Bragg Family South

Blueberries, anyone?? The weekend after the 4 th of July we went with our friend Jessica Howe to some other archeology friends who have a nice patch of blueberries. They grow far more than they can every eat, so they let their friends come pick them for free. We got a couple quarts in short order (before the heat and bugs drove us off) and then a nice lunch at a local diner. Our next big event was the re-shingling of our roof. You may recall we've gotten some storm damage over the last few years--well, this year Hope called the insurance adjuster , and he determined that we needed to get our roof replaced. We ordered the shingles in June, and last Monday, the crew showed up before 6 a.m. to start tearing off the roof before it got too hot (that's why this picture seems dark--the sun wasn't up yet). It was impressive watching the speed this crew worked at. They were able to use most of the old felt paper, and only had a few things to repair, so they made really good p...

Nothing like starting off the 4th of July with a bit of a BANG!!! When we last left y'all, we were in the midst of the 2011 Arkansas Archeological Society's summer dig... The rest of the week, we continued digging, and continued to find neat things like this 1830s vintage silver US dime: Here's an interesting picture--the orangish color object is a brick--what is the white thing above it? (Hint: it's upside down...) It is the ceramic, painted head of a toy doll! Like many (most) archeological digs, some of the neatest items turn up at the very end, and this dig at Historic Washington was no different (the dime and doll's head were found on the last full day of the dig). We thoroughly enjoyed this year's dig, heat and all, and look forward to next year's excavations. Earlier this spring, Kenny was given a cabbage to plant, and though it didn't fare well in the heat and dryness we had, it did produce a decent little head that was pretty tasty chopp...

This lovely bed of day lilies was planted outside of our church here in Monticello by Hope, using plants donated by her Aunt Diane. As you can see, they have flourished, and present a lovely entrance to our church (until this year's drought gets to them...). So, a few of you may be seeing the date of this blog posting, and wondering why I'm writing this today in Monticello, instead of being in Petrozavodsk, Russia, where I was supposed to be... The federal government, in its infinite wisdom, has decided to drastically restrict foreign travel by its employees (including scientists going to scientific meetings), so my trip to Russia (originally approved months ago) got canceled on me about three weeks prior to departure. I was able to send my Russian colleagues a powerpoint presentation with a recorded narration to play in my place, so I guess I'm still contributing to this meeting... So, this means I'll get a few extra days at this year's Arkansas Archeological ...

That excited lil' boy in the dentist chair is--surprise--Stephen! We took him for his first official cleaning the other week, and boy did he cooperate nicely! We expected him to struggle and fuss, but he acted like a big boy should, and we were very proud of him. We've been especially busy this spring, with school wrapping up for the kids, and a variety of other events to attend. Below, Kenny gets down to business at a crawfish boil we were invited to: The square hole in the board is located above a garbage can, making for an easy disposal option. Yes, Kenny was peeling his own "mud bugs" and seemed to enjoy these quite a bit. As did Beth, but she required a bit more help from mom to get her crawfish: Beth also had a part in a little play her class put on in celebration of their "graduation" from kindergarten: Below is a picture of Beth getting ready to sing her little heart out at the kindergarten musical: Note how much less apprehensive she is than t...