Milestone reached

There is good news and bad news when you turn 65. The good news: you've made it this far in relatively good health, you get your Medicare card, you buy your last fishing license which is good until you croak, and you get to have a lovely birthday dinner with your loving wife of 37 years at your favorite local restaurant, capped off by a good-luck kiss! The bad news: None - although another year older, with all the blessings that we have enjoyed over our lives and continue to experience, I would have to lie to complain. Kinda sappy, huh - but I'm a sappy kind of guy - deal with it!

Christmas in Siloam Springs: 2011

The celebrations continued in Siloam, with stocking stuffers at Charlcie's Dad's (we're making it simpler while keeping it fun) and dinner at the Riley's - not to mention Chris's birthday celebration on Christmas day. All-in-all the Ft. Smith, Siloam holiday road trip was responsible for a calorie intake exceeding safe limits - oh well, it was worth the risk, and there's always the new year to start over in attempting to be healthy.

Christmas in Ft. Smith: 2011

Tradition has continued for decades for us, splitting time between our families in Ft. Smith and Siloam Springs. The road trips continue! Christmas Eve at Dad's and Christmas lunch at Ronnie and Sally's.

December 20: Work has begun!

Things are finally falling into place and construction has begun on our new home. Today, the base for the driveway,the initial scraping for the foundation and contouring the site for proper drainage got underway. Charlcie enjoyed visiting with the four-legged companion of the bulldozer guy - a very large, but very gentle and carefree English mastiff.
Won't bore with the day-to-day progress on the home, but will update periodically.

An appreciative trout

On one of the few opportunities to fish lately, spent some time with a couple of friends on the Norfork River.  Not a bad weather day for winter.  Among the fish caught, I'm pretty sure this one felt a lot better after I caught and released him - after I removed the foot-long lamprey that was securely attached and sucking out his life's juices.  Saving the world, one fish at a time.

Crystal Bridges - A quick initial trip

The heralded new Crystal Bridges Art Museum in Bentonville is all that it has been touted to be. We were happy to go on our initial visit with our nephew Ryan and his wife, Kalen, as well as Ryan's grandparents, Pat adn Jack  This museum is definitely world-class and is a treasure for Arkansas and the US. We are already looking forward to our next visits!

 Tree sculpture at entrance

 Over 20,000 spools of thread suspended on bead chains; viewed thru a glass orb and it appears in detail, right side up.  Unbelievable!

 Incredible architecture - will be more impressive when the pools are filled

 Norman Rockwell's famous "Rosie the Riveter"

View from the back since this site is PG :) 

Even though this artist's self-sculpture is much larger than real-life, it is so realistic it is spooky.

Started our house today!

The contractor started site prep for our house this afternoon! The actual work began after we had left the site. With December temps in the 50s and no ticks, chiggers, snakes, or poison ivy to contend with, we thought a hike on our land would be a grand idea. And we found some nice photo ops - not necessarily anything unique other than the fact that they are on our property to enjoy from now on on a regular basis!

              House will be situated between the two largest oaks

Checking the stakes

View from the back of our house

Charlcie on the old spring box on the property

watercress in the spring box

The view from below where the back of our house will be

Looking below where the screened porch will be

Birds

One of our favorite things to do these days is to watch the birds flock to the feeders. By the dozens, cardinals, goldfinches, doves, titmouse, chickadees, on and on. There are such concentrations of them, a chicken hawk has discovered them and swoops down from time to time - he's failed to catch a bird yet, but he does rest on our deck rail (but not long enough to grab a picture so far).

Christmas with Ben and Myka

Ben and Myka made the trek to Cotter for celebration of his birthday and so we could have our Christmas early before the road trips to the various family observances. We had a fantastic week-end as always - wish we could have them more often - they are kinda fun for a young couple :) Well, that and the fact that we love them!

This young man sure is proud of his iphone Otter box!

Another basset in the family!  His name is Cotter.

Are they good lookin' or what?

Pic quality is not up to standard, but shows the happy group.  Dinner at PJs!!

Girls' Craft Day at the Vaughn's

It was the ladies time to do a craft project, while the men stayed clear. They had a great time designing and building the project for this year: table-top Christmas trees. They all turned out individually unique and very cool. A raucous game of "Fact or Crap" kept the laughter volume in the upper decibel range. The guys were allowed to join the girls for dinner to cap off a fun day!

Marsha, Laura, Nancy, Charlcie, Mary, Terri, Allie proudly display their creations

Fishing with Jeff

Nephew-in-law Jeff Poole came to visit for a couple of days. He is as passionate about fly-fishing as I am and was on a week-long fishing vacation and stopped to fish with me. We had a great couple of days of cool, but sunny weather. Bull Shoals was not wadeable so we tried a few locations on the Norfork. Jeff out-fished me again, and on my home waters!

Nice 16" rainbow caught below Norfork Dam

Catch of the Day.  Having a little fun with Jeff

Another fisher keeping an eye on us

Thanksgiving 2011

Thanksgiving time finds us splitting time between Siloam Springs and Ft. Smith. Schedule wouldn't permit Myka to make the trip, but we were very happy Ben could join us. We had Turkey Day dinner in Siloam, and then on Friday we met my Dad at Cracker Barrel in Alma for a late breakfast before Ben continued on down to Little Rock. Charlcie and I went to Dad's to spend the night. We watched the much anticipated Razorbacks and LSU match up, and were bummed by the outcome. We take solace in the fact that our only two losses of the season were to the #1 and #2 ranked national teams. Another great time with our families.

Beautiful morning at Charley's

Ben, Chris, and Ryan; a little football messiness

Chris and Ryan celebrating Chris's field goal

Time out from the post-dinner exercise walk for a group pose