Christmas Card Prep

I've started making Christmas cards.  I prefer making them to buying them.

Today I finished a batch of 15 cards.

This one was the proto type.  I didn't like the real red bow so found something closer to the color of the bird to use.

I used two punches for the wreath and stamped and punched the bird.

I have card bases for 15 more of these but will have to use other designer papers since I ran out of what I used for these.

I know its early to be doing this but we are heading to Barcelona Oct 1 for two weeks which is prime card making time.  In fact I'll be missing a cardmaking session at my friend's house and here at Vantage House while I'm away.

Dan's Birthday Flight

For Dan's birthday which is next week, I gave him the gift of flight courtesy of  iFly!

It's a large tube that he will enter - above on left.  At the bottom is a huge fan.

Looking up in the tube.  For his very first and last flight he won't go higher than the divider and someone will be with him the entire time.

Here he is in his flight suit.

He opted for the helmet.

There were 7 people during his time period.  After a classroom orientation they filed in and sat to wait their turns with instructor.

Here he is going though airlock.

The instructor stays upright and the wind doesn't lift him up.  Dan going horizontal is carried by the wind.

For his second flight another instructor comes to take him up and down.

Couldn't post the long video I took of Dan.  Too long Blogger says.

Here's one of his instructor. The one below that is a short one with Dan.

Civil War Stop

A final stop on our long drive home from NC in August was to visit a famous Civil War site: Grant's headquarters in Virginia at the end of the war.  Now in Hopewell, VA it was called City Point.

At the end of the Civil War this was the staging area for the battles that brought it all to a close.  Lincoln even came here by boat to go then to see Richmond after it fell to Union forces.

The James River was filled with all kind of vessels then and the shore line was a filled with warehouses and armories.

Now its a bucolic setting.

The visitor center here is in a plantation home once owned by the Eppes family, wealthy and slave owning.  One of the richest families in the South.  Eppes is described as not a strong secessionist but who supported the south and its way of life.

Grant set up his headquarters in a tent on the lawn of the house.  The house was used as the supply headquarters.

This site is part of the. Petersburg National Battlefield Park as you can see from the welcome board.

Inside was a great video explaining the operations here to keep the Union troops outfitted.

It's hard to fathom the activity once at this setting.

Old historical markers outside the parking area tell some of the story.

For anyone interested in Civil War history this is a stop to make.

We stopped in Appomattox in 2015.  Here's a post on that site.

Halifax, NC

On our way home from Lumberton, NC in August we took a detour to explore Historic Halifax that we found noted on the map.  In town we found this museum.

Halifax was a port city on the Roanoke River in colonial times.  It's claim to fame is in April 1776 the Provincial Congress met here and gave their colonial delegates to the Continental Congress authorization to "concur with the delegates of the other Colonies in declaring Independency". They were the first colony to do so. Later another Provincial Congress met here to approve the state constitution.

The museum here has exhibits on colonial life, plantation life including what slavery was like, and exhibits on native peoples.

The poem below was written by a former slave who earned much distinction in his lifetime.  Sorry, I didn't note his name.

There are buildings from the time periods some of which were open.

We didn't take time to stop there but did walk to the river where signs of its former condition as a port were no longer visible.

There's the Roanoke River through the trees.

We had many more miles to travel on I-95 north and lots of traffic to deal with.  We did make one more stop which I'll share next time.