Christmas, 2011

Lots of pictures follow from our recent Christmas gatherings. The Tennessee contingent arrived the day before Christmas. Maia is almost one year old already! She liked the tree and all the colorful gifts.

We have had an old electronic keyboard that Jessica and Travis used to play and play with. It now belongs to Maia, who is trying it out here.

On Christmas morning, Maia posed with her mother for me. She has become very aware of cameras and likes to ham it up a bit.

Here she is with the beautiful Christmas stocking that her Grandma Kathie made for her. These toy jacks can be snapped together in a variety of ways. Soon, Maia was making helical DNA models for us.

Mike and Jess found new T-shirts in their stockings. Jessica's was one we discovered during our recent visit to the Cedar Ridge Winery—the comment about shoes works well for her. We made the one for Mike, which features his cute little girl.

Maia quickly learned about gift opening. This package contained her new all-in-one kitchen, featuring a talking refrigerator, stove, and other appliances.

Meanwhile, Great Grandma opened one of her gifts.

Maia's new dolly, which Great Grandma Novy gave her, received its first kiss.

We invited our neighbor, Portia, to join us for Christmas dinner. Afterwards, the ladies played some cards, and Portia won!

Jess, Mike and Maia went for an afternoon walk. (What is it with this strange, warm weather we are having? I'm ready for some cold and snow!)

The morning after Christmas, we all met Rob's family at Amana for breakfast (never enough food at this time of year!). Penny and Maia got to know each other and spent some time comparing nooks.

After the Tennessee contingent left on Tuesday morning, the Minneapolis group arrived. After some lunch (leftovers), Anders and Grandma Kathie played "Monkeys Jumping on the Bed."

Anders also likes to play "Angry Birds" on my iPad.

The next day, all of the Minneapolis, Northbrook and Iowa City families joined us for the day. This included lots of time with the electric trains, which, as you will recall, were requested by Henry and the others. All of the grandkids made some cute little buildings of paper to add to the layouts. Here are Anders and Eleanor at the controls of the bigger Lionel set. Eleanor thought the engine made too much noise.

Below is another perspective on the Lionel set, which features both a Harry Potter Hogwarts Express passenger set and a Canadian Pacific freight set.

The HO layout has two independent loops, a wye, and a number of sidings that allow different engines to operate. I have four different engines: two Alaska diesels, a Santa Fe Diesel, and an older steam engine and tender. There are also four Holland America McKinley Explorer passenger cars, an Alaska caboose, and a set of freight cars of various kinds.

Betsy, who is a big Harry Potter fan, especially liked the Hogwarts Express train.

Before dinner, there was the usual round of gifts to open.

Two of my darling granddaughters posed for me at the front window with some of their gifts.

Henry and Anders played some ball outdoors.

Clara loves to hold Penny.

Rob helped the kids build a cabin from our set of Lincoln Logs.

 Then it was time to eat again.

Josey was quite tolerant of Clara's attentions and petting.

Penny and her dad enjoyed one of the afternoon football games.

Holiday Gatherings

In keeping with the season, we have enjoyed a couple of outings this week with neighbors and family. On Monday, we invited Kathie's mother and our good neighbor, Portia, to have lunch with us at the Iowa River Power Company.

Then last evening, we met cousins Phyllis, Bob, Ed and Karilyn in Mount Vernon for a dinner at the Lincoln Cafe. This was something we had talked about doing for a very long time, and we finally got all our respective ducks in a row to do it. Catching up with everyone was lots of fun, and the food at the Lincoln Cafe was quite interesting. Check it out here and click on Menu to read about the evening entrees they are currently featuring. Between the six of us, we tried all of the three different offerings and even sampled a couple of the desserts. Highly recommended!

Electric Trains

I've received a request from some of my grandkids. When they are here for Christmas, they would love to play with my electric trains. This has been all the motivation I needed to do something I've wanted to do for a long time. I started by designing a couple of different layouts, one for my HO-guage set and another for my O-guage Lionel set. Then I checked to see what parts I was missing (sections of track, connectors, etc.) and ordered some odds and ends. OK, maybe I went a little overboard, because I decided to put together a couple of more intricate layouts. Kathie actually encouraged me by saying it was OK if I wanted to use up some more of our basement space for tables for the layouts. So, I set up one 4x8 sheet of plywood for the HO set and two sheets (an 8x8 arrangement) for the O set. Here is what the O table looked like a few days ago. I was staging things on it while working on the HO set.

I made a control station for the HO set which you can see here. The diagram in the upper left corner shows the track sections and switches and numbers everything so that you can determine how to route power to the trains. On this layout, you can operate two trains at the same time. There is even a reversing wye and enough sidings to do some interesting things. I have four different HO engines—one steam locomotive and three diesel locomotives. Two of the diesels are models from the Alaska railroad, and I have Holland America McKinley Explorer passenger cars like the ones we rode when we visited Alaska last May. The other engines have various freight cars to pull. I can keep two locomotives idle on sidings while operating the other two.

Here I am wiring the bottom side of the table where the wires from the switches and track sections come through.

After routing those wires to the edge of the table, I created two wire bundles with connectors to the control station. (I listen to books on my iPod while I work.)

Here is the more-or-less final result for the HO layout. I invited the grandkids to make little paper buildings to decorate the layout. We'll see what they come up with.

The O layout is still a work in progress. I intend to set it up to operate two trains simultaneously as well, unless I run out of time before everyone gets here. I'll be sure to post more pictures when the grandkids arrive. OK, it is true that I'm playing. Who is having more fun—grandpa or the grandkids? I'll never tell.

Cedar Ridge Winery

 Yesterday, I asked my significantly better half out for a date. For some time, I've been wanting to visit the Cedar Ridge Vineyards, Winery & Distillery near Swisher, Iowa. You can learn more about them by clicking here. In addition to some reasonable wines, they make an interesting bourbon, a dark rum, and two different brandies, one made with Iowa apples.

We sampled the various wines and spirits, some of which we/I quite liked, and so we purchased several bottles to take home with us. Their tasting room is very pleasant, and they offer a number of different luncheon options (and a prime rib dinner on selected evenings). We tried their wood-fired pizzas, which reminded both of us of some of the better pizzas we have enjoyed on our visits to Italy. Of course, a bottle of wine with lunch was in order too. Plan to go there with us sometime when you are with us!

Thanksgiving 2011

Betsy has already reported on Thanksgiving, but I'll add a few more photographs. All of these were taken with my new iPhone 4S, and while it takes good pictures, it is not like working with a real camera. So, some of these are not great. I like a little more bulk in my hands when trying to focus, aim, shoot, correct for any lighting conditions, etc.

I got to spend quite a bit of time with the youngest of my grandchildren, Penny, who was full of smiles and giggles and who loved to move about and stand.

Anders played with Henry's train set quite a lot. Here he is busy working with a new layout that his dad helped him construct.

Penny couldn't sit by herself, but the other four cousins had a private table for their Thanksgiving meal.

On Friday, we watched the lackluster Hawkeyes lose their final 2011 season football game with Nebraska. You can tell how exciting the game was by observing Pete's attention level.

On Friday evening, we all went to the Chicago Botanical Gardens to visit their Wonderland Express exhibit. Click here to read more about it and to see a video of the various electric trains and miniature scenes. What a delightful event. Here are each of my children and their respective families near the entrance to the exhibit.

And here is a small taste of what the outdoor areas of the location looked like. There were millions of lights and decorations.