We Bought A House!

Well, after MUCH discussion, we (MrsE (my beloved wife), my Mom and me bought a house. It's a brand-new house about 350' (as the crow flies) from our current apartment.

It's a beautiful semi-detached (what used to be called a "duplex" when I was young). For the first time in our lives the 3 of us will be in a home with a fireplace and central air-conditioning. Nice.

New Blog

Welcome to my "new and improved" blog. Most of the content from the "old blog" has been moved over. More content will follow (hopefully on a far more regular basis).

Bronners = The Happiest Place On Earth

On our vacation we went to Bronner's. We've been there every year since MrsE and I have been together. Every year we go and buy a ball with the current year on it (this year's ball says "2010"). The store is open 361 days a year (they do take Christmas off) so they are always counting down the days to Christmas as this clock on the outside of the store attests.

 Inside the lobby they have a rather large tree-house (you can see the scale of it from the height of the railing near it's base).

 Some of their decorations are rather large like this pine-cone.

 The store is the size of 1.5 regulation-sized football fields.

 The "tree department" is overwhelming (as if the rest of the store isn't). Most "Christmas stores" aren't the size of this one department in Bronners).

 Loved the tree with the train going around (see the white stripe part way up the tree?).

 Here's a closeup of the train and track itself.

 I loved the 16' tree - unfortunately it wouldn't fit in our living room haha. They sell trees in sizes up to 50' in height. I was amazed to discover that the tree only takes 2 boxes to be shipped (but like my current 7.5' tree I'm sure it would never fit back into it's original packaging once you've taken it out).

 Gotta love GIANT wreaths on the ceiling.

 Lots of "themed trees" all through the store. There are about 350 trees on display in the store at any one moment.

 One of my favorite departments is the Department 56 Lighted Buildings.

 Some of the decorations are so detailed. This Thomas Kinkade snowman was immensely detailed.

 When you get to the far southeast corner they have a large collection of Hummel figurines. In these 3 LARGE display cases Bronners has accumulated a collection of EVERY Hummel figurine ever made.

 Here's a closeup of a FEW of the figures in the cabinets.

 Here's a better view of ONE of the three cabinets.

  If Christmas is the "happiest season of all" then Bronners is the happiest place I've ever been. Well worth a drive if you are in the neighborhood.

The Tin Room

Had a great time on vacation. One of the many highlights of the trip was visiting my (honorary) sister Anne who owns one of the most fascinating and beautiful collections we've ever seen. She collects "tin cans", i.e.cans that have interesting shapes or printing on them.

Here's a picture that shows an overall view of about 1/2 the collection:

 Here's the happy collector herself:

And like all good collectors she DOES collect more than one thing (here's an example of ONE of her other lesser collections (the tins are her biggest collection):

You Should Think "Musical Groups"

We were at Carp Fair on the weekend and among the many historical vehicles was this one.

 Now while it is a real cool truck (1923 it's from) here's a closeup of the end of the fuel-tank for those of you who aren't Jay Leno and into old vehicles.

Yes, it's a REO Speed Wagon like the band (REO Speedwagon). In reality the truck (which was spelled in 2 words "Speed Wagon" (REO Speed Wagon)) was quite the stylish truck back "in the day".


As Wikipedia points out on the name of the company (Reo)

The pronunciation, however, was as a single word (like "rio"), never as letters (like the band "REO Speedwagon").

 Reo was named for it's founder Ransom Eli Olds (the man who also founded Oldsmobile.