Inclement Balloon Weather

We're trying to launch a hot air balloon, but this weather has been holding up the launch.
At this very moment the sun is breaking, so I'm sending this post and going outside to launch. Update in an hour or so.

We had snow on Christmas Day

My whole childhood I thought it would be the bees knees to have snow on Christmas. Well, here it is, and I'm only 34!!

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas!

Marking Time

Last night was the first time I noticed Arthur say the word tornado correctly. He used to say "tormado". Just a while before that, in the evening, Arthur got to set the pace of our walk to the bridge and back. And for the first time, I was secretly hoping that he would be merciful.

Today we're going sledding at Oldman pass to try out the sledding. There was a winter storm warning in effect there until noon today, which is about when we plan to arrive. We were going to go yesterday, but the snow level was reported to be too high, and the storm was still in progress.

Jamey Sings

Jamey performs at the school holiday show.

Kindergarten Chorus Line

Arthur in the green hat sings along during the Green Mt. School Christmas show.

Jamey's Seventh Birthday

Happy Birthday Jamey!

Delicious Wine

This wine was delicious. Thanks to Uncle Bob and Aunt Adelaide for this last Christmas. I've been saving the bottle because I wanted to log it here so I could always remember it and perhaps find it again to buy.

Robotics

In the ongoing attempt to gain knowledge in the fields of robotics, I attended a seminar where Joseph Fernando of Microsoft gave a technical introduction to Microsoft Robotics Studio (MSRS). He was quite interesting and eloquent and has encouraged me greatly to push ahead in learning robotics.
Perhaps of even more importance is that the host of the meeting was accepting volunteers to be on their ICRA Challenge team and I have volunteered for that. This could really boost my learning curve and sounds like a lot of fun.
When I told the kids that I joined a robot team, Arthur said "Can we come?"
At the seminar, I learned of several other opportunities for kids of different ages, so I expect we'll get a chance to be involved in a lot of robotic events in the future.
When I have more time, I'll try to relate what was cool about the lecture on MSRS.

Pictures With Santa

We held a "Come See Santa" event at the Grange, offering to take an print pictures for $4.50 per 8x10 sheet.
I did the photography, and struggled mightily with my shutter-speed the whole day and manged to capture about 50% blurry pictures. But, through attrition, I was able to get good shots of almost everyone.
Jamey and Arthur were great sports to let us take their pictures ad infinitum, while I practiced; it took me ages to get one in focus.
I think I'll insist on professional lighting before I undertake another portrait attempt. Two halogen floodlights provided the dominant lighting in this shot, and I'm actually tickled pink that we had them as they made the pictures one thousand times better than they would have otherwise been.