Reinhard's Hobby

Reinhard has been very busy with his hobby of making pens and keychains on his lathe. He does such beautiful work that I thought we'd post a few pictures of some of the pens he's made on our blog for you all to see. These are not even all the pens he has made - he's given a bunch away already as gifts, but this is a nice sampling of his work. Talented guy, huh? :-)

If you'd like to see more just click on this link:

http://picasaweb.google.com/Benhausen/ReinhardSHobby#

Family Vacation and more . . .

Had a really nice vacation this year - something we'd been talking about doing for a few years now. We took a trip to see the sights in Washington D.C. What a great city to visit! We took the 5th-wheel trailer and parked it in Bull Run State Park in Virginia. That is a very beautiful park and campground, though we didn't actually spend a lot of time there since we mostly wanted to see Washington. We spent two full days in the city. Parked the truck at Union Station each day and explored from there.

The first day we did a Duck Boat tour that took us through the city and then also went into the Potomac River to show us the view from the river. Very neat! It was quite funny when the tour driver was commenting about how the traffic in the city was the worst he'd ever had to deal with of all the cities he'd ever been to. We figure he's never been to Paris cause there is still no comparison! (Paris is our personal benchmark for bad traffic and drivers - lol) After that we walked to see the Capital, the National Mall, and the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

The second day we booked seats on one of the double-decker buses that allows you to get on and off as needed to see the sights. We visited the Museum of Natural History, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Vietnam Memorial Wall. It is amazing how quiet everyone is at the Wall. Seeing all those many, many names is a very somber sight.

The weather was beautiful, the city was wonderful, and the trip was definitely worth it!

You can see pictures of the trip here - http://picasaweb.google.com/Benhausen/WashingtonDCTrip?feat=directlink

August was also filled with getting ready for back-to-school and getting ready for Mandi's moving out (for the 2nd time). I was asked to teach the Basic Tax Course for H&R Block again and those classes started on August 25th. Joey starts his Senior year of high school on Sept 8 and Mandi also starts classes again in Kalamazoo on Sept 8. On August 31st we loaded up all her belongings and moved her to an apartment in Kalamazoo that she is sharing with three friends. Today we needed to bring a couch and a couple floorlamps down there for them so got to see how the apartment is coming together. It's looking pretty good. We hope and pray that everything works out well for her and her friends now that they are living on their own for the first time like this. (Considering one of them had stuff stolen out of his car while they were moving in!) At least it's only 30 minutes away if they need our help for anything. :-) Do have to say that the house feels different with only one child at home with us. But I'm sure we'll adjust. :D

Camping 2009

Well the good news is we don't appear to have any leaks in the trailer! We were a little concerned since the tree fell on it last month. (If you didn't see the pics you can click here to check it out http://picasaweb.google.com/Benhausen/FallenTree?feat=directlink )

We had a good time camping for the weekend with my sister, Kathy King, and her family. Since Kathy doesn't have a camper she asked if they could borrow a couple tents from us. Worked out well until early Saturday morning when a storm blew through and it was discovered that the large tent had a couple leaks (we'd never had it up in the rain before)! They went home to dry out for a couple hours. Later Saturday was very enjoyable when our brother, Bill, and his longtime girlfriend Connie came to spend the day. Our niece Stacy also came with her daughter MaKenzie and her fiance Matt. A very nice day with some rousing games of tetherball, time spent in the pool, and having a picnic dinner of dawgs and brats cooked over the campfire. Of course I also posted pictures of all this too! > http://picasaweb.google.com/Benhausen/Camping2009?feat=directlink

Long OverdueUpdate

My Bad! I have sadly neglected my blogging. What can I say - life got in the way! Since my last post I have completed another tax season (my 9th!) and am now enjoying my summer free of taxes. Guess that's not completely true since I do have to complete my 24 hours of advanced tax classes if I'd like to work again next year.

Reinhard had a total of six weeks of layoff between December and January. He has been working steadily since then which we are extremely grateful for - especially being in the auto supplier business. At the moment he is in the middle of a one week layoff, but that's okay since we have plans for camping for four days at the end of this week with Kathy's family. Hopefully we have dry weather since Kathy's family is camping in a tent. :D

Mandi decided that CMU was not a good fit for her so moved back home at the end of the fall term. She worked at the H&R Block District office as a Client Service Coordinator during the tax season. It would have been nice if she could have worked in my office, but wasn't allowed since I'm the boss there. Hate those rules. With the District office just across the street from mine we were still able to car-pool quite a bit so that was fun and a nice bonding experience. When tax season ended she took a couple summer term classes at Kalamazoo Valley Community College and really enjoyed them. She has now registered for a full time schedule starting with the fall term and is making plans to move down there with several friends. Mixed emotions about all that but I guess that's part of our job - getting the baby birds prepared to be able to leave the nest.

Joey is officially part of a couple now since he and his girlfriend, Kayla, decided that they are in a relationship. He took her to their first prom in April and they looked adorable together. (See picture above) I found it surprising that it costs just as much to rent a tuxedo for our son as it does to buy a prom dress for our daughter - and at least the prom dress is ours to keep! He has squeaked through his Junior year of high school and is all set to start his Senior year in September. Man, am I starting to feel old!! :-)