Archive for December, 2005

Blacksmith shop

Wednesday, December 28th, 2005


Merry Christmas week! We’re in the Virginia mountains this week, so there won’t be the normal number of posts.

Here’s a seventeenth century blacksmith’s shop from Northern Ireland we visited this morning. At the Frontier Culture Museum in Staunton, Virginia, they have farmhouses, barns, and shops from seventeenth century Germany, England, and Ireland, as well as a mid-nineteenth century farm from Virginia. The intent is to show the conditions people left behind in Europe when they came to America, and what they had to look forward to here. It was a fascinating visit. The best part was that you’re welcome to look around nearly everywhere, pick things up, and generally act like you belong there. We walked up and down the stairs, rubbed our hands in front of the fireplaces, and got a real good look at the place and feel for how it really might have been.

On a sad note, we didn’t find an interesting vacation home to buy yesterday. Everything was either too expensive or (much more frequently) too disgusting. No loss, though, other than a little time. We’ll either look here again some other time or try somewhere else. No hurry. In the meantime, we need to fix up the travel trailer a little bit for the next few years’ vacations.

By the way, today’s pictures were taken today by Reader Number Two. Thanks, Mark! I have to show just one more:


I love that picture. Have a great rest of the week.

Number three is here!

Saturday, December 24th, 2005


Yes, I know it’s a weekend, but it’s Christmas Eve and I want to welcome Christmas properly. Here’s the famous Christmas Kettle on the front lawn of the Mercer Museum. Now what could be more festive than that?

I have a third reader! Congratulations and welcome to Paul. You’ll be the featured artwork Real Soon Now.

We went to the Da Vinci Museum in Allentown today for our Annual Christmas Adventure. Like most science museums, it was really aimed at kids younger than ours and it was kind of a small museum anyway, but there were some cool things there and we had a fun time. It just opened a couple of months ago, so the museum is in great shape and most of the exhibits work. There’s a bonus for you.

Plus, we had lunch at Perkins, which is always a treat, huh? They had a Breakfast Food Special that got us into the restaurant, and then we found out it only applies on weekdays. So, the food cost a lot more than we expected, but Perkins really does breakfast food well.

Conference center

Friday, December 23rd, 2005


It’s Joseph Smith’s two hundredth birthday today. To remind us of what he started, here’s the Conference Center in Salt Lake City. What a great building!

Art lovers

Thursday, December 22nd, 2005


Here are Reader Number Two and his friend appreciating art at the Michener Art Museum in Doylestown. It’s so uplifting.

Cape lighthouse

Wednesday, December 21st, 2005


I’m going to Cape Canaveral for a launch campaign in February/March/April this coming year. Plus, I have a meeting there in January in preparation for the launch. In honor of those trips, here’s a picture of the Cape Canaveral lighthouse. It’s on the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station property, so it’s not too easy to get a closeup picture like this. Although it’s not too hard, since anybody can pay a few bucks for a bus tour that takes you right by it. In any case, here it is.