The Rest of 2024

Boy have I been negligent ..... After the emotional Holland America cruise, I didn't have anything exciting to enter into my blog. So now it is catch up time. A lot of cliff note versions of the rest of that year but they will help me remember when I get more feeble minded and the photos help jog the memory.

Visitors

Ted and Penny drove up from St Augustine for a quick visit.

Then Zac flew up to visit his friends and help me drive to Salem for my annual 2 month visit. Its a tedious 2 day drive so we broke it up with a visit with Megan and Chris Wolfe.

Finally back at SAW (Salem Art Works) for another busy artistic activity filled summer. Visiting artists built some interesting scultpures for installation on the SAW park.

This ended up being a sundial

There were always at least 3 "pours" during the season and always fun to watch. Lots of steps involved to make the molds and lots of skills needed to safely pour the metals - either iron, aluminum or bronze.

This years crop of 8 resident artists

Next local summer event was the 27th annual NBOSS -North Bennington Outdoor Sculpture Show. Zac along with a lot of the other SAW employees usually participate yearly.

Gary"s with his entry at his SAW studio

installation

Zac built his scultpure on site

Betcha some cafeteria or restaurant is missing some silverware...

Mike another SAW employee with his artwork

Fourth of July in Washington County (right to farm) consists of tractors, firetrucks, a band with vintage members and local dance groups.

Fourth of July also provided a "Pourth of July" iron pour and then fire works at one of our large SAW contributors who live on Lake Catherine. Their sons love to do the fireworks and they have enough to entertain most of the lake residents. Great food, games, boatrides and laughs.

"Pourth of July" -- They also have one on "May the Pourth be With you"

These fireworks plus a small cannon to fire -

Zac and Katrina

Maria came down to visit -- since I had renters in my house she got a cabin on the Battenkill river (good for tubing and fly fishing). Really cute inside BUT that night, on her porch, she had a bear digging around in her trash can -- scary!

wild life, a firepit and hammock and a view of the river

water level was low that summer

Definitely a welcome visitor to Maria's cabin the second day - no repeat visitor.

This animal she didn't mind having around her cabin

SAW usually have these "Music on the Hill" events once or twice a season for the artists and townies. Food trucks and bus rides to the top of the hill.

Side trip with Zac and Fox to watch the local waterskiing team and enjoy the local food.

After picking enough blueberries for Zac and Katrina's freezer - it was getting to be time to head home. Since I was driving by myself I decided to stop by the Corning Glass Museum. Very inspiring and worth the drive.

After getting my feeling back in my butt from the 3 days of driving - I drove down to see Penny and Ted. They had just purchased a boat so I was lucky enough to get a nice ride thru the marshes and a delicious meal at one of the marinas.

Jekyll Island Turtle Center's mascot came to visit us during one of our conventions.

During one of our North GA drives thru the back wooded areas we spotted these animals hung from the trees and over a family's stone fence. Were they drying the skins or was it for intimidation ? WE believed the second. WE DID NOT slow down.

Thanksgiving was at Ted and Penny's house - all I had to provide was the cranberry jello salad - I got by easy!

Back at my part time job at the Jekyll Island Convention Center, we had a minor mishap during our annual installation of our poinsetta Christmas Trees. We learned an inportant lesson, don't install from the top down.....