James Madison's Montpelier

Marque cruising the long driveway to Montpelier, James Madison's lifelong home. Madison is known as the Father of the Constitution, and his wife, Dolley, inspired the title of First Lady

Unfortunately, no photographs are allowed inside Montpelier

We are honored to be allowed to park on the lawn for a great photo op. Marque is the farthest one on the right

Madison's temple in which he contemplated democracy

James often read to Dolley in the backyard that he landscaped

Green barns, from Sears, added when Marion DuPont established one of the leading horse-training centers there. The DuPont family owned Montpelier from 1901-83 when it was bequeathed to the National Trust for historic preservation

Leaving

Thank You, TJ!

Who would have known?

Through TN to VA

Steamboat on the Tennessee River

Quilt pattern on old barn

This is farm country

Sneed's alma mater, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA

The Adams brothers ~ Bill, Sneed, Michael
We enjoyed dinner with them, Linda and Kate

On the road again

In the swing of things

Pool time



Playground Fun

Annemarie is on her way to visit friends in Austin today. Before she left we had some fun at the playground.

One happy little fella

Whee

A Day with Family and celebrating Burke's First 1st Birthday party

Early morning, we went to Dylin's soccer game

Dylin capturing Burke's attention

Burke digging in to get all his presents out of the bag

Dylin and Aedin, after a quick swim in the pool, 'ice' the birthday cake and then decorate with strawberries

Burke gets ready for a swim and to eat his birthday cake

ANTICIPATION

The first bite's always the best

Brett, Burke, Annemarie, Papa Sneed

Cousins - Olsin, Aedin, Burke, Dylin

After Olsin's LL high scoring game - his team was the home team...

All the cousins

Taylor, Annemarie, Burke

Beautiful ending to a wonderful day

Red Eye to TX - the Bollmans arrive after midnight

Kiss the wolf, Burke

Burke acquaints himself with some of Annemarie's toys

Burke loves strawberries

They just don't make these tables small enough for me

We had lunch with Taylor at school

Annemarie got a bee in her bonnet that our sewing project should be making a quilt for our bed. Here are the fabrics that made up the patchwork squares.

We had to move the furniture and roll up the carpet to lay out all the squares. As per our wont, we worked past midnight to get to this point.

Watch me walk, Grandma

Aggie Pride

Seen on the way home from Abilene

Aggies love to display their pride in their school

Judging Field at ACU

Lovely campus. One can tell how strong the wind was blowing as the flags were totally unfurled

Sue takes time to pet Damaris' doggie

Cinderella did well

Surprising fact about the ACU Wildcats

Half of the cars being judged

The other half

Riding around Abilene

Our first stop was Frontier Texas!, a state of the art museum about the American West

Next up was Fort Chadbourne.

After a box lunch, we took a hayride to get up close and personal with some buffalo

...and some Texas Longhorns

Fort Chadbourne

We had dinner at one of our member's home. Entertainment was provided by a very talented local high school orchestra