2023 Christmas Letter

 

Partial Solar Eclipse - October 2023

Yesterday we were in the path of a partial solar eclipse. The beginning of the eclipse was at 10:23 AM, its maximum was at 11:53 AM, and it finished at 1:31 PM.

About 30 people from church were doing some door-knocking in the morning, and then having lunch together at the church building. Dan and I offered to provide some entertainment. Our goal was to set up our telescope to photograph the entire eclipse sequence, and project it on a screen, indoors. Sadly we had a bit of a technical issue at the very beginning, so didn't catch the very start of the eclipse. However, once we got it going, everything worked perfectly. Here are a few of the images we took, showing the different stages of the event.

Some of us went outside when the eclipse was near its maximum. We noticed these little crescent shadows on the wall of the building. They were created by light from the eclipsed sun passing through the leaves of a tree. It is actually the pinhole camera effect, which works by letting light through a tiny hole and creating an image of the sun. The second photo is a zoomed in selection of the first photo.

Other strange shadow effects were happening. People were holding up their hands to cast a shadow, and between their fingers a short "stubby" finger seemed to appear. 

 

We were pretty happy with our first time effort to image an eclipse. This was a practice run in preparation for the upcoming total eclipse in April 2024. Our town, Temple, will be in the direct path of that one, so we are hoping for good weather.

Fredericksburg Escape

For weeks we've been thinking of and talking about getting away for a few days. Our spring and summer have been hectic and somewhat stressful, so we felt the need for some relaxing time away. Our plans were to leave home fairly early on Monday, September 25. It’s a 2 ½ hour drive from Temple to our planned get-away, in Fredericksburg, Texas. Dan came down with a cold a couple days before we were to leave, but he insisted he could still go. Then on Sunday evening we had a thunderstorm, and it knocked out our power for about 10 hours. It was back on by Monday morning, but Dan was pretty busy making sure everything was back up and running, plus … his cold seemed worse. He insisted we should go, despite my reservations. So we headed out, but we were running later than we had planned. We stopped in Llano to top off the charge on our car, and pulled into Fredericksburg about 3:00 p.m. We found our little Airbnb house – a “villa” as it was advertised – and had no problem unlocking with the code they had given us. It was a sweet little place, and we knew we’d be quite comfy there.

 

 

Almost every time we looked outside our window, we saw deer grazing in the wild grass or among the trees.

Our villa was just a block and a half off of the main street, but took an uphill walk to get there. We walked to Main Street for dinner, and it was kind of a strenuous little hike. That wasn’t good for Dan, who was already a bit sickly. We had dinner, came back to get the car, and drove to a grocery store to stock up on a few breakfast and snack items.
 
On Tuesday I encouraged Dan to take a completely restful, relaxing day, which he did. He napped on the couch. He napped in a chair. He napped in the bed. The whole day was a down-day. It was a pleasant place to do that. I sat outside quite a bit that day, watching deer and squirrels, and reading.
 
By that evening, Dan was a bit more chipper, and since the sky was clear, we attempted a photo shoot. Our “neighbors” in the yellow villa (they were a really sweet newlywed couple) wanted to watch, so joined us for part of the imaging. We did the Crescent nebula, mainly because there were a lot of trees, and it was one of the few targets that we could capture between the trees. I didn't feel it was one of our better shots, but it was fun to image from somewhere new.

 

Wednesday we did a little more adventuring. We went to the Nimitz gallery, which is part of the larger War in the Pacific Museum. We had already visited the bigger museum on another visit (read about it here), but hadn’t gone through the Nimitz part. We also went to the small Japanese garden that, according to a plaque mounted there was “gifted to the people of the US from the people of Japan with prayers for everlasting world peace through the goodwill of our two nations, symbolized by the friendship and respect that existed between admiral Togo and Admiral Nimitz.” It was a lovely place to pause and meditate for a few minutes.

Later that evening we went to a beautiful park in the center of town. One of the things that I loved, there, was what they called the Story Tree, which depicts the history of this little German town. 

  

 

 

The sculpture in the photo above is in the park and is titled "Lasting Friendship." It commemorates the peace treaty between local settlers and the Comanche. Depicted are Chief Santanna and John Meusebach, sharing the peace pipe.

 
On Thursday we headed home. We had a few problems on the road (nothing serious), which slowed us down, but we made it home at last, and were happy to be back in our own “villa.”
 
By the following Monday, I came down with the same cold/flu bug that Dan had, and spent the week recuperating. Finally, by Sunday, I was feeling almost normal!  
 

We Had Joy, We had Fun, We Had Seasons in the Sun,

This summer we have been plagued by blistering days, with temperatures above 100 nearly every day, and almost no rain. Despite the heat wave, we've had some great times this summer. 

VBS

Our church family, Northside church of Christ, put on a one-day VBS. I was still healing up after my fall, so didn't help out like I usually do, but Dan, once again, spent the day helping the kids have fun in the jumpy house. 

FATHERS DAY

Our congregation has a tradition, which I find such fun. On Fathers' Day, our men are encouraged to wear a Hawaiian shirt. There was good participation this year.

These three took the Hawaiian theme to another level!

BABY SHOWER

I had the joy of attending a baby shower in honor of a sweet, tiny baby girl, who spent her first weeks in the NICU, but is now at home and thriving. 

 

BOOK CLUB

One of the things I anticipate each month is meeting with the Second Tuesday Book Club, which usually meets at the library, although occasionally enjoys meeting for a meal at a local restaurant. Although it's open to anyone, its membership has tended to be women, only. I've grown close to this small group of bright, fun, and caring ladies. 

I missed a couple of our meetings, while our family dealt with hospitals, ERs, surgeries and x-rays, so returning in June was a special event. I was so surprised and appreciative when I arrived and found one of the ladies, Ellen, bearing a gift for me, a potted orchid. "Yellow," she said, "because yellow is a color that brings cheer. And I'm sure you could use some cheering up."

CENTRAL TEXAS ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY

Dan and I enjoy our membership in the Central Texas Astronomical Society. This summer the club is celebrating it's 30th anniversary,  To commemorate its founding and its continuing success, club members enjoyed a meal together, in Turnerville (not far from our observatory). The food was both delicious and abundant (especially the fried catfish!). The presentations from past and present presidents were informative and, often, humorous. 

 

NEW TELESCOPE

For the past three years, Dan and I have been using our Red Cat telescope to do astrophotography. It's been a gratifying learning experience, but as we continue to have more and more birthdays under our belts, carrying the scope to the backyard and doing the set-up has become cumbersome and exhausting. When a new line of telescopes came out from a company named Vaonis, our interest was piqued. These scopes are small and lightweight. The set-up, including alignment, focusing and tracking happens automatically. We finally decided to order one - the Vespera model - and it arrived in July. Since then, we've spent quite a few evenings imaging. We think this scope will be a winner for us!

 

 

The Lagoon Nebula, imaged on our second night using our Vespera telescope.