Coast Guard Academy Parents Weekend

Several weekends ago, Dan, Helen and Erin attended Parents Weekend at the Coast Guard Academy in New London, CT. It is always fun to see Jeannie and learn more about her life as a cadet. This is her senior (first class) year and with that, comes much more responsibility in training the 4th, 3rd and 2nd class cadets under them.
Jeannie is playing "Fall ball" this semester to keep up her softball skills for the spring. Erin and Jeannie are pictured here in front of the softball fields. In addition to watching many sporting events, we were able to have dinner at one of our favorite restaurants in Groton - Paul's Pasta.
One of the traditions at the Academy is having the corp of cadets march on to the football field before the game begins and sing the alta mater. The weather was beautiful all weekend long. It is always nice to see parents of other cadets who we have known throughout Jeannie's time at school. It's hard to believe this is our last Parents Weekend, with Jeannie graduating in May 2009 and ready to start her career as an ensign in the Coast Guard.

Work Weekend at Morro Bay

This past weekend, Helen, Erin, Danny, Megan, Gavin (he was the biggest help), Helen, Ed, Brad and Margaret all met at Morro Bay to strip wallpaper from the walls and to paint and clean the house. We finished the living room, dining room, hall and entry hall.

Erin is pictured here with Gavin in front of Erin's new car. Gavin was in charge of Erin while we painted in the house.

At the end of the day on Saturday, we went to a pumpkin patch near San Luis Obispo. There was a corn maze and we all got lost in it.

Erin helped Gavin pick out his pumpkins for Halloween.

Picking out pumpkins was hard work so Gavin took a rest with his pumpkins in the back of the car.

Brandenberg and Potsdam

Prior to starting on our bike trip, we had 3 days in Berlin to explore this beautiful city. Pictured above is the Reichstag, where the German government does their work.

We met the barge in Potsdam, where Sans Souci Park is located. It was here that Frederick the Great built his palaces. Pictured here is the largest building in the park, the extravagant Neues Palais , built between 1763 and 1769, at the end of the Seven Years' War.


We rode our bikes a little further that day and stopped at Cecilienhof, where the Potsdam Conference took place in 1945. This was the conference where Stalin, Churchill (later Clement Atlee) and Truman met to determine how to divide up a war torn Germany.

After a day of riding, we all had dinner together on board our barge, the Mary Lou. This barge had 8 staterooms and a crew of 4. It was captained by Klaas from the Netherlands. His wife, Kora, was with us on this trip and we enjoyed them both very much.

One of the days, we rode through the forests to meet up with the barge. This was one of the more unimproved bike paths on the trip.

Berlin is fascinating

This first picture, that Ian thinks I took from a postcard, is actually a picture that I took right at dusk in front of the Brandenburg Gate. We had just landed there in Berlin and met up with our group for a quick dinner. The gate is as beautiful as everyone says.

Thanks to Ian and Starwood Points, we stayed at the Westin Grand just up the street from Checkpoint Charlie. The location was ideal as it was just a short walk to Museum Island, the Berlin Wall and the Tiergarten (which is like their Central Park).

The bear is the symbol of Berlin and Buddy the Bear is all over the place in different colors and styles. Allison and Ian are pictured here with one of them.

One of the more interesting memorials in Berlin is the Holocaust Memorial. It is right in the middle of the city and represents the different coffins of victims of the holocaust. There are hundreds of them on this city block, different heights and placed at different angles on rolling hills of bricks.

Here we are in front of one of the sections of the Berlin Wall. It is very sobering to think of the number of people killed trying to cross this wall to get to freedom in West Berlin. One of the best things about this trip was all of the history that we learned about Germany - and the struggles of the people that lived through it.

Evan Takes Wing

It was a fun weekend being with family and friends up in Provo as we moved Evan in at school for his freshman year at BYU. In the first picture Evan and Gavin are on top of the BYU cougar during the BYU-Northern Iowa football game.

A BYU institution, the Creamery, was the place for us to go as we had hot fudge sundaes after the football game.

Evan's room is in Maeser Hall. Thanks to Helen, Erin and Megan for helping to turn cinder block walls into something more homey for Evan.

We took a little time off from interior decorating in the dorm and decided to climb around Cascade Springs. It was a beautiful day and we had a lot of fun. Gavin really enjoyed stepping in the water with his shoes on.

After working hard, we had a chicken dinner out on the back patio of the townhouse. Just as we finished dinner the heavens opened up and there was a downpour. But that was OK because we went inside and played games and watched a movie. Best of luck Evan. We miss you at home.