Christmas 2019 and the new 2020

Whew!  Bragg Family South survived another frantic holiday season, and are slowly getting ourselves ready for a new start in 2020.  Tomorrow, Hope and I go back to work, and our kids go back to school.  But first, here's a quick recap of our December and holiday season...  The picture above is of the recently restored Taylor House and interpretative center in eastern Drew County (about a half hour from our house in Monticello).  The big house in the back was originally constructed in the 1840s and was one of the first large homes in this part of Arkansas.  After years of neglect, the University of Arkansas-Monticello acquired the home, a couple nearby family cemeteries, and some other related structures, and got grants to start a restoration process.  You may recall some posts on this blog over the years where Bragg Family South helped on various archeological projects at this site--these helped with the restoration.

While not yet quite done, the Taylor House (also called "Hollywood Plantation") was sufficiently completed that we were able to use their interpretive center as the venue for our local archeological society chapter holiday party.  In the picture below, Dr. Jodi Barnes of the Arkansas Archeological Survey provides some interpretation of the effort to various chapter members:

While I had many other things going on, I did have a chance to do some hunting, which (until the last day of the season) was most notable for my finding another archeological site (with both prehistoric and historic components to it).  The picture below is of a dart point I found on this site, which is probably 2000+ years old:

I did manage to bag a buck on the last few minutes of the last day of the regular deer hunt in mid-December, which is the largest deer I've shot on this lease in Arkansas:

As glad as I was to get this deer, I did manage to severely pull a calf muscle hauling it out of the woods, so I was limping pretty good for much of the latter weeks of December (and I still feel it!).  That didn't keep me from joining my family on various snowshoe expeditions in our Christmas visit to northern Wisconsin.  Below, Stephen got a little time in on snowshoes, his first attempt ever (look at all that snow!):

The snow that blanketed much of the region fell mostly in late November and early December as a thick blanket of wet snow that didn't really melt much until after Christmas.  This heavy load bent over or broke many small trees:

It also made for challenging snowshoeing, as the small trees, bent shrubs, and broken tree tops made navigating the woods difficult.  Below, Kenny (in the foreground with the Packers hat) and my brother Bob joined me on an expedition to a pine stand not far from Tomahawk, WI:

We had quite a festive Christmas with my parents, siblings, and spouses (and their dogs) at Mom and Dad's Rhinelander home.  Below, my mom pets Lily, one of my sister Laurie's dogs:

Below, Beth snoozes with Mingo, Laurie's other dog.  Our kids have known these Llewellyn setters since they were pups, and have come to be very close to them:

All the snow made for some pretty good sledding, as Stephen and I found out before Christmas:

My youngest brother Bill came up from southern Wisconsin to join us in Rhinelander for a few days, and he and I went out snowshoeing on Christmas in a stand of old-growth timber not far from Three Lakes, Wisconsin.  Below, Bill poses by one of the largest eastern white pines in this stand:

We had a lot of chance to visit, and Beth took advantage of having her grandmother and Aunt Laurie around to paint their fingernails festive holiday colors:

The big treat on Christmas was Laurie's husband Mark's Italian-themed dinner.  Mark is a professional chef and restaurant owner in the Madison area, and his meals are always treats.  Below, Mark monitors his main course, a stuffed pork loin, as it roasts in the oven:

And, of course, after the big meal--nap time in the "sleeping house":

All too soon, our visit to Rhinelander ended, and we started our next adventure--a trip to lower Michigan to visit with Hope's family.  We had to leave on Saturday in order to arrive in time, because we had a big series of events planned for us and Rick Pruden on Sunday.  Our first stop Sunday afternoon was the National Museum of the Great Lakes in Toledo, Ohio (https://nmgl.org/).  Definitely worth the stop if you are in the area!  Although not all of the exhibits (like the big ship in the background of the picture below) are open in late December, we had a good time seeing all of the rest of their displays and programs:

We made another couple of favorite stops, going to the Libbey Glass factory outlet store and then Tony Packo's (a restaurant) for dinner before the evening's big event--a Toledo Walleye minor league hockey game:

We have gone to several Walleye games in recent years, and have always enjoyed the high-quality hockey (the Walleye's won this game over Cincinnati 6-3), but this year's highlight was watching Beth ride the "Fan-boni"!:

Rick Pruden got Beth (our biggest hockey fan) this as part of her Christmas gift this year, and she was thrilled!  (That's here in the light blue coat waving to the camera).

We also had a chance to have dinner with one of Hope's cousins and his family, pictured below with Beth and Stephen:

Rick spent a lot of time preparing a large corned beef for the gathering:

 Hope taught the group a new Harry Potter-themed memory game, even if Beth looks skeptical:

The weather was relatively warm during our visit, so Rick took us to a nearby park to hike one of their trails along the Huron River to an old dam, which had a lot of water rushing over the flood gates due to recent rains:

Here is a different view from on top of the dam:

The trails were pretty quiet that day, with it being close to the holiday.  Below, Stephen poses near a couple large eastern cottonwoods growing along the trail:

This brief blog posting hardly does justice to all we've done since the last blog post.  We've attended a whole bunch of holiday parties, had to get a new refrigerator, did a lot of driving, and suffered through various ailments (ask Hope about her food poisoning some day!).  Although I hate that the time flew by so fast that we didn't get to see everyone we wanted to, we had fun, and now we're looking forward to the adventures that 2020 offers!

Happy new year, y'all!