Today Has Been Pippin's Second Birthday!

Pippin turned two today, and I took pictures yesterday and today to help celebrate. While cleaning out my old childhood bedroom, I found posters lying in my walk-in closet that I had totally forgotten about. I thought these two cat posters looked great in the upstairs corner where my loft couch is. I was eager to get a picture of Pippin with them. Finally on the day before Pippin's birthday, after Pippin spent most of the day outdoors as usual, I got him to accompany me upstairs with my camera. I thought this would be good timing right before his birthday. I had to encourage Pippin to get onto the couch and stay there long enough for me to take a picture. The pillow on the couch is an old childhood pillow of mine that has a teddy bear and my name on it. The couch armrests had been torn much earlier when Hazel and Aren had rented my house with their first dog.


I wanted a close-up of Pippin and the Rachael pillow, as an example of our bond.


Pippin made a cute pose lying right beneath the cat posters, with my name peeking out from the pillow behind him. Pippin was tired out from his outdoor treks.


My name is more clearly seen in this next picture, and Pippin looks sweet right in front of my pillow.


I held my camera down low to include both posters in this next picture. Pippin was quite comfortable resting beneath them.


Pippin soon decided he wanted to be closer to me. Only his rear was near the pillow, but he was happy to be resting beside me.


Pippin changed his position again, and by holding my camera at an angle just right, I was able to take this picture. I thought this was an adorable pose, with the Rachael pillow on the other side of him.


Pippin wanted to rest with the real Rachael, not just the pillow.


This is a neat angle of Pippin lying in front of the Rachael pillow.


Pippin climbed back on the armrest, quite active again. I took this picture quick. Compared to the kittens on the posters, Pippin looks so grown up.


Partly inspired by the posters, I thought it would be great to accompany Pippin outdoors on the morning of his birthday and take birthday pictures. He absolutely loves it out here. Here he is sitting on the curb that runs in front of my house. A driveway that leads into wooded land that had been bought is in the background, and the driveway right behind Pippin leads to the house Hazel's best friend Deborah Payne just recently bought from her aunt. I'm excited about Deborah moving in next to me.


Pippin soon started playing in leaves right next to the curb. He was having some fun on his birthday, wiggling all around.


Here he paused, looking straight up at me.


He became interested in exploring the area leading off into the woods.


Pippin decided to take a rest on my curb, peering back up my nice and quiet street.


I moved where I could get a picture of my house on the other side of Pippin. I had wanted a picture of Pippin in front of my house for a long time.


Pippin quickly got up again, and I wandered around with him for a while before he came to a rest on my driveway.


Pippin was interested in the driveway leading into the woods, and I got a nice picture of him resting in front of the bushes over there.


I eventually got Pippin to return to my driveway, holding my camera down low for this picture. Pippin had just then spotted the mailman approaching my neighbors Tina and Jason's house, making him alert all of the sudden.


Pippin had a nice rest at the very end of my driveway, right next to my carport. Tina and Jason's house is visible to the right. They are very nice neighbors.


My camera battery ran out before I could get birthday pictures of Pippin in my backyard, but I love the ones I've taken. Pippin certainly liked my company. I had to leave Pippin soon afterwards because of Berea's Spoonbread Festival taking place, but I certainly continued to think of Pippin. I was eager to share these pictures on Pippin's special day.

Hindman Family Folk Week 2009 Part 2

This is the second set of Hindman Family Folk Week pictures. For those of you who haven't seen the first set of pictures, you may want to go to the post below this, and then come back up to see Part 2. These are better seen in order.


On Thursday, we experienced lots more rain. It poured that morning, and later on that afternoon, a big storm came. I was safe inside our cabin, watching the small storytelling class led by Angie DeBoyd practice their play in the living room. Even though I wasn't a part of the class, I was an invited guest, and I got to know the play really well as they practiced over and over again. After the class was over, the rain had calm down. I walked into our room and heard the sound of rushing water behind our sleeper sofa. I peered out the window behind the sofa and saw that the stream that had formed in the earlier rains had grown much bigger. I photographed it through the screen window. It was pretty neat to have such a stream right outside our cabin.


After supper, I had a chance to walk over to Troublesome Creek, and as I suspected, it was much higher. I made sure to stand in the same place I was earlier, so it was easy to compare the height of the creek to when I first took its picture. I love the before and after pictures.

I then photographed the stream rushing it the creek, with this familiar tree on the other side. If you look at my last post, it's once again noticeable how much higher the creek is.

The normally empty basin by Granddaddy's office now had a beautiful waterfall flowing into it. The basin itself wasn't as pretty, filled with leaves and such in the water that was now covering the basin. It was a remarkable change nevertheless.

I stood on the footbridge and took another picture facing this direction. This view shows how close Troublesome Creek came to flooding its banks.

Looking on the other side of the bridge, I could see that the bush that was earlier a few feet above the water now had its bottom part submerged into the water. The water was noticeably murkier after the rains.

There are Appalachian seminars going on during the folk week, and just a week before Hindman Family Folk Week started, the director, Mike Mullins, asked Mommy and Daddy to lead a seminar about the McLain Family Band. Mommy and Daddy felt nervous and rather pressured to put together a seminar so quickly, but agreed to do so. They put pictures on Mommy's computer to project a slide show on a screen. Ron Pen, who had encouraged Mommy and Daddy to put together this seminar, is seen giving a welcome to them.

It was Mommy's turn to speak.

The slide show started out with pictures of Daddy's mother Rose playing music with her family when she was younger. I loved hearing about Grandma Rose playing music, not having experienced her playing music myself. Grandma had stopped by the time Daddy was a baby.

Daddy was explaining this picture of Grandma Rose's family playing music in front of their house. Grandma Rose is second to the left, playing a banjo.

Here she is once again second to the left, playing a fiddle with her family. I would have loved to hear her play music. Daddy said she stopped because his older brother Roy didn't like it when he was young.

Mommy talked about Grandma Rose's sister playing.

Mommy started talking about her family, giving history of the McLain Family Band. Here she is standing before a early picture of them. Mommy often waved her arms around in front of her during this seminar, giving evidence to her teaching experience.

Here, the band is seen on a foreign billboard, an example of all the traveling they did.

Mommy was explaining after Granddaddy left the band, they found they were more free to enjoy themselves. Daddy and Michael had joined the band at this point.

At the end of the slide show, Daddy showed everyone the big family picture that was taken in the May Stone Building after the McLain Family Band had played for the dedication concert for the Raymond Kane McLain Office Building. I am easily spotted with my crutches right beside Daddy on the far right of the family portrait.

By that Friday afternoon, the rain level had gone down quite a lot. I took pictures at a favorite spot of mine, which was right behind the May Stone Building. This is looking back at the footbridge.

I loved standing in this spot these past couple of years. There used to be a small bridge here that cars drove across to get to the May Stone Building. I remember my family driving across it in 2004. Its remains can be seen bordering the creek in this picture, with the new footpath behind it. Now the bridge has been replaced by a highway style bridge on the other side of the May Stone Building. That bridge is visible in the picture on Part 1 of the kids going to the white vans. That bridge is further above the water, with the creek hidden from sight while driving across it. The old bridge was prettier, but now I can enjoy this part of the creek without cars driving back and forth right beside me. When Mommy was living here, cars had to drive right through the creek.

I stepped inside the Raymond Kane McLain Office Building to take a picture of the dedication plaque.

Here is a view of Troublesome Creek from the deck in front of the office building. It includes both trees I had earlier taken pictures of.

Before supper on the last evening, I took this picture of the kids playing on the hillside in front of the May Stone Building, with the adults talking on the porches. This was a classic scene seen from right beside the porch of my family's cabin.

We had an early supper, and before the evening concert, I had time to walk up the road that led uphill past our cabin. It eventually went around a U-turn towards another cabin that served as lodging. I enjoyed walking around this cabin once again and taking a picture of our cabin from above.

When I arrived at the May Stone Building before the final concert, my usual seat across the aisle form Pumpkin and Alison was taken, but Alison made room for me on the other side of her. While she was getting up for something, I took this picture of the audience with Pumpkin included. Ron Pen is seen in his familiar overalls and baseball hat.

By the time Ron made his introduction, he had put on a black dress jacket and a top hat while still showing his classic overalls. This made for a funny appearance.

Early on, Ron led the shape note singing class. I had to move my position to get a picture of Alison and Mommy standing together singing right beside Ron. Alison's head is shown just above Ron's right shoulder.

Deborah Thompson led the shape note group for their next song.

Deborah then performed with a banjo class that she had taught that week.

I don't remember which guitar class Daddy was teaching, since he's not in any of the pictures that I took, but here's one of the guitar classes performing.

Here's the dulcimer class. Since I wasn't on the aisle, I had to raise my camera high above my head to take these pictures.

Mommy's bass class did a fine job performing.

The teenagers came together to do a silly song of "We'll be Coming to Hindman", done to the tune of "She'll be Coming Round the Mountain". Earlier that day, I happened to be passing through on my way back from the bathroom just as they were rehearsing that song, so I got to enjoy that song twice.

Neal Rhodes and his family got up to play music. I had already known Neal from Cumberland Dance Week before I started going to Hindman.

It was the storytelling class's turn to perform. After seeing the play again and again in rehearsal, with Angie constantly interrupting and making big use of being a director, I was interested in seeing it being performed in front of everyone. Angie had to leave Hindman early, so she missed the actual performance. It was my first time to see the play from the front, since I was sitting behind the actors in our cabin. I had the play well memorized. The girl below is playing an old woman in the play, with the man beside her narrating. Thre is an imaginary one-eyed fish hanging on the door in front of the old woman in her rocking chair.

The old woman has lots of money that a group of three robbers want to steal. Here is the leader, who is called One-Eyed craning his neck to listen to the woman.

He sends one of his men to peek though the hole in the woman's door one night. The old womans yawns and tells her fish hanging on the door that the next day she will cut it up. The robber thinks the old woman saw right through the door at him and flees.

One-Eye thinks the robber's story is ridiculus and sends the other robber out, but the same thing happens, with the robber thinking that the old woman is watching him though the door and threatening to go after him when she is actually talking to her fish, which she has yet to cut up. He flees and One-Eye is even more upset. He vows to go after the old lady himself. He approaches the old woman's house just as the old woman is yawning again. This time when the old woman is threatening to cut up her fish the next day, she directly refers to the fish's single eye. Now One-Eye is petrified the old woman is about to attack him, and he runs back to the other robbers. The three of them together admit defeat, and the old lady is left at peace. One-Eye is the robber at right in the photo below. The play went pretty well, after all the rehearsals that they did.

After the play, members of the Ritchie family sang a song together.


Here is a clogging class that danced while traveling around the room. Their routine was just ending when I took this picture.

Ron led the shape note singers once again as the concert was coming to an end. I was able to get a close-up of Ron leading Alison and Mommy. I enjoyed the threesome together in the same picture.

Ron then turned around and sang with the singers. I loved seeing Ron singing near Alison and Mommy. His outfit was quite fun.

On the final morning of the folk week, I got to have breakfast sitting next to Ron. I showed him my photos. He enjoyed my pictures of him. It was nice to have that time together right at the end of the week. Alison and Pumpkin were at their usual table in the back corner, and I got this picture of Ron saying goodbye to them. He was back in his usual baseball cap. I got to say goodbye to Alison and Pumpkin too that morning.

Before leaving Hindman, I once again walked to the hillside below the deck of Granddaddy's office. It was my chance to say goodbye to Troublesome Creek. It was another beautiful morning. On the way back towards the May Stone Building, I saw a snail in the grass ahead of me. I was pretty excited to see a snail in real life, since that doesn't really happen to me. I got a nice close-up picture of it.

It is nice to have these pictures as memories of Hindman Family Folk Week. I've now had two wonderful weeks there and hopefully more in the years to come. It sounds like Daddy will be away playing for the Berea College Country Dancers at the same time next year, which would mean I would have to miss Hindman. At least Ron lives close by in Lexington, so I may get to see him from time to time. Alison and Pumpkin live further away. It's good that we can keep in touch.