Heike and I have been married for 17 years as of last Friday. We went to Bald Head Island, visited the lighthouse, drove on the Island with our rented golf cart. It was a nice day. No, we didn’t do anything elaborate, expensive, or extraordinary. But it was satisfying to us, in our own sentimental way.
I was going to take out an ad in the Wilmington paper, but they really wanted too much money for the few words that I wanted to say, so I’ll embed them here in my blog so that they’ll exist forever in cyberspace.
I love you Heike, I’m happy that you have been my beautiful wife for 17 years. You are my wonderful lover, my best friend, & the mother to our children. I love your smiling eyes, your soft lips, and your beautiful body. But it’s your heart & passion that I love the most. Ich Liebe Dich Sehr! – Tim
This past Sunday we went for a walk on the beach looking for seashells, shark teeth, and seaglass. Take a look at the tooth we found, really nice! – Tim
Today is my birthday, I have now blessed the Earth’s presence for 37 years. 
Today my beautiful wife and kids prepared a nice birthday breakfast table. The table was decorated with Birthday decor, fresh flowers, balloons, and candles. For breakfast Heike and I drank a Mimosa (orange juice mixed with champagne).
I opened my presents.
- A DVD of “The Castle” (an Australian Film) from my wife. This is a great film if you haven’t seen it.
- A new set of silver hoop earrings from Patrick and Rebecca.
- Christopher bought me a beautiful replica of Mount Rushmore. We placed it on the Mantel, and it looks great! (But one of the nicest presents … was just having my son back home.)
Later Heike and I went for a great walk on the beach alone. Heike found tons of wonderful shells, seaglass, and shark teeth. She found a huge sea shell that was all intact. I wish I knew the name and kind of shell but usually you only find broken ones. We saw alot of broken sand dollars but unfortunately, no complete ones.
Heike baked a wonderful cake with whipcream icing. It was delicious! Back to healthy eating tomorrow.
- Tim
Yesterday, Christopher returned home! We missed him very much! After spending 3 weeks in Colorado with his grandparent’s and visiting Mt. Rushmore in South Dakota, he’s home. He flew from DIA to Chicago, and then to Raleigh. We drove 2 hours + to Raleigh and picked him up, then drove 2 hours + back home. He’s very happy to be back home.
We love you Christopher,
Mom and Dad
We had a nice Labor Day weekend. The screened in portion of the back porch needed staining. So we stained it a nice redwood color. The stain/sealant is so messy though. It’s very difficult to not get it where you don’t want it. So we did end up with some on the concrete which we probably need to get some kind of acetone or something to remove it.
We went to the beach. And we saw them pull a bi-plane wreckage out of the Ocean, that crashed the previous day. The pilot was performing acrobats and something went wrong. Fortunately, he parachuted to safety. We were disappointed that we didn’t have our camera with us so we could get a picture of it. You can read the article about the crash by clicking here.
Our son, Christopher is still in Colorado. He’s going to travel with his grandparents soon to South Dakota to see Mt. Rushmore. That’s going to be a memorable sight seeing adventure for him. One day I hope to see Mt. Rushmore also. He’s going to fly back to NC the day before my birthday. We’re going to be happy to see him after his absence for 3 weeks. His parakeet, Pauli really misses him too.
I’ve decided I’m going to pursue my Amateur Radio License and become a ‘ham’. I’ve ordered the study guide and I’m going to see if my son Christopher wants to take the exam with me on October 14th.
- Tim
Last night we didn’t sleep well. Tropical Storm Ernesto kept us awake with alot of wind and frequent, frequent gusts of high wind that rattled the house and our nerves. A survey of the neighborhood the following day didn’t reveal alot of damage, but some. A few neighbors had pieces of vinyl siding that Ernesto pulled away, lots of tree debris, and a street lamp was damaged. We went for a walk and also saw small trees knocked over and a fence that was damaged.
