY...ONE OF AMERICA'S FINEST CRUISING GROUNDS, AND AN ESSENTIAL NATURAL RESOURCE.

THE BAY IS A HUGE ESTUARY, HOME TO MANY SPECIES OF WILD CREATURES....BIRDS, CRABS, FISH, PLANTS OF ALL DESCRIPTIONS

... AND MAN...IN LARGE NUMBERS, CONCENTRATED IN CITIES LIKE WASHINGTON D.C, BALTIMORE AND ANNAPOLIS, BUT ALSO IN VILLAGES LIKE URBANNA, AND HAMLETS LIKE LEWISETTA.

THIS YEAR WE SAW BUT A SMALL FRACTION OF WHAT THERE IS, BUT ENJOYED OUR TRIP IN ANTICIPATION OF ANOTHER CRUISE, PERHAPS NEXT YEAR.

HERE ARE SOME OF OUR MEMORIES.

*************

This year, we decided that Jerry would move the boat with friends, and Kathryn would join after Jewel was in the Bay. So, Mike Schwartz, a friend from Charleston and I moved her to Solomon's Island, MD.

Mike's In Charge

The weather was fine and after a quick trip up the waterway, we crossed the Pamlico and Albemarle Sounds to Elizabeth City, and the Pasquotank River, which drains the Great Dismal Swamp.

There are two inside waterway routes between Norfolk and N.C., and the Dismal Swamp Route is the least used. The Dismal Swamp is a wildlife refuge rich in natural beauty and history.

George Washington first proposed a canal be cut through it to join Virginia and North Carolina. Have a look at this website for details and follow some links. I've never done the Dismal Swamp before, but it's very easy and in the morning, eerily beautiful.

We started after a night at a lovely anchorage in the Pasquotank, and then into the canal itself, through the pair of locks into Norfolk.

By the time we got to Norfolk, we'd worked ourselves "into a state" of serious longing for softshelled crabs, but found them difficult to find at this time of year. With the weather blowing 20 knots out of the north, we stayed an extra day, and then left, searching for crabs.

Urbanna, VA is a small town on the Rappahannock River that I'd intended to visit in the past. Kathryn and I tried to visit once before, during the Oyster Festival, but were begged to stay away by the overwhelmed locals...so this time, believing that surely there'd be softshells in Urbanna, and Mike and I ran up the Bay and Rappahannock to a lovely spot.

Only to be disappointed. We did find a couple of tiny crabs in a sandwich at a local ice cream parlor, but not a real dish of crabs did we encounter.

Again, the next day we proceede past Reidsville, VA, after a call to The Crazy Crab, where I'd found softshells in the past, revealed them closed...and then into Lewisetta, VA on the south shore of the great Potomac River.

Beautiful Downtown Lewisetta, VA

This is a tiny village that's hanging on only by its fingernails. This hamlet has few full time residents, and consists of vacation homes and a small marina. A lot of this was literally taken apart a few months ago by a "no name" storm that dismantled about everything that wasn't tied down, and a lot that was.

Just picked her up and put her on the hard.
She's not likely to exceed the speed limit for a while.

We'd have purchased fuel there, just to be neighborly and help out some folks who need the business, but the fuel pump had been knocked out by the storm, and the dock was in tough shape....BUT, a local waterman offered to find us some softshells. This nice young man drove to town and called in some of his own markers with another local to get us a dozen frozen crabs, and practically wouldn't accept payment for his effort.

The husband and wife owners of this place aren't asking anybody for help, and don't expect any....particularly from their government that's hassling them over environmental permits to even repair their broken up facility. With no income, and no prospects, they going to have to sell the little business that they've spent the last 14 years creating.

The land will probably sell for it's real estate price, and luxury condos will be built there. The watermen will have to go somewhere else. The world will be a better place. Sure it will. These really friendly people deserve better than they're getting.

But.......we did get some softshells....and for those who don't know of what we speak...here's the deal.

In the life cycle of the Blue Crab, there's a period after molting in which the crab's hard shell has been shed and not yet re-hardened. When dredged in flour and Old Bay Seasoning, fried in butter and almonds, they're a delicacy that few folks can deny.

They can be eaten with a nice white wine. That's called dining.

Consuming, however is another thing entirely, and they're actually better consumed with some form of Brown Likker, a glass of which is in the left lower corner of the illustration.

Leaving after a night "on the hook," we made our way to the Patuxent River, and Solomon's Island, where we made arrangements to leave Jewel for some repairs at Zahnizer's Boat Yard, a place we've known from the years we had our ketch, Tzigane. A day's drive home, lunch with Isaiah, a sort of fix...to return with Kathryn in short time.

Solomon's...home to a gazillion boats.

After a short time at home, and a trip to Kansas for another Gusty 'n Gracia Fix, Kathryn and I returned to Jewel for a couple of weeks together on the Bay. There's a story here, too, but I won't burden you with it....let's say that our Jewel wasn't completely fixed, so we made lemonade in several ways, and enjoyed that also.

Oysterman Monument

During our upper bay time, we visited Rock Hall, MD, a place we'd never been before. It's a nice little town, home to a lot of Maryland watermem who earn their livelihoods in the traditions of their heritage....crabbing, oystering, fishing....cleaning their boats, repairing their equipment...it's the same the world over.

These fellows found us a 18 softshells in their freezer, for sale. Ummm.

While in the area we visited one of our favorite galleries in Chestertown, The Massoni Gallery, and then returned to Zahnizer's to complete the work.

We also spent a day in Annapolis, the Capital of Maryland, and visited our old haunts ... shopped for little kids, and old friends....drank a little beer....ate a little seafood....took a long nap,

Annapolis Waterfront

and went to Washington DC for a day at the National Gallery of Art....a wonderful place...lunch and Prosecco in the cafe...just like when we were young...

What a deal! An incredible treasure that we never fail to love.

Cold and rainy in DC

Finally, Jewel's done....the heater works....we don't need to be tied to a dock to stay warm and we're off again.

Running downwind in 15-20 knots of wind across the great mouth of the Potomac, in a confused sea with wind and tide against one another sounds daunting....but our Jewel did just fine...really fine. All day long, I don't think more than a couple of much larger boats passed us, and when we got into the lee of the Virginia shore, it was a short run to Deltaville.

We stayed at the dock of the Fishing Bay Yacht Club, as guests visiting from Charleston, and these folks made us very welcome. They shared their weekly potluck dinner with us, and we made some new friends, who I hope will visit us at the Charleston YC in the future.

This time of year, weather is always an issue in the Chesapeake, and I chose weather windows to minimize risk and discomfort. So, we next spent a couple of days in Hampton, VA at the Hampton YC. This town is an old place....but with precious waterfront and is therefore on the cusp of redevelopment...it's an interesting town that we've never visited....a space museum and near the great Maritime Museum in Newport News, VA. There was a neat Pirate Exhibit, and look who I found.

Avast there, ye pirate Grandma! Aaaaaarrrrggghhh!

We spent a couple of days here and enjoyed some of what this area has to offer....with the intent to return again for more.

A short blustery trip across Hampton Roads back to Norfolk and to visit Portsmouth, VA...another town we'd formerly only run past...and enjoyed their art museum, a sports bar for lunch, and the old houses in their gentrifying historic district...reprovisioned, and made Jewel ready for the trip to Charleston.

Don Waters delivered Kathryn's car to drive to Durham for another Isaiah fix while Jerry and Don left for Charleston.

The trip to Charleston was supposed to be "dicey" with a very short weather window for crossing the Albemarle Sound. That can be a dangerous and uncomfortable place in a strong Norther...but with luck and Jewel's speed we used the entire window to run, fast, back down the Sounds for a night at Ocracoke, one at Mile Hammock Bay on the ICW and back to Charleston.

Officer Waters Has The Helm

Don's a great guy to be on a boat with. A strong, easy going young man...Don's a Charlotte Policeman...and a credit to the CPD. We're lucky to have such folks on our side.

Leaving Ocracoke at sunrise

This was a great trip, despite some technical glitches....but we found places that we need to revisit....saw some places that we've yet to go, and which we will visit in the future. We're already making plans for next year.

Life is good.

ISAIAH HEINZ

2006-10-11T00:15:00.000-04:00

Of course, the really big news was the birth of Isaiah Heinz, which has been chronicled in emails and photos. I'm adding this to the Family blog for completeness, since everyone has seen a gazillion pictures and heard me rave about this perfect baby, probably till you can't stand any more. Tough! For pictures alone, see the Greenhoot Photo Site which shows some of our photos, but be sure and follow along on Jennifer's Blog Site, which details all the stuff you want to know....and her own pictures.

SALUDA PARK

2006-10-10T23:37:00.000-04:00

We're slowly getting started on the Saluda house. You can see the original post in the series by clicking here.

The site preparation is taking a lot longer than we thought it would, as the house is larger, and the mountain has to be carved out and larger retaining walls built, but we've broken ground, and our Master Builder, Bill Burdett is hard at the project.

There've been delays that we've caused, of course, not the least of which is a substantial re-design of much of the house that delayed final plans and engineering drawings...but, it's better to get it right the first time, and worth the effort. Bill had real reservations about the first plan, and we're glad he told us about them, as the house is much better and more functional this way. We're particularly glad that Bill's proud of this project that he feels will be a showpiece of a house.

Here are some views of the current elevation drawings, the site as seen at the beginning and as the walls are being placed.

This will be a view from the far shore of the pond...the view is actually off the deck at the right side of the drawing, looking at the center of the pond.This will be the view as you approach the house down the road, looking at the front door beside the garage.

This is the site when we first started.

We dug out some of the dirt for the preliminary survey.

Now we're seriously into site preparation, and building
the retaining wall(s)

Kathryn has the furniture layouts pretty much planned, and much of the furnishing has been arranged....furniture and oriental rugs and "stuff" is accumulating in varied places in the hope that we'll remember where it all is at moving day.

It's exciting....and will be a fine legacy for our family in the future. Named "SaludaPark" it'll be waiting for you to visit next Fall.

******************

FEBRUARY 28,2007...BIG NEWS!
They poured the foundation today....the house is BEGUN. All this time has been spent getting ready to build....site preparation was so important, and so complicated by the major league slope issue that it's taken much longer than expected....but now, the hole is dug...the foundation is poured, and after a few more weeks we'll start framing the house itself.

THIRTEEN! truckloads of concrete were brought in to fill the forms that have been constructed to make the foundation.

The structure is really massive... I'd been concerned that we build it strong
enough to last for several lifetimes and never slide off this mountain. Bill says, "Jerry, that house isn't going anywhere, ever."

There was a huge hole to dig before they got down to solid dirt and rock, so the foundation is basically countersunk into the mountain...the sides of the hole will be filled in after waterproofing the concrete...and then comes framing.

After the forms were removed, the concrete foundation looks like a fortress.

This is Bill Burdett...our builder...Those blueprints are his way of showing us that yes, someday there WILL be a house here. Bill's a great guy, and we're lucky to have him build SaludaPark for us.

It takes a LONG time to build a house....and it's more difficult in remote areas on mountainous terrain...but our SaludaPark is finally coming together.

It's now September, 2007....and the house is dried in....roof is on....we're changing things around a bit, and creating a new pond and a trail around the property, choosing the colors and cabinets....and making the turn to the home stretch.

Here are some contemporary pictures of our new home.

TO LONDON AND BACK

2006-07-19T17:04:00.000-04:00

Big Ben, the symbol of London

In May, we traveled to London with Art and Barb Bolz. Art has recently retired too, and it's a great thing to be able to travel with old friends from the days when we were doctors. They're such fine people that it was a double treat for both Kathryn and me.

The time in London was wonderful, and the return home on the Queen Mary 2, "The Crossing," was an experience not to be missed if you can swing it. There's a lot to show, and about that, more, later.

After an easy flight, a short wait and a bus trip, we checked in to the Royal Horseguards Hotel, just off the Thames Embankment a few minutes from everything. Here's the view from our room.

It's really easy to get around in London. The legendary taxis are everywhere, or for a few pounds, a day pass on the transit system gets you anywhere in a few minutes. The city itself is vast, of course, but the center where all the action is is really very accessable.

May is a beautiful time in London. The flowers are in bloom, and some of the gardens rival Charlotte. This park is in front of our hotel...we overlooked this each day. Just a few blocks up the street was Trafalgar Square...the other direction was Parliament and the river. It's a great location.

Immediatly after arriving, we set out to research the question of whether or not English food has improved since we were last here. The answer is, no. Pub food in London, well, forget it. But the Guinness is still creamy, and that makes up for a lot. Pubs all seem to have a similar ambience, but we recommend small ethnic restaurants for actual hunger related issues.

Having criticized pubs it's only fair to mention this one; the food is awful, but the pub is real. The Sherlock Holmes Pub is on the site of the old Northumberland Hotel, which is mentioned in several places in The Canon of the great man's Adventures. Just a few minutes from our hotel, we couldn't pass this by.

Each time we come to London, I have a different appreciation. Often we've been on our way somewhere else, and don't spend a lot of time in the city itself, but this time I realized my deep appreciation for what this city means to all the world.

The tradition is everywhere...in the museums and on the street corners...there are monuments to warriors and memorials of heros everywhere, and it is a magnet for incredibly diverse citizens, of all shapes and flavors, all drawn to the place where freedom began.

This 2000 year old city has seen everything that history can show. There are other great cities of course, and some older...Rome and Athens come to mind...Alexandria...but in terms of the significance of what happened here, I think London signifies the Beginning of the Modern World. Just think of it....the origin of the English Enlightenment...the beginning of experimental science....home of Issac Newton...the origins of self governing peoples....the measuring of longitude that enabled the spread of European culture over the entire world...the creation of instruments of finance...it goes on and on. And it's not over...the city is growing within itself. One evening at dinner in a tower across from the old city, we counted eight giant construction cranes in a single view...billions of pounds of investment in new buildings.

Some of the new stuff is really ugly, consistent a lot of contemporary "art"...one building, nicknamed The Gherkin, literally looks like a pickle, and it contrasts with the classical Christopher Wren architecture of St. Pauls Cathedral and the old city. But it's still being made. Everywhere there's more...more growth, more traffic, more people, more money... Where does it all come from? I guess from all the world..it all goes to London....for the same reason we do.

Everything is expensive in London....one wonders how anyone can afford to live there....and lots of folks don't, but just come for day trips from outside the city. Still, the place is overflowing with people from all over the world.

Speaking as a Classic Knee Jerk Jingoistic Patriot, it's my opinion that one of the least attractive attributes of life in America is our claim that cities like our lovely Charlotte are "World Class." Fuggetaboudit! London is World Class. On a London Scale, Charlotte ranks no higher than a 3.

This is the Battle of Britain Monument, on the Thames Embankment. I'd missed this on our earlier visits...it's very inspiring, and a remembrance of what was done here, for them, for us, by a small group of brave men.

Most of our time was spent on the usual "tourist" stuff....discovering the underground...Hyde Park on a rainy day...the Victoria and Albert Museum, at any time a superb experience....pubs and small ethnic restaurants....street performers in Covent Garden, a Vivaldi chamber music concert at St. Martin in the Fields....and the London theatre.

Limbo in Covernt Garden

We saw several shows.......the best of which was American, Movin' Out, which we'd seen here...it was superb and wonderful and beyond great...but closing early in London for reasons nobody could understand. Kathryn got to see Judi Dench in an easily forgettable Noel Coward play...she was excellent of course... and we saw "Sinatra" which is popular in London now. At the same time, the latest said-to-be-smash-hit there is Billy Eliot, which we couldn't make ourselves enjoy, even a little... Go figure.

Trafalgar square is a great place...I just wandered around alone one afternoon, while a festival of folk dancers from all over the North of England performed their traditional dances with themes from ancient times, complete with swords and knives, fools and knaves, and fun for the performers and the audience, alike.

Trafalgar Square

We spent one day in Kent, at Churchill's home, Chartwell. It's a lovely place on a large estate...picturesque and all. Actually, I think a case can be made that once you've seen one great man's home, you've seen them all.....but not here.

Chartwell contains the artifacts of one of the critical times in all history...The Battle of Britain...before and after, one of which overwhelmed me. On a wall, by a door, in a small glass frame is a letter from Franklin Roosevelt, the envelope says to "an important naval personage." Here's a copy.

January 20, 1941

Dear Churchill

Wendell Wilkie will give you this--He is truly helping to keep politics out over here.

I think this verse applies to you people as it does to us:

"Sail on, Oh Ship of State!
Sail on, Oh Union strong and great.
Humanity with all its fears
With all the hope of future years
Is hanging breathless on thy fate."

As ever yours
Franklin D. Roosevelt

Think of it..in the darkest hour of a dreadful time, written before Pearl Harbor at a time when the U.S. was "uninvolved," at least officially, the President of the United States summed it all up with a handwritten note to the beleagered Brits...a poem by Longfellow. And it was hand carried by a defeated political opponent, Wendell Wilke, who in the darkness of the hour was "trying to keep politics out."

Consdider the bitterness of our current politics and I wonder if we're the same people now...or whether we can come together ever again to defeat a deadly threat as Americans did in 1941. I was overwhelmed by this note....literally moved to tears.

I can't leave this one out....no boater can not go past the oldest yacht club in the world, The Greenwich Yacht Club, and then downriver to Greenwich and the Observatory.

Here's Kathryn with a foot on each side of the Prime Meridian of the World. I tried to tell her she was in both today and yesterday, but she pointed out that the international date line is on the other side of the globe. Damn smart women, anyway.

There's really too much to show on a blog.....so invite yourself for drinks at our home, and we'll give you the whole earful and pix to boot.

The Signature Treat was "The Crossing" on QM2, the greatest ocean liner afloat. This is a remnant of a former time...some say QE2 is even moreso, though smaller, but this ship is a phenomenon in its own right. Once again, for a discussion of propulsion mechanisms, roll in two days of Force 10-11 storms on the North Atlantic, please invite yourselves for drinks, but here are some impressions.

Imagine the finest Four Seasons Hotel you've been in, a fifth of a mile high, and two football fields wide, laid on its side, driving through the North Atlantic at twenty five knots for a week, arriving under the Verrazano Narrows Bridge at sunrise, past the Statue of Liberty on the port side, to the dock, slick as a whistle exactly as planned, on time to the minute after three thousand miles at sea. If you got that, you're starting to understand The Crossing.

The Ship's Lobby

Accomodations are great, the service excellent and the food superb. Here are some views of the ship....huge and magnificent, and the company was better than that.

The ship carries nearly 2500 passengers, but wasn't completely full...and nearly half that many crew to provide impeccable service. Excesses everywhere, some understated and some not, but no request is untended to. Multiple restaurants, entertainments, pubs, bars, a spa, swimming pools, scholarly lectures, a great library, it's all aboard.

A theatre and Planetarium Entertain Day and Night

A fine bar, The Commodore Room extends across the whole beam of the ship with a view over the bow. The Churchill Room cigar bar was my favorite place of all. I closed that place down with long conversations with a young Scot, Liam each night over brandy and cigars....wonderfully elegant.

Commodore Room

Dinner was formal for several nights, informal, meaning coat and tie or casual on occasion....but that made the evenings into an event...not just a great meal. I actually enjoyed it, although it's clear I spent more time in tux that week than I have in the past three years combined.

All in all, it was a great way to spend a week. I'd probably not do it again, just because I'm a hands on kind of mariner, but it was a rare treat, and a fine way to celebrate our 70th birthdays, this year.

A week at sea is a long way, and a lot of time. I've found, in my own boats, that when things are going well a day at sea is like a day at sea. It gets exciting in bad weather, but this ship performed magnificently in a two day storm, and we hardly were inconvenienced at all. So I was glad to see the Statue of Liberty, and very proud to see the joy and excitement, the anticipation of America in the eyes of all our fellow passengers.

We had a great trip, loved every minute of it...but I'm glad to be home! We have lots of other events planned, and now that I'm about half way home figuring out this Blogger Thing, perhaps I'll do better keeping up in the future.

Check back from time to time.....you never know what I'll post here....and if you have the stomach for it, try the Patriots Point blog too.

Best to all our friends and family, from Jerry and Kathryn

CRUISIN' WITH THE CHARLESTON Y.C.

2006-07-18T01:05:00.000-04:00

As Summer arrived, and our other activities allowed, we made a few local cruises with our friends at the Charleston Yacht Club. We keep Jewel in Charleston, where we visit with friends, some of whom are shown in Characteristic Poses.

One of our favorite locations is to Moise Island...a small spot of land in the vast Lowcountry wetlands off the Intracoastal Waterway. It's a place for cookouts, and excess of food and drink. Nothing succeeds like excess, and the attitude in this sign more or less gets it right.

Eric starting the stew. Everyone else is drinking. He's cooking.

Every club outing has a Go To Guy...ours is John Buck. Need a hand docking? John's there. Have some problem anchoring? John's scoped out the best places. Cooking? John. I complained that I left my cigars on Jewel, and in two minutes, who's there with a cigar? John Buck. He pretends to be a gruff old man, but he's a pussycat. Prob'ly pissed at me for telling.

Contrary to popular opinion, we do actually have boats, and we travel to places in them. Here, looking over Jewel's bowrail on the way to Moise.

Laura Davis, a fine friend who just retired from teaching was honored by her husband Carroll at a party for the Club at a cruise to Beaufort, S.C. These pictures, taken on the dock, show the ambience of the place. Note the excess among the partying yachtspersons. Let's hear it for excess.

We Bad! Red and Mike

There are informal get togethers too....a couple of weeks ago, the same guys got a small cruise out to Bass Creek, off the Stono River a couple of hours from Charleston. More excess, lies, food, good times....but some additional folks.

Ginny's alive in the morning....that's the good news...the bad news is....she might be the only one.

Rumor has it that Toby found a magic potion.

High level conference being held on the beach.

On of the subjects of discussion when we travel with friends is whether or not it's really "fair" for us to have all this fun while our children are home raising babies, changing diapers, working and being responsible. The concensus of this meeting is: "No, it's not fair and who cares?"

GETTING UP TO DATE

2006-07-17T23:22:00.000-04:00

It's been a long time since I've posted our comings and goings....a lot of activity, a trip to London and back on the Queen Mary. Jen's baby is due in September. We've had a few trips on Jewel, and of course, our grandchildren...joy of joys...are growing and loving...and there's nothing better than picking up the phone to hear "Hi, Grandpa. This is Gusty!" Whatever bad there is in life just goes away.

I'll try to bring everyone up to date, with apologies to anyone who actually misses my "stuff." How there could be anybody who'd not miss these grandchildren is beyond me, so we'll start there.

In March, Gracia has a birthday. Ron and Carol went for Gusty's in April, so we visited a couple of weeks earlier for Gracia's. This little doll is sweet beyond words...a tiny little girl, she's just a "pistol' in the social sense...open, happy and outgoing...and she loves her big brother like a baby sister should.

Go Faster, Gusty!

Of course, having a spectacular Mom is a plus for any little girl.

While we're on the subject of our spectacular Grandchildren, here are some more pix of the kids during a visit this Summer. Dea brought both kids for a visit to Litchfield By The Sea, with Steve and Lauren Ball and cousins Eliza and Hank. Chris came later in the week, and Grampa and Gramma joined for a couple of days at the end. Everyone had a blast at the beach, and with both sets of Grandparents fussing over them after returning to Charlotte, it's a wonder they ever want to go back to Kansas.

Surf's Up, Dude!

One of the best things to do when you visit, is to see your cousins, Hank and Eliza. We're off on a trip to Huntington Beach Park.

And you get to go swimmin' too.

And, a girl has to show off her Daddy!

The thing about Grampa he's always taking my picture!

And Gramma is ALWAYS hugging us!

After the beach trip, the Kansas Greenhoots visited with Jen and Todd, and Chris went home....but WE got the kids again....and Ron and Carol, Lauren and Dea and Grampa spent a day touring a drive-thru animal park north of Charlotte. It was hot, but a picnic fixed that...and Ron got up close and personal with a couple of new friends.

We never figured out what Ron was most interested in, the Emu who wanted to know "which one o'you guys is Granddad," or the fairly well hung Giraffe. Oh, never mind.

But that's what it's all about. What a great summer visit we had...now we can hardly wait to get to Kansas and see 'em all over again.

WE'RE STILL AT IT!

2006-05-02T10:14:00.000-04:00

What a life! It's a great ride for a couple of nobody kids from Southern California, and about the only way to improve it is to share it.

We love our residence in Charlotte, but it's not a family gathering place, and we want a place where all the members of our extended family...from California to Cinncinnati, to North Carolina can meet, join together for holidays and retreats, and come to know one another. Our children have joined us to two wonderful families, and we our want our family to know them too. We were reminded of the importance of this at Andrew and Emmy's wedding last year, and have wondered how to create a place for continuing the feeling we had there.

Since we're all so scattered, we felt the best for everyone was to acquire a place in the NC mountains that everyone would love and where everyone was welcome and where the economic impediments to gathering together could be minimized. If you can get here, on foot or by car, you're welcome. It's just that simple.

It started as a simple concept: a few acres, with a stream or pond, and a simple, small house, sufficient for "camping out" for a short time. BUT, as always happens with our projects it got bigger, bigger, more, and more....so as to accomodate our needs from aging generations to babies, fishermen and mountain bikers, readers and hikers, and motorcycles, and friends from Charlotte and Charleston, and Durham, and teenagers from California...and, and....so, now it's a different concept. It became a residence.

We're in the process of making a legacy for our family to use in future generations, where people can visit or live, and which Kathryn and I'll use during the remainder of our lives, as a place of repose and contemplation, rest and enjoyment for all of our family.

After an extensive search we settled on Saluda, NC, a small two block town on the Eastern slope of the mountains in the Isothermal area of the state....a place of moderate climates in all seasons, and a truly lovely little town. Only an hour and a half from Charlotte, or about three hours from Jewel in Charleston, it's a sleepy ideal. A small country town...a couple of good restaurants and galleries, a Public Library and small park, thirty minutes from Asheville and less from the Blue Ridge Parkway, or the Bevard Music Festival, fishing, hiking. How could it be better? We can't think how.

Here's a picture of a few storefronts in the one block "business district" which sets the tone of the place.

Historic Downtown Saluda

Our chosen land is ten acres, with a pond that I've already stocked with trout, about five minutes away from this metropolis. As you approach the house, you enter a bowl between the hills, the bottom of which is a 3/4 acre pond. The house will be set into the bowl...below the edge...so that despite the presence of other homes and neighbors nearby, we cannot see anyone's home from ours. The land is covered by a thick, pure stand of Poplar, with wild Rhododendrons and other native plants. All of this will be preserved as much as possible, and after construction, restored as naturally as we can, using only native plants.

Imagine a home built here...I'm sad that some trees have to go, but there's plenty of forest left.

Pond from the homesite

You can barely see the pond from the homesite now, with the full Spring growth of the forest in the foreground. With some clearing, there'll be a path to the pond for grandchildren and grandpa with fishing poles.

About half way up that bowl, which is obscured by the trees, will be the house as seen from the pond

The house plans are being drawn by John Fryday, the architect who designed our Condo Apartment in Charlotte, and the home will be built by master builder, Bill Burdette, who's built and lived in these mountains for thirty years.

Here's what the current floor plan looks like. The upper, or main level is entered directly on the ground level, and won't require old folks to climb stairs. It has two master bedrooms, and is entered from a covered porch at the front door, or through a "mud room." A large kitchen and great room is the center of indoor living, and a large curved, covered verandah for sitting, smoking Grandpa's pipes, sippin' Wild Turkey whiskey, watching the real wild turkeys and wildlife around the pond which is below and in front of the verandah. A separate "sunroom" looking into the forest allows a degree of quiet, away from the crowd, if needed. It sounds idyllic, doesn't it.

It will be.

The lower level is for children or guests of a younger persuasion, and is reached from inside or outside, built on the slope, below the main level upstairs. It has its own deck, a small screen porch, bedrooms and baths, and a playroom for the younger set.

Follow this site for future developments, and photographs of the state of construction. Architectural elevations will be available later in the week.

We hope everyone will use and enjoy this with us, and will follow its construction with interest and love.

Great News From Jennifer and Todd

2006-04-13T14:29:00.000-04:00

Jen and Todd have great news....see the miracle at their blogsite.

http:/theheizblog.blogspot.com

Some Pix from Gracia's Birthday

2006-04-13T14:13:00.000-04:00

We visited Gracia and Gusty on Gracia's Birthday. Here are several pictures from the weekend. Wonderful children!

This is our new Family Website.

2006-02-06T13:08:00.000-05:00

This is our new Family Website. It will contain new pictures of our wanderings and of our adorable grandchildren. Follow it for news and enjoy sharing our adventures.

2006-02-05T17:54:00.000-05:00

2006-02-05T17:49:00.000-05:00

2006-02-05T17:39:00.000-05:00