December 26, 2018

December 13, 2018

 Our Norcold refrigerator’s ice maker has been giving us fits for sometime now.  It leaks water during the filling process which freezes in the ice tray making a mess and sometimes the shutoff arm sticks.  After doing some research and found a couple of suggestions that might fix the problem but neither of them worked.  Finally gave up and ordered a new one which should be here today.

December 15, 2018

 Joyce has been having some problems with her Ninja mixer lately.  It looks like that the large mix attachment is missing a part so the only thing she can use is the smaller smoothie canisters.  Also, the darned thing is large and takes up a lot of storage room.  So yesterday we drove up to the outlet mall in San Marcos to see if we could find a immersion blender.

 She wanted to get one with a silicone end so she could use it with her really nice cooking pots but we couldn’t find one.  All the ones we looked at had a metal tip.  So on the way back to the house we stopped at a couple of stores but didn’t have any luck.  After we got home she found one online and got it ordered.

 This morning I went over to the office for the usual Saturday morning coffee and snacks.  I met  a couple who are part-time RVer’s and a home is Portland, Maine.  They have three son’s who are all in the military, two U.S. Marines and one who is a Navy Seal.

 The other day I was doing some research on some of my relatives who live in and around Spartanburg County, South Carolina.  After a few minutes I came upon some Bryant’s from that area that were married to some of my Crocker relatives.  For sometime now I have suspected that I was related to the Bryant’s but never had any real proof until now.  Well, that discovery has opened up a whole side of my family so I probably have a year or more of research ahead of me on that side of my family.  I’m pretty excited about this discovery.

December 22, 2018

 Father Time is is marching at a very fast pace right now.  Both Joyce and I can’t believe it is almost Christmas.

 We have been staying close to home lately with just a couple of trips up to the Quarry Shopping Center that is north of here.  Joyce likes to go to the Whole Foods store to get their chicken sausage and healthy stuff.

 Since I don’t have a lot to write about so how about another edition of “Where We’ve Been and You Should Go Too”.  This one is about Gettysburg, PA. and the Battlefield.

 The Battle of Gettysburg was fought July 1-3, 1863 and pitted Major General George Meade’s Army of the Potomac against General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia.  It turned out to be the bloodiest battle of the War Between the States with Union Army casualties over 23,000 and the Confederate’s at somewhere between 23,000 and 28,000.

 If you plan to make a trip to Gettysburg we highly recommend taking a guided tour through The Association of Licensed Battlefield Guides.  Our tour was an hour with the guide riding in our truck which he would have driven if we had wanted.  During the tour we went to several area of the park and where we didn’t stop, our guide pointed out areas that we should go back and see later.  By-the-way, we recommend you take at least two or three days in the battlefield area.  See this page for making a tour reservation:  https://gettysburgtourguides.org/reservations/

 In addition to touring the battlefield make sure you visit Gettysburg National Cemetery.  The cemetery was dedicated November 18, 1863 by President Abraham Lincoln during a “few remarks”, now known as the Gettysburg Address.

 Also in the area is the we also visited the President Dwight and Mamie Eisenhower’s home that is also worth a visit.  https://www.nps.gov/eise/index.htm

 You can read about our September 2012 visit there here:  http://barryandjoyce.blogspot.com/2012/09/

 Here are more link’s that you might be interested in checking out:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Gettysburg
    https://www.nps.gov/gett/index.htm
    https://www.destinationgettysburg.com/index.asp

 Joyce and I stayed at the Artillery Ridge Campground which is affiliated with Passport America giving us a half-price discount for all four days we were there.  This park is closest to the battlefield but the roads and parking sites are on dirt/stone and might be muddy when it rains.  Read the reviews here:  http://www.rvparkreviews.com/regions/pennsylvania/gettysburg/artillery-ridge-campground-2429
December 25, 2018

 Merry Christmas!  We are spending a quiet day here at the house today.  Joyce plans to make us a turkey dinner but that is going to be about the whole she-bang.  We do plan to call the kids sometime today as well.

Barry & Joyce