60!!! WOW!!!!!!!!

My Mom has given me flack for a long time about giving her new titles:

Mother (I'm the eldest, though I think that she secretly likes this one)

Mother-In-Law (a definite hard one for her to swallow)

Grandma (oh, how she thought that made her seem old)

But now, I am saddled with having my mother in her 60's! THAT is what makes her seem old, because I am certainly not old enough to have a 60 year old mom!

I am glad, however, that she is still young enough at heart to play in the sand box (on the left above), and I love the majestic silver at her temples.

Happy Birthday Singin' Sixties Sal!!!

We love you and wouldn't have turned out this good without you.

Siege Engine in the Snow

Loving all things mechanical, as I do, I had the Scouts who I am work with on their Engineering Merit Badge make a trebuchet for a 'plan and build' project. We started with the first picture as our plan, which I grabbed on the net.

After detail planning and suggestions from one of the boys, we ended up with the second pitcture.

It is made of PVC pipe (3/4" dia.), and is 120 cm on the base. It was throwing snowaballs about 30 ft. out on the frozen lake where we camped last night.

Here is a video of it throwing a snowball in our driveway.