telegraph springs

Snow

2011-10-29T12:22:00.000-04:00

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October snow

2011-10-29T08:25:00.000-04:00

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Happy Birthday Pati :)

2011-09-04T21:01:00.000-04:00

Jessie and Daddy having fun :)

2011-09-04T20:29:00.000-04:00

Great Country Farm....

2011-08-25T11:36:00.002-04:00

wir hatten einen tollen Nachmittag im "Streichel Zoo".

"ohne Worte"

2011-08-23T21:45:00.000-04:00

Family outing

2011-08-18T21:57:00.000-04:00

Jessie rode a mile and a half on Joey today, her longest horse ride ever! Claudia and she rode over to our friends the Frommack's house where Jordan was playing, and I walked along with a stroller strategically empty, expecting she'd have enough after a couple minutes, but she loved the whole ride. She was terribly (and I select that particular word with great care, as she's clearly in her two's) disappointed that she couldn't also ride Joey home, but Joey was acting up by then because of a horse-fly bite and so Jessie had to settle for a stroller ride.

It was also a first for Jordan, who had ridden his bike to the Frommack's house on his own a couple hours earlier, the farthest he's ever ridden by himself. The Moms coordinated by phone so they were looking out for him, but it was a big step for Jordan and he did great. Our kids are growing up!

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Jordan's zucchini

2011-07-21T20:25:00.000-04:00

Jordan's up to bat with his very own world's largest zucchini he picked right from our garden!
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Leave a rake out for a week in VA, and it grows into the forest...

2011-07-21T20:23:00.001-04:00

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Jordan's reading spot

2011-07-16T15:08:00.000-04:00

Jordan says he discovered this reading spot from one of his Geleynse cousins when they were here last.
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It's HOT in VA!

2011-07-11T16:50:00.000-04:00

Look at the top right of my Prius' information screen for the outside temperature just before 5pm today -- 100 degrees F! You can also see the effect on fuel efficiency -- 48.9 mpg is a little more than 1 mpg less efficient than in the spring or fall when I don't use the A/C.

Not surprisingly, Washington DC today was named the 6th hottest city in the U.S. when calculated with humidity to compare heat indexes.
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Horses through the mist

2011-07-07T06:45:00.001-04:00

Pretty picture, but they weren't supposed to be out and made me late for work as I rounded them up.
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Kipper and Jessie, water time!

2011-07-05T17:13:00.000-04:00

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Minotaur Launch successful

2011-06-30T14:49:00.001-04:00

Here's our Minotaur I rocket that launched from Wallops, VA yesterday. It's the largest rocket ever to launch from Virginia's space port, but will soon lose that title when our Taurus II launches later this year. We saw this launch from our home, and the Taurus II should be even more visible as it's considerably larger. Although it was smaller than I had remembered from seeing previous launches, we were able to clearly see stage 1 and 2 burnout and the next two stage ignitions. Getting real time updates over the internet at the same time added to the fun, although our slow internet connection didn't let us watch the video or hear the countdown.

Any opinions expressed here are my own and not necessarily those of Orbital.
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Ice cream is in order while Jordan and I stay up late for another launch delay...

2011-06-29T22:29:00.000-04:00

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Berry hunting on the back 40

2011-06-25T17:31:00.000-04:00

Jordan, Jessie and I are hunting berries by our woods, while Claudia is out riding. All we hear from Jessie is the sound of munching interspersed with "more, more!"
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Guitar lessons for the littlest

2011-06-24T23:23:00.000-04:00

Jessie took this guitar lesson by our friend Paul very seriously -- strumming slowly and consistently while staring awestruck at her instructor. Soon she'll be leading the worship music at our Friday evening homegroup.
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Happy Father's Day!

2011-06-19T13:05:00.001-04:00

Here's a great YouTube video they showed in church this morning, for all Dads out there.

More flying

2011-06-18T12:33:00.000-04:00

Yesterday we "traded in" the plane Mom and Dad got Jordan for his birthday for a different one that was supposed to be easier to learn with, because we weren't making much progress on the other one. A much improved experience! Both Jordan and I could fly this one straight out of the box, including doing nose dives, loop-the-loops, and real landings. Along the way we discovered many great places to crash land a plane too, like on the roof and in the tops of trees. If it ever gets stuck at the top of our willow there'll be no way to get it down other than to wait for a windy day! This morning when I took it out I even had two small birds flying along with me for several minutes, not sure about this intruder in their domain. We flew around in circles over the back field, and they followed close behind or flying next to me, like fighter jets scrambled to bring in a wayward plane over DC.

The new plane is a HobbyZone Champ, and it's the high wing that gives it inherent aerodynamic stability, so that it automatically recovers if you "stall" it in flight.

Flying lessons

2011-06-16T19:53:00.000-04:00

We pulled out a present Jordan got last year from Oma and Opa, and relived the fun of flying last night. This plane is a lot of fun, and amazing how far it will go.

Thunderstorm

2011-06-12T19:56:00.000-04:00

Jessie and I were playing outside as this storm approached. It sounded like a waterfall approaching for about a minute before the trees suddenly went wild when it hit -- from no breeze to what you see in the picture in a matter of seconds! Ten minutes later it was all over and the sun was back out.

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Weeding in the garden

2011-06-11T16:33:00.000-04:00

Claudia and I went out to weed the garden after a fresh rain, but I got distracted by this wine and cheese along the way. She's making great progress on the weeding.

She says I can make it up with a bouquet of roses soon. :-)
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Sandbox time on Saturday morning

2011-06-11T10:40:00.000-04:00

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Banneker Elementary family picnic

2011-06-10T20:29:00.001-04:00

Got back just in time to catch Jordan's school's family picnic.

In the picture where Jessie's pointing through the fence, she's pointing at Jordan, with a red shirt at the edge of the picture.

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Back from a week in Phoenix

2011-06-10T18:25:00.000-04:00

I just got back from a week in the beautiful city of Phoenix. I enjoy that city more and more each time I visit it -- hot, dry, sand-colored, but clean and orderly, modern, vibrant, and no traffic (at least when compared to DC, the 2nd worst city in the US for traffic)! We have three impressive campuses there (two pictured below) and an expert engineering and integration team. I manage a Test Engineering group there that in many ways is a model of efficiency (thanks to previous processes developed before we acquired this division), and one purpose of my trip was to find opportunities to integrate processes from there with our own here in Virginia. Simply acquiring another company doesn't provide much competitive advantage in business if you just use it to add business -- instead, we can gain much more by finding efficiencies using both divisions that have more of a multiplication effect than an additive one. A week isn't enough to accomplish all that but relationships were made and processes analyzed and actions assigned that I think will start yielding results very quickly.

All opinions expressed here are my own and not necessarily those of Orbital.

Barn painting

2011-06-06T12:52:00.001-04:00

Our barn's getting painted! We have some lovely new neighbors who love to paint, and graciously asked if they could paint it for us! Does that say more about their generosity or about how forlorn the barn was looking before...?
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Beautiful morning to wake up to!

2011-06-06T07:08:00.000-04:00

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Recycling our old picnic table top into a vegetable garden planter

2011-06-05T17:43:00.001-04:00

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Thanks for the new outfit, Oma and Opa!

2011-06-03T18:46:00.001-04:00

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Dear (enter name of blog reader here),

2011-05-31T14:54:00.000-04:00

I got this funny alumni newsletter from my Alma Matter today, confusing me at first until eventually I realized it's a template, not a real newsletter, which must have gotten sent out mistakenly to all alums. Ah, the dangers of clicking 'Send' too soon!

Click on the photo for a readable size.

Memorial Day at Pati's

2011-05-30T17:04:00.000-04:00

Water games

2011-05-28T17:52:00.000-04:00

Claudia's cooling off after a ride, and Jessie's just plain having fun!

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Jordan's field trip to Richmond

2011-05-20T06:51:00.000-04:00

Jordan's on his way to Richmond! While there his class will visit the Confederate White House and other historic sites. What's he looking forward to the most? The TV screens at every seat in the fancy bus they get to take there!

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Blog and podcast recommendations

2011-05-03T20:33:00.000-04:00

I discovered two great treasures today -- a podcast service by Family Life with daily or weekly podcasts that can be downloaded and listened to on my BlackBerry or iPod. The first two podcasts I listened to were great, I'll be doing more of this on my ride in to work.

The second discovery was from one of those podcasts, talking about "purposeful hospitality", inviting people over for dinner without worrying about getting everything perfect or having a spotless house. "Hospitality is not about you, it's about making other people feel warm and welcome" is one of the mottos of this paradigm. The show was a discussion with Sandy Caughlin, the author of the book and blog called "Reluctant Entertainer". Check out the blog for great hospitality and entertaining ideas!

Then stop by and let us practice our hospitality on you!

This is a turtle from a foreign world

2011-04-30T17:26:00.000-04:00

Discovered by Jordan as we explored and cleared out our woods today. The foreign world is our back yard, of course.
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our darling sunshine

2011-04-24T13:04:00.000-04:00

Ready for a horse ride

2011-04-23T14:59:00.000-04:00

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Baltimore National Aquarium

2011-04-23T10:38:00.000-04:00

Had a great time at the National Aquarium in Baltimore yesterday -- more photos to come!

My famous nephew

2011-04-20T20:28:00.004-04:00

You know those annoying website authentication fields where they ask you to type a word to prove that you're a human and not a computer? Usually they give you a word or a random series of letters. Late last week I was asked to type this in, which looks surprisingly like my nephew Andre' Geleynse's (somewhat unusual) name!

Meet my alter ego

2011-04-19T13:33:00.000-04:00

I just connected with myself in a new way... meet Ben Hekman, Calvin Grad, Electrical Engineer...

I've known about this "other Ben"'s existence for some time. He shows up in Google searches I do on myself, shows up in Calvin College news during years in which I wasn't there, Hilton Hhonors reservations asks me if my address is in Grand Rapids, and a few times shortly after the other Ben graduated from Calvin I got emails from friends looking for him. I finally looked him up on LinkedIn and just for the novelty of it sent him an invitation (against LinkedIn policy since you're actually supposed to know everyone you invite). Now Ben Hekman is officially connected to Ben Hekman.

Of course, being a twin I'm already used to the fact that there's another of me out there...

Sunday lunch

2011-04-17T13:26:00.000-04:00

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Rain of petals

2011-04-16T15:48:00.000-04:00

The view out our windows is dreary as rain has fallen steadily all day. It's also removing the last of our cherry blossoms which are scattered over the ground. We had a short and unseasonally cold and wet spring this year, so didn't get to enjoy our cherry blossoms as much as we would have liked. But I'm looking forward to warmer weather this week and the promise of green coming out from all the trees now that the first blossoms are fading.
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More Jessie vocabulary

2011-04-15T18:31:00.001-04:00

Bah -- ball
Bah -- bath
Bah -- "Pooh" (used for any movie)
Bah -- book
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When you do this in a puddle...

2011-04-10T17:31:00.000-04:00

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...this happens!

2011-04-10T17:30:00.001-04:00

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2011-04-10T15:11:00.000-04:00

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Outdoor Sunday

2011-04-10T15:02:00.000-04:00

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Saturday morning breakfast

2011-04-09T10:39:00.000-04:00

Jessie's healthy breakfast suggestion for a girl on the go:

Rice crispies
Almonds
Walnuts
Raisins
Mix with cold herbal tea leftover from Mom's cup
Drink through a straw

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Eagle-cam

2011-04-06T19:55:00.000-04:00

Here's a neat link -- a live webcam in an eagle's nest. The last of three eggs is hatching right now!

http://www.raptorresource.org/falcon_cams/index.html

Launch aborted

2011-03-30T20:02:00.000-04:00

A dramatic last second launch abort of an Ariane V rocket with one of our satellites ("New Dawn") on board occurred today. Despite the disappointment of a launch abort, the good news is the satellite is okay and the rocket detected the problem while it was still able to perform an orderly shut down.

After

2011-03-20T18:11:00.000-04:00

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Before

2011-03-20T17:41:00.000-04:00

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Test#2 from ipod

2011-03-20T16:38:00.000-04:00

Claudia in Quebec

2011-03-19T13:41:00.000-04:00

After 10 days away, Claudia's on her way home, currently flying over Les Isles Mingan in Quebec, near where I grew up and where my family went boating on a couple occasions.

She had a great time in Austria and was wined and dined by her family and friends for ten days straight. It's a tough act to follow!

First outdoor picnic!

2011-03-13T14:45:00.000-04:00

The weather's getting nice enough for outdoor eating -- spring is here!

Photo by Jordan
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More nuki creations, with the architect

2011-03-13T11:13:00.000-04:00

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Double-nuki girl

2011-03-12T18:33:00.000-05:00

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MVI_3615.AVI

2011-03-05T12:40:00.000-05:00

Jessie

2011-03-03T21:05:00.000-05:00

"Who's the cutest? Me!!"

A few of Jessie's words:

Coco -- cookie

Gogo -- Jordi

Mo' -- more

Peas -- please

Gotchy! -- horse (she calls every horse Scotchy)

Jiss -- juice

buh-buh -- nuki (pacifier)

boo' -- book

poppee -- puppy

baw -- ball

2011-02-26T15:26:00.000-05:00

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Shooting range

2011-02-26T15:22:00.000-05:00

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NASA Ames Rocket Crashes into the Moon and the unexpected happens

2011-02-21T19:42:00.001-05:00

Here's an informative video about NASA's LCROSS mission, with, um, an interesting conclusion. Watch all the way through...

Jordan's magic trick!

2011-02-09T20:50:00.003-05:00

This was requested a LONG time ago, finally got it uploaded to YouTube and onto the blog. Be amazed!

Leaning snowman of Philomont

2011-01-30T21:27:00.000-05:00

Our snowman has been tilting more and more over the past few days (yes, it still held itself up, even when Jordan wasn't there to lean on!). We finally performed an emergency lifting operation today and it was successful! We hear there's a structure in Italy that may need our expertise next.

Spring vacation planning

2011-01-24T21:01:00.001-05:00

We just reserved tickets for Claudia to fly home to Austria in March using air miles, and Jordan is looking forward to vacation time with Daddy at home! I'll need to think up some good activities to keep the three of us busy for a week on our own -- any ideas? Anyone want to join us? Anyone (besides me) want to join Claudia?

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Electrified Jessie

2011-01-22T09:53:00.000-05:00

My life as a banker

2011-01-16T21:01:00.000-05:00

Back in 2007 cash flow was positive, consumer optimism was high, the Dow was approaching 14,000. The bubble was still big and unburst. Banks were still trusted and admired. Around that time I felt I had a little money to experiment with and I discovered a great site, http://www.prosper.com/, which enables members to borrow and lend from each other, a sort of grass roots effort to help each other out and make some money at the same time. Lending members pool their money together to fund loans for anything from small business investments to helping someone consolidate credit card debt. I uploaded $500 and made 10 separate investments of $50 each, spreading them across mostly borrowers with high credit ratings but a few with lower ratings. These lower ratings were clearly higher risk but consequently also allowed me to charge higher interest rates, just like a real bank. My experiment started off well and I was excited to learn about another facet of investing -- little did I know I had just started on a roller coaster ride that would be the bane of many greater bankers than I!

As the stock market crashed, lending ground to a halt and loan defaults skyrocketed across the U.S., I got a front row seat with my little lending experiment. I realized quickly I had got caught up in the same fervor as the big banks when I let myself make subprime loans, in the hopes of a higher return. Surely, I figured, if other banks are giving them loans then it's safe for me too! I wonder how many loan officers at Lehman Brothers or Merill Lynch regret the same thought.

Another problem I soon discovered was the lack of liquidity in my loans. In my case, Prosper simply wasn't set up to sell loans (they've changed that since then), but it mirrored the situation large banks got into when the value of their loans dropped so much they became junk. Even if I wanted to cash out, I couldn't. I had to sit by and watch while several of my borrowers defaulted. In some cases I got a small portion of my money back from collection agencies (minus the agency's fees), and in others I got nothing at all. A few honest souls (or "continuously employed souls" is probably more accurate) continued paying off their debt, even though interest rates dropped tremendously and they were still stuck paying off my loan at much higher rates.

Since all loans were three year loans, I finally received my last payment today and took stock of my investment:

Total invested for three years: $500.00
Total return on investment: $430.76 (-5% APY)

Credit rating of AA that defaulted: 25%
Credit rating of A and above that defaulted: 29%
Credit rating of B and below that defaulted: 100%

What did I learn? I need to go read Jordan a bedtime story now, so that will need to come in a future posting!

Bye bye, Oma!

2011-01-16T14:16:00.000-05:00

Jessie waving "bye bye!" to Austrian Oma on the phone a few minutes ago...

3D cards by Jordan

2011-01-12T20:10:00.001-05:00

Jordan picked up on making "3D" cards over Thanksgiving break last year, and made this cool looking space card which is shown here on my office door. Thanks, Jordan!! It gets many comments at work about how smart Jordan was to place the spaceship at the L1 Lagrange point!

It's snowing!

2011-01-11T20:02:00.000-05:00

Great big puffy snowflakes, giving hope for a snow-day tomorrow instead of school!

Photos by Jordan

No mosquitoes here!

2011-01-11T19:55:00.001-05:00

The antithesis to my nephew's blog.

Virginia hockey

2011-01-10T20:00:00.000-05:00

We've had enough cold weather lately to freeze the neighbor's pond over, so this weekend we got out on the ice and had a good round of broom hockey! Despite the snow you see in the picture, we've only had two "storms" with any accumulation so far, the most recent one being slightly less than an inch. This time last year we were shoveling out from three feet of snow, which most Virginians would just as soon do without this year (but of course we Hekmans are praying for a repeat of that storm!).

Happy new year!

2010-12-31T23:32:00.000-05:00

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Jordan's recent reading list

2010-12-23T21:34:00.001-05:00

Jordan's reading like a book worm again these days, having read more than anyone in his whole school for a recent class competition (over 1000 minutes).

Will you have a white Christmas?

2010-12-22T21:33:00.000-05:00

It sounds like we may get a few inches of snow on Christmas day, but if not, at least we still have some white left over from this snow we got last week.

Lunar Eclipse

2010-12-21T04:10:00.001-05:00

Jordan and I got up to watch the lunar eclipse at 3:46am -- did you????

THE DIGITAL STORY OF THE NATIVITY

2010-12-18T18:37:00.000-05:00

Coffee cake breakfast

2010-12-11T10:39:00.002-05:00

Home sweet home

2010-11-27T15:48:00.000-05:00

It was so nice to come back to a beautifully decorated home ready for Christmas, thanks to our friend Pati!

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The end is near

2010-11-27T12:16:00.001-05:00

The end of our trips north are always the funnest -- after 4 hours through New York and another 4 through Pennsylvania, the passage through Maryland and West Virginia fly by at just a few minutes each and then WE'RE HERE!

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Walking the line in PA

2010-11-27T11:14:00.000-05:00

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Jessie asleep...?

2010-11-26T18:32:00.001-05:00

I think Jessie just fell asleep, about 10 miles into Pennsylvania. So now comes the dilemma -- take advantage of her sleeping to drive straight through (getting home around midnight), or get a hotel as planned and risk a repeat of the sleepless night we had last week on the way North...?

So far, we've had a nice trip, some lake effect snow in NY but otherwise nice weather and relatively content kids.

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Trip back home. Winter wonderland to come

2010-11-26T13:45:00.000-05:00

Also sweet jessi picked a pack of cherrie tomatos as her snack at our first gas stop she is such a health nut. And will keep us all eating better
She only slept from kemptville to the boarder so not very long we shall see how we will make out hugs for now all of us
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Back in the U.S. of A.

2010-11-26T13:11:00.000-05:00

And a cold, snowy U.S. of A. It is!

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Jessie and Tony

2010-11-22T18:15:00.000-05:00

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Walking the line somewhere in PA

2010-11-20T16:36:00.000-05:00

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First stop, Orchard Hills, MD

2010-11-20T12:09:00.000-05:00

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Benihana

2010-11-13T16:46:00.001-05:00

Any of you been to Benihana's before? It's a super japanese steakhouse where the food is prepared right in front of you, by chefs who make the food preparation a show. Our chef (somewhat unauthentically named Francisco) twirled knives through the air, flipped eggs into his hat, created shapes with the food, and ended up serving us a delicious three course meal in great style. The picture below is of our group, mostly made up of the technicians from my lab. They are the ones who actually came up with the idea, as a thank you to one of the other managers who has helped us through the big schedule crunch we're working through. If you have a Benihana near you, I highly recommend you go at least once.

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The many uses of dominos

2010-11-09T16:54:00.002-05:00

It was so fun to watch Jessie discover dominos yesterday... the first thing she did with them was to pick one up and point it at the TV and push the "buttons" on it! What a 21st century girl! And a little while later we found her wandering around the kitchen holding it to her ear and "talking" in it. :-)

She's been under the weather the last several days with teething and (we discovered today) a double ear infection. And yet she's still such a smiler, as you can see in one of these photos. She wowed the doctor with her smiles this morning, the drive-through teller on the way home, the pharmacist where we got her antibiotics, and of course she continues to impress her parents at home. On top of that, she can't wait to wow her grandparents, cousins and uncle and aunt in just a few weeks!

Apple Butter time

2010-11-04T21:46:00.000-04:00

It's Apple Butter time again at our friends, the Bakers, and this time they put on quite a show. They had booths set up for their organic farm business, Day Spring Farm, as well as booths for other businesses, a pumpkin carving contest, a petting zoo, and of course their traditional large copper kettle of apple butter. They had a good turnout too, and we all had a good time, Jordan playing soccer while Jessie got up close and personal with a goat and a calf.

iMac fun

2010-11-01T20:12:00.002-04:00

We actually had to stop this prematurely, because Jessie started to cry whenever she looked at the pictures. Can't say I blame her...

Finger Pain

2010-11-01T19:18:00.002-04:00

In the competition for most painful finger among the cousins, Jordan took home a silver medal this week with a solid performance in the garage door (thankfully failing to leave any of it there). It was certainly a painful event at the time, but it's also gaining him brownie points among his friends as he shows off the black, blue and green results.

Finger pain

2010-10-31T16:49:00.002-04:00

In the competition for most painful finger among the cousins, Jordan took home a silver medal this week with a solid performance in the bathroom door (thankfully failing to leave any of it there). It was certainly a painful event at the time, but it's also gaining him brownie points among his friends as he shows off the black, blue and green results.

Haunted Lincoln Logs

2010-10-30T12:27:00.000-04:00

It must be nearing Hallowe'en -- even the Lincoln Logs around here are looking spooky!

A fun day with the Rimmers

2010-10-27T21:22:00.000-04:00

Fall hiking on the Appalachian Trail

2010-10-24T14:18:00.005-04:00

Click for full size to get the most of the colors -- the fall foliage is at it's peak here right now!

Lazy Sunday

2010-10-24T13:19:00.000-04:00

It's a lazy, sit-on-a-rocker-on-the-lawn-and-feed-the-horses-too-many-carrots kind of Sunday in Virginia today.
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Life lessons

2010-10-17T16:27:00.000-04:00

We're hiking at Sky Meadow, and Jordan and Grant are in charge of Annie. A minute ago a group of college-age girls walked by and oohed and aahed over Annie (about the 10th group to do so). As they passed us, we heard one say "I think we just taught those boys an important life lesson. If you bring a dog, the girls will follow you!"
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Question from Jordan for his cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, or the blogosphere at large

2010-10-16T10:25:00.001-04:00

Since a friend of Jordan's is running a marathon today, Jordan would like to know if anyone knows how far the Israelites had to walk around Jericho? Enter your responses as a comment, and the distance with the most votes will be considered historical and Biblical truth!

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Swish!

2010-10-10T17:08:00.001-04:00