Nordic Visit

Well, we haven't posted anything to this blog in over a month-and-a-half. We've been quite busy. And with the need to get our annual newsletter out, we don't foresee getting many posts up in the next few weeks.

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Jon went with the sales manager, project manager and a fellow engineer to a local job site - Nordic in Rockmart, Georgia. The picture above was taken in the room where we've just completed the installation of new rack. The rack is cantilevered, so it looks like it's levitating about 8 inches above the ground...a cool effect. Practically speaking, it allows the end user to store more loads because their lift trucks can slip under the rack, and the bays don't have to be as wide. It allows 320 additional loads to be stored in the room.

The room is a freezer, and had been cooled down to -10 degrees (yes, 10 degrees below zero) on the day we visited (yesterday). They store ice cream and chicken in the two rooms we racked (in separate rooms because the ice cream will smell like chicken if stored in the same room). This was a $1.2M job for our company.

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We hope to post some "catch-up" blogs soon, telling of such things as Syndi & Jon's hike, our trip to Michigan for Thanksgiving, our new homeschool co-op, Syndi's piano performance at a homeschool Christmas event, our family Christmas and more. Stay tuned! And maybe we'll even get the newsletter out to those of you who get it.

Awana Grand Prix 2008

We had our Awana Grand Prix this past Sunday at our church, Pleasant Valley North Baptist Church.

Each of our three oldest kids made a car.

Syndi had a grand idea of making a horse race car. She drew it up, and Daddy shot it down. But, being an engineer, Daddy couldn't go without thinking about how he might actually make it work, and had it worked out about 10 minutes later.

So Syndi had a cool horse for a car, which took the prize for best design in the T&T group.

Junior wanted a Batman race car, so we made one, even with the rear wing design. Junior was a bit disappointed that he didn't win a design prize, but he's very happy to have a car to race around the house with last year's Lightning McQueen car we made.
For Stephen's first Awana Grand Prix car, we made a little red racer with green stripes. He was so excited, he wanted to play with it as soon as we finished gluing the wheels on! We had to keep it from him so it survived until the race. As it was, as soon as he'd lost his two races, he started playing with it and chipped off part of the rear fin before we even left the church.

The race went well. Especially for everyone else. It was double elimination, so two losses and you're out. With three Caruvana cars in the race, we had a total of six races. Yes, each of our kids lost his or her first two races. Six attempts, six losses. Not a good record, especially for the children of an engineer. Daddy just hasn't figured out the tricks the other dads must know. Oh well. They'll get another shot next year!

The kids had fun, and enjoyed pizza afterwards.

It was another fun Awana night!

Trick-or-Treat 2008

The Caruvana kids went trick-or-treating up and down the street tonight. There weren't many people home on our fifteen-family cul-de-sac. Stephen was dressed as a dalmatian.

Syndi was dressed to match her American Girl, Molly.

Junior was Spider-Man!

Julia was a pumpkin.Notice that Julia has "learned" to smile.
We're trying to de-program her.

We Voted! Did You?

We did early voting tonight.
We took all the kids and went down to the Civic Center and only waited in line an hour to vote.
Our kids did pretty well, and were good entertainment for the crowd. Friends of ours who'd arrived about 45 minutes before us had had waited 75 minutes to get through the line. We expect Tuesday's lines will be much worse.

Vote Early!

Vote Often!

Oh, wait - you only get to vote once.

Crazy Hat Nite at Awana

We had Crazy Hat Nite at Awana recently.

Our kids made their own crazy hats.
Some of the leaders wore crazt hats, too.
It's a fun night the kids enjoy.
(And the leaders, too...)

Coosa Valley Fair 2008

We made our 5th annual trip to the Coosa Valley Fair recently.
Junior and Stephen had fun on this little ride.

I wish you could have seen the shock on Stephen's face when it made its first drop. He looked
terrified for 2 seconds, then loved it the rest of the way.
A roller coaster for the kids.
Syndi and Stephen are in car #2.
Junior rode near the back of the coaster and was a little scared.
Dumbo takes Junior for a ride.
Or maybe it was the other way around!
Syndi won 1st place for a bracelet she crocheted.
She was quite proud (and so were we!).
Junior won 2nd place for some fudge he made...
...and 3rd place for some peppers he entered.
(We were very proud of him, too.)
He, however, was extremely disappointed.
We had to plead for this somewhat straight face.
(He's a very driven young man.)
Cesilee Blackwelder (who came and helped us with all the children) and Stephen rode in a swing.
The swings went round and round.
Junior made a very long trek through a pirate ship to go down this very long slide...

...and, of course, Stephen had to follow.
The family picture!

This was our 5th trip to the fair in our four-and-a-half years in Georgia. Julia did great. She didn't get to ride any rides because she was too small, and we were there for 4 hours!

Junior getting a real buzz!
Aubrey (left) and Cesilee (right) came to help us with the kids.
They were a great help and a lot of fun. I couldn't count the number of times Stephen ran off to a different ride (he was very excited) and Aubrey chase him down. In fact, it got to the point where I only knew Stephen had run off because Aubrey began to jog off in a different direction. ("Umm, there goes Aubrey...Stephen must've run off again!")
Thanks, guys, for going with us!
We didn't get to ride the ferris wheel this year, but it still looked really cool towering over us.
Another great year at the Coosa Valley Fair!
Until next year...FAIR-well!

Fireproof

Last Friday, on its opening night, Syl and I went to the theater to see FIREPROOF, the new movie from the makers of Facing the Giants. (If you haven't seen Facing the Giants, then we highly recommend you do!) FIREPROOF is an excellent movie. It stars Kirk Cameron, and has a very wholesome message. A successful fireman has a failing marriage at home, and he and his wife are ready to call it quits. But a wise father comes beside his son, and challenges his son to a 40-day love dare.

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Click on "WATCH TRAILER" in the image below

to see the trailer for FIREPROOF.

I highly recommend this film. It is action-packed and funny, but it's also very serious and does really wrench at the heart. It has a clear presentation of the need for a Saviour. We loved it! Do what you can to go see it.

Recreational Art

Last Saturday we made some progress on the re-decoration of the Rec Room (the one in which we painted one wall as a chalkboard. By the way, Syl LOVES the chalkboard! The chalkboard paint was a success...just give it some time to absorb/build up the chalk dust.)
We gave some wall space to each kid (Stephen, Junior, Syndi and that big kid, JON!) and let them paint whatever they wanted.
So they each did their art work in the Rec Room, hence the title "Recreational Art."
Even the big kid had fun. Syl taped off everyone's area and prepared the paint.
Stephen's art was more modernistic.
We all thought it looked cool.
Junior's art was from the camping trip to Lake Huron while they were all in Michigan. Above you see them driving to the lake.
Syndi's art was a rendition of her trip to Camp Barakel, also while they were in Michigan this past June. Pretty neat, huh?
The BIG kid's art was a measuring stick beside which we intend to mark off each kids' heights and maybe have a hand print from each. The space-related items are all painted with a glow-in-the-dark yellow.
We had a lot of fun!
Maybe we can post a picture after we mark off the kids' heights!

Time for A New Freezer

Praise the Lord for allowing us to see we needed a new freezer!

The freezer shown above was our old freezer.

Time for a little story...
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We have some girls who come to clean at our house every Friday or two. (They are the sweet Smith girls, whom you can find in blog posts gone by.) Now these girls have been coming to clean for a couple of years (less a summer or two), and they almost always have to empty a bucket in the basement tub. So each week, one of them goes downstairs, passes by our chest freezer, and empties the bucket in the next room.
Last Friday, Leah Joy went down and emptied a bucket just before they left. After she returned upstairs, she mentioned to Sylvia that it looked like the freezer might be unplugged. Sylvia thanked her, and the girls left. A few minutes later, Syl went to check on the freezer, and found it plugged in. We surmised that the cord pictured above was mistaken as being connected to the freezer. This coiled wire has been beside that freezer for years, so it was odd that it was noticed only now. Syl, just to be sure, opened the freezer...only to find water pouring off the lid, and the items inside thawing!
In August we purchased over $600 of beef (a whole cow), which was all stored in this basement chest freezer. After calling Jon at work, and after some further investigation, Sylvia found that only the top items - which happened to be the liver, which we didn't plan to use - had thawed out, and the beef below was all still frozen. The freezer had died! The freezer had to be over 30 years old. We got it after Syl's grandmother passed away over 9 years ago, and she had it long before that. Syl and the kids immediately went into action. All of our beef was squeezed into the freezer upstairs and our neighbor's freezer.
That Friday night turned into a very hectic night. We had an AWANA conference Saturday morning, and had to leave the house by 6:15 am. Friday night we farmed all the kids out to different houses. The Blackwelders picked Julia up, which eased the stress. So I came home from work, we ate dinner, sent Jules with the B's, drove to three other houses and dropped kids off, then headed to the mall. Sears closed at 9 PM, and we raced around and got there at 8:25 PM! We looked at what they had, waited for them to see what they had in stock and selected one. Syl was paying for it at 8:55 PM while Jon went out to the minivan and started dropping down the Stow-N-Go seats and clearing the massive amounts of kids' junk that had piled up since Jon last cleaned it (the June trip to Michigan). Syl came out, and we went around to the pickup area. I've never seen Sears bring out a product so quickly. They had that thing out in 30 seconds after we arrived at the door! I was still trying to clean up and drop seats!
Well, we got it in the van, got it in the house, and managed to squeeze it through the basement door...uh, somehow...and slid it down the stairs. (How many engineers does it take to get a freezer in the basement? LOL) We got it up and running, let it cool down overnight, and stocked all the meat into it Saturday! And the above picture is what it looks like now. (Ever seen that I Love Lucy episode with the sides of beef???)
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So all is well now.
We have a new Kenmore freezer.
The Lord was gracious to us and let us not lose 280 pounds of beef.
And thanks to the Smith girls...glad you came to clean Friday!!