Celebrating Jay's 50th Birthday

Friends out to see Kevin play

These will be some familiar faces for Mum and Dad......Valerie, Healther, Mark and Neil joined me last night to see Kevin play with The Paul Holdman Band.

2011 Indy Ice Storm

Every 20 years or so Indy is hit with an ice storm. This is a different phenomena to a regular winter snow storm - everything is covered with a sheet of ice. It is beautiful to look at....difficult to live with! You will see below the driveway has been covered with 2" of pure ice for 10 days - I can get my car over it, but I can not walk on it lest I go down (on an already injured buttocks!)

My herb garden in February!

Rocco David Esmailzahdah

Rocco was born 1-11-11 at 9lb 4oz. We have had 3 trips over to Columbus, Ohio (3 hours) to visit and help the new parents out. We are LOVING every minute of being grandparents.

Kevin playing with The Great Paul Holdman

Kevin says, "Sometimes when the horn player for the Doobie Brothers just happens to be in the audience, you really must ask him to get up and jam....."

Check out Kevin on the drums...

Frozen Pond - Winter Images

There are 12 shivering gold fish in the pond. It is amazing on a warmer day with some thaw how they will be moving around....but definitely slower! See photos below for there usual winter conditions.

Joel and Eli's dog Max.

Cold January Day - high temp around 25F (-4 C) but sunny. The pump continues to run in the pond so the fish have some moving water and O2. The pond was frozen (except for the middle where the pumps gurgles) but we had a fresh snow fall on the ice. It gives a layered appearance.

The next morning...evidence of a critter. Black was not out but I doubt he would venture out on ice anyway. I believe it was a possum or raccoon.

2011 - the year of the photographer

It's a new year....and check out my new toy - thanks Santa Kevin :)

Following are some photos I have taken - just experimenting with stuff right now and learnign the camera - but so excited to learn new things about photography!

Blue Man Group - Gum balls & Marshmallows

While in Vegas we went to see Blue Man Group. They are a funky group of 'Blue men' who do a theatrical/percussion/visual ensemble thingy. Not a word is uttered by the Blue Men. they have some messages that are blasted overhead with neon signs. It is very entertaining. We were in row 6 - and were provided with plastic ponchos as some of the paint sprays into the audience.

Kevin LOVED it. I bought him the original creation of a painting made by the paint balls from the Blue Men. I will send a separate blog post with a photo of that .

SW Trip # 3 - Sedona, AZ

It is called Red Rock Country. About 100 miles south of the Grand Canyon. We had a beautiful drive through a mountain range and down an incredible canyon with red rocks and Ponderosa Pines (Flagstaff south on 89A). We were in elevations of 7,000' at the Grand Canyon, 8,500' north of Flagstaff, 6,000 at Flagstaff and then 4,000 in Sedona.

The red rocks surround the entire city of Sedona. There are dirt roads just outside of town with wonderful views of the rocks.

Below is Cathedral Rock.

Enjoying breakfast with a view.

Amazing rock formations of all shapes, sizes and colors.

Below is one of the off-the-beaten path roads we took. The red dirt is REEEDDD!!! Wouldn't want to put kids in white socks here.

The rock formations are often named. Kevin thought this was quite interesting and being the creative soul he is, started naming some rock formations himself.

Below is Dual Face Rock - in the center Buddha is looking toward the sun with his eyes closed; on the left edge is Chief Red Rock's profile.

Below, Kevin identified and named Resting Camel Rock.

And of course......the ever intellectual, latin speaking Kevin named this one

Penis Rock.

SW Trip # 2 The Grand Canyon

Truly a magnificent sight!

Here we are at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon in Northern Arizona. We didn't plan well for the temperatures! As we drove towards the canyon we were in a snow shower. Neither of us had packed appropriately....we were cold!!! 7,000 ft elevation and a cold front. We had a comfortable, warm room and there were 2 nice restaurants that we enjoyed dinner at each night. The second day was clear, with blue skies but cold temperatures. We spent several hours driving the south rim and stopping to capture some of the glorious views below.

Watch as light in the canyon changes throughout the day - above and below are morning light.

Colors get richer as the sun gets higher. The above and below are mid-day light.

The next two are at sundown...the shadows are long and colors muted.

Most of the photos capture the canyon at about 8-10 miles across - but at the widest it is 17 miles across.

The photos do not begin to express the vastness and the magnitude of this wonder.

Even though it was cold, it was a great to be in 'nature' - a total juxtaposition to the lights and noise of Las Vegas.

The view from our room - morning after a light snow fall.

We stayed in the National Park where there is beautiful wildlife . This deer was eating some clover outside the lodge.

And Mr Elk appeared both evenings we were eating. We joked he was on payroll there because his entry was definately a crowd pleaser. After dinner we saw him at a different spot with another crowd of tourists. There were signs around the park saying it is 'Unlawful' to approach the animals.