6 years, baby!

Aloha

A Little Extra Touch

Trent carved out the second bearing for the telescope today. He decided to add a little something in the center -- kind of his trademark, if you will.








He held it up for Camden and said, "What's this?" To which Camden promptly replied, "Saturn!" Trent said he feels pretty happy with his carving if his 1-year-old can identify it! (Yes, we are also learning the planets. Our little whiz kid can name most of them by himself now.)

"Baby Yacht"

Hanging in the pool with Uncle Joseph. (Sunburn? Not my baby!)

Littleton Historical Museum

This week, thanks to Alicia and Nathan, we discovered the Littleton Historical Museum, a free and very close recreational destination. Camden loved it!



It's not so much a museum as an experience. Imagine walking through two working 1800s farms, staffed with volunteers in vintage dress and dotted with pens full of farm animals and buildings and equipment from the period.



Cam went scampering down the path after this lady, squealing "Walkie stroller!" She graciously offered him a ride in her wheelbarrow.
















Here are our friends, Alicia and Nathan, in front of one of the barns.

Aren't they cute? :)

Cool! A real blacksmith.

The blacksmith's shop was Trent's favorite part when he was a little tyke. (He's a native, remember, so this place is not new to him! Sometime, we oughta take him with us.)

Camden got a real kick out of the sheep, which were bleating very loudly! (telling each other about lunch being delivered, I suppose) The little nut kept running up and down the fence, giggling and saying, "Goodness sake." Yeah, that's a new one. Wonder where he got it...

Hanging out under the "lilies" as Camden kept referring to them. Well... at least he's got the basic idea. And in all fairness, the lilies in our yard that I've been showing him probably look pretty tall from his perspective.

RMPPG

As some of you know (and some of you don't), I'm an editor by trade. (Please don't judge my informal postings too harshly; I have myself to do that. :P ) Anyway... I belong to the Rocky Mountain Publishing Professionals Guild, which is great for networking, especially since I have been 100% freelance since Cam was born. I love having a job that I can do while he naps. I joke with Trent that Camden doesn't even know he has a working mom. :) Wow, there are a lot of tangents in this message.

So... we just launched our new website (www.rmppg.org), and it looks awesome! Feel free to take a peek! And if you ever need an editor, writer, indexer, etc., or know someone who does, send them our way.

Belleview Park

Building a Telescope

As I mentioned in an earlier post, Trent and I both love astronomy. And, as anyone who has seen my bedroom set knows, Trent has an amazing talent with woodworking. So, we decided it would be fun to build a telescope together.

The tube is made out of mahogany. Trent started out with planks like he has in his left hand.

Beginnings of the bearings.

Trent's done most of the work so far, but I've helped a little, too. Here's me sanding down the tube.

The bottom-left part of the pic shows sections that have been sanded. Power tools rock.

Trent in the carport/workshop.

To be continued...

A Time to Celebrate

To all the awesome fathers in our lives: Thank you for all that you are and all that you do.

My Daddy...

... aka "Poppa" (When I pulled out this picture, Cam started giggling convulsively. Then he shook his head and said,"Silly Poppa!")

Pipo (He may be far away, but Cam sure likes to talk about him!)

"Gampa" Feist ("Therrre's Gampa")

Great-Grandpa Don, who passed away earlier this year. We love him and miss him.

My cute-daddy brother, Adam (who is celebrating his first Father's Day this year!)

And of course, the love of our lives ...

















We love you! Happy Father's Day!

Love,

Melody & Camden

Return of the Easter basket

Such a resourceful little chap. *sigh*

Who's duh man?

TRENT IS THE MAN! He just put a swamp cooler--which he found on craigslist for $100 and fixed up himself--on my roof! And the only help he had was a push of a button from me for about 5 minutes. Sound like a miracle? Nope, just my brilliant, handy husband at work.

So, in case anyone ever needs to do this, here's how (all these pics were taken after the fact, but work with me here; use your imagination):

Step #1: Attach a length of rope to your handy-dandy winch. (Doesn't everyone have one of those? Great for four-wheeling, camping, pulling out tree stumps, and other miscellaneous household chores. )

Step #2: Extend the rope over the top of the roof and tie it to the swamp cooler.

Step #3: Place the swamp cooler on a "ramp" created from a ladder and bath towels.


Step #4: Call your wife on her cell phone. Use the cell phones as walkie-talkies while she operates the winch in front of the house and you guide the swamp cooler up the ramp on the other side.


Tada! Swamp cooler on the roof."Well, it's up here!"

I love my husband. As he put it, "Work smarter, not harder."

Of course, our little man wandered around keeping himself busy while we worked and saying "help Daddy, help Daddy."

He was so good, Daddy even let him have a little ride on the "beep-beep" (scooter). Well, not really, but he did like sitting on it.